Parrot AR.Drone Quadricopter : A New Flying Experience

Courtesy of www.rchelicopterfun.com

The AR.Drone quadricopter or quadrocopter is a revolutionary product merging the very best of several worlds, such as video gaming, modeling, and augmented reality. The Parrot produced quadricopter is remote-controlled by an iPhone4, iPhone3GS, iPad or iPod Touch 4th Generation and equipped with several sensors, such as a vertical camera, front camera, and an ultrasound altimeter. The best thing is it could also be used in video gaming, for instance AR.FlyingAce, a battle between two AR.Drones. Read more our Parrot AR.Drone review.

You can get these in the package; the AR. Drone, four types of adapter, 1,000 mAh Li-Po battery, 3 cells Li-Po balancing charger, indoor and outdoor hull, sticker for outdoor hull and a manual (see above pictures for detail).

How To Fly AR.Drone

To fly this thing, you need to have the Apple products like iPad, iPod or iPhone, and then you need to download the Free Flight software to control the AR. Drone at http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/free-flight/id373065271?mt=8, but you need to register first. You can alter the pre-programmed command by using this software if you want to have a different flying experience.

Auto-Flight Features

The sophisticated gadget comes with several best features. The one that I like is the auto flight functions. When you lose contact with it, the automatic flight will automatically get into action, where it will hovering stationary until the battery depleted, and then decide by its own to land it if the entire battery has been used. You can also turn on the auto-flight mode if you want to do something for a while.

The computer will do everything for you, you only need to tell what to do. For instance take-off is easy, just press auto take-off button and set the altitude you want the toy to hover. It will stay that way until you take control and give another command.

Because everything is pre-programmed within its processor, you can’t fly the toy pass the given flight parameter. Therefore, you can surely fly it even if you are a newbie, but if you want to learn everything related to this RC Toy, feel free to visit its site at http://ardrone.parrot.com/parrot-ar-drone/usa/.

Camera

AR.Drone equipped with two cameras (front and vertical/down), very useful when you want to see what the toy sees. Front camera refresh rate is a bit slower than down camera. Down camera is needed in auto-flight mode. Unfortunately, this RC helicopter gives no video recording features.

Battery

The battery will last for approximately 12 minutes and full charging takes about 90 minutes. I would recommend – for longer battery’s life - to stop using the toy when the power in the battery is only around 20%.

How to Repair AR.Drone

The durability of AR.Drone is good, the carbon fiber frame and polypropylene foam body give a good protection to the electronic component within. In case of any crash happens, you can learn to repair it by yourself from seeing this video. But you need to have a spare set of gear, blade and the AR-Drone tool.

Some safety features also given to it, such as it will turn off when some sort of excessive pressure given to the propellers. This will prevent the motor getting burnt.

When seeing the capability such as the auto-flight, newbie-friendly functions, the built-in camera, the durability and stability, you can expect to get this at more than $500, but the AR.Drone price is much cheaper only around $300.

If you like to own this awesome toy after reading this Parrot AR.Drone review, you can purchase it at AR. Drone shop for discounted price. For more gaming experience, you can visit the Apples iTunes stores and find some games for the toy.

READ MORE - Parrot AR.Drone Quadricopter : A New Flying Experience

Everything We Should Know About Li-Po Battery

Electric RC Toys has becoming more popular – especially the airborne type, since Li-Po battery invented. It has more advanced benefits which are helping to popularize the electric toys. One of them is the light-weight benefit, which is very suitable in flying remote controlled toys, like helicopter or airplane. The Lithium-ion Polymer battery can be obtained in the market starting at around 1996.

Li-Po is using dry electrolyte that looks like a thin plastic film, that is why this battery could be shaped very thin and light-weight but able to hold more power. Compare to the Lithium-ion (Li-ion) battery which is using a liquid electrolyte.

New Type of Li-Po Battery

Since 2009, the new type of Lithium-Polymer battery has been introduced, where it is using a gelled electrolyte. Some people call it a hybrid Li-Po battery. This new battery type has less possibility to leak, but still keeps its flammable potential, to burn or explode when overcharged or other mishandling act.

The hybrid Li-Po battery has an interesting trait, its ion exchange rate tend to get more efficient when it gets warmed up.

Li-Po Battery Ratings

If you read the label on the battery, you can see some sorts of technical term, which are the battery specifications. Read on for more information what to know when you want to buy a LiPo battery.

a. Voltage

Each cell in Li-Po battery contain 3.7 volts, compare to NiMH or NiCad which contain only 1.2 volts per cell. Sometimes you can find the battery with 1S or 2S written on the label, that means the battery contain 1 cell or 2 cells (S stands for Series), respectively. More cells means more power, for instance 10S Li-Po battery contain 10 battery cells with the total power 37 volts.

You will also find a label like 4S2P (P stands for Packs), that means the battery contains 2 packs of 4 series of cell. This type of battery will hold more capacity.

Please be careful in choosing your battery, read your rc toys manual, which kind of battery they need to operate properly. Don’t try to change it unless you know exactly what to do next.

b. Capacity

Capacity describes with a milliamp hours (mAh) unit, which means the power contains in the battery. In practical it means how much load can be given to make the battery fully discharge in 1 hour. For example; 1,000 mAh battery means it will be fully discharge in 1 hour if the load given 1,000 milliamps (1 A), that also means it will discharge in 15 minutes if the load 4,000 milliamps (4 A) or 4 minutes in 15,000 milliamps, and so on.

Therefore, if you want to play longer with your RC toys, please find the battery with bigger mAh. You can change without reading your manual, but the problem is when you want a bigger capacity, the battery will become heavier. Consider this when you want to get higher battery capacity, especially when you intend to use it on your airborne rc toys.

c. Discharge Rate

Discharge rate is the term to inform you how fast the battery discharged safely. You can find the discharge rate describes in C unit. If you see the 20C, it means the battery can be safely discharged 20 times more than the capacity, 10C means 10 times and so on.

You can calculate it by yourself by using this formula. Divide the capacity to 60, to get the capacity in minutes, and then multiply it to the C rating. Then divide the capacity with the results.

For example, 20C rating on 2,000 mAh battery, that means you can give 20 times more load equals to 40,000 miliamps and that would exhaust the battery within 3 minutes. Let’s see the formula : 2,000/60=33.3x20=666 mAh per minute; then to get the time divide the capacity to the result, which is 2,000/666=3.03 minutes.

Several Li-Po batteries give different discharge rating, that is Continuous and Burst. Continuous is the normal discharge rate (normal usage) and Burst means the battery discharge rate when under short burst of increase power. Example of this rating is 10C Continuous /20C Burst.

You could expect that more C rating means more expensive the battery will be. Purchase the largest C rating if you can afford it. As a guidance, for normal flying rc it is enough to get 20C-25C, for larger airborne supply it with 25C-30C, and if you are an aggressive player please use 35C-45C.

Li-Po Battery Pros and Cons

RC Li-Po Battery Advantages

• Light-weight and can be built in almost any shape and size
• High discharge rates
• Hold bigger capacity compare to other battery type with the same size

RC Li-Po Battery Disadvantages

• Volatile and easily burn or explode when mishandle (i.e. overcharge, punctured or shorted)
• An expensive battery than another type
• The battery life-span is 300-400 charge cycles, or even less if not cared for in the right way
• Battery life-span depend upon several things such as storage, charge and discharge

How to Handle Li-Po Battery

• Keep your battery’s temperature around 50 - 60°C when in use or in storage, hotter battery will shorten its life span. If you find out that the battery reach above temperature everytime you are using it, then you should buy another battery with higher discharge rate
• Prevent over discharge; never push your battery to use more than 80% of its capacity. For instance stop using your RC toys when you have used 1,600 mAh when you are using 2,000 mAh type of battery.
• Never charge your battery more than its capacity, for example 2,000 mAh battery should charge it at 2,000 mA or 2A current (or also known as 1C). But some batteries could stand to 2C or 3C charging rate, that means you can charge it twice or thrice its capacity.
• Inadequate charge balancing, find a good charger with charge balancing features or a single cell in your battery would possibly damage by over discharge when other cells still not fully charged.

I hope this article could gives a better picture about RC Li-Po battery, but if you want to know more about it, please read this resource. You can also visit my previous article about rechargeable battery's charger.

READ MORE - Everything We Should Know About Li-Po Battery

Syma S022 CH-47 Chinook RTF – It Is Not An Ordinary RC Helicopter

Syma - the famous brand in RC Helicopter – release a product named S022 Chinook CH-47 3-channel RC helicopter. Consider as the big RC helicopter in micro rc helicopter family (7.5 inches long) with military style, suitable for all age and some of RC hobbyists are happy to see its quality and durability. If you love to play with RC heli before than you will likely love this one more than ever. Read the Syma S022 testimonial page and you will find lots of people are satisfied with this.

Syma S022 Description

The product can be used as soon as you open the package and charge the battery, but you need to buy six batteries for the transmitter. The package contain : RC helicopter, 3 channel transmitter, 7.4V 800mAh LiPo rechargeable battery and 110V home charger. Yes… you can get the instruction manual (in English) inside the box also.

Syma S022 encased with a metal frame but its weight is only 34 grams, very light. Able to move forward-backward, up-down and left-right, that’s why it is called 3-channel type. The standard Li-Po battery in the package can fly the helicopter in approximately 8-12 minutes. You can charge the battery directly to the power outlet or through USB cable. The full capacity can be reach within approximately 30-45 minutes.

The technology own by Syma gives stability to all of their product, S022 also has this. You can fly the RC helicopter with ease even if you never fly it before. The remote controlled is using infra red. This copter is suitable for indoor flight, but you can still use it outside if no wind blows. Syma S022 helicopter is controlled by the 32 – level precision high-speed control systems. The control can be use within 100 feet radius. All of these make this RC very easy to control, you can even land it on 2x2 foot square.

You can find Syma S022 CH-47 RC Helicopter with a discounted price through this link. If you have ever flied another type of flying RC, you will see that flying this one is exceeding your expectation.

If you like to find out another type of this flying toys, feel free to visit the best selling RC Helicopter page and Syma S107/G page.

READ MORE - Syma S022 CH-47 Chinook RTF – It Is Not An Ordinary RC Helicopter