Want a flying machine to play at home? An Indoor Remote control Helicopter must be the best choice, it can provide many good time for you. But how to choose a good helicopter? If you are new to the helicopter family, you many find it difficult to choose, but later on I will explain some criteria on differentiate the helicopters.
Transmitter Channels:
You may find something such as “3CH”, “4CH”, “6CH” on the name of the helicopter, it means the complexity of the helicopter’s control systems.
- Three Channels Helicopter:
JXD 335 is an example of three channels helicopter, the three channels are:
Throttle: It is to control up and down. To go up you need to move the throttle upwards. Take care that the throttle is close when you switch the helicopter on. You always start with the throttle in the down or closed position. The helicopter will start flying when the throttle reaches 50% of throttle. To go further up you need to push the throttle stick further than 50%. To go down you need to pull back on the throttle stick.
Rudder: It is to control left or right yaw. To turn the nose of the helicopter left you need to move the rudder stick to the left. The helicopter will yaw to the left. To turn the nose of the helicopter right you need to move the rudder stick to the right. The helicopter will yaw to the right.
Elevator: It is to control forward and backward flight. To go forward you need to push the elevator stick forward. The nose of the helicopter will pitch down. To go backwards you need to pull the elevator stick down. The nose of the helicopter will pitch up.
- Four Channels Helicopter: JXD 340 is an example of three channels helicopter, the additional channel compare with 3 channels helicopter is: Aileron: It is to control left or right roll. To bank left you need to move the aileron stick left. The helicopter will roll to the left. To bank right you need to move the aileron stick right. The helicopter will roll to the right.
- Six Channels Helicopter:
Walkera Mini CP is an example of Six channels helicopter, the additional functions compare with 4 channels helicopter are:
CCPM: Mixing of cyclic and collective. As throttle inputs increases in the Normal Flight mode, the Cyclic Collective Pitch Mixing (CCPM) system automatically adds pitch to the blades to help lift the helicopter of the ground. The amount of pitch and how fast it is added can affect the flight characteristics of the helicopter.
3D mode: For aerobatic maneuvers. This function will be use when flying aerobatics. This will enable you to fly the helicopter up side down. Basically from 50% throttle and upward the pitch of the rotor blades will increase with a positive angle of attack. From 50% throttle and downward the pitch of the rotor blade s will decrease with a negative angle of attack.
Rotor Systems:
There are few ways to differentiate the rotor systems as follow:
- Coaxial Rotors:
Coaxial rotors are a pair of helicopter rotors mounted one above the other on concentric shafts, with the same axis of rotation, but that turn in opposite directions, it can balance the rotating torque. - Single Rotor:
Single Rotor only using one motor to rotate one pair of main blade, it will result of the rotating torque, therefore the vertical tail blade will provide the motion to counter the rotating torque. - Tandem Rotors:
Tandem rotor helicopters have two horizontal rotor assemblies mounted one in front of the other.
Single rotor helicopters need a mechanism to neutralize the yawing moment produced by the single large rotor. This is commonly accomplished by a tail rotor, coaxial rotors. Tandem rotor helicopters, however, use counter-rotating rotors, with each canceling out the other’s torque. Therefore all of the power from the engines can be used for lift, whereas a single rotor helicopter uses power to counter the torque
Gyros:
The gyro is a small electronic device that is connected between the receiver’s rudder and Aileron channel, used to stabilize the helicopter’s heading by detecting rotation of the helicopter and sending opposing commands to the helicopter’s anti-torque system. Therefore Gyro make the helicopter become more and more stable.
What is my choice?
After knowing the basic knowledge about remote control helicopter, then how to choose a suitable helicopter to play at home? Personally I will recommend you to buy a JXD 340, the length only 21cm, really suitable for playing inside home, and easy to store.
Some may recommend you to by a Syma S107G, it is also a wonderful micro helicopter. However, I love to play JXD 340 more since it is a 4 channels helicopter, it can drift left and right, therefore it has another name - Drift King.
Is JXD 340 easy to play? Absolutely yes. It has the Coaxial Rotors with the flybar structure, the torque will be balanced easily, it’s really easy to play. The gyro also make the helicopter keep stable, can resis float under the little wind.