Heli-Baby - The homepage

Reproduction

When I purchased in summer 2007 an old Heli Baby series 1976, I was after first inspection very dissapointed about the condition of the model. The steel parts were very rosty, the aluminium parts covered with resinous rests of castor oil, all the bearings were notchy, the canopy was cloudy and shattered and so on. All in all there was no part that has survived the long stay of about quart of a century in a storeroom without any damage. The look for spareparts was also not successfull. The most dealers which were accredited Schluter sercice centers in the past have closed their shops during the years or have passed.
So I started to measure the parts with a caliper, made drawings of them and developed manufacturing plans, to make these parts in the often necessary pauses on the machines between bigger part series in a small number of pieces.
I was surprised that the nessessary time to produce them was much bigger than I have planned and than the model promises on the first look. Some "old" production methods I had to develop new, because we do not apply them on our Joker models. The nessesary tool construction was immense and has temporarily disturbed the normal production.
Congratulations to Dieter Schluter and his former team, who has produced this model compared with today in very large series.
On this page you can see the birth of the "Heli-Baby 07". The main aspect is always the highest possible originality. The first pic shows the Original-Schluter spare parts list from 1976 with added numbers, which were good for identifying the correct spare parts. This arrangement was choosen as base, to get always a good overview about the progress of the project. Parallel to this "main theatre of war" exists a second field with plastic parts, rotorblades, wooden parts. The following pics show the continuous progress of the model. But this progress cannot calculated exactly following the pics, because many parts are nearly ready and only really ready parts are shown. So we expect the complete kits about end of 2007. About 90 percent of all parts are self made because the series is so small.

The kit price of such a small series is not to calculate. So Dieter Schluter hat suggested to offer the kits to the same price like 1975 but now in Euro (378 Euro w/o tax)) and I will follow that idea. This sound logical and will be an acceptable compromise to get the investment back. The spare prices are on a similar level, so a crash will not cause higher costs.

Original - Klicken Sie für die Vergrößerung

Nachbau - Klicken Sie für die Vergrößerung

catalog spare plan

status oct 1st 2007

status oct 15th 2007

status oct 26th 2007

status nov 05th 2007

status nov 27th 2007

statusnd jan 04th 2008

The last reproduction parts were ready at new year 2008, so in the first week of january the first prototype could be finished. Except some small details all parts fitted at once (what is generally not normal).
The follwing still shots try to show the charme the Heli-Baby has like in the good old times. The model looks simply extraordinary in relation to all other models on the market.

Prototyp - Klicken Sie für die Vergrößerung

prototype pic 1

prototype pic 2

prototype pic 3

prototype pic 4

prototype pic 5

prototype pic 6

prototype pic 7

prototype pic 8

After justation of the radio parts the first flight of the new Heli-Baby was the 13th of january 2008. The wheather promised for a short period of time good conditions with sun and calm wind. To save time to get at least some good shots I drove quickly to a near parking field in the near. As in good old times the model was equipped with four servos (Futaba 3001), a ppm-receiver and a 1400mAh Sanyo KR battery and nothing else. I was curious to see if it was possible for me after more than a quart of a century to fly without gyro...and it was successfull. In the menu "films" are some short sequences of the first flights. The first flight was me, the camera was an old type, I am sorry. Later in the afternoon I gave my radio to a friend and filmed for myself. So I shot some good pics. He also could fly the Baby with the same success after about the same time that he has not flown without gyro as me.
Below some impressions from the first flights.

Erstflug - Klicken Sie für die Vergrößerung

first flight pic 1

first flight pic 2

first flight pic 3

first flight pic 4

first flight pic 5

first flight pic 6

first flight pic 7

first flight pic 8

Parallel to the built of the prototype the bags for the kits were packed. Of course I looked also for an authentic design of the kit (only the box is smaller now). The pics below show the kit content.

Finishing this short story I will thank all who helped me to realize this extraordinary project, before all I must mention my wife Jutta. Without her initial idea ("It is so sweet! Why do you not produce such a model?") the Heli-Baby would not be born a second time. Thank also for Dieter Schluter and Eberhard Hof (Helioldie.de) for their continuous help!

Bausatz - Klicken Sie für die Vergrößerung

kit content pic 1

kit content pic 2