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V-WING AVENGER
R/C AIRCRAFT

Air Hogs V-Wing Avenger R/C Aircraft, retail $49.90 (www.spindirect.com...)
Manufactured by Spinmaster (www.spinmaster.com)
Last updated 02-05-11

This isn't a flashlight, household lamp, Christmas light set, or other thing that glows,but what the hey. I have only evaluated remote controlled (RC) toys several times before, so please bear with me here.

I love things that fly; that's why I took the bate (I've seen the Air Hogs brand advertised on United States TV over the last year or maybe a little more {as of early-October 2008}) and also why I added a seperate section titled "PRODUCTS DESIGNED TO FLY" on my website.

This is a fairly small, lightweight, easy-to-fly remote controlled aircraft. It fits in the palm of your hand, and is designed exclusively to be flown indoors.

It flaps its wings in order to fly; not all that unlike this product.

SIZE

This toy is remarkably easy to use for an R/C aircraft...here's how to make it fly:

As with any rechargeable product, charge it first (see directly below), and then you can pretend to fly a dragonfly (well, that's what the kitty cats think it is).

1: Be certain the battery in the aircraft is fully charged first.

2: On the underside of the aircraft's body near the front, there's a tiny on/off switch.
Use a fingernail to slide this switch to the "on" position.

3: Hold the aircraft so that the nose points straight ahead; you should hold it with most of your fingers gently grasping the underside (bottom) of the Avenger's fuselage (body).

4: On the remote control, slide the switch to the right of the left-hand control slider toward the right; a green LED will come on.

5: Gently throw the aircraft forward, and push forward on the left hand slider - if you followed these instructions even slightly, your Avenger should now be flying.

Congratulations, you are now a pilot!!!

For additional instructions & tips on how to fly, please read the instructional material that comes with the product.

Turn the Avenger and remote control off when finished using them.
Same switches as before, but slide them in the opposite direction this time.

The battery in the Avenger itself is rechargeable and is not designed to be changed; however the batteries in the remote will need to be changed from time to time.

To do this, unscrew & remove the phillips screw from the battery door on the underside of the unit, using a phillips screwdriver that you furnish yourself. Set the screw aside if it comes out; otherwise just leave it in the hole.

Remove the battery door, very gently place it on the ground, and kick it into the garden so the hungry, hungry praying mantids will think it's something yummy to eat and strike at it...O WAIT!!! YOU'LL NEED THAT!!! So just set it aside instead.

Remove the four used AA cells from the compartment, and dispose of or recycle them as you see fit.

Insert four new AA cells into the compartment, orienting each cell so its flat-end (-) negative faces a spring for it in each chamber.

Finally, place the battery door back on, and screw the screw back in.
Aren't you glad you didn't kick that battery door into the garden with all those hungry, hungry praying mantids now?

Here is what a praying mantis looks like.
I found this guy on the morning of 09-08-06 clinging to the basket of my scooter.

To charge the battery in the Avenger, follow these simple steps:

Place the Avenger directly over the charge port on the remote, and press it down gently until it fits the port (see the photograph a bit farther down this section).
Slide the switch on the remote to the left (so it is positioned directly above the "CHG" position).
Red & green lights in the remote should now come on.
When the green light turns off, slide the switch on the remote to the center ("OFF") position.
Disengage the Avenger from the unicomplex...er...uh...the remote control.

Photograph showing the Avenger "docked" with the remote for charging.

According to the instructional materials, one full charge (stated as "up to 15 to 20 minutes") will give you 5 minutes of flight time.

This RC aircraft is meant to be used as a toy in a dry area outdoors, not as a flashlight meant to be carried around, thrashed, trashed, and abused, so I won't try to drown it in the toliet tank, bash it against a steel rod or against the concrete floor of a patio, let my mother's dog's ghost take a leak on it, run over it with a 450lb Celebrity motorised wheelchair, stomp on it, use a medium ball peen hammer in order to bash it open to check it for candiosity, fire it from the cannoñata, drop it down the top of Mt. Erupto (I guess I've been watching the TV program "Viva Piñata" too much again

(yes, I watched four episodes of this program just two days ago!!!) - candiosity is usually checked with a laser-type device on a platform with a large readout (located at Piñata Central), with a handheld wand that Langston Lickatoad uses, or with a pack-of-cards-sized device that Fergy Fudgehog uses; the cannoñata (also located at Piñata Central) is only used to shoot piñatas to piñata parties away from picturesque Piñata Island, and Mt. Erupto is an active volcano on Piñata Island), send it to the Daystrom Institute for additional analysis, or perform other indecencies on it that a flashlight might have to have performed on it. So this section of the web page will be ***SIGNIFICANTLY*** more bare than this section of the web page on a page about a flashlight.

This product is recommended for children of 8 years of age or older; younger children can injure themselves on moving parts or by swallowing something they should not (like an AA cell or the spare rudder).

The Avenger has three "channels"; this allows three models to be simultaneouly flown in the same airspace. There is a selector switch on the remote controller labelled "A", "B", and "C"; this switch should be set by the factory to the correct band; however if your Avenger becomes lost or destroyed, you can replace it with another Avenger and use the same remote controller with it.

Photograph of its remote control.

WMP movie (.avi extension) showing the red LED in it flashing.
This clip is approximately 1.968 megabytes (2,096,506 bytes) in length; dial-up users please be aware.
It will take no less than nine minutes to load at 48.0Kbps.

Screen dump from the above video, showing the red LED in its "on" state.

WMP movie (.avi extension) showing the Avenger flying in the living room.
It flies out of the frame quite quickly, then flies back into & out of the frame later; but you should be able to hear the wings flapping for the entire duration of the flight.

This clip is approximately 3.590 megabytes (3,725,098 bytes) in length; dial-up users please be aware.
It will take no less than eighteen minutes to load at 48.0Kbps.

Screen dump from the above video, showing the Avenger in the air.

Video clip on YourTube showing a very brief flight of the Avenger.

In this video, you can hear me say "Entering sector zero point three" in the same manner as the speech synthesizer in the coin-op arcade video game ''Star Trek'' {it's supposed to be Mr. Spock saying this}, then say "I mean...flight number three", in the same manner as the speech synthesizer in the coin-op arcade video game ''Looping'', followed by the Avenger briefly flying across the room, crashing into the wall, and becoming stuck between a floor lamp and the wall.

This clip is approximately 2.899984231243 megabytes (3,034,898 bytes) in length; dial-up users please be aware.
It will take no less than forteen minutes to load at 48.0Kbps.

Another video clip on YourTube showing another very brief flight of the Avenger.

In this video, you can hear me say "Entering sector zero point five" in the same manner as the speech synthesizer in the coin-op arcade video game ''Star Trek'' {it's supposed to be Mr. Spock saying this}, then say "I mean...flight number six", in the same manner as the speech synthesizer in the coin-op arcade video game ''Looping'', followed by the Avenger briefly flying across the room, crashing into the wall, and slowly sinking down that wall & disappearing behind the bed.

This clip is approximately 2.476345245555 megabytes (2,601,918 bytes) in length; dial-up users please be aware.
It will take no less than twelve minutes to load at 48.0Kbps.

A video clip on YourTube showing the NIR LEDs flashing in the remote control for the Avenger.

This clip is approximately 3.295453435675 megabytes (3,460,752 bytes) in length; dial-up users please be aware.
It will take no less than sixteen minutes to load at 48.0Kbps.

Video montage (single video though) on YourTube showing the product failing to fly correctly.

That sound that you may hear during part of this video is music from the pee-cee computer demo "Delusion" by the demo group ''Sonic PC''. This product is not sound-sensitive; the music may be safely ignored or even muted if it pisses you off.

This video is 2.098885723422 megabytes (2,324,381 bytes) in length; dial-up users please be aware.
It will take no less than ten minutes to load at 48.0Kbps.

I cannot provide any of these videos in other formats, so please do not ask.

Spectrographic analysis of the LED in the Avenger.

Spectrographic analysis of the LED in te Avenger; spectrometer's response narrowed to a band between 630nm and 640nm to pinpoint emission peak wavelength, which is 632.980nm.

The raw spectrometer data (comma-delimited that can be loaded into Excel) is at http://www.tllm.site//42/avenger.txt

Spectrographic analysis of the flashing red LED in the aircraft.

Spectrographic analysis of the red "Power" LED in the aircraft's remote control.

Spectrographic analysis of the yellow-green "Charge cycle in progress" LED in the aircraft's remote control.

Spectrographic analysis of the NIR LEDs in the remote.
Looks like the peak wavelength is 920nm.

USB2000 spectrometer for visible wavelengths graciously donated by P.L.
PC2000-ISA spectrometer for NIR analysis graciously donated by Ocean Optics.

TEST NOTES:
Test unit was ordered from Spinmaster on 10-05-08, and was received on the evening of 11-03-08.

Product was made in China.
A product's country of origin really does matter to some people, which is why I published it on this web page.

UPDATE: 00-00-00

Spinmaster

R/C aircraft

NIR and visible red LED

4 (3 on R/C, 1 in aircraft itself)

N/A

Slide on/off on underside of product

Styrofoam & plastic

N/A

4xAA cells (remote), 3.7 volts LiPo rechargeable (aircraft itself)

Unknown/unable to measure

Very light splatter-resistance at maximum

NO WAY HOZAY!!!

"Arch" kit (for the floor), labels (for repairs), spare rudder

Unknown/not stated

Because this product is not intended to emit light (though it does have a flashing LED), the standard "star" rating will not be used.

Air Hogs V-Wing Avenger R/C Aircraft * www.spindirect.com...

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