I crashed my poor Eco-8 again. Was flying nose in realtively low (10 feet up or so), went turn it around (back to tail in) and it got away from me .

The crash looked quite bad, but surprisingly, not all that much got messed up. The main shaft is bent (fixable), the landing gear broke, main gear is a little chewed up but I think it is still usable (about 5 teeth got the tips knocked off), and one of the little balls broke off of the swashplate.

I'm mad at it so it's just have to stay broke for a while [sm=punching.gif]

Seriously though, It's just gonna have to stay down untill I can afford the aluminum swash plate. I'm not gonna waste my money on a new plastic one.

you have any CA?

Well, the stuff that broke can't really be fixed just by glueing it, wouldn't be a strong enough joint. Well, maybe the landing gear, but deffinatley not the swash plate.

I would also like to point out for anyone with an Eco-8, don't buy the DM (Duzi Modell) hardened shafts, the Ikarus ones are WAY stronger. I have an Ikarus hardened main shaft that got bent, I tried as hard as I could to bend it back straight (by hand over a wood block) and only moved it a few hundreths of an inch, the DM one which I just bent today took hardly any more presure to bend than the stock shafts do.

I got it all repaired except for the Swashplate.

Don't know if the landing gear is as strong as it was, but I guess it doesn't make much difference since I got the wide landing gear coming in tommorow or thursday.

I checked my funds and I've got like 60 bucks, the aluminum swashplate is $78 so I should be able to get it back in the air pretty soon. In the meantime it'll give me plenty of free time to practice on the sim.

I've been thinking I might just put the Eco-8 away for flying at the field, and get something like the MX400 to fly at home. The Eco-8 is great for the flying field or a big lot, but a bit too big to be doing anything other than hovering in the vacant lot next door to me.

Wow, you love to crash your eco-8 eh?

I would strongly suggest alot of sim time before trying anything like nose in. Crashing may allow unplanned upgrades, but it's expensive..

Coincidentally, I would highly reccommend a micro heli. It will do wonders for training your heli reflexes. Once you learn to fly the micros, flying the eco-8 will be a walk in the park. This is how I did it (Went from micro FP to eco-8) and i've never had a single crash with my eco. Come extremely close, yes. I've done a few hair raising nose dives during forward flight and managed to save it at the last minute, but i've managed to avoid the ground, so far..

The MX400 (X-400 for all purposes) is a really nice looking bird, and is actually going to be my next micro purchase once I get some more upgrades for my eco. Namely, the alu swashplate and rotorhead.

Well of course, seeing all the parts fly everywhere is the coolest [&:] The crashing really doesn't bother me too much, because I know once I get better I wont be doing it as much (well hopefully anyways!).

I'll probobly get the MX-400 around or for my Birthday (which is next month).