Model Airplane News - November 2009

In the Air

Armed with three helis and charged batteries, I headed to the local ball field to see what they could do (the carrying cases make this very convenient). Before I headed out, I did a quick check of the blade balance and found them all to be very close; the wood blades needed a small amount of tape to get them perfect. I did a spot check on the critical fasteners to make sure they were tight and found none loose. I then checked all the controls to make sure they were correct and that the gyro was not backwards. All was well. The last check was the blade tracking that was near perfect on all of them, with the exception of the “S” model, which required minimal adjustment.

Hover For a 450-size heli, all models exhibited exceptional stability. At first, I thought I’d miss having expo, but found it easy to hover in one spot. I tried the low rates but found it to be a little too slow. This, however, will be a big help for beginners since they usually tend to over control.

Aerobatics All the models are highly aerobatic and agile. There was minimal pitch-up in fast-forward flight and they tracked very well. Naturally, the carbon-fiber blade-equipped models had much

better response and maneuverability. However, even the base model performed excellent basic aerobatics such as stall turns, loops and rolls. It can do many of the 3D moves, but tends to bog somewhat during heavy collective pitch change maneuvers. This is not a problem since the pilot can easily change to carbon-fiber blades when he gets to that point in his training. The other two models performed great 3D maneuvers as well as conventional aerobatics. I had to tweak the factory setting for the throttle and pitch curves to get the maximum performance. The KDS800 gyro performed amazingly well; just as good as the expensive ones. Again, a little bit of tweaking of the gain to your personal preferences will have you performing outstanding pirouetting maneuvers. The included 20C discharge battery is perfectly adequate, but I suspect a higher discharge rating battery would give even better performance.

If you’re like me and have limited building time and would rather be flying, the KDS helis are a great value. You won’t need to compromise on quality or performance. Right from the box, they’re excellent performers and with a little tweaking, they’re even better.