Hobbyking Mini vara (motor Inc, ESC, Servo) (ARF)

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Customer Rated

Feb 23, 2015

Received Hobbyking mini stick during the week - all good no missing parts and balsa parts and covering in good condition. Only problem was red instead of white tail section (not a big issue). Built and installed radio Saturday. Reconfigured motor to mount on outside of firewall thereby allowing enough space for 460mA 2S battery and esc to fit into front compartment. CG was found to be 35mm from leading edge of wing without any additional weight added. (not 100mm as in installation doc's). Maiden flight on Sunday - some minor trim adjustments and stick flew well - great little fun fly and can fly in light wind - good purchase - lots of fun anticipated.

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Customer Rated

May 21, 2013

I was very impressed when I opened the box, it all looked very cute and nicely made. Like others I was a little worried about slotting the trailing edges for the cyno hinges, but it turns out to be OK with a good sharp knife and a steady hand. Only real problem I had was that the motor came out of its little mount on the maiden, damaging the wires a bit when they wrapped around. So check that the grub screw is aligned properly with the flat on the motor itself and put it together with a bit of loctite. I think mine had simply not being tightened enough when assembled originally. (It comes preinstalled.)
I mounted the battery outside under the nose, as I found that with a 460mAh that gave the right CoG, and that battery is too big to fit inside with the motor. If you can manage to swap the motor round to be outside you could fit that size of battery inside. Anyway, mine flies fine with the battery under the nose and it does not show in flight.
I get well over ten minutes of flight, and plenty of performance. Good aerobatic performance, although it tends to want to roll upright from inverted flight. It flies much like my 40 sized Stik apart from that.

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Customer Rated

May 05, 2013

Wow. small but powerful parkflyer. I thought it is very weak due to balsa. But it is not. It is very strong. According to my 2 or 3 flying, very good flying performance and strong. Small? It is OK!
If you want to enjoy in playground, I recommended this. You can enjoy it and feel perfect!

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Customer Rated

Feb 27, 2013

A fun little airplane! The cover that was on the plane was transparent red cover and not as it looked in the pictures. The servo for ailerons were too weak because hinges for the ailerons are were very sluggish. I modified the bracket and put an Turnigy 1800A for the ailerons. The motor I changed to a Turnigy 1811 1800kv whit a 6x4 prop. And that was just what the aircraft needed. It was a bit underpowerd whit the stock motor. The aircraft was a bit wobbly in the air but is fine to fly acrobatics whit. I even put in a i86AP Flight Stabilization Control Board and it fits perfectly! This little gyro is amazing! It makes this little aircraft feel like an big aircraft and all the wobbling stopped.

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Customer Rated

Feb 01, 2013

The CG is stated as 100 mm. This is obviously wrong. I will fly it at 35 mm in the next couple of days and see adjust accordingly.

To get close to the wing cord for the CG I needed a 460 2s, right on the nose. The only place it can be mounted is on the outside of the fuselage. Something it's quite right.

One last thing, what is with the battery plug on the esc. Looks like someone was getting rid of some old inventory.

Nicely put together plane, easy build once I got the hang of the techniques of building a micro, i.e. control rods, propellor mounting and cutting the slots for the hinges (very thin balsa). My next micro will be a lot easier since I expect the instructions to be just as brief.

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Customer Rated

Jan 06, 2013

OK, have now completed test flights with a fully symmetrical wing. This little beast needs this modification desperately. The tendency to high speed dives when performing mutiple rolls and other flat wing idiocyncracies have been eliminated. The next mod is to a much larger, 50pcnt, rudder then she might perform stall turns etc.

The wing section I chose was quite random. I replaced the flat ribs with a fully symmet pattern that was 2cm deep at the mainspar and kept all other measurements and construction as per the kit. It took about 3hours to build from scratch.The aileron servo needs to be relocated to the top of the wing as there is no room in the fuselage with the modified wing saddle shape.

This is a much better plane to fly!

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Customer Rated

Dec 20, 2012

very nicely packaged kit with no problems, all the servos were included. Model fly straight as a die from first flight with only minimal aileron adjustment [this won't always happen because of the banded wings].

A very quick and maneouverable little beast and a load of fun in stock build.

Only a few comments

1 I now use a 5x3 prop. This only loads up to 3 amp for the motor and esc so all within specs.

2 Nose weight was needed to achieve the desired CoG. I have another of these [built from the HK kit] and the C10 motor is mounted externally and this eliminated the need for lead.

The kit supplied C10 has a longer shaft and cannot be reverse mounted.

3 I am in the process a building a symmetrical wing. Hopefully this will allow multple axial rolls without the nose looking for the ground. Might also use two servos for aileron differential as the model is quite capable of carrying a bit more weight.

4 Almost forgot, the supplied prop saver was useless. I replaced it with another HK type and no problems.

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Customer Rated

Nov 06, 2012

recieved stick and wiating on more parts to get it flying. ESC that comes with it uses non-JST connector, so I can't fly it yet.

Monokote was bubbled in a couple places, but over all is done well (overlapped adn sealed all around. Larger instructions could be provided for new people, as it was hard to see what/where some of the instructions were to be done. (like the wing mount server wires should, place to mount reciever and battery to maintain CG)

Box arrived looking like it was almost bent in half but everything was intact with air pillow packing.(so it arrived in great condition) If you live in midwest (like IA or MN) regular shipping ~$20 was just as fast as EMS shipment ~$67 and was trackable all the way to my post office.

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Customer Rated

Oct 16, 2012

This airplane is pretty nice. Itr was my first build and balsa plane so i was a little worried about how it would turn out to be. I put everything stock with a 370mah nano tech battery and i found it to be a little tail heavy so i put 5 screws in the front and it flew better but it still was tail heavy,so i ended up putting my camsports fun in the front to take areal videos. Now the CG is perfect. I would recommend this plane for maybe your 2nd airplane but you,d have to get the elevator throws down a bit. Good luck!

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Customer Rated

Aug 28, 2012

Chegou o kit, bem embalado, construdo com plstico vermelho transparente, diferente da foto, muito parecido com o original, vou trocar o plug do ESC onde encaixa a bateria. Me parece bem feiro irei montar e voar dentro de algumas semanas, voltarei a postar a minha opinio sobre seu vo.