Duration

[donlayola]

What was the helicopters nationals duration?, just wondering.
I think its going make me depressed, but oh well,(jk)

my reaction after seeing the time:





jk

[chia]

I wouldn't exactly be depressed with a time of 1:42 if I were you. Best time I've heard of is 2:18, though it'll probably go up by nationals.
Since you said it is vertical when it hits the ceiling, I'm assuming it doesn't wobble then, so it's well balanced (meh. I built the same model and it ended up super unbalanced, but that's probably my own fault >.>), so that can't be the problem. Eh, you'll probably have to wait for expert advice on the other questions. I'd actually been wondering about winds left over also, I'd just forgotten to ask.

[jander14indoor]

OK, this goes counter to my general recommendation that you use as much rubber as the rules allow. BUT, if you are landing at a site with LOTS of turns left you aren't using all the energy stored anyway, try using less rubber. Go slow here, but shorten the motor say half inch at a time and see if the times stay the same or go up. Alternatively, try going a LITTLE up or down in size. Not 1/6 inch at a time, but 0.005 inch wider or narrower at a time.

Jeff Anderson
Livonia, MI

[WCarneyJX]

A couple of good flyers I know are suggesting using less rubber as it lowers the total weight and because the copters they are flying cannot handle full torque anyway. My copter flies well on 2 grams 5/32 or 3/16 and will land with no turns left. Best flight so far is 1:56.

As to efficiency this is really a design issue. Most of the choppers out their are using two spars offset at an angle, as is mine, but the most efficient solution would be a single spar with the rotor angles optimized (by that I mean the angle changes from center outward but not necessarily in a helical pattern, but that's a whole discussion topic in itself) but this makes for an advanced design and I don't know of a kit that has this configuration.

[donlayola]

I heard that nationals in 2010 was 8 minutes, when it was a trial event!!!!
Is this true!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?





jk on the smiley's, but not kidding about the nationals time last year.

[chalker7]

The super-long duration helicopter at nationals last year was not a Science Olympiad legal helicopter. It was one of the event supervisors' (mine, in particular) that was being flown just as a demo.
We weren't timing any of the flights, but I somewhat doubt it was getting 8 minutes. The flights were longer than legal helicopters should get, probably more in the range of 5-6 minutes due to constantly getting hung up on the ceiling in the armory.

[Kovu]

Hey, we have been getting times close to a minute which is pretty good for all of the problems we had, now the problem is some of the times it wobbles and spins in circles and only goes for a half of a minute what could be happening.

[Mr. Cool]

At Regionals we flew them in a hallway, so no pesky rafters to worry about. We finished first with a time of 1:07. (not great though I know)

[illusionist]

So it was essentially necessary to have a probe on top of your helicopter huh?

[Frogger4907]

If you are going to touch the ceiling the probe is needed.