Since the last post just majically disappeared, I will post a new one.

I bought a Cobra Super Scale 700 series from Aerodyne. Since I have bought it customer service has lacked big time, in fact I have been lied to.

The $2000 heli kit mechanics are junk!!!!! There is so much slop in the balljoints that this thing shakes like a Chihuahua in the dead of winter. Bodies are great, but everything else is Chinese junk.

Not worth the money at all!!! I will never spend another dime there.

It is still there for me-It's in the docs section. It would be nice to have a full review on this heli by someone who's not affiliated in any way with RC Aerodyne.

Would be nice, then maybe they can tell me what they did to get the vibration out of the heli.

I ordered the ball link ends of a Goblin to put on mine. I fit the ones off my Goblin and they fit snug like they are suppose to on the stock balls on the Cobra. There is another $20 to fix a problem it shouldn't have.

Very big problem is you can't fly the mechanics out of the fuselage. Therefore you have to do all the work and then if there is something wrong you have to tear it completely back apart to fix it.

By the way, the main shaft I ordered that are suppose to be in stock is coming from China. Got the tracking number yesterday. So much for in stock parts!!!!!!

I am sorry for all the problems you are having with your corba but mine is flying like a dream. No vibrations and a head speed of 1100. I got mine on Wed of last week and had it flying on Fri. I am using 10 cell for a setup and really its the way to go with the heli. The only thing I had to do extra was put an aluminum rod between the 2 wings to help stiffen them up. Thats it. I have about 10 flights on my heli now and with the set up I have now I am getting 8 min of flight time and only using 67% of my battery life. Again I am sorry you guys are having problems but mine rocks. I am taking it to a warbirds convention in St. George Utah this coming weekend and will try to get some photos and video to post in a week.

Last week I saw two of the RCAerodyne Cobras fly while at Scale Masters. The gray one had issues and at one point the tail gave out and he had to auto it. It survived but it was damaged. The other one was in green camo paint and it flew really nice.

From talking to the owners it sounded like the gray one was brand new with no flights on her. In fact the first flight was Friday night under the lights. It had a weird noise to it like something was wrong, but it flew fine. He put a few more flights the next day and that's when the tail gave out. The green camo had been flying for a while so the owner had all the bugs out of it. The green one flew really nice.

When you compare the price of a Cobra helicopters in reality $2000 is really not bad. If you go with a Century fuse you will be looking at over 2K. By the way the Century Tow Cobra is the same size as the Super Cobra in question. But I will admit the Super Cobra has more scale features.

I have never purchased anything from RCAerodyne, yet. I think every kit will have some sort of issues one way or another. I know I had issues with my Vario Huey and that thing was over 5K. You need to work the issues out and I am sure you will like it. If not sell it and go on to the next project. I would be interested in buying it if you decide to sell it.

I have the RCA Super Scale AS-350 and the Super Scale Bell 429. Both of them have ball links that are sloppy. The linkages are sloppy, too. I was concerned about this and thought it would cause a problem. But I tried it anyway, and it turns out that there wasn't any practical problem as a result of the slop.

For certain, eliminating the slop is preferable. There's no downside there. I'm just saying that I was alarmed at a problem that in reality, didn't exist. Both helis fly extremely well. Almost everything else I own are Vario machines, which fly beautifully. Once you setup the heli, these RCA machines are flying just as well.

I suspect the shaking you have is not really related to the slop in the ball links though. Balance the blades on a balancer first, and try again. If that doesn't solve it, then balance the blades while mounted on your rotor head. It's worth spooling it up to let the blades swing out fully, then lock them down once you spool down. Remove the head, and put the whole head on the balancer (with the head on its side).

There's no reason for sloppy ball links to cause vibration, but an out of balance head will do that all day long.

If the head balances on the high-point balancer, but still shakes, take a look at the chordwise CG of the blades to see if they match. I have a set of blades on my Bell 429 that have a mismatched chordwise CG, and these blades shake even though they are balanced against each other. By loosening the bolt tension, so they can swing more easily, the vibration is minimized, but not eliminated. I had an opportunity to borrow another set of blades while at the Southern Scale Challenge and saw that the heli flew vibration free with this change in rotor blades. Cliff is sending me a new set, since I really can't correct the chordwise CG.

If your head balances ok with the blades and it still shakes, then check your chordwise CG, and/or try another set of known good rotor blades to see if that improves things for you. If it does, you'll know the problem and Cliff can take care of you.

Joel

Pitted Next To

I was next to Joel at the Southern Rotory Challenge and got to watch both of the machines fly that are listed above, and every flight he made with them was smooth... and he is well known for his smooooth flying helis...
My own thought would be to check the spanwise cg first.. only because I would think that would be the easiest test to do first..
If they are more then 1/8" different, they are very likely your problem.
But I would also do the high point balancer too..
Good luck and once you locate the actual problem, I am sure Cliff will make it right for you..
Stan

AMA 2918-Team JR, Spin Blades,,Castle Creations, Unique Aircraft

Flew mine all weekend with absolutely zero problems with the heli. I am sorry that you have had problems with yours but it looks like you are the only one having problems with the cobra. All the ones I am reading about and mine fly like a dream.

Here is my video of the Cobra. It flies like a dream and it shows in the video.

Watch at YouTube

really nice Nick!!

and great video as usual!

Roy Mayoral

awesome flying as usual! I want to be like Nick when i grow up

drive a rotary, fly a rotorcraft

problem is RC aerodyne claims they carry all spare individual parts for the superscales BUT.its not true.they cant even produce mainshafts..all parts are still in china
whole lot of them came with bad shafts and rotor hubs..for $2000.hmm..i expect some QUALITY and parts support..

Well I have been silent for some time now. This is only because I told the guy helping me I would be.

Now for the truth that the RCA fan boys mite not like and maybe won't believe.

In fact my Cobra 700 Super Scale was not the "only" one with a severe vibration problem. The problem stem from the rotor head, which was machined out of center, so the blades actually wobbled while spinning. The exact term the owner of Roban use was "several" helis went out of the factory this way. Maybe at the time the owner of Aerodyne did not know of this problem, maybe he did, I don't much care.

The owner of Roban sent me the new head, which is a complete new design, from China Express mail, as soon as they were finished in production.

Once again, I doubt they did a whole redesign to a rotor head for my heli alone. Took a big man to step up and admit they had the issue in the first place, and then to take care of it exactly as he told me he would in the time frame he said he would. He also sent me the new ball links to use on my heli that will tighten everything up the way it should be.

I will get a chance to test hover it tomorrow to make sure all is well but I would bet it is going to be fine.

Would be nice next time someone has an issue to not act like they are crazy and they are the only one with problems and there would be no possible way they could be telling the truth about an issue!!!!

I agree..my point was..not against ROban...Roban models is doing a great job in support and parts replacement,,my beef is with RCA..they don't return calls don't give any answers, but mike at roban excellent !!..if that's the case why not just buy directly from them.? why support a US retailer that does not give a hoot about its patrons.?..

Great news that you figured out what the problem was with the rotor system. Having a rotor hub drilled off center was not close to the top of my troubleshooting list!! That's great that you figured it out and good news that Roban knows about the problem and has a fix.

What steps did you take to determine that the head was drilled wrong? Just curious how you figured it out. Did you balance the blades and find you still had a problem? Or did something else occur?

Joel

I had the same problem with a lightning heli 3 blade head. After messing with blade weights and balance etc., I took the head of and mounted it to a spare shaft and spun it in a drill. The wobble was easy to see at that point. Glad you got it figured out and that Roban was willing to make good on the bad part.
Barry

All helis and planes have an expiration date stamped on them...you only find it after you crash!!

Hey Joel,

I wish I could say I figured it all out on my own but I didn't. After balancing, adjusting, changing the main shaft, Roban contacted me after seeing my problems and said they had "several" heads go out that were drilled off center. He was very certain that I had one of them. Roban is very good to deal with, and yes they need a new US distributor.

Just got mine and must say I'm impressed
quality of the fuse looks good and the mechanics seem solid no slop to be seen anywhere

Just one small anoyance was that short boom for the tail was missing - no biggie but anoying none the less
of course the proof of the pudding is in the flying but for a scale machine you can have finished and in the air in a day its pretty impressive

Cheers
Joe

On the J curve of all things Heli, I am still going down hill, FAST

Yes they are very nice and very scale detailed. The fact that they are scale to start with and all I am going to do is finishing touches was the main reason I bought it in the first place.

I just flew mine with the new head and it is as smooth as glass. Now I can move on to the detailing.

I will be starting a new post to show all the assembly details and the scale detail I will be adding as I go. Leave the negative behind and move forward.