Technical details of arriving Omphobby M4 disclosed

Jonas Wackershauser shared many technical details about the new M4 last night. The description is detailing the helicopter well, all key information are listed and reasoned, even detailed images are attached for better understanding.

The helicopter is designed around usability from both the flying and maintenance aspects. The design from maintenance aspects ensures that no need to take it completely apart for a small replacement or adjusting. The very same purpose is served by the open frame design as well. This frame design can also be very beneficial during wiring.

Flying abilities were presented before through more EVT test videos, which were quite satisfying. The only thing which cannot be presented this ways is how the helicopter will behave in your hands, this can only be tested by your own experience.

Viva magenta, charm orange  and racing yellow helicopters will come with black anodised aluminium parts, whilst the blue version will arrive in silver colour on the same parts.

Both the tail and the spindle shafts are 5mm thick, the main shaft is 8mm, which is about the same diameter than the main shaft of the good old T-Rex 500 which is a 420 class, so the main shaft is definitely thick for a model in 380 class, perhaps its crash resistance is high. The typical main shaft diameter in the 380 class is around 6mm.

Both the main and the tail grips have radial-axial-radial bearing arrangement, to hold and guide them properly in all circumstances. The pitch range is designed for ±14° collective and cyclic pitch ranges, but this was already known from the previous publications. Still they are very wide ranges, especially in this class. The high precision long throw tail mechanics isn't new information either, just this time the picture about it can explain, what they meant with this definition.

Indeed, the tail mechanics is very convincing on both the tail and the servo end. Speaking about the tail servo, its placement in the helicopter, namely closer to the front than to the back is unusual nowadays, perhaps the old Align T-Rex 600 was the last using this approach. Jonas promised that this solution will provide virtually unlimited power on the tail. The tail ratio is 4.5:1.

The tail boom has a teardrop shape, it's expected to be very rigid, probably it won't bend too easily.

The flight mechanics has a compact design thanks to the direct drive simplicity, and yet the guys at Omphobby were able to achieve a high vertical CG as well as high rigidity.

The battery was also in the focus as this is also important at electric helicopters. The room for the battery enough to accommodate even bigger batteries, the battery tray has got a latch, which can surprisingly be on both sides depending on that which one you prefer. One thing to be considered at the 1800mAh-2200mAh 6S batteries is the weight, which is ideally between 295 grams and 325 grams.

Seemingly the helicopter is prepared for crashes. Canopy holders are designed to break first to absorb the energy in case of a crash. Beams can be replaced quickly. This solution can protect the main frame.  The motor cage (or on its official name: the motor guard) is a grid around the Sunnysky motor.

This is a standard equipment, and it serves the very same reason as the canopy holder: this has to take impact forces. Definitely more than nothing around a massive motor, and it's obviously cheaper than the motor itself when the helicopter crashes. After all, it's natural, landing gear is impact resistant.

M2.5 screws are used almost everywhere in the frame to provide high crash resistance again, and to prevent broken screws during maintenance.

The swashplate is a conventional 120° CCPM system with an anti rotation bracket. The servo layout perfectly follows this 120°, this is a very precise construction, one of the bests we can have with the current technology standards, there's no technical solution the prevent some sort of geometry distortions mechanically. Nevertheless, if your FBL is unable to overcome these small problems, then you are better chucking that in the bin. The precision is served by the turn-buckle linkage rods, which are provided by Omphobby to all servos and between the swash and the blade grips as well. Speaking of blade grips: now it's a sort of standard, grip arms are mounted with bolts onto the grips, this is not different with the new M4 either.

The Omphobby M4 combo version will come with an Omphobby ESC, which integrates an HV BEC, RPM output, Internal governor & FBL governor options, telemetry output, Omphobby HV 12mm cyclic and tail servos, Fun-Key RotorTech 385mm Ultimate High Performance Carbon Fiber Rotor Blades, Omphobby 71mm tail blades made of durable, impact resistant, fiber reinforced plastic with highly visible paint scheme, and finally but last: Sunnysky direct drive motor. The total take-off weight will be around 1350 grams.