Toy RC helicopters - fun for all ages!
Toy rc helicopters have really become popular within the last couple of years and it's easy to see why they appeal to so many people because they're pretty cheap to buy and flying them isn't difficult!
Even more recently, micro-sized toy helicopters have appeared in shops everywhere, and these tiny infrared controlled palm-size helicopters can be flown by kids down to 5 or 6 years old, although there are plenty of adults having just as much fun with them! One such helicopter, the Havoc Heli, is shown below:
Admittedly a toy rc helicopter can never offer the same level of satisfaction that a true multi-channel rc helicopter can, but products such as the Hot Rod helicopter and Dragonfly King, both shown below, are a great deal of fun and can certainly give you a basic feel of lifting an rc chopper from the ground.
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These are two very different types of toy helicopter, the Hot Rod is the conventional shape while the Dragonfly King is a coaxial style with two separate rotors and a vertically mounted tail rotor.
Toy rc helicopters like this come completely ready to fly (RTF) - all you need to do is supply the radio control gear batteries, charge the motor battery and away you go! And the great thing is that they are very easy to fly, and robust too - so any heavy landings shouldn't inflict too much damage.
How toy RC helicopters work
Single rotor:
Toy helis such as the Hot Rod have 2 motors, one to control the main rotor and one to control the tail rotor. The throttle stick of the transmitter controls power to the main rotor motor and the rudder stick controls power to the tail rotor.
However, the relationship between the two isn't as accurate as it is on a proper model helicopter and this is why the directional control of the toy is sometimes a bit vague - if the tail rotor isn't giving as much thrust as it should, or is giving too much, then the fuselage of the helicopter will want to turn of its own accord and send the model flying off in a direction that you didn't intend it to.
But, with some degree of practice it is possible to keep these things flying in a small area, as the photo below shows:
Contra-rotating (coaxial) rotors:
Contra-rotating, or coaxial, toy rc helicopters such as the Dragonfly King have no need for a conventional tail rotor because the main rotors spin in opposite directions to one another, so cancel out the effect of torque and hence the need for a tail rotor.
Turning is achieved by slight variations in speed between the two main rotors, relative to each other, which upsets the torque balance and spins the fuselage round to the desired direction.
Coaxial helicopters can be flown much more accurately than the toy single rotor helicopters, and they generally stay in whichever direction that you put them in, making indoor flight even easier.
Toy rc helicopters definitely 'fill a gap' that has existed for way too long; when I was a kid I always had to settle for the kind of toy chopper that sat on a handheld base and shot off into the air at the pull of a cord, spinning violently and very unrealistically in the process!
Nowadays though, thanks to the likes of the examples shown on this page, anyone wanting to have some low cost helicopter fun can do very easily and without the worry of severe damage and costly repairs.
Check for toy rc helicopters on eBay.
Related pages
Electric rc helicopters - if you prefer something a bit more realistic.
Coaxial rc helicopters - more information on how they work.
Mini rc helicopters - if you prefer something a bit smaller.
Micro rc helicopters - ...or smaller still!
Infrared micro helicopters - the big hit of 2006.
RC flight simulators - the safest way of learning to fly an rc helicopter.
