My first HobbyKing support issue

When you browse though different RC forums on the web you often hear people saying that HobbyKing is cheap but does not provide any support. Or that HobbyKing does not stand behind their product and they would not solve any support claims.

Based on my experience this is not true. Read below what I recently experienced with HobbyKing’s support team…

Until now I was one of the lucky customers that had received every order in perfect condition. Moreover all the products I ordered worked as expected. Unfortunately that changed with the HK450GT that I received recently (read here).

During the build and setup i noticed nothing special. Everything went together pretty easily. But then it was time for the first test hover. And nothing happened! The motor speed up but the main rotor only turned very slowly. At first I thought the maybe the pinion was not secured correctly on the motor shaft. But that was not the case. After bringing the helicopter back into the house the problem was found very quickly:

As you can see on the video the one-way bearing does not sit correctly in the main gear assembly. Either the OD of the one-way bearing is too small or the ID of the main gear assembly is too large. In either case the main gear has no chance to apply torque to the main shaft. That’s why the rotor only turns very slow while the motor spins normal.

At that point I filed a support ticket on HobbyKing’s new support page. I wrote them what exactly the problem is and also included the upper shown YouTube link. As I filed the issue on Sunday I was not expecting to hear from HobbyKing until Tuesday or Wednesday. But HobbyKing’s support staff seams to work really quick (when you take into account how many support tickets they might get every day). On Monday afternoon I already got a response. They told me that the warranty department checked my claim and that they already requested a replacement from the manufacturer. As soon as the replacements arrives they will send it to me at their cost.

So everything worked out great for me. All I have to do is wait for the replacement to arrive. As I have a spare main gear assembly from my previously crashed HK450v2 the waiting time is no problem for me. But I can understand that somebody who does not have any spare parts might be disappointed as his new heli would not fly until the replacement arrives.