I ordered 2 units for grand kids. I decided to charge and test each unit prior to wrapping. The first heli was fine - charges ok and flew ok. The second unit had been mis-manufactured and could not be charged due to an incorrect left side frame plate which covered the charge cord connection port. A call to H-L customer service resulted in a replacement unit shipped from H-L the same day! The replacement unit worked just fine. This was my first purchase from Hobby-Lobby but won't be the last because of their great customer service. Thanks to Nicky in H-L customer service for her prompt and courteous resolution to my problem. Rating for the manufacturer's QC is 1*. Rating for H-L customer service is 5*.

When I got the heli in the mail it was a little smaller then what I thought, but when i started using it I was glad about the size. I am a first time heli owner. This heli can really take a beating i accidentally dropped it from about 6 1/2 feet in the air when i was flying it. The only thing that i didn't like was that the manual didn't tell me what the blue left and right buttons on the remote were for but i figured out that they were for the lights on the underneath although the flying time is short less then ten minutes per charge. You can have a lot of fun in that short amount of time. I would definitely recommend it to anyone looking for a good tough little heli

I've flown RC planes for 40 years but had not tried helicopters until Santa brought this one for my 9 year old. Note that the packaging indicates that this model is for ages 14+, and that is probably right unless your kid is going to have lots of help and supervision to get this little model flying well. We live at high altitude (8000 feet), and were already aware that model helicopters are marginal performers at this altitude.

We initially tried to fly this in the living room and quickly smashed it into the furniture. Fortunately it survived, but until you learn to fly it well, you need a much larger space. We were able to gain access to a school cafeteria this morning and found that the large, open area of the cafeteria gave us plenty of room to trim it out and learn to keep it under control. After 3 flights in the cafeteria, my kid is ready to try it in the smaller space of the school hall way, and then we will take it home and take on the challenge of the living room.

Be aware that if you live at high altitude, you may not be satisfied with the performance. We can maintain an altitude of about 5 feet for the first 3 or 4 minutes of flight time, but after that, as the battery discharges, we can only fly in ground effect, less then 5 inches AGL. It requires about 3/4 throttle to hover and nearly full throttle to climb out to shoulder height.

Flying tips:
Find a large, indoor, open space for your first few flights. A school gymnasium or cafeteria is ideal, but a two car garage or other open space will work. A place with a smooth floor is really helpful because the landing skids tend to snag on carpet, causing the bird to flip onto its side.

You can charge from the transmitter, but this rapidly drains the transmitter batteries. I strongly recommend that you use the USB charging cord instead. We plugged this into the USB power adapter that came with our Kindle. The charger's housing glows red when the chopper is fully charged.

Set up the helicopter so that you are standing directly behind it. Keep yourself lined up with the tail boom so that the transmitter and the helicopter are both facing the same direction.

Set the transmitter to the desired channel (A, B, or C) and pull the throttle (left control stick) stick all the way back, turn on the transmitter and receiver. Advance the throttle to full and then pull it all the way back again. This allows the helicopter to recognize the transmitter.

Notice that all of the LEDS are flashing brightly. Use the two blue buttons on the top of the transmitter to shut these off. You have a really limited power supply, and the LEDS suck up a lot of juice. At high altitude, we cannot get the helicopter off the ground if the LEDs are flashing. I'm thinking of removing them to save the weight and permanently eliminate the power drain.

Gentle Gentle Gentle on the controls. For your first few flights, advance the throttle carefully and deliberately. Feel the detent notches in the throttle stick, and practice advancing the throttle one notch at a time until the helicopter begins to skitter. If you are flying over carpet, you need to quickly lift off so that the skids dont drag, but this is really tricky, it is easy to advance the throttle too far, slam the copter against the ceiling and then send it crashing to the floor.

Its much better on a smooth floor. When it starts to skitter, about 2 more notches of throttle will take it to an altitude of about 3 inches. Once the helicopter is airborne, it will hover, more or less in the same place, probably yawing slowly in one direction or another. Make very small adjustments to the trim knob between the two control sticks to straighten out any yaw tendency.

Be ready to chop the throttle when the helicopter gets out of control.

You have NO roll control, only pitch and yaw, so you have to fly purely by attitude adjustment. Right stick controls your pitch and yaw. Pushing the stick forward causes the helicopter to pitch forward and then begin to fly forward. Neutralizing the stick returns to hover. Moving the stick from side to side causes the helicopter to yaw left or right respectively.

Practice yawing the helicopter to the heading you want and stopping the yaw when it is pointing in exactly the direction you want. Try to yaw it around the compass, stopping at each of the compass points.

Once we mastered this, we taped four sheets of typing paper to the floor and practiced flying from point to point, landing on each sheet of paper.

Downside is that the helicopter takes 30 minutes to charge for every ten minutes of flight time, but this is simply a limitation of the current technology. A spare battery pack that can be removed for charging would be a nice upgrade, but overall, I feel that this is a nice little helicopter, and probably about as good as anyone has the right to expect at this price.

Experiments we are planning to try: We are going to try removing the body shell and the decorative tail skid. I don't think either one has any aerodynamic purpose, they are just for pretty, and if we can remove a few grams of mass, we think we can get better flight performance.

1st Shark heli I got would not charge from either the USB cable or the transmitter. I could get the rotors spinning but not enough power to get out of ground effect. Hobby Lobby's fantastic customer service sent me a replacement right away. Unfortunately the replacement doesn't charge or even link to the transmitter. I tried every channel (A,B, and C) and variations of turning on the heli then the transmitter and visa versa. The second heli had a different charging plug. But that did not help. I even replaced the batteries in the transmitter just in case the new pack I opened had bad AAs it it.

Heli looks cool but I am 0 for 2. I will not be trying for a 3rd. Kudos to Hobby Lobby customer service. But this product is junk.

This heli is a blast. I have flown rc planes for at least 5 years and am fairly advanced. My brother gave me this heli for my birthday. It is super easy to fly even for a novice flier and really fun. It may be the step that gets me into flying more advanced helis. It drives my cat nuts!!