Having freshly charged ni-cads or even better, ni-mh batteries in your controller will assure you have a fully charged helicopter. They will save you money and save the land fill from wasteful alkaline batteries.

ADJUSTING CENTRE OF GRAVITY

This term is used by us aircraft hobby guys and gals a lot. Everything has a center of gravity – even you. When building planes and helicopters it is very important to get the GC in the right location.

As far as mini RC toy helicopters are concerned, the centre of gravity is just a little forward of the main rotor mast. This is why these helicopters always fly forwards. If the center of gravity was centered on the rotor mast, the heli would more or less stay in one spot.

The instructions say you can add weight to the nose of the helicopter to give it even more forward centre of gravity to make it fly faster. This added weight actually tilts the heli forward ever so slightly to give a little rearward thrust off the main rotor.

If you have read the RC Helicopter Theory And Controls section, you know that helicopters basically change directions by pushing air off the rotor in different directions. You can play around with this on your own mini RC toy helicopter by adjusting the centre of gravity.

By taking any weight off the nose and putting it on the tail, you will be able to hover. If you put a lot of weight on the tail, say a small paper clip, the helicopter will fly backwards.

Just remember, the more weight you put on, the heavier the helicopter becomes and that reduces your flight times.

What ever you do, don’t use thumb tacks in the nose to add weight. You might get lucky, but eventually you will puncture the li-po battery in the nose of the helicopter... by, by birdie.

If you can locate some foil tape, that works very well - just like what is supplied with the RC toy helicopter. Just cut it into small squares and add it to the nose or tail as needed.

Using some tape to tape a small paper clip on the nose also works. Be careful not to get tape on the decals, it will tear them off when you remove the tape.

A little ball of plasticine stuck to the nose or tail boom will also work well.

Experiment with the centre of gravity, it can produce some interesting flying.

TAIL ROTOR

"My Havoc Tail Rotor Won't Work" question is one of the most frequently asked. This is the most common problem and solution.

If you find your mini RC toy helicopter is spinning wildly out of control – check the tail rotor motor shaft very carefully. Chances are there is a piece of hair wound around the motor shaft.

This will of course slow down the motor and the tail rotor will no longer provides the correct amount of thrust. You will probably have to remove the little rotor blade to slide the wound hair ball off the motor shaft.

This does put unnecessary load on the motor and transistors however, so minimize it as much as possible. This applies to controllers with or without the throttle modification .

This goes for peoples eyes too. Use common sense when flying around pets and people. We have all heard the saying “dumb animals” what about the dumb pilot controlling the helicopter...