As a professional helicopter flier, I often find myself writing reviews for remove control helicopters, and this includes electric helicopters. The electric ones are often the ones with the most agility, which is very important to many consumers, but you can probably imagine that these helicopters are also the ones that can be dangerous if you try to fly them in the rain or near power lines. So whenever I write reviews for remote control electric helicopters, I make sure to emphasize the potential pitfalls and I test each one carefully.

I am not like some of the other reviewers that just writes an endorsement for any old remote control electric helicopters just because they are getting paid to do so. In fact, sometimes, I will actually turn down the opportunity to promote remote control electric helicopters of a certain brand because I deem them dangerous for the typical consumers, and I worry that people will read my review, go out and purchase a specific brand of remote control electric helicopters and end up getting really injured. One occasion of this happening with a colleague really hit home with me, and I’d like to elaborate on it a bit.

This friend wrote a gleaming review for remote control electric helicopters, and I had warned him that the brand he was writing about was not always the most reliable, and sometimes they used cheaper materials to cut corners. Well, he was too entranced by the amount of money offered for this short review, so he wrote one that was just brilliant, and he posted it online and in print for everyone to see. Lo and behold, sales in that helicopter skyrocketed, and people for the most part were happy with them after the first few weeks of purchase. Then bad things began to happen. People reported the remote control electric helicopters shorting out and a few peoples’ helicopters even caught fire because of faulty wiring.

One person had to go to the hospital because they tried to put the fire out in their remote control electric helicopter and they couldn’t put it out fast enough. And a small explosion was enough for one consumer to lose a finger. As you can imagine, the reviewer just felt horrible about giving this company such a great review for their remote control electric helicopters when he had never even checked them out. The saddest thing was that this reviewer then left the helicopter business because he felt so shamed about leaving an un-researched review and hurting his trusting readers. I tried to get him to come back to the helicopter company after he was away for a few years, because I knew that flying helicopters was his passion, and I just felt so bad that he had deserted it.

It was obvious that he was depressed by the entire incident, and he ultimately did go back to flying in recreational meets, but he never regained his great name or reputation, and he was demoted to the ranks of recreational fliers from them on.

View all Kate Billings's articles

---

About the Author:

More Remote Control articles