Flite Test Micro Adventure Review

[John (ACEPILOT109)]

Hello!
This post is just to warn others about this aircraft!

First I want to get some things straight, I am 16, I've been flying RC for over two years (mostly building my own designs) and I am not "just another new pilot making a complaint" like I know I sound. I also love every thing Flite Test and have never had any issues till now.

I purchased a Mice Adventure for 75 bucks! great deal, it was on sale. I then purchased two battery's for $9.50 and for shipping, $38.00 and got a receiver $40.00. I felt that the steep price would be offset by getting a very good flying and fun aircraft. I was very wrong.

The plane was damaged in the packaging, near the nose and on the floats. It had issues with the ESC needing to be recalibrated multiple times, but other than that I thought it was still gonna be a great aircraft. I set the plane up as per the FT video provided and it was very simple to do.

Now, its a calm day and I go to fly it. Immediately the enplane does a strange Dutch roll and flips! Second flight, I take off with more power and fly faster but every turn I attempt results in a strange tip stall Dutch roll mix. I land, not the best landing but I had to land fast to avoid a crash. Third flight, was a lot better but still, the same over all issues with needing to fly very fast and even still, it wants to tip stall.

Now, I am returning the plane, my request is still pending but I'm very upset that my 38.00 I paid for the shipping cant be returned, and I may still need to pay for shipping just to give it back. At that point I might as well sell it on eBay if that's how its gonna be.

Why a bad plane?
The FT video showed the plane flying wonderful with no stabilization or gyros of any kind, mine also had no stabilization and I did not get the same results.
I would need to buy a $70.00 gyro board and at that point the plane would be over $200.00 and I should just buy a bigger/better Horizon Hobby plane that includes free shipping, repairs, and returns. Very disappointed that I was mislead into this situation and I guess I should have known about all this, but the video made it seem all good. I hope this is taken in a positive way to people interested in this airplane.

DO NOT BUY THIS PLANE! BUY A SPORT CUB FROM HORRIZON HOBBY!

Please watch the video if you'd like to see the flying.

 

[OliverW]

That's really disappointing, but thank you for warning us! This one was on my wish list but now it sure is off it..

 

[John (ACEPILOT109)]

That's really disappointing, but thank you for warning us! This one was on my wish list but now it sure is off it..

No problem, I really feel its a good plane, just not for how much you have to pay to get it to fly right.

 

[JasonK]

I watched your flight video and Josh's and your looked like you had rather extreme inputs, so either heavy on the sticks or to much deflection. Even in the setup video, Josh said that to much control surface movement can make the small craft act really odd.

The damage in shipping is unfortunate. the ESC needing calibration multiple times also seems odd.

 

[John (ACEPILOT109)]

I watched your flight video and Josh's and your looked like you had rather extreme inputs, so either heavy on the sticks or to much deflection. Even in the setup video, Josh said that to much control surface movement can make the small craft act really odd.

The damage in shipping is unfortunate. the ESC needing calibration multiple times also seems odd.

I noticed that too, I had all my surfaces setup the same, with travel and expo and what not. When I was smooth on the control's it was still very difficult to fly.

 

[JasonK]

I noticed that too, I had all my surfaces setup the same, with travel and expo and what not. When I was smooth on the control's it was still very difficult to fly.

Are you flying spekctrum or some other system? spekctrum has to be set at 120-125% to get the same as 100% on other systems... so if you weren't flying spekctrum and set the same dual rates, you probably had higher throws then Josh had.

 

[John (ACEPILOT109)]

Are you flying spekctrum or some other system? spekctrum has to be set at 120-125% to get the same as 100% on other systems... so if you weren't flying spekctrum and set the same dual rates, you probably had higher throws then Josh had.

I was using spectrum, DX6e with a AR620 receiver

 

[Hondo76251]

Could be throws, but Its also possible it might have a janky servo. Ive has some Chineseum servos that worked fine on the ground but would get all twitchy when flying, whenever you put any resistance on them.

I dont have the adventure, but i do have the beaver. For a lot of planes this size balance is a big deal. Just a little bit one way or the other and they get squirrely in a hurry. I had to play around with the CG on the beaver a few times before she flew well, i imagine the Adventure would be similar.

If it were me, I'd keep the plane. With that kind of shipping cost you're not getting much back to end up with nothing. Sucks to spend money on something you're not pleased with but, at the same time, it can be kind of fun to have a beat around plane in your fleet to experiment with that youre not in love with. Maybe try adding some flaps, i know that helped slow down my beaver a lot.

 

[Monte.C]

Could be throws, but Its also possible it might have a janky servo. Ive has some Chineseum servos that worked fine on the ground but would get all twitchy when flying, whenever you put any resistance on them.

I dont have the adventure, but i do have the beaver. For a lot of planes this size balance is a big deal. Just a little bit one way or the other and they get squirrely in a hurry. I had to play around with the CG on the beaver a few times before she flew well, i imagine the Adventure would be similar.

If it were me, I'd keep the plane. With that kind of shipping cost you're not getting much back to end up with nothing. Sucks to spend money on something you're not pleased with but, at the same time, it can be kind of fun to have a beat around plane in your fleet to experiment with that youre not in love with. Maybe try adding some flaps, i know that helped slow down my beaver a lot.

+1 for calling out the Chinesium. And for the rest of your logic & advice.

 

[JasonK]

That looks almost identical to the beaver that my son picked up at Flite Fest, I setup him up on my dx6 with a 2s 650mAh lipo with 30% expo and High/Med/Low rates of 100/75/60% all with 30% expo (wasn't sure which one it needed, so gave him options to test) and he said it flew great, he was even doing tricks with it. He said he only used the lowest rates.

Only issue(s) we had were self inflicted by him (wrong battery initially) and what appears to possibly be an issue with the motor's bearings from a hard crash in mud (I haven't looked into this one yet for him). Didn't have any flying issues with it at all.