Why is the 120s so unloved.

[nrk2of3]

It looks like a great Heli on paper. I loved my 120sr just sold it on ebay. Nice size it was just no fun in the wind. the 45 deg. flybar made it more of a problem in the wind. I would have thought the flybarless head would have helped that. good beginner power cheap price. brushed hopup motor availability. built like a tank. But insert sound of crickets no videos no new 120s forum. I'm having a hard time figuring out the lack of love. I do have a 200srx so i haven't purchased one but at $120.00 I was thinking about it. nice little cruiser good for the kids to play with. Why is there just no buzz around it?

[toys2cars2toys]

Originally Posted by nrk2of3

It looks like a great Heli on paper. I loved my 120sr just sold it on ebay. Nice size it was just no fun in the wind. the 45 deg. flybar made it more of a problem in the wind. I would have thought the flybarless head would have helped that. good beginner power cheap price. brushed hopup motor availability. built like a tank. But insert sound of crickets no videos no new 120s forum. I'm having a hard time figuring out the lack of love. I do have a 200srx so i haven't purchased one but at $120.00 I was thinking about it. nice little cruiser good for the kids to play with. Why is there just no buzz around it?

My thoughts exactly, it's the same on RCGroups and youtube

I was waiting for the flood of good reports before buying one for my kids

I had a 120SR, after my msr, looking back it was pretty bad, poor in any wind and lots of penduluming, but I flew it loads, had fun and it helped build my confidence and teach orientations

When the 120S was announced, I was surprised that it had the same 2 brushed motors, but then it makes sense, I never had problems with my motors.
The 120S should be a great trainer, it'll never be great in the wind, be even so.....

[PugMaster]

I just got one out of 120SR nostalgia and it is super stable but does feel under powered compared to CP stuff i fly. I got it to replace the 120SR mechanical's I have in an Airwolf build. the lower head looks better and the flight characteristics are perfect for a scale build.

I will only be flying it in a large garden so it is fine and Mode 3 really does add some excitement to it and it does seem to have more power in that mode. the auto level works really well. Trim flight appears to do nothing.

[bladespinning]

Wondered that as well
I bought a 120s about a month ago as a trainer after coming in from quads to a 230s but after a couple crashes figured I better back up a bit. I really like mine and continue to build skills with it. I would say it will do a small wind and maybe a better flyer may survive stronger winds but for a low cost backyard trainer or just playing around beater, why not.

[learnedthehardway]

I'm thinking it's because there are cp helis with self level/stability/6g/ect modes that make them fly like a fixed pitch heli. Once they're ready they can go right to true cp at the flip of a switch instead of another purchase.

Pretty much eliminates the need to buy a true fixed pitch. Plus everyone's main complaint about the 120sr was its lack of power that made it get bullied by even a slight wind. Blade ignored the complaints and put the same motors in the 120s.

Except for its lack of wind resistance I didn't think the 120sr flew that bad, as long as you were constantly giving it something to do you could avoid the pendulum effect and it was a very durable/reliable bird.

I learned all the basics on mine and so did my son, took alot of punishment and still works to this day.

[jrman83]

From the forum perspective, I can see no new forum section for it. It really is just an update to the model and nothing more. Maybe it should be titled S/SR.

The HH perspective is probably a numbers thing. Despite whatever may have been said about the SR I believe they sold tons of them. I can't tell you how many threads I have read that have had people in it that got their start with a 120SR. I had two of them when I got out of the hobby for a while about 4yrs ago. I believe the heli still hits that same nitch. Decent starter. There may be a little more competition nowadays with the XK/V977 and even the 230s isn't that big of a step up, although may need a little more flying space so I would be interested in their sales figures. The 120 is a larger micro heli but youtube has many videos of the thing being flown indoors in homes, not just gyms. I did it a few times.

If I was just getting started today I might buy one if I didn't come here first. All my helis I bought before was without information on forums to steer me right. Might have even bought this one, or considered it anyway, if it was all brushless and had like HCP100 speed.

[nrk2of3]

I was going to ask for one for fathers day but now I'm not. I was going to get it and the hop-up motor and just replace it first thing. I now have a 230s and i need to stay focused on it. by the 23rd or so i'll have all of my replacement parts in. i will have put more cycles on the new batteries.then i will start to expand my skills. I can hover and fly circuits. first more sport flying then aerobatics loops and rolls. after all that some smooth 3D. I feel better about a crash if i have parts on hand to fix my machine. sometimes things get shelved if they get busted and not fixed right away.

as for CP machine as a trainer for the new guy I would not recommend a 230S. It flies wonderfully in stability mode but getting it flying is a trick. I have found just popping it up like a nano cps is not the trick. it bogs and things start to get all pear shaped. Flying the bird off the ground works wonderfully but beginners don't have that skill. I love the nano cps as a cp for the beginner, pop it up and fly untill you hit a wall and keeping doing it until it clicks. bail out is hitting throttle hold before the wall. I really like having 3 LHS with parts hanging on the wall. i don't have to have a load of spears. that's why i like Blade over some of the china choppers.

someday i may get a 120s + the hop-up motor.

[RCBound]

why does the 120 S have SAFE...has anyone flipped in upside down, lost orientation, and needed it to flip up right? I didn't even think the 120 was able to rotate past a certain attitude. Does it have an ACRO mode?

When people come into our store looking to learn the basics...they get a $50 quad. Then they get the 230 S if I'm able to talk them into it. Otherwise if they are heli bound they will skip the 230 and go bigger. I try to emphasize how good of a trainer the 230 S is, many crashes very little repairs.

I don't even know why the 200SRX is on the shelf anymore really...
I realize the 230 S is a bit wonky in self level upon taking off but just watch the disc and hold cyclic properly until you lift off...most people heli bound should be willing to disregard auto level as an option from what I see. Unless you have zero interest in flying inverted or 3D at all. Then take advantage of auto level all you want.

[BrokeDad]

I don't have any hate for mine. It was only $90 new from the hobby store. I've almost bought out their remaining non-kit models and I don't think they plan to restock. Everyone wants a drone which is fine with me. I do own a couple. The part I like is I've gotten such great deals on helis as the store wants the shelf space back. They will part with them for what they paid or even a little less.

I don't plan to deck it out with custom parts. But it's a decent yard flier although it wasn't my first CP trainer choice.

[HeliLust]

The 120s is totally unimpressive. I have a friend that got one and I set it up for him on his dx8. The stability mode drifts all over, calibration flights don't do much to make it any better. It loses calibration of the stability in minor crashes.

It's a nightmare for me to help keep this thing flying for my friend. 4 or 5 batteries to get it calibrated good enough for him to fly it, its more tinkering than flying for this heli for a newb and most experienced fliers won't want to fly it.

It's not one of blades better helis and it's got all the problems blade is well known for, linear sevos, swash that separates, expensive parts, weak motors, the list goes on.

I don't think there will be much interest in it at all and won't be surprised when it's discontinued with a short shelf life.

[30psi]

I bought my first heli - a 120S RTF - 2 months ago.

I took it over the fields and found it got overcome by the wind quite easily and would struggle to over come it. I didn't understand the 3rd mode at that time, so it would just go out of control as the other two modes were self stabilizing.

A week later I bought a Nano CPS. I found this way more fun to fly in the stability mode and it felt alot quicker and nimble. Having studied how to fly in Idle Up mode I found the RTF controller too sensitive so bought a DX6i and then looked at a progressive throttle, sensible collective and 40% DR. After a few weeks, I'm now at 100% throttle and full range on the collective and 85% on the DR. I've started doing some flips and rolls and will now look at further improving my skills.

This is now my point - I haven't touched the 120S since, simply because I feel it won't teach me anything.

If they did the 120S as a CP it would make a lot more sense. The 180CFX doesn't appear too much larger, but I'll continue to crash my CPS a few more times before I upgrade to that and hurt my wallet or something/someone.

[HeliLust]

After you can fly the cps around fairly well without crashing all the time move up to a 230s. It's a cp heli that flies good, has the safe and crashes better than the 180cfx. You will progress faster having the bailout feature of the 230s.

[smdub]

To bring up a somewhat stale post... I bought a 120S a couple weeks ago. I think it already needs to go back to HH for an intermittent gyro problem but I'll post that on its own. Agree looking at the specs, the S is somewhat disappointing on what it could have been. But looking at it as what it is vs what it isn't, it is an improvement.
Improvements over the SR:
1) flybarless
2) separate control & servo boards (no more expensive 5-in-1 board)
3) SAFE

The size is a good one for me. Small enough to fly around inside and my small yard (and survive a crash.) Under the 250g sUAS weight limit. Overall an inexpensive starter heli.

[Rob_G]

Originally Posted by HeliLust

The 120s is totally unimpressive. I have a friend that got one and I set it up for him on his dx8. The stability mode drifts all over, calibration flights don't do much to make it any better. It loses calibration of the stability in minor crashes.

It's a nightmare for me to help keep this thing flying for my friend. 4 or 5 batteries to get it calibrated good enough for him to fly it, its more tinkering than flying for this heli for a newb and most experienced fliers won't want to fly it.

It's not one of blades better helis and it's got all the problems blade is well known for, linear sevos, swash that separates, expensive parts, weak motors, the list goes on.

I don't think there will be much interest in it at all and won't be surprised when it's discontinued with a short shelf life.

I have come to realize the calibration changes on this heli as the controller warms up so it's impossible to properly calibrate it. I contacted HH and they sent me a new control board, but it has the exact same issue. So I think it's best to fly it for 3 minutes and then calibrate it. You are correct that the calibration feature does very little to correct the hovering and sometimes manual adjustment of the servo links is then required.

Still, I like flying it around in my basement where I don't have that much room and need something docile.

Rob

[BrokeDad]

I actually like mine the more I've flown them. Once the links are adjusted manually they fly quite well. You need to be aware that adjusting one can affect the other a small bit it seems.
It's a fun easy heli for simple circuits and a loop or a roll in 3D mode. I can fly mine in 10mph winds as long as I'm ready for it. I own two and fly one with my daughter. The are very durable. They have hit tree limbs at full speed, fell 4 stories to the ground, etc with no damage.
The one upgrade like the nano that is almost a must is the AL swashplate. Eventually the plastic one will wear out from popping apart.
I just yesterday picked up their new 200S FP heli. It looks like everything the 200SRX wasn't. It has many of the 230S parts and a few of the old 200SRX ones. I have a thread in the 230 forum on it right now. I will be posting a more in depth review once I get a chance to fly it more. I just had time to unpack and hover it indoors before bed last night.

[Rsrocket1]

I've had mine for a month now and am ready to turn the stability mode off altogether (and will be ready to buy a bunch more parts). The swashplate detachment was very annoying but I found that a small piece of blue painter's masking tape adds just enough resistance to keep it from popping out by itself after the first 1-2 detachments.

If you think about hovering like balancing a broomstick on the palm of your hand, you can master it pretty quickly and the AS3X helps keep the tail pointing in a steady direction for one less thing to think about.

I can now go full throttle and fly circles, figure 8's, rectangles and pitch back heavily to come to a full stop from forward flight. Unfortunately the helicopter now cuts out quickly if I fly with more than 2 batteries in quick succession so I think I'll have to fly, wait, fly wait etc. to let the motor cool down between batteries.

So far I've broken both halves of the blade grips, a swashplate ball, both front canopy connectors, lost the tail fin (replaced with a piece of cardstock), and 1 blade because the new grips were too tight (have sanded down the blades to make them a little less snug). Everything else still seems to work fairly well.

I'd like to consider moving on to a similar sized CP heli in the near future. I'd rather take too small a step than too large of one but with the current gyro technology, it seems as if CP heli's are just as stable as FP heli's and quad copters.

Open to suggestions....

Thanks