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5 Things I Love About the VAS Banshee
!VAS Banshee First Flights
When I went down to the Pecan Patch FPV event to cover it for RCGroups, I was excited to meet Alex (IBCrazy) and thank him for all the great antennas that make FPV work better. I saw him on the flight line flying a fixed wing plane and he was nailing some crazy tight gaps and he even scraped a wing on the ground during a low pass and kept on flying. That plane looked like it flew great and I had to know more about it. I learned it was his design called the Banshee which is a smaller version of the Spectre. I really wanted one and luckily the guys from Stone Blue Airlines were there selling kits. I purchased one and brought it home. I needed to order some servos and other gear for it so it was a couple of weeks before I started the build. I finished it up and got my first flights in this past weekend. I think I'm in love and wanted to talk about the 5 reasons why. !1. It's All EPP Foam I'm no stranger to EPP foam. When I started flying over 16 years ago, we were using EPP in combat slope planes and early electrics. The Banshee uses EPP and that makes it incredibly durable. I'm talking you'll be hard pressed to break it no matter what kind of durable. It gives you confidence to get down low and fly under trees and super close to obstacles. You can get crazy with it and not even worry about breaking it. !2. It's a Kit How many kits have you built lately? Sure it might take more time, but you get to use the skills you've learned over the years and actually build something. It gives you much more satisfaction than assembling a RTF. It also allows you to build it the way you want and use the gear you want. !3. The Way it Flys Oh man, does it fly as good as it looked when I saw Alex flying his. The first couple of flights I had the rates dialed up too much and it was pretty sensitive. Once I dialed it back some and added a bit of expo, it smoothed right out and locked in on rails. The other guys at the field were commenting on how smooth it looked. I had a huge smile on my face, but it was hard to see with the HeadPlay HD's covering my face. The Banshee handles great and you can do some serious slalom turns around obstacles. It's all yank and bank with no rudder and it slows way down for small fields or just cruising. At full throttle it climbs vertical for days and does the full suit of 3 channel aerobatics. !4. The Way it Crashes Ok ok, I crashed it. Before I dialed down the rates I got a little crazy and went slaloming through the quad racing pylons we setup at the field. I was only a few feet off the ground and the pylons were not spaced very far apart. I had to yank hard to make the turns and I over banked on one and put it in. I walked out and the plane was fine. Literally no damage. It unplugged and slung my camera out as well as the video transmitter. I placed them back into position and launched. I'm using metal gear servos so they won't strip and it's no big deal. Crash it all you want, you'll just keep on flying after each one. !5. How Fun it is to Fly You probably already know by now, but I had so much fun this weekend flying the Banshee. I cannot wait for the next outing. It's exactly the FPV barnstorming basher that I was looking for. It flys great, it's more durable than my wife's tupperware, and it's just easy simple FPV fun. One thing I was worried about was the launches. On my other FPV airplanes, I've used autopilot systems to keep the plane stable in the air while I put on the goggles or they had landing gear so I could just take off flying from the goggles. The banshee launches on rails just like it flys. I ended up sitting in my chair with the HeadPlay HD's on and launched from this seated position FPV style with no stress at all. It's fun to do some acro too in FPV. I was doing rolls, loops, and point rolls, and even some inverted flying. I really don't think I could happier with it. !Gallery @1.jpg @2.jpg @3.jpg @6.jpg @7.jpg @8.jpg @9.jpg |
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How did you paint yours? And what kind of tape are you using?
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I love my banshee. great little plane. I have a bunch of videos up on my youtube page:
http://www.youtube.com/nateobomb2/videos |
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Latest blog entry: DIY 90" Flying wing - First flights...
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some pics
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Latest blog entry: DIY 90" Flying wing - First flights...
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What kind of motors are you guys using? I have some smaller 2204,2005 and then some 2826 for a bixler build. If I'm looking for smooth slow bashing. Not 100 mph. Something just a little less stressful then my mini quads.
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Quote:
http://www.alofthobbies.com/xa2212-kv1400.html |
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Latest blog entry: DIY 90" Flying wing - First flights...
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Yeah thought so. It's the going theme..my biz 3 is too big sometimes and my bonsai is too small.
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Thanks for the article, Jason! Now we need some video
I find the best motor is 2210-2215 size and 1500-1700kV swinging a 7X5 prop. You can put more motor on it, but really 200-250 Watts is about the maximum you want to run on this plane. I started making the motor mounts out of polycarbonate now. After the head to head crash with that miniQuad I found that the motor mount was the weakest link and thus, now it will not break -Alex |
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Quote:
Alex, Is that 22mm motor Can size? Or stator size you listed up above? Thanks. edit: found out its stator size |
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Last edited by rclab1; Jun 30, 2015 at 06:20 PM.
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Here is mine.
I'd highly suggest buying the Stone Blue Airlines metal motor mount. |
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Quote:
On the specter alex has reinforcements on 3 sides i think it is, but for some reason this is just a straight L shape, which works great with metal, but not so good on ABS. |
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Latest blog entry: DIY 90" Flying wing - First flights...
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I saw Jason fly this thing on Sunday afternoon and it was definitely fun to watch. He was flying low in between some trees, barns, and slalom poles and it looked like it was on rails. When he crashed the plane - it just laughed and asked for more. I definitely wouldn't let the motor mount issue scare me away from it.
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