Beam E4.8 Acro build completed

[Jetleaf]

I finally finished the build of my 480 Acro. I should have been done with it weeks ago but .......life. The build went without a hitch. All the parts were there and the manual was pretty easy to follow. The only problem encountered was four of the ball links included in the kit split when the linkage rod was threaded into them. Luckily I had a supply of ball links in my E4 parts bin. If you get this kit you might want to order some extra links. This heli has turn buckles for the swash to blade grip arms which made blade pitch adjustments a snap. The tail box is a thing of beauty and is the smoothest heli tail I've had on any of my helis.

The electronics I went with were KST MS325's on cyclic and the KST MS565 on the tail. These are the coreless, contactless, hall effect sensor servos. I used the Hobby Wing 60 V4 ESC with an X-Nova 2618-1580 motor. And the IKON 2 flybarless which was fairly easy to setup with the help of the IKON setup thread in the Brain flybarless forum.

The maiden hover was as good as it gets. The heli lifted off and hovered nice and stable. No wobbles or pitching tendencies. Just a rock solid heli. The cyclic is a little sensitive for my dumb thumbs but a tweak of the cyclic settings will tame it to my skill level.
I've uploaded some pics,and will be adding more in my gallery here https://www.helifreak.com/album.php?albumid=485

A couple of guys were interested in the weight of this heli. Ready to fly with a battery pack is 1080 grams. This is with a 6s 1300 Venom pack. Weight without the pack is 846 grams. Not to bad for a 450 size heli with 360 mm blades. By comparison my Gaui X3 weighs 894 grams without a battery pack and 1257 grams with a two 3s 2200 mah packs in series.
This is a great heli and if it lasts as long as my V1 E4, which i bought in 2008 and still fly, then I'll be pretty happy.

[Unihiron]

I'm in the market to build my first "premium" heli. I have had great success with a 450 clone and I enjoy it, but I'm looking to add to my little hangar. I am seriously considering the Gaui X3 but this new Beam caught my eye. How does it compare to a Gaui? How does it compare to helis that swing the same size blades like a 450L Compass etc.. ?

[onepiece]

Great job! What a well built machine.

Thanks for sharing. This is really motivational for the BEAM faithful. Appreciate you sharing your electronics choices as well.

[Jetleaf]

I have the Gaui X3 also and both helis fly great. The Beam is a better engineered design in my opinion. The quality of the parts and fasteners is also a step above those on the Gaui. I just prefer aluminum over plastic. The tail on the Beam is a work of art and has the smoothest pitch slider I've encountered. Also, I don't care for self tapping screws that thread into plastic for obvious reasons. I would still buy the Gaui because it does fly very well and parts are more readily available here in the U.S. although parts for the Beam are available they still have to come from Korea. Ive had no issues getting parts. In fact anything Ive ordered has been on my door step in 2 days. Shipping costs are around $23.00. I also have an original V1 Beam E4 with flybar that was purchased in 2008 that I still fly. If you plan on keeping your heli for several years the Beam will last.

[Jetleaf]

Thank you one piece. I wish Beam was more popular in the states as they make some great helis.

[Unihiron]

Thanks for your reply. That's promising to hear. One final question. You have bad a Beam Heli since 08, how do they handle crashes? If you have had good experiences with their shipping, it's worth the little extra investment over a Gaui.

Sent from my Nexus 5X using Tapatalk

[Jetleaf]

Mine has survived quite well to have lasted all this time. It has had tis share of parts replaced, main gears, main shafts and feathering spindles, tail shafts, blades, flybars.