Trail of tears

[borocouncilman]

Since buying my Blade CP in June, I've gone through more than $200 in replacement parts due to crash damage alone. That total is just in damaged parts -- not enhancements/upgrades. For amusement, I've attached a reasonably complete photo of the spread.

I presume that other Blade CP owners have similar collections. In the beginning, I even numbered crashes with a Sharpie, but that got old quickly. Yes, those are broken sets of training gear. The canopies were replaced due to underside crash damage and torn mounting holes. I've even broken a swash plate (not pictured).

Fortunately, the frequency of crashing spread out over time. Notice that #3, #4 took place on the same day! Since the second big crash, I always make sure that I've got a spindle and main shaft on hand.

Does anyone else have piles of carnage to share?

[HeliDan]

Stop the carnage!! It hurts!!

I thought of keeping broken parts and keeping track, but after a few crashes, I did not want to know the cost and CERTAINLY did not want the wife to have ANY idea of the CARNAGE.

Forgive me for laughinng, but the broken training gear is priceless!!

[rudderman]

It looks like some of those blades are repairable.You might want to try that and save yourself some money.I use to throw away blades until i learned to repair them.Then it got alot cheaper on me lol

[hopntod]

Quit beatin yerself up and get a 450.Even if you cannot afford the entire package at once, you will be happier in the long run. Todd

[borocouncilman]

Quit beatin yerself up and get a 450.Even if you cannot afford the entire package at once, you will be happier in the long run. Todd

I purchased a T-Rex after learning to fly on the Blade CP. The above "trail of tears" is a byproduct of learning to fly on the Blade CP. With all of the crashing and rebuilding, I did learn alot about setup and how the helicopter actually works. That experience was very helpful in terms of getting the T-Rex into the air.

If you can fly the Blade CP, you can fly anything. That certainly held true when I stepped up to the T-Rex. Even with the T-Rex, my Blade CP still sees a lot of action.

Of course, I'm not pounding it into the ground as often as I used to. My last crash was the result of noob-inverted flight. I still don't have the guts to flip the T-Rex, but have crashed the Blade CP enough that there's "NO FEAR".

Owning both, I'm still not convinced that it's cheaper to crash a T-Rex than a Blade. There's a whole bunch more that can get bent and go wrong with the T-Rex. A novice that slams a T-Rex into the ground is going to have a much more difficult time getting things working right again. My Blade CP actually got better with the crashes as I got better putting it together.

Now, I do believe that a novice will crash less frequently with a T-Rex. It's remarkably stable and so darn responsive that you can get yourself out of trouble in almost every conceivable circumstance.

With all of that, I'm glad that the Blade CP took the abuse of my "learning curve".

[borocouncilman]

Forgive me for laughinng, but the broken training gear is priceless!!

Yes, it's funny. :)

From my personal experiences, I recommend that folks ditch the training gear as soon as possible. With a low-sitting platform like the Blade CP, they don't do much to prevent blade strikes. Further, they're not heavy enough to make any real contribution to stability.

[Saibot]

That looks like my old pile of carnage too. Just stick with it and keep practicing, it'll get better. I rarely crash the Blade anymore and even when I do it's no big deal. Like everyone says about these things - if you learn on the Blade you can fly anything. Knowing this made me keep at it. I fly the heck out of a T-rex all the time now and after literally hundreds of flights I have only crashed it twice, and one of those was from mechanical failure.

[hopntod]

borocouncilman,That makes perfect sense to me.

[tailStrike]

As far as the broken parts thing goes - you have no idea :). I throw mine away because I was running out of room in the basement :D.

I have to agree that the Blade CP is definitely going to make you appreciate how stable larger, belt-driven birds are. I just got through reassembling a CP from parts I had laying around for a friend and you would have thought I had never flown a helicopter before when I went to hover the thing for him :). If you can fly that thing, a 450 is a breeze. Let me also add that I hate rate gryos :).

[borocouncilman]

Let me also add that I hate rate gryos :).

Hear hear!

[eddo22]

you can repair the main shafts too using two crescent wrenches to bend them back. just check your work by rolling it on a flat surface to confirm you've got it straight; i use a glass table. i've alternated between two mainshafts and used the same two for months thru several crashes until i had to finally replace them due to the gear being stripped.

[jongalt26]

I feel your pain on the $ for repairs. I ended up losing a CX2 to the wind that I sunk a bunch of $ into for upgrades. I should have just saved that for my next heli.

So umm is that the Doylestown Borough you are a councilman for? You wouldn't happen to ummmm have any sway over or uhhhh be good friends with either Phil or Dave to get my permit & plan reviews done faster? Just kidding.
.....kinda
J

[zen]

On a web site I am developing for newbies I call the BCP/BCPP 'the heli's that beginners love to hate'. I could not hover my first BCPP and believed it to be unflyable. (Only ... I knew that other guys fly them!) Then I got a cheap belt drive tail Walkera and managed to hover it a few times before destroying it. Then I got another BCPP with a Trex deal and began flying it and discovered I could now hover it.

Since then I guess I have paid for two or three complete heli's in parts. As the guys say above, I didn't tote up the cost because I don't like to think about it. The first time I tried going nose-in, with the Trex, I promptly dumped it. Since then all flying development has been with the Blade. Now I can take off nose-in.

I especially like the Blade's park-friendly size. It lets me go flying more because a local park mere blocks away by bicycle is a perfect place to practice. The heli, Tx, and batteries fit into a small daypack. I buy E-sky blades (for the Honey Bee CP/CP2) on the Internet for a quarter of the cost of E-flite blades. A Park 370 brushless motor has turned it into a hot rod. Crashes are less frequent, and the more I fly it the better I like it.

[Kindling Maker]

I love my BCPP i just crash alot the only problem I have is waiting on parts, it takes a week for them to get here. But working on them is half the fun isnt it?