Designs and Kits

[lllazar]

How heavy are your rotors usually? Mine come in around .95-1.00 g

[chia]

I think that's what our rotors have been ending up as as well.

[thewinner]

The NJ state competition was on Tuesday, and in Div B, most of the helicopters looked like they were from the Freedom Flight kit. The top time was 1:52 from a Freedom Flight helicopter.

[sj]

And in NJ Division C the top helicopter was a modified Freedom Flight which flew for 2:26. Then second was our custom model which flew for 2:12 and third was a Freedom Flight which flew for 2:11. Overall as thewinner said many of the helicopters were from the Freedom Flight kit.

[lllazar]

Ehh...i really do hope they ban kits next year.

[aubrey048]

Ehh...i really do hope they ban kits next year.

Agreed. I think it destroys the spirit of S.O. I have never used a kit, and I will never ever use one.

[sj]

I agree. We used a kit to get an idea of how the event works and then started custom building which has given us far better results.

[lllazar]

I've never used a kit but the main reason i'm opposed to kits is because this event is NOT AT ALL just about the testing and retesting flights. The experience you get from designing your copter, any jigs, and actually building it without all the pre-cut wood and etc in kits is extremely valuable to actually getting to the heart of scioly.

Kits pretty much turn this event into a "who can afford to buy a $40-50 (not even including the winder, and other building materials) 1st place medal at most regional tournaments". Sure, one could argue that kits themselves aren't going to just fly perfectly and that you need to test and adjust things, but if the design proposed by the kit is decent, then there's really not much else to do but build well (which, with all the jigs and instructions in the kit, is fool's play) and put in a few hours testing, depending on how high of a time you want to get.

I don't mean to bash anyone who uses kits, they can be quite useful for those starting out, but they shouldn't be allowed in actual competitions is all im saying.

[chia]

At the same time, it might be sort of hard to judge exactly when something is built "from a kit" and when it isn't... how much modification has been done to it, etc. I do agree with the reasoning for banning them in competitions, but I just don't see how it can be enforced.

[thewinner]

chia has a good point. It would be very difficult to enforce that rule. At the same time, kits may be superior to helicopters at the regional levels, but at nationals I don't really see how a run-of-the-mill kit can compete. I have never seen any kit get over 2:30, and I believe the nationals times will be much higher than that. Most kits have at least one thing that can be improved. In conclusion, at the higher levels of competition, sticking with a kit design may save you time, but will probably cost you in terms of performance.