Torsion blades

[Andy from Sandy]

A guy at the field today was flying around doing a few piro flips when for no apparent reason his helicopter screws itself in a ball and fell out of the sky.

This was a Synergy using the 690s http://www.modelhelicopters.co.uk/ac...s_Torsion.html

When we got to the model one of the blades had split completely open from tip to root. On even closer inspection there was an exit hole where the lead weight went out.

These blades unlike any other I have seen do not have a foam core. There is a couple of bits of balsa stuck in and that is it.

A fellow club member happens to work with carbon and when he looked at the blade his conclusion is that the construction of the blade is below par. The blade is made in two halfs and just stuck together. He could see where the lead weight was stuck in and there was not a continuous line of glue, just a few dabs.

For those that use these blades you may want to try twisting them and see if they are coming apart around the edge.

[Tim Procter]

Mmmmm, Not good.

[Smoothound]

I saw a set mashed at Charmouth today and although they went in quite hard they were both purely broken in half rather than split...

I've not used them myself although I've crash tested many other types of blades

[Tim Procter]

Torsion blades have had "VERY GOOD" reviews so this comes as a shock TBH.

Like anything in this world, There is always a bad apple that can spoil the party.

[waveydavey]

The construction is definitely suspect, there is nothing wrapping one side to the other so it is as Andy says above below par design and construction. The guy up until today was loving the blades, nothing wrong with the flying characteristics.

[marktigere1]

Well this is timing.

Stuffed the Raptor today and my 600 Torsion Glass blades have opened along the seams on both blades

The balsa core spread over the field.

Worried about my other set on the Skippy now as they do look a bit suspect in construction having looked inside.

[Andy from Sandy]

God forbid, what we don't want is for the lead to exit when the model is in a hover near anyone.

[MrB]

V-blades are also wood cored. It's always hard after a crash-did it cause the crash or did the crash cause it

[Andy from Sandy]

did it cause the crash or did the crash cause it

It looks to have caused the crash. We think the lead weight exited the blade first causing the tracking to be badly affected.

In other crashes where for instance there has been a boom strike, the blade is either broken or badly damaged at the point of strike.

In all the crashes that have happened at the field it is the first time we have ever seen a blade completely separated along the seam on the leading and trailing edge.

[Nipster]

Have just seen something similar on a different forum. A Torsion tail blade seems to have split down the seam then vacated the grip leaving the bolt and brass bush behind.
You can clearly see the dabs of glue on the two halfs.

Downed a 700 too

Hope this isn't a trend developing.

[ivor-bigen]

Hi
Is this with the new or old style Torsion`s?
Ivor

[nightstalker]

These are the new type of blades also not mentioned is that the N9 is one of the hardest helis to boom strike come to think of it you can while il flight, so this is why us at the club felt the blades let this heli down in flight and on hitting the ground the blades was not moving so the impact didnt make the damge we saw in the aftermath

[marktigere1]

Have just seen something similar on a different forum. A Torsion tail blade seems to have split down the seam then vacated the grip leaving the bolt and brass bush behind.
You can clearly see the dabs of glue on the two halfs.

Downed a 700 too

Hope this isn't a trend developing.

Great, I have Torsion tail blades on the Skippy as well

[Ashley Davis]

before everyone panics.....this is one set of blades that had a failure.

Both I and Robgt have been beating the crap out of torsion blades for several months with no issue, so bear in mind that whilst this might sound bad you need repeated failures of this type before writing them off as dangerous. For the record I've had weights move around in thunder tiger blades and BBT maniacs in the past, so this isn't something new or unique to Torsion.

[waveydavey]

I don't think anyone is panicking Ashley just pointing out the inflight failure of a blade which I and others witnessed. Andy was loving the blades and has also been chucking the N9 around. But the fact remains when you look at the construction of them it's not good. Two halves glued together along their seams without any wrapping especially on the leading edge is not good. We have a composite engineer who works in F1 in the club and he was surprised at the construction.