Hughes500Pilot
Key Veteran
Location: Anaheim, CA
| My ThoughtsLet me begin by saying I do not "hate" Century helis...
However, there are several reasons why I would NEVER buy or recommend one to someone. Let me give you a run down...
First off... The Hawk line of helicoptes are "OK" helis. Not great, not even good, just ok. If thery were truly outstanding, you would see a ton of them at every flying field. In reality, you might be lucky to see even one at any given field.
That brings up the issue of getting help. If you have a question and no one at your field has ever seen or owned one, how do you except to get good help?
The Hawk line is still using an "old fashioned" wire drive tail rotor. Does not sound like a big deal, but just wait. Most people are opting for good heading hold gyros like the GY-401 with the 9253 (this is an excellent gyro). What happens is your super good gyro will place a lot of load on the tail rotor. That load is transfered into the wire drive system and gets into a function called "tail rotor wind up". This is where the wire begins to twist under torsional load. After a while, all that twisting fatigues the wire and causes it to break. No you have NO TAIL ROTOR ANYMORE! Not a good thing.
Next, you have to consider what happens when you crash. You can just go to your local hobby store and buy the parts you need, right? WRONG!!! I challange you to walk into any hobby shop and find parts for the Hawk helicopter. I will bet you money that you will be hard pressed to find hobby any hobby shops that actuall carry Hawk parts.
No problem you say. I will just mail order them from Heli-World (aka Century). First off, Heli World has a very bad reputation for poor customer service. Ever time I have delt with them it has been nothing but headaches. Also, you can expect to wait months at a time for parts to be shipped to you from a backorder. My good friend had to wait 3 months for a part to come in that he needed. He was grounded all summer.
Now a little food for thought. You can get youself a Raptor or a Shuttle. They are proven to be good fliers. You can go to any flying field and expect to see tons of Raptors and Shuttles. If you have a question or need help, I have no doubt that you will find the answer. As for parts, just walk into any hobby shop and I bet you will find a full line of Raptor and Shuttle parts IN STOCK.
Instead of trying to save $50 in the short run... Do yourself a favor and look at the big picture. You will be better off if you avoid the Hawk.
-Steve |
