Customer Reviews

Blade CX3 MD 520N RTF Micro Helicopter

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

This is the first RC helicopter I've owned and it was right in my price range, but I was stuck between the cx3 and the cx2. I decided to go with the cx3 because of the upgraded gryo from the cx2 (which is what I was told by my hobby dealer). I also like the body which sets this apart from all the other helis in the same price range. This has been a VERY easy copter to learn on and I can see myself wanting to upgrade soon. It flies well, but not perfect of course. I had slight tail jittering with mine but was fixed by getting a new set of landing gear with proper foam on the part that the body touches to eliminate the body from shaking from the motor. The gear that came with mine was missing foam on the left side (which is the only reason I gave it a 4/5). The spare parts for this are cheap though, so no big deal if you wreck it! It handles very well and overall I am glad I went with this as my first! Word of caution though.....BUY MORE BATTERIES!!! You will be wanting more than a 10 minute flight!

I have cut my teeth on the mcx micro heli, so this is my second heli. While a little bit harder to control (nothing beats the MCX...), it is fantastic outdoors, and after 30 minutes or so, I've been having a blast with it. E-flite is really getting some great helis out.

I was thinking about getting the new mSR, but decided to stay with coaxial blades. CX3 is a really nice step-up from the micro helis, as it's size makes it much more suited for outdoors flying. Hovers really steady - the gyro definitely works. Just don't expect any big acrobatics, or great speed. And for absolute beginners (even if they have a pilot of the year award...) I would probably recommend trying out the mcx first. It's so light, you can really trash it around, and it will fly forever. CX3 is definitely more fragile, however that's again the function of its size.

One word of caution - buy more batteries! As any small electric RC heli, you don't get much past 8-12 minutes of flight time, and waiting for the battery to fully charge can be painful if all you want to do is fly :)

I teach people to fly radio control helicopters

and I often purchase different ones to see if they will make a good teaching

platform,

The CX3 is definitely not a teaching platform and would not recommend it for a first

time pilot, the very first hard landing snapped the landing gear

and that is a repeatable scenario, the gear is far to light for the helicopter

if you are learning to fly, or teaching someone order the following

5 sets of blades

extra battery

upgraded landing gear (stock replacement is just as bad as original

also expect that you will be trimming this helicopter out with the control arms

I love this helicopter. I bought some upgrade parts from flyrcrivesud.com to make it even better. I like how real it looks. I wish they made a bigger scale too.

I'm new to this toy heli stuff and have decided it probably isn't worth the trouble. Spent a lot of time doing small hops on the ground before I learned to control a hover in the air. Didn't take long before I got a bit over confident and crashed it into the ceiling fan. It stripped the gears, bent the shafts, and broke the landing gear. Cost about $20 for the parts and a hour or two figuring out how to take it apart, replace the parts, and put it back together. Also had to borrow a metric micro allen wrench. Seemed to fly ok after the repair. Had another rough landing though and broke the landing hear again. The landing gear on this thing is really flimsy. Saw an upgrade for the landing gear on a website for $12 and may try that.

The battery for this thing only last about 10 minutes on a charge. Then after about a dozen charges your lucky to get 5. So if you want to keep flying plan on new batteries at $16 a pop.

Its kinda fun to fly it, but it is gonna get expensive for parts and batteries if I decide to keep doing it.

Just got this so the jury is still out. I wanted something in between the really cheap Helis and the really crazy single rotor models. I bought a Syma S107 and was immediately hooked. In fact, I bought three more for friends and family, at $28 they are great gifts. However, for some reason, the S107 is really easy to fly and hard to break. This one, at 5 times the cost, is much harder to fly, and easy to break. Hmmmm. But it is heavier, and obviously serious, and a little scary compared to the S107. Mine didn't hover out of the box. I need to trim it significantly and haven't quite got there yet. I am confident that I will get it to fly and will enjoy it as my skills increase. Oh, and the balance charger died on the second charge. I see on the forums that they are junk anyway. Plan on investing in a good charger and extra battery packs, and blades, etc. Still cheap for a great experience. A lot cheaper than the $3M MD 520N that it is modeled after. Drool.

This is a terrific helicopter for beginners. There is so much cheep junk out there that can discourage someone starting out flying rc helicopters. Spend a little more and get something that is quality made and easy to fly. By the way, it is a lot of fun for experienced helicopter pilots too.

Bought the BNF and bound it to my DX6i.

First flight: 6" off ground and straight back into couch. Result: Broken blade.

Second flight: 2 feet off ground, hover for 2 seconds and straight left into wall. Result: Broken blade and broken lower gear.

Third flight: 5 seconds of hover and wild gyrating. I Cut off the throttle. Result: Bent stabilizer.

No more flights as I have no more spare parts at the moment.

The added light package looks nice though.

The constant uncontrolled rotation accentuates the fragile nature of the product. In other words, it is uncontrollable, crashes, and breaks - all in the first few seconds. The longest and best part of the entertainment and excitement is waiting for the battery to charge. The experience goes down from there.

Once the choppter is charged and ready to fly your are only seconds from an exciting and destructive crash. Even with the trim and the controls to their limit, the choppter contines to spin out of control, crash, and break.

The suggested optional 'training' landing gear do not fit this helicopter. The suggested blades do not fit and two days later the suggested batteries have not arrived.

In conclusion, the entire transaction was a huge dissapointment both for me and for my wife for whom is was a birthday present. Though she is a FAA pilot, she found the helicopter to be completely uncontrollable. Another pilot, who flys medivac helicopters and was recently named pilot of the year, tried adjusting and flying it to no avail. The experience consists of waiting 30 minutes for the battery to charge, disconnect the battery - which takes a while as the fit is not good, launch the helicopter, spin, and crash. I suggest that you hand launch it from as high as you can reach as more distance from the ground delays the crash by a second or two.