The CP is a great little bird for only a few $$

[rdlohr]

I learned to fly on mine and I beat it senseless in the process. I blamed it for many things that mostly turned out to be me and my dumb thumbs. The tail is still a bit squirrelly, but now that I am transitioning from hovering to forward flight it seems to be less of an issue. I had said repeatedly that my TREX SE is easier to fly, but now I would say the REX is easier to hover only. Forward flight is easier on the Blade since everything is in slow motion by comparison. For $219 plus the Lipo/moter upgrade, you can't beat this bird. I may buy a second one.

Rick

[DebianDog]

I have flown them.... I personally would never buy one. I would spend my $219 on a sim and buy a bigger better helicopter after 6 months of "training". But I am a terrible pilot.

The good news is if you master THAT helicopter you will be able to fly anything else with ease. :smokin:

I mastered hovering and FF on my Rex and when I went back to my Raptor 60 I was like WOW THIS IS EASY.

[rdlohr]

I would spend my $219 on a sim

I have a sim, but there is nothing like actually flying a bird. I fly both the CP and the TREX SE, but I find myself more willing to try stuff on the CP. At the end of the summer I expect I will be bored with the CP, but for now as I am just getting the hang of forward flight, I'm loving it.

Its no TREX by a long shot, but its slower speed allows you to learn the motions without crashing on every wrong move. I have to be careful with my REXY because it is so fast that any wrong move and I'm down.

[DebianDog]

Well nothing beats practice! :hug:

[heliboy1023]

I hate the 2 I own. Both tails hold like crap, and they fly just as bad as they hold the tail. My heads are basicly perfect, everything at 90, everything setup up as best as possible. However, now I've finally gotten over the pucker facter for my rex, it made me hate my cp. Hell, I'm almost afraid to crash it. My t-rex, a crash costs around $30 with blades, my cp costs around $22-25 with blades, and it still doesn't fly anywhere close to my rex. Infact, I am much more willing to try stuff with my rex than my cp, just because it flies so much better, and since it does what I tell it to do, and don't have to fly the tail all the time, it makes everything easy.

Personally, if I could go back in time, I would have sold the one I bought, and just kept the one given to me, over time fixing, and not caring if it is broken like I use to do.

IMO, unless you are a good pilot, the cp is a waist of money, and should be spent on a sim, or getting a bigger heli. The only reason people say it is good for beginer is due to the pucker factor, however, if I were to have started with a sim, and a raptor 50, I would have saved a lot.

[rdlohr]

Hehe, I guess I'm out voted! I did enjoy the little bird this morning! :D

[rdlohr]

Actually, I'm surprised you have put so much money in your CP. I spend $50+ every time my REX goes down. I hardly ever put money into the CP. I just keep patching together everything that breaks, even the blades. With the REX, I would not do that.

That having been said. I wasn't inferring that the CP flies anywhere near as well as a REX, it doesn't. The CP is a toy in comparison. I've just been enjoying figure eights and circuits with it. These are things that I still find difficult with the REX. Not bad for the price of a few crashes with the REX. Makes a great backup bird IMHO.

[zooland1]

I toatally agree with rdlohr. I love my blade because I rarely spend anything on repairs. My blade is now pretty reserved to indoor flight (which I can't even consider with the rex), but I have probably glued or epoxied everything on this thing at least once. I tried to CA a blade grip on my rex monday and it popped on the first flight. The one I did on the blade is still holding after a month. Of course I was able to reinforce the broken ball with a piece of CF, which there is no way to do on the rex.

I dropped my rex after a brain fart on Monday and had to put $60 in it to get it back up.

[heliboy1023]

I toatally agree with rdlohr. I love my blade because I rarely spend anything on repairs. My blade is now pretty reserved to indoor flight (which I can't even consider with the rex), but I have probably glued or epoxied everything on this thing at least once. I tried to CA a blade grip on my rex monday and it popped on the first flight. The one I did on the blade is still holding after a month. Of course I was able to reinforce the broken ball with a piece of CF, which there is no way to do on the rex.

I dropped my rex after a brain fart on Monday and had to put $60 in it to get it back up.

I really have to disagree with people who fix crap on the blade with glue and epoxy. No offense, but it is really a very bad, and unsafe habit. I use to do that before I had a little incident. A ball on my blade grip broke off, so I took a little ca, and glued it back on. Well, I thought it would hold well enough, but it didn't. It let go during flight, and the blade struck the boom. $50 later, I learned my lesson.

Glueing stuff back together may work if you are at the field, and don't want to leave, but why risk your bird, or more importantly, your safetly, and others safety, when parts are cheap compaired to a nitro heli.

[rdlohr]

heliboy1023: Are you talking about a REX or a CP? It is hard to hurt yourself with a CP. I regularly patch it up. If you are talking about a REX, I fully agree.

That having been said, I'm an engineer so I have a pretty good feel for what I can fix and what I can't. I've hardly put any maintenance money in my CP. I've bought a few sets of blades and just recently a new frame, but I glued and wired the frame repeatedly before I finally had to replace it. I cut pieces off the blades and retape them regularly also. My buddy did buy me a new canopy which I appreciated since mine was mostly unusable.

I fly over grass so my crashes with such a light weight bird are seldom catastrophic.

[heliboy1023]

The ball incident happened on the cp. Fixing stuff by CA isn't safe at all, atleast once you get past hovering.
When I started FF a while back, before the ball incident, I had the same mindset. Then that crash, and I realized how lucky I was. The main reason that crash was so expensive was the fact it was the first time I really fixed it. Need all new servo gears (probably broken from a prior crash), new frame (blade broke, and where it hit the boom, left a mark, but had no where near enough force to break the frame, so that had to be from a previous crash) mainshaft, grips, and blades.

Now that I am doing light 3d with my cp, and FFF, if I were to just ca stuff together, the forces put on them during flight could easly cause a failure, and since I am not flying my cp at a field, but infront of my house, if something fails, there is a chance of it hitting something of value.

If I was flying at a field, a drop or two of ca, and I wouldn't be to worried for that day, since I have a crapload of space to fly.

[rdlohr]

Typically the parts I fix end up stronger that the original, but thanks for the heads up!

[WayneBrown]

I absolutely hated mine. I sold it two days after I bought it for way less than half of what I paid and bought a trex.

[rdlohr]

I hated mine for a long time too, but now I'm finally enjoying the little bugger. I still do get annoyed at the tail when it decides to spin 360 for no apparant reason. I would not recommend it as a primary bird over a TREX. I just think for $219 its a flyable heli that fills my heli fix while my TREX is recovering from crashes.

[rdlohr]

Having just come in from flying another pack, I have to admit the little bugger is still a squirrel even though I have tamed it a bit. :arggg:

[zooland1]

I currently have four balls on my blade CA'd. As I pointed out, if and when I glue a ball back on, I drill out the center of the ball through the arm after gluing it. I insert a piece of 2mm CF rod through it and then glue it again. Then trim it with a dremel. Again as rdlohr said (athough not an engineer), I work for an engineering firm, I am very careful with what I repair and ensure the integrity of my repairs before I even try it. I am not afraid to admit when something is scrap and pitch it. I do admit I blew it with the rex grip, but I had to try it. And yes, I had a tail strike because of it. The boom I repaired, the grip and blade I trashed.

[Rick Rotorhead]

Since I bought my CP (Twister=Blade) in March its had:
Two sets of wood blades £22
Two tail rotors £9
one tail gear/shaft £3.50
One tail motor £9.00
Two mainshaft/gears £10.00
One set U/C skids £5.00
Plus one tube CA and One pk JB Weld
Total Cost of spare/repairs approx = £60
Purchase price of Twister CP in UK = £199.99
Total heli expense inc Tx nicads = approx £285
Flying to time to date = 9hours
Other info: The rear U/C mounting sockets repaired with JB Weld - worked great
Tail boom badly fractured along its length - but tight sticky tape bandage works ok
Original Canopy still in use, but mostly sticky tape now......
My Opinion: Fun factor 8/10. Heli trainer 2/10.

[Gary JP4]

I fly both the CP and the TREX SE, but I find myself more willing to try stuff on the CP.

I agree. I started on a DF4, and now have a HB CP2 (basically the same as Blade CP), and T-Rex SE. I crash the DF4 FP all the time. I fly eights, fast forward, fast turns, nose in hover, pirouettes in place, etc. It is pretty much junk but when I crash I usually straighten the blades and keep flying (usually). I have also replaced every part on it. I have crashed the DF4 a hundred times.


I am a little more careful with the CP but try fast forward, nose in hover, eights, (no 3d yet) and I have replaced cross links (term?), blades, main shaft, and cross shaft (between blade grips) several times. And what about the motors two main, 2 tail, and 2 GWS DD. All this with no bad crashes. Have also straightened the main shaft and glued the blades several times. That main shaft sure bends easily. I highly recommend fuses installed in line with the main and tail motor. I too will try things I won't try on the T-Rex yet.

I pretty much just hover the T-Rex, cautiously nose in sometimes. I am scared to crash it and I haven’t yet. I think I will also be bored and irritated with the others when I feel comfortable with the T-Rex. I think it was better that I did not start on the T-Rex. At least I had something to fly while I was working through all the problems on the T-Rex.

I might feel different if I had someone to teach me. I am on the crash and build method of learning to fly. I also use FMS. I don't think my computer is good enough for G3.

[schmleff]

I have a blade but it was not my first heli. I don't think its bad. The tail moves around a lot. It is much better when you back the gyro off however.

I fly it outside and inside. I have been nose in hovering a pack or two a day in my kitchen trying to master it.

No its not a rex but it does its job.

[Rick Rotorhead]

My Twister/Blade CP has lots of sticky tape over many splits in the canopy. It has a tightly wrapped sticky tape bandage the full length of its longitudinally fractured tail boom. Its has JB Weld securing the U/C mounting sockets at the rear of the main chassis. The U/C also often just unplugs itself in flight leaving the batt pack and skids dangling by the batt wire and Rx aeriel, using rubber bands now to try to keep it in place. Woody blades have no covering left under their tips and covering is blistered up on top. How it still remains flyable God only knows, but it takes off, goes and does its thing, then usually comes back and does a landing. I got a love/hate thing for this little heli - today I love her - she's cute, cheap and makes me happy (Oooooo baby - yeah!). Tomorrow she may be history 'toots.

[doolittle]

EVERYONE HAS DESCRIBED EVERYTHING MY CP DOES AND MORE. TO BE HONEST MINE HAS ALMOST DROVE ME CRAZY.IM GONNA GET A CORONA 120 NEXT.THEY TELL ME ITS ALOT MORE STABLE.I KNOW ITS FIXED PITCH,BUT I CANT FLY INVERTED ANYWAY

[Rick Rotorhead]

To get back to the thread starter - the cp is challenging and a handful in the slightest breeze, but for not much money you get a flying helicopter that in calm conditions is a lot of fun to play around with - just don't expect too much from it. In otherwords you get what you pay for - the cp cost only 1/3 of a normal complete heli. There are countless pros and cons and from reading all the forum inputs the opinions range from it being a fairly stable and aerobatic capable funster thats well worth the money and gets even better with the available upgrades, to a squirrely little monster that spends more time broke than flying with atrocious tail hold, a gutless stock motor and high consumption of ten quid tail motors. The thing is they're all true! The question is then 'can you find a better handling more stable and controllable, yet inverted capable heli, for about the same money? - if so, lets all go out and buy one :)

[akshaw]

I learned to fly with the older version of the Honeybee CP2, which is pretty much identical to the Blade CP (other than canopy). Even now that I have done rolls, loops and flips with my Honeybee, I am not tired of it. Once I even got it hovering inverted and didn't crash! I haven't got up the nerve to try any of these things with my trex. For me, the smaller size makes the honebyee less intimidating and more relaxing to fly than my trex. But I have to say the power and larger size of the trex makes it way more cool.