RC-Hangout

Heard on RC Heli Nation that Blade is discontinuing the 550X and 600X. 700X is still being supported, but apparently the team got freed up to fly Goblin brand helis.

Not happy about this, personally. I like my 550X quite a bit. May have to stock up on parts so I can keep this thing flying for a while yet.

Ugh. This blows. Blade is saying 1 year of parts support and that's it. And who knows if they'll even carry through on that.

So cut bait and sell my 550x and parts or buy a spare kit and some choice spare parts?

Dustin also has a 550x. Not good!

Time to start buying used airframes. Look how long Min Air has been gone and folks are still flying those, same with JR Vibe. Gaba had his how long after production ended a couple years I think.

Its not going to last forever but if you get to buying up airframes then you should be able to last a couple years.

Not sure it is worth it. 550X never really caught on all that well. I've only seen mine and 2 others in the wild. And they are roundly laughed at by most due to anti-Blade biases that exist in the hobby once you're out of the beginner stuff. JR Vibe has a solid rep so it stands to reason they've hung on. Don't expect the 550X will do so. Nor the 600X for that matter. 700X will probably be going away within the year, too (not discontinued yet, though).

Gob 570 may be in my future as a replacement. Just hate crashing the goblins. Put my 500 in again this past Sunday at the annual STARS club 1st day of winter fun fly. As far as I know I had the dubious honor of being the only one to do a serious crash at the event. Got parts ordered up for it.

Yeah garbins are painful to put in. I have been only looking at 550s. If I could afford it I would consider a synergy. But then again I have not really looked to in depth at them. Just can't afford an endovor of this magnitude right now.

Yea seems like a mistake on HH part. They were starting to get a decent reputation. Even if they try and decide later to enter the market again people are going to be scared to invest in them again.

I've been eargerly waiting for news of the TSA 560 - 570 to be released, there is an article on it being a prototype in one of my heli mags

Thinking about a synergy e5 now. Gonna start pricing things out with some common replacement parts. I like the pod n boom for what will be my "workhorse" practice heli.

Those birds are a bit high in cost compaired to something like Gaui or Align. You'll find that the prices are close to what a garbin cost, if memory serves me right. I would like to get an X4ii. That's about a good size for me, i think its a 550 class.

Sorry not the X4ii but the X5 with formula canopy. The X4ii is a 500 and the X5 is the 550.

Doing some more research on the discontinuation... Now reading the entire pro series line is being discontinued due to high liability concerns by the ownership of horizon hobby. Don't know how true it is. Plenty of other companies produce these things, both large and small size companies. In and out of the US. Maybe hh posed to large and easy a target for the consumer protection board and ambulance chasing lawyers. If this is the case, though, then why not just come out and say it?

Anyway. Given all this and the fact that parts are already starting to run out at the normal places I'm definitely going with a new 550 size heli.

That's really a shame, Paul! I love the look and the power of the 550x helicopter.

Good luck with choosing a different 550 helicopter. Based on what I know about you, I'm sure you've already got a couple of "potentials" in mind.

Okay, came down to the Synergy E5 or the Gob 570. AS much as I like the E5's looks and the engineering that went into it, the crash costs just look to be off the charts bad on it. And with it being a small biz operation I have doubts on the availability of parts when needed and the potential to have long term staying power in a pretty crowded market. So I'm going with the Gob 570. Shares a lot of parts with the Gob 500 which I already have, they are still the hot product on the market with a growth curve ahead of them for SAB heli division so hopefully the company will be around for a while. Crash costs are moderate (Align probably would have been the best for crash costs, and I did consider a 550 from them). And the Gob 570 will take 550-570 size blades so I can fly what I have on hand and then go to a larger blade moving forward.

And being that I'm in a celebratory mood still with the holidays and my recently getting hired full time, I sprung for the carbon edition. Going to use the KDE 600XF motor I was originally planning to put in the 550X. New Edge 120HV, castle bec pro, BK full size cyclics (coreless, not the brushless) and the BK mini tail servo (mounting plate is standard size). I have an ikon on the shelf I'll be using. Going 6S on the setup.

I'll sell the 550X as is, bind n fly. Doh... forgot the DSMX sats... ... okay, ordered them up too, along with a cable to go from the edge rpm output to the ikon.

Now to get what I'm selling figured out and documented so I can put it up on the block.

Yeah they r done with the big birds.. Cortez was fly'n on the team and just went back to Align because of it... They will continue parts tho.

If u r selling and getting a new kit.. Go Synergy.. We an be best'ies! Lol.. Details to follow.

Heh. Sorry gob570 already ordered up. I like the synergy quite a bit but this is going to be my workhorse heli for training.it will be crashed and I need something ghat isn't going to kill me every time I have to order parts. And I want to know parts are available when I need them.

Haven't compared crash cost on Synergy vs Goblin.. Would have thought the Gobby to a more expensive repair tho...

Vs Synergy I don't think so. Belts hold up well to crashes so you're not usually replacing any main gears or anything like that Synergy is a traditional main gear system and my experience with them is that even if you hit TH in time, you have a 50/50 chance of chipping some teeth off or worse. Synergy main gears are beefy SOBs and they cost big money. Maybe they survive better, reducing replacements. Blade holder arms, all the head stuff. Main shafts. It all comes out more expensive, which stands to reason: less sales volume means more parts cost generally speaking. The big cost items on the goblins are the booms and the canopies. 570 canopy isn't too horrible. Only 10 or so more than I'm use to paying for align or blade stuff of similar size. Booms are expensive at $50-70 a pop, but they also hold up very well in crashes (I haven't needed to replace one yet on my Gob 500 after several crashes, some severe). And when you compare to all the parts involved in a tail on TT heli (boom, tt, gear sets, bearings, front block, boom supports and block, etc), the cost is actually about the same for a goblin boom replacement (and nylon nut/bolt replacement) vs a TT setup, especially on the expensive Synergy.

And like I said, I already have a Gob 500 and a 700. A lot of parts share between the 500 and 570 and some share between 570 and 700. By going with the Gob 570 I'm able to share significant portions of my parts supply.

Just made more sense to me. But the Synergy E5 was very tempting. IT looks like it is a solid machine and I've heard good things about them.

Guess so then yeah... 3 or 4 E5s down here.. 2 team pilots.. I'm drewling over them lately.