Airhogs Havoc Remote Controlled Mini Helicopter review

• Author: DigitalMind
• Filed under: Techie Toys'n'Games
• Date: Apr 7,2008

My friend told me about a very affordable remote controlled helicopter that is meant to be used indoors ! (Approx. 25$ at Walmart) As a techie, I’ve always loved all things remote controlled, and always wanted a remote controlled plane or helicopter. I rushed to Walmart and picked one up. I wasn’t expecting much.

The Havoc Helicopter is about 5 inches long, and 2 inches high. It’s body is made of Styrofoam ! (That kind of worried me, but it turns out it’s a GREAT thing) There is a blue LED in the helicopter that blinks when turned on, it’s a great help with helicopter salvage missions when it’s stuck behind a cabinet amongst a mess of wires!

The helicopter is charged via the remote control which holds 6 AA batteries. You can fly the helicopter for about 5 minutes before needing to recharge for about 15 minutes. That’s not too bad. At first the wait time seemed like forever since I was still learning how to fly. After a few flights, 5-6 minutes of flying was plenty to fill up my flying needs and waiting 15 minutes to fly again was no problem.

I wish it came with a wall charger though so that the batteries in the remote wouldn’t get drained by recharging the helicopter itself.

It does take some practise to fly this helicopter, the controls are VERY sensitive (especially when you first start on a fresh charge) and the first few “flights” that I did was more flying into walls and the ceiling than anything else. A few hours later however, I was able to manoeuver it all over the apartment, and even make it land nicely at the designated “landing zones” in the apartment.

My girlfriend and I made a game of it, we made landing zones and assigned points to each one based on how hard it is to gently land it there. I would charge the helicopter, fly and land as much as I could in the 5-6 minutes of battery power I had. After we recharge the battery, it’s her turn, then we compare our points!

The Styrofoam body made it last way longer than it should. I crashed it every way imaginable (not on purpose). I had to pull it out from behind cabinets, behind the couch, yet somehow it survived it all ! (I honestly didn’t think it would last more than a couple of days, considering the cost and the “look” of it)

I’ve had this helicopter for over 6 months now, I bent the back “tail” while fishing it out from behind a cabinet, and it now has a bad habit of turning much more in one direction, no matter how much I adjust the trim. It’s ok though, I got my money’s worth and I give this product a 4/5 because of the price! (If it cost $100, I would have said it’s BAD, but for $25, it’s EXCELLENT!)

In Conclusion, this is a very good product and a great starter RC helicopter for fun around the house (Or in my case, apartment!) . It has motivated me to go and get a bigger and better one that I will be able to use outside.

Here is a Video from the makers of the helicopter, showing the Airhog, and demonstrating the REFLEX (that I haven’t heard about, but now really want to try) :

That’s the end of my Airhog Havoc Helicopter review, Thanks for visiting TechieNATION !