by RCModelReviews » Fri Jan 14, 2011 8:37 am
It's good to see that *this* HK FPV plane has just a little dihedral and more vertical stabilizer area than the EPP one. It should handle *much* better.
However, unless you're going to be flying over acres of uninhabited farmland or wasteland, I'm not so keen on the idea of a hard fiberglass fuselage. If you hit someone or something, this model will do a *lot* more damage to the said person/object than the EPP version will -- and that could be bad for the hobby and bad for your wallet.
Personally, I'm not a fan of foamies -- but when it comes to FPV, I think it's a sensible safety factor to make the plane out of a material that's light and easily deformed (ie: foam).
Also, don't take HK's recommendation of a 9g servo for the steerable noseleg too seriously. Such a servo would be trashed on the first hard landing. Much better to use a medium to standard-sized metal geared servo which is more able to take the abuse.
I'm also not a fan of the general layout that HK is using for their FPV models. You still have a lot of side-area in the fuselage and much of that's a head of the CG. Once I'm done with the reviews of "store-bought" FPV airframes, I'll be making my own to see if I can do better.
RCModelReviews.com, just the facts.