Upgrading from an E-Sky Honey BeeII I was surprised at the low cost of the HK500GT. After all it is difficult to justify the money needed to build even the entry model Align 500E on which this heli is based.

My final parts list came to the following:
1 x HK500GT kit @ R899.00
1 x Turnigy Typhoon 1800KV Brushless motor @ R360.00
1 x Turnigy Brushless ESC 85A with 5A SBEC @ R458.49
3 x Align DS510 Servos @ R375.00 each
1 x Align DS520 Servo @ R420.00
1 x Set Carbon Blades @ R189.04
1 x Turnigy 6S 2650mAH LiPO @ R422.25
1 x Fibreglass Canopy @ R109.00
1 x Spektrum AR7000 Receiver @ R1080.00
1 x CSM SL420 Gyro @ R1 550.00
1 x Metal Tail blade holders @ R127.00

This brought the initial total to R6 739.78 which is in line with the Align 500E except for the following:

The Align 500E kit does not have nearly as much alloy, it does not include a battery, receiver or carbon blades nor does it have a CSM gyro. I can go on but this isn't meant to be a brand bashing review.

Onwards then to the build.

Everything fits together as it should.

The head is of outstanding quality and apart from replacing some of the screws assembly was straightforward. Do remember to loctite all the metal to metal screws and put a drop of superglue on the screws that fasten into plastic. The standard fibreglass blades wouldn't fit into the bladeholders and vary in weight. This wasn't a big deal to me as I ordered the CF blades which were matched, each being exactly the same weight these fitted with no problem whatsoever.

The frame presented no problems either. All boltholes lined up perfectly and if you use Align servos they just slide into place. I have heard about main/ autorotation gears that are oval from the factory, well mine weren't BUT they are soft and will strip eventually. Fortunately Align parts fit perfectly and at roughly R110.00 for a twinpack of main and R93.00 for a twinpack of autorotation gears it was a not too expensive fix. The plastic canopy is of a poor quality but I never received the FG canopy even after I brought it to the WiFly teams attention so had to order one.

The taildrive gear stripped after a hard landing where the tailrotor touched the ground. Once again I replaced this assembly with Align(No HK stock available in S.A) although I can't say it will be stronger than HK.

After setting up the heli using video material downloaded from www.helifreak.com I took the bird for its first flight. Wow, compared to the twitchy, unpredictable HBII this heli is just so stable.

The Turnigy motor has loads of torque, maybe a little too much as it chewed the HK gears on the second take off.

The ESC does a splendid job at not only supplying smooth power to the motor but also the receiver and servos. As an aside you should NOT strap the Tz85A ESC down with cable ties as you may cause a short circuit on the circuit board, I stuck mine to the bottom of the battery tray with 3M double sided tape and it works very well.

In summary:
This helicopter presents great value for money. I went a little overboard with electronics but that is what makes this heli great, you get to choose how much you want to spend when you start building instead of being forced to fork out big money for a base model and then having to spend fortunes in upgrading.

I give it two thumbs up.

From: Koebel | Created on: 5/13/2011 8:48 PM

Well my kit is together, setup and trimmed.
This heli has been superbly thought out and is exceptionally well put together. The head is rock solid (however stripped and put back together with loctite!) and has almost zero slop.
90 % of the head is metal with the exception of 2 parts which are plastic. Having said that though, no effect on flying, but I will replace with metal parts once they have worn.

The boom, boom stays, and fittings are really good and do not flop around once secured. Recommend loctite when screwing into metal though.
The stock tail case is plastic, and I definitely will be replacing that. No problems, but I think this heli deserves all the alloy it can get. It is quite a bit bigger than the 450 and seeing as I haven’t skimped on the electronics, no need to skimp anywhere else.

The stock fiberglass blades were absolutely perfect out the box and tracked 100% on first spool up.
The plastic vert and horiz fins, I replaced with the carbon fiber ones (because I like CF) but the plastic ones do just fine.
The skids and skid holders are quite robust and have withstanded some heavy landings whilst setting up. No need to replace anything here! HK has really put together a really nice package.

Here are the electronics I used”:

Turnigy typhoon 1800KV 500 motor (Huge Power)
3 x Turnigy MG930 cyclic servos
1 x 5A Turnigy BEC
1 x Turnigy Plush 80a W/BEC ESC
1 x Align GP750 Gyro and DS520 Align rudder servo

You may ask why I used an addition BEC and the reason is quite simple. The Plush 80A will only supply 5v and I wanted 6v to the servos.

1 x Turnigy 3s 1500mah 20c lipo to run the servos and Gyro

My main battery choice was to go with the 2 x 2200 3s 20c lipos in series. This option was fine, but the batteries run fairly warm and will only give you about 5 minutes safe flight. I am not doing any 3D but fast forward flight, stall turns etc.
I recently purchased a 3000mah 6s 20 c pack and this seems to be the better choice. The pack gave me about 8 minutes flight and was only slightly warm after the flight. It’s a bit of a squeeze to fit it under the canopy, but it does fit.  The 500 heli does require quite a bit of head speed (around 2300-2500) and will definitely need a bigger battery to accommodate.  

Speaking of the canopy, I did purchase an Align canopy (Mok brand for $22), as the stock canopy was cracked. This seems to be a general problem as the plastic used on the canopy is very brittle. Seems our postage handlers are also a little rough with our parcels, so I think that may also have had something to do with it.

The HK500GT is a formidable clone of the trex 500 and is definitely a wise choice and most certainly a good investment when sizing up from the 450 heli. It is exceptionally stable, even in 25km/h winds, and chews up the sky quickly with its very capable power plant. The only downside to this heli is the need to own more 3000 mah 6s packs, but with Wifly’s keen pricing, it’s not a bank buster at all.

GO GET ONE!!!

From: null | Created on: 10/2/2010 7:39 PM

When i recieved my HK-500 i was really impressed by the quality of the parts, especially the CNC metal head parts!

I had a few problems however.

- The clear part of the plastic canopy was damaged. The canopy also won't fit with my Zippy 6S 3000 battery.

- The canopy spinner theads were also chipped and broken.

My main concern however was the amount of insolation tape i had to use to balance the main blades. There was a great difference in the weight, centre of gravity and dynamic balancing of the main blades. I am planning to change these asap.

The CNC head balances well.

Locktight every bolt and nut that goes into metal. Use Cyno on plastic parts. Very important.

Overall this is a great clone and is a great experience to fly!

From: evandtroux | Created on: 9/29/2010 1:02 PM