First PicooZ mods
 

Here's my first modded PicooZ. The tail boom has been lightened by removing the paper and the back section of the foam canopy. The main rotor has been balanced with a piece of tape. The fuselage was split down the middle and the battery moved forward. The graphics stickers were changed so that they are all in the front of the CG. The gear covers have been removed and the fuselage painted with artist acrylics thinned with water.

This Picoo was the usual clockwize spin variety that leveled out and trimmed beautifully to a meandering hover right out of the box. It had no forward motion. I tried weights, but didn't like the loss of runtime at the end of the bettery discharge.
This heli is now slightly lighter than stock and has great forward motion. It also can gain altitude until nearly 10 seconds of circuit cut off with very little wasted on ground effect.

This Picoo now flies beautifully! I can sit on the couch, take off from the coffee table and fly back and forth through the kitchen and living room. Just a tad less left trim on the stick allows the heli to slightly turn clockwise and it's off in another determined direction! After a good ten minutes, I can direct it to the coffee table helipad for a soft landing.
Next is the bearing mod to the main rotor for even longer runtimes!

So who wants to be the first to get me one of these?
Just Kidding

I just realized you don't need to do any of these tricky mods to get your Picoo to fly forward. All you need to do is twist the tail rotor dramatically. I tried this on a freshly opened, unmodded PicooZ last night and it flies forward faster than this one now. And unlike adding or subtracting weight, you can readjust if it's going to fast forward or to slow.
It seems that twisting the tail a lot makes the tail rotor have some down trust as well as side thrust and it lifts the tail like the Bladerunners and MMs. Try it, you'll be amazed!

Good stuff Az!

I've been neglecting my Picoos recently as I've started putting in some Simulator time in preparation for flying my HoneyBee FP2 !! :D

It's a real mind bender to adjust to working with 4 channels!

I've finally started getting used to flying "tail in", in the sim. Once I'm confortable flying "nose in"...THEN I'll feel I'm ready to take out the real deal!

I definitley need to get back into the Picoo mod though, I had order some 1mm carbon rods and micro battery connectors and such so I can build my own frame for the picoo and give it the ability to be able to swap in/out fresh batteries !

I bet it is! I have a hard enough time mastering 2 channels on the Picoo. I'm planning to do the same. There's just something cool about the open frame models. I guess because they look a bit like the original prototypes made a few years ago. More machine looking than toy looking.
I swear, I haven't had so much fun since the introduction of Zips and Bits.

They are great little helos arn't they! Here's mine. No mods yet, just an added tack in the front for ff.

Yeah, I love em. My son and a freind came over today and we had three of them in the air dog fighting. Sounded like being inside a hornets nest!

I have one, I havent done much. Created a front air dam on the nose. It is nice for forward flight. Especially when you throttle up. It really takes off.

Another trick is...I put a piece of scotch tape down the tail boom and folded it over. Effectivly making the tail boom taller. WOW made such a difference in stability.

I also got one of the Wild Wheels 3ch off the bay of e. Wont go forward. The 3rd ch does little.

Anyway, thats my .02

Ive neglected this board. I need to show you guys my collection now.

I went from a ZZ in July now I have:

2 epochs (1turbo supra - 1just shotgun motor WRX)
MR01 F40
Firelap II Mclaren
MR02 (no body at the moment)
MA-010 Chassis set and Lancia Delta
BMW Overland
and an assload of ZZs my fave being my articulated Yellow H2.

That sounds like fun! And they sure can take a beating! Mine has atleast 25 crashes on it, with the wall, furniture, and celing fan :rolleyes:

My modded Picoo just died! I've been flying three of them for a couple of weeks with most of the flight time on the modded one, which is my original Picoo. With all this flying time, I never broke a tail rotor. Well, I made up for my good luck with one good crash. The tail rotor broke, so I replaced it with a new one. The Heli still spun around counter clockwise like crazy. All I can figure is that the tail motor got a good smack and isn't getting up to speed anymore. It's still hooked up and spinning, but can't counter the main rotor anymore.
Not a big deal as I wanted one for parts anyways. And I've gotten alot of flights outta the thing. I'm using my ch B Picoo for most flights now and alternate with a ch C every now and then. Man, I love these things!

Everywhere I go... PicooZ this, PiccoZ that, these are so cool...
WHY CAN'T MINE COME IN THE MAIL ALREADY!!!!!

I also wanted to be the first to paint one :( , no one seemed to have the courage to do it. Also, I have a suspicion that regular spray paint will eat the body, am I correct?

Maxx

Yeah, regular spray paint will dissolve the foam. There are water based spray paints, but they may go on a bit heavy and weight is a big factor. I just used watered down artists acrylic paints. The pics posted earlier in the thread show my modded and painted Picoo.

Here's a few pics of another modded PicooZ. It has the carbon fiber main shaft/ball bearing mod as well as a new frame.

The frame is made of 1mm carbon fiber rod superglued together and then the joints were epoxied for strength. The main rotor was balanced with a small sticker.

Part of the original Picoo body is used with other foam parts added.

This heli flies super smooth. The bearings make it whisper quiet and have increased runtime. The heli shuts off after 10 seconds of dropping into ground effect.

Last pic. Here you can see some of the frame that holds the battery. I used some .5mm carbon fiber rod for braces. I tried to design the thing so that I could replace any parts that would eventually fail. The battery is farther forward to allow for more FF.

Beautiful work!

Our Pico at work has started not flying anymore. :(

I went to look at it with new eyes after reading about your mods, but something has failed on it.

It spins wildly now and crashes before you can trim it out.
(This kind of thing is expected with demo units)

Az! That bird is looking delicious!! :)

I had bought a few extra of the 50mah batteries (12 to be exact) and also got some micro-nano-pico (in other words, REALLY tiny) power connectors. I'm hoping to be able to swap in/out the battery so I can use my peak charger.

I want to Mod the battery too....I read somewhere guys were thinking about 130mah battery....should give 15min of flight...heard of that?? They mentioned that Picooz batteries are 50ma/10c batteries. So you can safely pull 50ma X 10 = 500mA max current draw......here's some of the batteries...

http://www.bphobbies.com/view.asp?id=A2416227

Im new to all this....just bought 4 yesterday...2 for me...and two Christmas presents....will mod the first one :D and keep one stock.....

We can't keep these in stock at my RS store.
I frequently order them for folks, but they are very popular and are very often sold out online too.

Mostly adults for themselves.

Here's my picco. I love it. It flies a lot better after the new shell and I also added some paper to the stab to stop the spinning.

Flies great!


http://i95.photobucket.com/albums/l1...cture020-1.jpg

I sure am glad I found this thread,,, I just purchased a copy heli of the picco,,, called a zip zap,,,, I cant wait to start doing the mods you guys are speaking of,,,,,,

btw can you explain how you added the bearings and also what size bearings you use

Waitwaitwaitwait....You bought a knockoff PicooZ called a ZipZap?

There are knockoffs all over the place... got ours for $75 for 2... love these little helos

air hogs havoc heli is exactly the same got mine at walmart 2day for $30 and already modding thanks for all the great pics everyone but, Azimov, could you maybe give me some more of that frame and maybe some drawings?

Where did you get this and can you post pics of it?There are detailed threads on this over at RCGroups. And indoorflyer.co.uk sells a kit that has the bearings and carbon fiber shaft.Really would like to know more about this if it exists.I haven't seen these yet. Are they exact copies of PicooZs? I know spinmaster had been chosen to sell Picoos, but I didn't know they would be renamed.The frame is actually very simple. I'll see if I can whip up a drawing as my camcorder was taken back to it's owner and I can't get pics right now. Still, I would suggest exploring the PiccoZ mods threads at RCGroups as there is a wealth of different frame ideas there.

yep they are exactly the same I will post some pics soon of packing and chopper, but they are the picooz to a T all they did was put an Airhogs sticker on the remote, that I quickly peeled off! :p And I'm heading over to RCG now, Thanks

Your right RCGroups is cool and there are several links there about the Havoc Heli

Cool! There has been alot of talk about Airhogs (Spinmaster) putting out Picoos for some time. I guess they missed the boat on Xmas though. I really expected to see them before the Holidays were over. No problem though, I hope they are around for some time.
Yes, please give us a pic or two of the Airhogs heli with it's packaging when you get the time.

sorry its been so long but my dog thought my chopper was a flying chew toy
and ate it so I'll be buying a fw more soon

np, I bought a Havok the other day and it's the most balanced, best flying Picoo I've had to date. I really love these things. I look forward to what Silverlit has up their sleeve for new models or improvements. Whatever that may be.

Been a long while since I posted here, but here's my havoc. Just ordered a gram scale so I should have weights in a few days.

That's looking good man! I am most envious of your heli pad. I don't think I'm gonna tear into my Havoc anytime soon. It flies way to well to screw around with. I do have another Picco that I've got plans for though.

Nighthawk
 

Here's my first attempt at modding:

http://sg.geocities.com/saltandlight55/nighthawk1.jpg

http://sg.geocities.com/saltandlight55/nighthawk2.jpg

Kewl! Looks like some kind of Jewish Black Opps heli, lol. The conspiracies are true! Where's my tinfoil cap, lol.