Flexpro Landing Gear Review

[mysticmead]

OK.. I received my set of Flexpro landing gear in the mail today and here are my initial impressions as well as a few pics. . The gear arrived in a box fully assembled. I believe them when they say you can't break the gear simply based on how massive the gear is. Seriously, this gear is twice as big as my stock gear for my Black Hawk 450 (which is the same size as Trex gear).
http://i62.photobucket.com/albums/h119/mysticmead/flexpro/100_0205.jpg

here's a couple pics next to my stock gear as a size comparison.

http://i62.photobucket.com/albums/h119/mysticmead/flexpro/100_0200.jpg
http://i62.photobucket.com/albums/h119/mysticmead/flexpro/100_0201.jpg

the gear is 8 inches long and 4 inches wide (for those that prefer metric sizing that's 203mm long and 101mm wide) with gear this big, who needs training gear. the gear is made of the main tubes, the mounting bars and the connecting tubing. the top bar is attached to the main tube by a piece of colored flexible tubing with a tab stuck in the tubing on both ends. there is a gap in between the top and bottom sections allowing for the "Flex"How much flex is there? enough flex that I can place my hand on top of the gear and flatten it to the table

quality of the gear? well, it appears that the clear tubing that attaches the main skids to the strut was cut by hand. as you can see in this pic the cuts are not straight.
http://i62.photobucket.com/albums/h119/mysticmead/flexpro/badcuts.jpg

the end caps for the skids are hard plastic and come out easy. nothing a little CA won't fix. the Skids themselves are plain aluminum, no clear coat, no andonizing at all.

How well do they perform? Not sure yet, it might be a few days before I can get them mounted and give them a shot. Hopefully the weather will hold out this weekend and I'll get a couple flights on them. If for some reason they don't mount to my heli (without mods) then I'll make sure that Cobra1002 tries them. I know he wanted to get a set to test and after last weekends crash he might need them ;) I also want to put them on his gram scale and get the weight of these things.

[Funky]

Mine are 35 grams. Stock gear/Gorilla gear is about 20g. Mine mounted without any problems. I couldn't tell a difference in flight from the added weight. I don't like the looks of the big skid tubes, but they sure are easy to see in the air.

I started a thread in the 450 section about them yesterday
http://www.helifreak.com/showthread.php?t=65328

[PTFlyer]

I haven't got my set for testing yet.....still waiting.......I sure could have used them last weekend....

[mysticmead]

it appears that I might have to modify mine to get them to fit my Heli. the holes are going to be 2.5mm off on each side. I'll let Cobra1002 try them before I drill new holes though.

I know what you mean by not really liking the big (read HUGE) tubes.. Who knows, once I do mod them to fit, they might grow on me.. time will tell.

[diverjack]

I'm still waiting for mine, too. checked the mail.......nothing yet. :(
I hope Elvan is a man of his word and sends them! Looking forward to doing a test on them.

[PTFlyer]

I'm still waiting for mine, too. checked the mail.......nothing yet. :(
I hope Elvan is a man of his word and sends them! Looking forward to doing a test on them.


Ditto.......it's been a couple of weeks and I still have yet to get my set.......wonder whats up

[mysticmead]

the flexpro gear was sent to me via USPS.. it was a box small enough to fit in my mailbox.I don't know if your postal carrier would have put it in your mailbox or if they would leave a attempted delivery notice. I can say, that I did ask for the yellow gear (to match my tail blades) but got the blue set instead. no big deal.. but...

I had my friend mount them to his Trex 450... they do sit a bit higher than stock gear, which is not a bad thing. means there less of a chance to bounce the tail off the ground. we didn't get to really test the gear last Sunday.. winds were in the 15mph range with higher gusts. He is going to give them a good beating this week (hopefully) and let me know. After he beats on them, I'll mod them and fit them to my black hawk...

[Skarn]

Man, they are UGLY! LOL but if they don't break.....

Skarn

[diverjack]

the flexpro gear was sent to me via USPS.. it was a box small enough to fit in my mailbox.I don't know if your postal carrier would have put it in your mailbox or if they would leave a attempted delivery notice. I can say, that I did ask for the yellow gear (to match my tail blades) but got the blue set instead. no big deal.. but...

I had my friend mount them to his Trex 450... they do sit a bit higher than stock gear, which is not a bad thing. means there less of a chance to bounce the tail off the ground. we didn't get to really test the gear last Sunday.. winds were in the 15mph range with higher gusts. He is going to give them a good beating this week (hopefully) and let me know. After he beats on them, I'll mod them and fit them to my black hawk...
MysticMead......I asked for the blue gear, got the yellow gear instead! Wanna trade? :)
I just got them in the mail yesterday. They seem to deliver as advertised, and yes, they ARE heavy looking! Mine seem to be narrower than my stock T-Rex skids. Landed from about 2 feet off the deck, and they hardly flexed at all!
Tried at 3 feet; they landed a bit harder, and one of the legs came out of the flexible tubing. Just a matter of reinserting it back into the tubing. Not much to them really. Skids IMHO, are way too big, though.
Anyway.......that's my opinion. :)

[mysticmead]

for a set of gear that is supposed to keep you from breaking your trex.. a landing like that and it popped apart.. while that could have broken stock gear (maybe) you'd expect the gear to not fly apart.. maybe it's just a bad set of skids.. who knows.. I know the ones I got look like they'd pop apart on a hard impact.. to bad the weather hasn't been to heli friendly.. already popped a set of woodies this week because of the wind..

[mysticmead]

ok... we had some good weather for a change...and my kids decided to not break any bones this last weekend (don't ask).. so Cobra1002 and I went flying... since he has a Trex450 and the flexpro gear mounted to it with no mods, he was the crash test dummy...

The gear did a good job of keeping his tail out of the grass because they're taller than his stock gear. rough landings (not crashes) were no problem and they got tested on those a LOT. He landed hard enough that I could see the gear flex and absorb the impact then spring right back to where they started. Unfortunately for Cobra... the hard impact landings took it toll... not on the gear, but on his tail control rod. his last flight of the day start off great.. nice smooth spool up but as soon as he hit the pitch... he went into an uncontrollable piro. He hit throttle hold and we watched it go in... gear first from about 20 feet up. it wasn't a straight down hit and he had a little lateral movement.. but the gear took the hit perfectly. it acted like a spring and took the brunt of the impact and then let him do a lazy flop onto his side... damage report... none.. not a single thing broke.. not even a bent flybar.

in all I'd have to say, the gear may be ugly.. but it does it's job. I know Cobra is happy with them..