New Hobby....

[tonyburbidge]

Hi,

I have recently moved to the Swindon area from the South Coast. Being stuck for things to do in my new rural location, a friend of my father (who happened to be clearing out his garage) asked if I would like his old Radio Controlled Helicopter as a project and something to amuse myself with. I now haved a rather elderly, but in good condition Robbe - Schluter Futura Helicopter. The Heli has no radio gear installed, and I have no transmitter (was thinking about a Futaba Field Force 7 or similar). The Heli does however have an engine (Size 61) , exhaust and fuel tank. It is currently assembled but I have no instructions to take it apart, clean, check and re-assemble. I found this site whilst browsing the internet. Having no knowledge of radio controlled models, I figured joining would be a good way to learn, to meet like minded people and get some lessons and advice on actually flying the thing! I was wondering anyone had details of any meets or club nights where I could come along, say hi and meet a few faces? Have posted messages on my local model club website (Cricklade) but no reply as yet....

[moyesboy]

Hi tony
How about posting a picture of the model?

Just so you know, the airframe and engine represent approximately half of the equipment costs when building a new heli. Havign said that the servos, gyro and radio seem to become better and better value year on year.

The downside of the futura would be the cost and availability of spare parts compared to the newer kits from taiwan. Though the older helis have a few followers on here.

The robbe futura spares are listed at Untitled Document (midlands) - look down the right hand side for the plans and then in the robbe spares pages by the S part number.

Experienced pilots will go a long time between crashes. New pilots will tend to have a few incidents. It might be better to start with a more common heli with readily available spares (TT raptor, or Align Trex). There might be a buyer for a futura airframe on here somewhere...

[ipitombi]

Hi Tony,
Welcome to the forum,, you will find a lot of help on the site and good advice.
If you have not flown before then it might be a good idea to get a sim (Pheonix is a good one) and practice on a computer..
Cheers,,

[scoobystig]

Hi Tony

and welcome to another Swindoner

if you need help setting up or need some lessons then come and visit us at the Paul Heckles school of flying, just down by J15 of the M4

i used to be a member of Cricklade a few years back, how is it up there at down ampney

i fly at the marlborough club now and as i got fed up with loosing wheels in the concrete ruts and the big mud piles at each end of the runway

FYI there is a heli club based out near Roves farm on the oxford road, about 10mins from Highworth

[coptermanic]

Hi Tony, and welcome to the forum.

ps we got married in Highworth Church, and lived in the village during the mid-eighties.

[tonyburbidge]

Hi,
Thanks for the replies...
Not sure where Roves Farm is as i've just moved to the area... A quick Google search didn't show any RC model Heli clubs but i've now obtained a few numbers from the BMFA website. Yeah, will post a pic or 2 once i've figured out how! Have done a little research into my new thing and agree that spares may be an issue, if i have to let her go in favour of a more recent machine then maybe thats the way to go, nice new kit, build from scratch and learn as I go... shame, nice heli and pretty huge too (have had a look at the engine, says Size 61 Webra)... time will tell...

Tony

[tonyburbidge]

Have added a few pics in my member gallery.....

[scoobystig]

Hi,
Thanks for the replies...
Not sure where Roves Farm is as i've just moved to the area... A quick Google search didn't show any RC model Heli clubs but i've now obtained a few numbers from the BMFA website. Yeah, will post a pic or 2 once i've figured out how! Have done a little research into my new thing and agree that spares may be an issue, if i have to let her go in favour of a more recent machine then maybe thats the way to go, nice new kit, build from scratch and learn as I go... shame, nice heli and pretty huge too (have had a look at the engine, says Size 61 Webra)... time will tell...

Tony

its called Ridgeway heli club, and Miles Thwaites is the contact
and it is about here

A420 to Highworth, Swindon, UK - Google Maps

[scoobystig]

of course you can join us at Marlborough Club, we fly on Marlborough common and also have a second site near Collingbourne which is between marlborough and Andover
takes about 30-40mins in weekend traffic, it a wide open site 1km away from any buildings so we have no issues with noise or anything

however the club is 99% fixed wing and i am pretty much the only heli pilot in it, not that they are not welcome its just mainly fixed wing flyers, i fly both so suits me fine

i will probably join Ridgeway later in the year though

[ROCKET RONNIE]

hi Tony and welcome mate

[trillian]

Hi Tony,

Welcome to the forum. I had a look at the gallery pics. What you have is the original version of the Futura, usually referred to as the Futura Gold as it has the gold frames and tail boom. The canopy looks quite good for it's age as well. You don't see many of that style canopy because the later Futuras moved to a different design.

I have a bunch of Futuras, mostly SEs but they share a lot of the same parts. I do aslo have some Futura Gold airframe parts.

My guess is that's a Webra 61 engine in there.

I have various manuals and stuff and I'll see if I have a Futura Gold manual in .pdf form you can download.

The Futura is very sturdy and very well engineered. It can last a long time and they fly very well. However, the downside is that parts are outrageously expensive. It's a very stable and forgiving heli and once it's setup properly it will be quite easy to fly (relatively speaking) but you don't want to crash it!

---I just read your post above. Yeah parts can be an issue but you can keep these helis flying, there are quite a few out there still and the way to do it with a machine like this is to buy parts 2nd hand before you need them. So it's one of those things where a little more TLC is required than with some of the newer helis. But, I hasten to add, you will be hard-pressed to find a more accurate and precise flying heli.

Anyway, I'm happy to help any way I can as I am a bit of a dyed-in-the-wool Robbe flyer ('must be something bad I did in a former life ).

[tonyburbidge]

Awesome, once again thanks for the reply! Now I have a dilemma! I have a 'nice' classic heli (yes, it is a Webra 61 engine).... expensive spares and too risky to fly as a beginner!.... on the basis of expensive spares do I fix her up and keep her until I have some more experience of the hobby, or stick her on ebay and use the cash (plus the cash I would have spent doing her up) on a more recent model where spares are more widely available.... Having zero experience of this hobby, I have no ideas what I need to fix her up anyway! Basics would be all the radio gear, servos, transmitter, receiver etc.... then i'd need some main and tail rotor blades and i'm sure there will be a few other accessories.... dang!

[trillian]

Awesome, once again thanks for the reply! Now I have a dilemma! I have a 'nice' classic heli (yes, it is a Webra 61 engine).... expensive spares and too risky to fly as a beginner!.... on the basis of expensive spares do I fix her up and keep her until I have some more experience of the hobby, or stick her on ebay and use the cash (plus the cash I would have spent doing her up) on a more recent model where spares are more widely available.... Having zero experience of this hobby, I have no ideas what I need to fix her up anyway! Basics would be all the radio gear, servos, transmitter, receiver etc.... then i'd need some main and tail rotor blades and i'm sure there will be a few other accessories.... dang!

Yeah, the things you would need to outfit the Futura are pretty much the same as you would need for a modern heli of similar size when it comes to radio gear, servos, gyro etc. It takes 690mm main blades and 105mm tails.

In the grand scheme of things it would be best to learn on something that is cheaper to crash. (not to mention that it would be very difficult to replace that hexagonal boom if it got damaged, it can be replaced with a more common round Futura SE or Millenium boom though).

I don't have any experience with the Webra engine so I'm not sure how easy they are to tune and stuff.

[tonyburbidge]

Hmmmmm...... looking towards Ebay at the moment........

[BobJ]

Hi Tony

Ok no need to send the pictures as per my email reply today, as it's the older gold version in truth I would forget learning on it really as U
i don't think spares are going to be easy to come by and expensive ( not that price or availability us going to be much better on the later SE version) bear In mind the model you have dates from about 1991 & later SE version was around 1995 so both very old in heli terms. I doubt you get much for the model second hand but selling it on and going for a
Modern model would be the better option long term but given as you already have the model another option would be to fit it out and use it until you break it and transfer all the radio to a new model as the equipment you would need would be the same as for a 50 or 90 sized modern model.

Cheers

Bob