RC helicopter from CVS for $24.99 Blue hat toy company

[eliotshoots]

In fact, have signed up for this forum as I own (Christmas gift from my son's godfather) the HoverLites unit of which you speak. Flies well for the price. BUT...there are flaws in it's design/electronics. For instance, there is a stabilization wire extending from the top of the motor, at about a 30 degree rake/angle toward the rear of the unit toward the rear stabilization tail rotor. There is a small screw/nut set that secures this wire to the frame itself. The nut either fell off, or was missing from the start. Flew the unit for the first time today. (1/6/08) Consequently, the heli crashed and broke apart. SO....this is not a consumer issue...it's a manufacturer's defect. Trying to get in touch with the California importer to see if this unit can be replaced. So...beware....Have a good new year. The instruction manual only points to the Innovage LLC importer company.

[NiteKreeper]

This sounds VERY much like the Venom Micros that appeared in Australia just before Christmas - AU$30 and mine had a plastic santa instead of a cockpit...
VERY cool electronics for the price (Capacitive-discharge-powered and the smallest motors I've ever seen, together with a nice blue strobe...)

We had some great fun in the office until it caught the carpet loops one-too-many times and ripped the skids off.

But based on that experience I went and bought my son a Blade CX2 for Christmas, and that's the BEST decision I ever made!
We'd almost given up on flight after numerous foamie mishaps, but the CX2 flew straight out of the box and practically hasn't landed since!
(Well OK, it's stopped once, but that was to install the CF tail mod and the motor heatsink!)
(And then again to replace a lower rotor and a skid )

And I have that little $30 piece of crud to thank!

[park]

Originally Posted by NiteKreeper

This sounds VERY much like the Venom Micros that appeared in Australia just before Christmas - AU$30 and mine had a plastic santa instead of a cockpit...
VERY cool electronics for the price (Capacitive-discharge-powered and the smallest motors I've ever seen, together with a nice blue strobe...)

We had some great fun in the office until it caught the carpet loops one-too-many times and ripped the skids off.

But based on that experience I went and bought my son a Blade CX2 for Christmas, and that's the BEST decision I ever made!
We'd almost given up on flight after numerous foamie mishaps, but the CX2 flew straight out of the box and practically hasn't landed since!
(Well OK, it's stopped once, but that was to install the CF tail mod and the motor heatsink!)
(And then again to replace a lower rotor and a skid )

And I have that little $30 piece of crud to thank!

That's what got me. Last year I see one of those airhogs at the store and I thought, that's a gimick, it's to small that can't work. But it did!! Now I have a lama v3, walkera 5#8, 53#1 and a 22e........hook, line and sinker.

[NiteKreeper]

Originally Posted by park

That's what got me. Last year I see one of those airhogs at the store and I thought, that's a gimick, it's to small that can't work. But it did!! Now I have a lama v3, walkera 5#8, 53#1 and a 22e........hook, line and sinker.

Yeah I can see how it works like that - I'm doing some overtime next week so I can buy a second bird for myself...
I like the look of the Blade CP, but I can also see the value of having 2 CX2's around the house (common spares box, similar performance for "racing" etc)

[funguy]

The manufacturer/importer of this blue hat heli claims on the box that you can increase and decrease the speed of the main rotor with the remote control. Fact is however that you can only turn the main rotor motor on and off. At about half way up on the left remote, the motor kicks in at full speed.
On top of that problem, the switch reacts slowly. There is about a one second delay between what you tell it to do and the motor actually cutting off or turning back on. Don't even try to turn it on unless you have a wide open space as it will take off with full power on the slightest attempt to power up the main rotor. If you try to take the throttle back, it will turn the motor off completely and the landing is by design always a crash.
Buy it only if you want to build your own ceiling fan from the parts

[DaveC]

Here is a review of the HoverLite - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ev5_afzGFYY

Not a good start if this guy is right - you are likely to get the bad habit of flyiing from the tail (rudder reversal)

Regards David

[Jichino]

The Hoverlite flies but it's not as stable as i thought it would be. It's not really an issue since my son really seems to like it..lol. I plan on buying another one but this time i'm going to check out youtube first (never thought of that before..lol).

[widgeteer]

Hey Brokenagain- thanks for the input !! Yes, I did buy one, also. Right about the spinning. I taped a larger piece of cardboard to see if that would stifle some of that spin. Well, inconclusive. Still playing around with it. Yeah, parts. I broke ablade hub link thing and tracked down the company for parts. not gheap, and postage- well. So I bought a few extra parts I thought I might need- then started to look around for someone that might have a broken one- for parts.
So I ran into a guy that had an almost new Esky Blade A2 for a reasonable price, so I bought it. Already broke in, you know? ( 200.00)
Darn ! with these two to play with, and my growing collection of Picooz's, clones, co-axial 'bug', flapping Vamp, and the planes sitting around, AND this lousy weather- too many toys, not enough time !! LOL