Guys !!
Guess what. The postman knocked at my door today with a small parcel. I did not even think it would be the heli i ordered 5 days back !
What a nice surprise !! What surprises me was that HK guys have got this packed in such a small box !
Everything looks intact, however havent opened everything yet.
Will be posting pictures soon.
Unfortunately i do not have the servos yet ( gyro i have ) , so the flying this might wait for a month or so, till i get the servos.
But i am eager to build this soon .
Thanks everyone for best wishes.
-Gaurav

Wait! we havent wished yet  

So that makes 3 of us with un-assembled HK-450 V2 Helis in their closets! Hope it would be a great learning experience. Vinay has already put his thread for his Heli build. Hope its good source of text for both of us.

My HK-450 Pro (Torque Tube edition) has been shipped, should have it soon.  After the first crash that takes the torque tube out, it will become a regular belted one

gaurav has ordered a GT not V2

Opps! My Bad. But ain't the build process same ? just I would be at learning on a cheaper Heli 

Yes mine is a GT. I guess for us beginners, it doesnt really matter which one we choose. We all gonna crash and buy spares !!!
In fact spares of GT are not yet on site, so I cannot order them now. In this sense the V2 or MT is better, but then GT parts should be available soon.

even the V2 parts are not out. But no major difference there, But I have a question.

Anwar: diff b/w v1 and v2 apart from the 4mm feathering shaft in v2 and 3mm in v1?

I started with a V1. I believe a good friend is still flying it somewhere in Bangalore

If you are talking about the differences between the Align original ones, there were many. A new feathering shaft supporting thrust bearings, new main and tail gears (high strength, and if I remember correctly, even the number of teeth were different), lots of metal upgrades in the head and tail and an upgraded swash plate and main shaft. They also upgraded to a better ESC and motors (3500kv to 3700KV).

You are right in that only the feather shaft is the one that will give you real trouble when you try to substitute parts.

Here is a trick if you run out of the rubber dampers (like O-rings) on the feather shaft inside the head. Get some glow fuel line/pipe, and cut like 1 to 1.5mm sections out and use them instead.  They will not last as long, but can certainly help you wait while replacement parts are on the way

Ya sure will keep that in mind. Once the spares arrive, I think myself and ujjwal will merge orders and get a single pack to save on shipping.

I end up ordering stuff for multiple folks here, and the "Wishlist" feature on some online stores is a real help.  My fellow flyers make a wishlist, and share the link with me, and I can easily include them in my own order.

Thats what we do here too. Amir, me and other aermodellors share our requirements and then we sort together on what we need urgently (via EMS) and not so urgently( via air parcel ) and we club and order.Saves shipping, and this ways we get a consignment at regular intervals.

Nice discussion this is. Reminds me how some people at the other forum have started thinking that those who order from hobbycity are cheap.

Back to the topic, I will be posting some pics soon.

Don't do that, I am already feeling jealous >

Here are some pictures.
I havent opened the packets yet, but after being flying the miniTitan, i somehow feel that this heli is very small. Its definitely smaller than the mini Titan.
Overall the quality looks excellant !

One more here.

There is no manual included here. I will need to search the net and find the Align manual, or perhaps an HK one.

Here is what i plan to use on this setup :
HK 450 GT Heli
MG-14 metal gear servos on cyclic
Turnigy DS480 digital servo on rudder
HK 401 Gyro
Turnigy 2200 3S 11.1V battery
Futaba 10C radio / 7 channel 2.4G rx
Turnigy Typhoon 2215 motor
Turnigy Plush 40A ESC

At this point i would like to thank Vinay for his HK450-MT thread, as from there i read about the motor, and the digital servo on rudder. That helped in selection greatly.

I would start building this at least a month from now, since i have the electronics on back order at Hobbycity. I hope to have them by end March.

Don't worry about that Gaurav.  It helped show everyone how "mature" they are.  I can see the forum owner saying this, as the vested interests are clear (just reading through that thread, and seeing how he refused to respond to why HobbyCity was blocked is ample proof where his priorities are).  But I am saddened by the attitude of people acting as mere sidekicks, instead of properly advising him about what is best for the hobby, and how to make it accessible to more people. That is what a true friend should do (both as a friend of the person and as a friend of the hobby).  It is truly unfortunate that many many years of RC life has not only added to people's technical knowledge, but it also seems to have built an "elitist" mentality in them Basically, it is like saying that "if you do not covet a Morris Minor and instead wish to buy a Tato Nano, then you are not welcome on the road" ! 

I just hope no newcomer ends up there.  Even being on international forums is a much more welcoming and useful experience than being asked to get every single item from one hobby shop ! Either that, or you get ridiculed ! This hobby will never see the kind of uptake everyone wishes to see, with this attitude and treatment.

This is not the thread for this rant, but I did not want to respond there anymore. Thankfully, you guys are doing a great job of helping newcomers find products from the right sources, always remembering that most LHSes are banking on your support to stay alive.
 

Has this something to do with my 'Full and Final' post there? just asking as I have not been there since.


Isn't that clear from the top domain suffix of .COM there? (Wiki def for .Com http://tiny.cc/dzBgH )    I should have noticed that long back and saved my time and energy from those provocations.


Amen!! 

You should visit  

Exactly, There were some people on that forum, for whom I had a high regard of ( even though i never met them ), and i thought they would have a broader/more mature view of looking at things. However their views/attitude recently was kind of shocking to me too.

Regarding Elitism, in my view those who have this kind of feeling are not really hobbyists at all. A true aeromodeller would love and help with anyone and everything that relates to aviation. Be it a cheap HC 2Ch airplane or a sophisticated jet. When someone looks down upon someone just because they are buying the brands, its pitiable really. 

The recent discussions reminded me, of how Anwar handled things a couple of months back when IRC went down. I was the one who started the thread "IRC down" and it was so welcoming to see Anwar's stance at that. He was so understandable there, and even offered help to get the site back up. That is open-ness in the true sense and a good . Good job. I am glad we have a gem of a person leading this forum.


Ujjwana, There was nothing to do with your final post there.

Coming back to the heli, Good to have 3 people here who are building HK helis.
I will post back soon with some updates.

-Gaurav

MAke it 4, I have another one on the way.

Gaurav -My first interaction with Sunil was when I requested that a note about this forum be posted there, when we were starting.  He was very understanding about that (even though it was in direct competition to what he was doing), and let my introduction post stay there for a week.  Even though I disagreed with how he was running the forum (with a single LHS focus), that act earned him my respect.

It seems that the sudden growth of this forum has turned the tide on that With the current attitude, I see that forum deteriorating rapidly (even if some others are trying to save it or put a more humane face to it); that is NOT something to be celebrated. Every suggestion to improve it is looked upon as either an ego issue, or as a business conflict.  I have decided not to participate even in technical discussions there anymore. Hopefully someone else will stand up and say that 2.4Ghz flyers are NOT beta testers for the forum owner, and it is a well adopted technology that is much more widely used now as compared to FM. Hopefully the large percent of members ON THAT FORUM ITSELF who also purchase from Hobbycity (or the ones who are not knowledgeable enough to understand the true value of a airplane "kit") will some day be NO longer looked down as being "worthless".

if it wasnt for anwars patience in solving problems and helping, I would have never visited RCI nor sticked to it. AFAIK, I became a member of IRC, but I never felt like posting there.

Well, looks like the time has come for me to begin work on this.
Here is the equipment i plan to use :
HK 450 GT Pro heli - Belt version
Turnigy 2215 motor
Turnigy Super Brain 40A ESC
3x MG-14 Hextronic servos for cyclic
Turnigy D520 for the rudder ( I know this isnt the best choice, but the 480 as not available )
HK-401B Gyro
Turnigy 2200mAh 3S 20C battery
Futaba 10C radio and 7 channel RX

Hope to take pictures along the way. Will also post links to manuals video that i will be downloading, since the HK heli comes with no documentation whatsoever.

-Gaurav

I had huge issues with the MG 14s. In first case, one of the servos was travelling slower than the other two . I had by this time thread locked all the screws  . Luckily I have the habit of ordering spare. So I had one servo spare and changed it. Now this servo was travelling more than other two. Luckily this issue was radio program fixable.

All the best.