Walkera 4#3 Brushless System due early 2009

[Steve Joblin]

The Walkera.com site is already showing pictures of the Brushless Motor conversion items that will be available. Rumor on other forums indicates a release date of January 2009, but don't know when it might be available in the US. I'll post here as soon as I hear any updates.

[skunkworx]

I wonder if it'll be both B/L main and tail motors? That'd be kick-arse dude!

[freakyFlyer]

I hear it will be out in the US late January. It's brushless main motor only. I saw a few pics on another forum.

[skunkworx]

Even just the main would be nice. My 52 is pretty awesome with the B/L setup, so this one could only be better with it. Can't wait to see it on the market. I just hope prices aren't ridicuous. Even better would be if they were compatible with Spektrum!!! Suppose we can't ever hope too much for all that!

[Steve Joblin]

Ehirobo provided the following write-up on another forum: The following is a direct "copy and paste" of what Ehirobo wrote:




For some of you out there which hate to solder tiny wire to the micro receiver. Walkera had release a bind and fly solution for you with their new brushless motor kit. You just need to plug it in an forget about replacing motor. With the new RX2406A receiver you simply plug the ESC into the receiver and fly. The weight different between a brushed 4#3B to a brushless 4#3B is 5.8 gram (40.5g vs. 46.3g, both with canopy and without battery). The flight time is still a reasonable 10min and more on the flight characteristic in the test flight section.

Installation:
As with the popular ebay/ losi setup you need to cut around 0.5mm materials away to fit the motor into the stock motor mount. But it is very simple as I use a paper cuter to trim the frame slightly. Motor come fitted with a 16 teeth brass pinion and it will fit the motor mounting slot without any modification. For the ESC you can use double sided tape to tape it on top of the receiver or mount it under the receiver mount. It is only down to personal preference as both local would fit but if you mount it under the receiver mount it would be a tight fit between the canopy. After mounting all the hardware simply plug the ESC into the receiver, connect the motor to the ESC and attach the ESC’s power input to the receiver’s power input, then you are ready to fly.

Test Flight:
We charged up the battery and test flight it inside our office. As I am have a 10250kv motor in my 4#3B, the power from the Walkera setup is very impressive. With just a 16t pinion it have a lot more power. Do not have any information on the kv rating on the motor but it sure have a lot more power then the 10250kv motor. I would say atleast 20-30%. And since it only use a 16t pinion there are not too much loading on the motor. With 25°C room temperature, the motor is still ice cold after 10min indoor flight! The flight time is around 10min before I notice a decrease in performance. I may be able to push it to 11-12 min but really don’t want to over discharge the battery. The heli is more stable then the brushed version due to the increase in weight. But with the increase in power it still fly quickly. It acutely move up much quicker than the brushed version.

Conclusion:
With the increase in power and reliability of this brushless system I don’t see any reason not to get one for your 4#3. With this simple setup you donot need to solder tiny wire, or convert the whole system to 2S lipo. The down side is you need a new receiver to plug the ESC into. But with the increase performance it is really worth it and you will never need to worry about replacing motor again.

PROS:
- Simple installation
- Lot of power

CONS:
- Need to buy new receiver