ekripper
08-20-2004, 03:19 AM
Hi all,
Just got back from IRCHA and did ALOT!!! of flying with the Ion's and have some good feedback to provide. I tried many different blades, batteries, and motor combos. I got to spend quite a bit of time flying with Charlie from Thunder Power and Brian from Tanic Packs there as we flew their packs back to back on the same setups to compare them. I flew Tanic, Thunder Power, and Flight Power all on the same setups so they all had a fair shake. I tried 2P, 3P and 4P packs. I flew Actro motors, Hacker motors, and LRK motors. I also tried the new V-Blade 690's, TG Gen II 690's, TT 680's, SAB 680's, MAH Gen II 690/700's and NHP 680's. So the following iare my opinions of the different setups.
First of all batteries. As far as the big packs go the TP 8000's and the Tanic 3P 7500's have about the same punch and same flight time. The Tanics wiegh in at two ounces more per pack. Both of these bigger packs performed very well with the big Actro 32-3 and I don't think you could go wrong with either one. The smaller packs were the TP 3P 6000's, the Tanic 2P 5000's and of course the Flight Power 2P 5000's. The Tanic and the Flight Power seemed to hit with the same power and naturally had the same flight time. Now I've been told these two companies use the same cells so that would stand to reason but who knows if that's true or not. You can definetly feel how light these are in the heli's flight characteristics. These packs make the heli very nimble. They seem to get a bit soft at the 6 min. mark but you can safely get 8 min. out of either pack. The Tanics don't have the spacers in them so they are easier to fit under the Ion canopy and heat up a little quicker. The batteries don't really feel good until they hit 100 deg it seems so getting the heat quicker was a plus for me. The TP 6000 were definetly my favorite pack. They had more punch than the other two small packs naturally due to the 3P configuration I would guess, yet still remained quite light and provided a nimble machine. They maintained most of their pucnch throughout the 8 min. flight. None of the packs ever got warmer than 130 either.
Now blades. I felt the new V-Blades were a bit to much for my taste as they are very rigid but I could see how alot of guys would like these. They just forced me to manage my collective alot better and Im just way to lazy for that sort of thing. The new generation TG blades look cool as hell but again, I felt they were grabby and forced me to fly the collective more. The TT and SAB's were both a very neutral blade that seemed to give good dampening and still maintain some punch. My personaly favorites were the gen 2 MAH blades. I could get away with collective mistakes yet they still had the punch and were just flat out fast through maneouvers. Kind of Ironic cuz I hated them on my glow machines when I tried them. The NHP's were ok as well but nothing that really grabbed my attention.
Oh and now the motors. Well, you all know how well the Hacker performs so I won't go there. I've discussed in another post the Actro 24-4 and how well it did so no need to reiterate that. Now the goods...the Actro 32-3 I borrowed from Chris S. and holy !@#$ man, that motor rocked. Equal to 90 power for the first 3 to 4 min. then good 80 power the rest of the pack. Since this wasn't my motor I only flew an 8 min. flight with an auto at 4 to check temps but I loved it. I only flew it with the larger packs from Tanic and TP and wouldn't recomend trying it with the 2P's or the TP 6000 3P. Might drop voltage to quick and ruin your motor. Now, I also got to fly an LRK setup in one and let me just say WHOA!!!! I have never flown a machine with that much power...ever!!! Definetly a 5 min. and land to let the power system get off it's knee's motor. I won't say much more about this motor until I can spend alot more time using it. It's possible that this one could be hard on everything but I have one coming and will fly the snot out of it and find out. Definetly a 4P pack only motor.
For you guys flying the stock setup with the Hacker I feel that the absolute best combo out there is with the TP 6000mah 3P packs. This gives you a light weight, high power setup for 8 min. of flight. The weight difference from the 8000's is very noticeable in the air and 8 min. of flight seems pretty reasonable. For those of you power mongers out there the Actro 32-3 is killer and has more than enough power to compensate for flying the larger packs. This thing sounds absolutely kick ass when spooling up! Russ I hope you get yours soon I think you'll love it. I will keep you posted on the LRK findings as I should have one this week...if this thing doesn't kill my batteries and controller look out...this may be the stump puller/90 slayer. I'll keep you posted. Hope this info. helps out a bit and I apologize for being so long winded, just had a lot to share.
Regards,
Eric Klapstein
Just got back from IRCHA and did ALOT!!! of flying with the Ion's and have some good feedback to provide. I tried many different blades, batteries, and motor combos. I got to spend quite a bit of time flying with Charlie from Thunder Power and Brian from Tanic Packs there as we flew their packs back to back on the same setups to compare them. I flew Tanic, Thunder Power, and Flight Power all on the same setups so they all had a fair shake. I tried 2P, 3P and 4P packs. I flew Actro motors, Hacker motors, and LRK motors. I also tried the new V-Blade 690's, TG Gen II 690's, TT 680's, SAB 680's, MAH Gen II 690/700's and NHP 680's. So the following iare my opinions of the different setups.
First of all batteries. As far as the big packs go the TP 8000's and the Tanic 3P 7500's have about the same punch and same flight time. The Tanics wiegh in at two ounces more per pack. Both of these bigger packs performed very well with the big Actro 32-3 and I don't think you could go wrong with either one. The smaller packs were the TP 3P 6000's, the Tanic 2P 5000's and of course the Flight Power 2P 5000's. The Tanic and the Flight Power seemed to hit with the same power and naturally had the same flight time. Now I've been told these two companies use the same cells so that would stand to reason but who knows if that's true or not. You can definetly feel how light these are in the heli's flight characteristics. These packs make the heli very nimble. They seem to get a bit soft at the 6 min. mark but you can safely get 8 min. out of either pack. The Tanics don't have the spacers in them so they are easier to fit under the Ion canopy and heat up a little quicker. The batteries don't really feel good until they hit 100 deg it seems so getting the heat quicker was a plus for me. The TP 6000 were definetly my favorite pack. They had more punch than the other two small packs naturally due to the 3P configuration I would guess, yet still remained quite light and provided a nimble machine. They maintained most of their pucnch throughout the 8 min. flight. None of the packs ever got warmer than 130 either.
Now blades. I felt the new V-Blades were a bit to much for my taste as they are very rigid but I could see how alot of guys would like these. They just forced me to manage my collective alot better and Im just way to lazy for that sort of thing. The new generation TG blades look cool as hell but again, I felt they were grabby and forced me to fly the collective more. The TT and SAB's were both a very neutral blade that seemed to give good dampening and still maintain some punch. My personaly favorites were the gen 2 MAH blades. I could get away with collective mistakes yet they still had the punch and were just flat out fast through maneouvers. Kind of Ironic cuz I hated them on my glow machines when I tried them. The NHP's were ok as well but nothing that really grabbed my attention.
Oh and now the motors. Well, you all know how well the Hacker performs so I won't go there. I've discussed in another post the Actro 24-4 and how well it did so no need to reiterate that. Now the goods...the Actro 32-3 I borrowed from Chris S. and holy !@#$ man, that motor rocked. Equal to 90 power for the first 3 to 4 min. then good 80 power the rest of the pack. Since this wasn't my motor I only flew an 8 min. flight with an auto at 4 to check temps but I loved it. I only flew it with the larger packs from Tanic and TP and wouldn't recomend trying it with the 2P's or the TP 6000 3P. Might drop voltage to quick and ruin your motor. Now, I also got to fly an LRK setup in one and let me just say WHOA!!!! I have never flown a machine with that much power...ever!!! Definetly a 5 min. and land to let the power system get off it's knee's motor. I won't say much more about this motor until I can spend alot more time using it. It's possible that this one could be hard on everything but I have one coming and will fly the snot out of it and find out. Definetly a 4P pack only motor.
For you guys flying the stock setup with the Hacker I feel that the absolute best combo out there is with the TP 6000mah 3P packs. This gives you a light weight, high power setup for 8 min. of flight. The weight difference from the 8000's is very noticeable in the air and 8 min. of flight seems pretty reasonable. For those of you power mongers out there the Actro 32-3 is killer and has more than enough power to compensate for flying the larger packs. This thing sounds absolutely kick ass when spooling up! Russ I hope you get yours soon I think you'll love it. I will keep you posted on the LRK findings as I should have one this week...if this thing doesn't kill my batteries and controller look out...this may be the stump puller/90 slayer. I'll keep you posted. Hope this info. helps out a bit and I apologize for being so long winded, just had a lot to share.
Regards,
Eric Klapstein