New Record

I set a new personal best last night in hover times:
8:22 minutes, 7-cell, 700 mAh, NiMH Batt.
The bird did brush the floor once during the flight, but it was the front of one skid, and the chopper was otherwise was free of terra-firma.

More importantly, I broke the seal on the plastic bag for my NiCad batt from Ikarus, charged it at 500 mAh (2C) until it peaked, waited a while, and then flew my next flight. Duration? A scorching 3:44 minutes.... I'm using the same chargers, and I'm in the same freakish mile-high conditions -- the only thing that changed here is the type of battery.

A while ago I answered the question of "is it worth going NiMH?" by comparing it to skiing (among other things). I had only compared it to some of other readers experiences and not really done a "lab" test under similar conditions. Well after last night I am posting the following note:

For Sale: Genuine Ikarus Piccolo NiCad. 7-cell, 250 mAh, only been used once. $23 or best offer.

Call hobby-lobby and get the 7-cell, 700 mAh NiMH batts, its definitely worth it!

[pgoelz]

Don't give up so fast! The Panasonic NiCds take 4-5 flights to reach peak capacity. They then stay that way for a long time.

How long can you fly _out of ground effect_ on the NiNh cells?



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Paul Goelz
pgoelz (at) eaglequest (dot) com
Piccolo web page: http://www.eaglequest.com/~pgoelz/piccolo1.html

I think the panasonics are better nicads for this application than the sanyo's that icarus sells. This is just from my experience with the sanyo's and hearing from others using the panasonics it seems that they are getting more flighttime out of them than I am from sanyo's. Any comments on this? (250 mah cells)

[pgoelz]

Absolutely! Actually, I thought that Ikarus sold Panasonics as Piccolo packs.

I have flown Sanyos and Panasonics and there is a BIG difference. The Sanyos did about 4.5 minutes when new, but tapered off to about 4 minutes after maybe 30 flights.

The Panasonics did about 4.5 minutes when new, and that increased to about 5 minutes after maybe 5 flights. It increased to 5.5 minutes after I cut my blades.

I have three 7 cell Panasonic packs. The oldest has been flying since maybe April or May. It has identical performance to my two newer Panasonic packs. From day to day, they vary a bit. But atll three still can give me a consistant 5 minute flight, with another 30 to 45 seconds in ground effect.



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Paul Goelz
pgoelz (at) eaglequest (dot) com
Piccolo web page: http://www.eaglequest.com/~pgoelz/piccolo1.html

Paul:

When I tried doing a scientific measurement, I invariably would spaz-out and come close to loosing control of the piccolo. I can tell you that one time I was flying at full power and got a quick glimpse of my wristwatch: It read 2:38 minutes.

After that it was a scramble to keep the helicopter from hitting the TV, wall, other furniture, etc., but there was still power there.... The last four minutes of (I'm guessing here) of last nights 8 min. flight was definitely just for a record attempt. She didn't get more than 1-foot off the ground, but it was still "in-air" time.

If the Astroflight charges NiMH cells that I would stand by my recommendation to gamble the $30 and get one from hobby-lobby. I will keep testing the NiCad's, but the flight patterns seemed similar with both types of batteries (only the NiCad was much shorter).