The Evo 1000 Source List

Evo 1000 when built

Since I have a few friends interested in getting into the RC Flying Hobby, I am including a first ever source guide.  This is what I've used.  It's good and it's dirt cheap.  I'm only listing two vendors to keep things simple.  I also wrote a more in depth article about the Evo 1000 suggesting that it's best to buy two.      Since the days of the Hobby Store in your town are coming to an end, here's a source list where to find these parts.   Of the remaining Hobby Stores, I know of none that stock this plane on their shelves.

eBay

The plane arrives in pieces

The Hacker Hotwings Evo 1000- It's $38 when not on sale, and there is free shipping when you spend over $69 (Catchy Number)  Otherwise it's $7.99  You may want to consider buying a second one and letting it sit on the shelf for a while.  After a few months, you may want an upgrade the plane and having one ready to go would come in handy.   Omni Models- A good USA Vendor
This is the most of what is considered the plane, it comes in a fairly small, very light box. The foam and motor mount are the main things you'll be using.

Control Horns- At just over $1 a pair,  this is worth the money, pick up a couple of extra just to have a spare.  This is from the same vendor as the plane so shipping is paid for with the plane order.

XT60 Connector - This comes from China so it may take a couple of weeks to show up. Buy a few pairs.    You will need wire strippers and way to connect two wires together.

Skywalker 30A ESC- Banggood sells these from time to time. Another very good one is the Turnigy Plush 30.  You can find them also on eBay for around $20.   Otherwise, the Skywalker which is nearly identical is around $11

Amazing Glue- You need this

UHU Por Adhesive- Not sold in the USA, so you have to buy it elsewhere.  It's worth the money.

Banggood

Motor-BR2212-  This motor will handle the plane without a problem- It's very powerful, don't let the low price fool you.  You will tear up the sky with this motor.
These are the newer generation motors called "Brushless motors."  They are 3 phase which means that there are three electrical wires that go to it. They are over 90% efficient.  This motor can spin at 15,000 RPM without a propeller on it.
Another benefit of the plane is the pusher prop design.  The motor is in the back of the plane leaving flexible foam up front in case of crashes.

Radio Control- There are many out there, select what works for you.  This one is inexepenvie and pretty good.

Radio Control- This is the FlySky FS-i6-  I happen to own one so I can talk about it from experience- It's a very good, low budget radio.  The only thing I don't like about it is that some of the parts fall off over time.  You're free to put whatever radio system you want in this plane and yes, you can easily spend up to $1000.  The radio and receiver are both around $40.  For each plane, you'll need a new receiver which you can also order from Banggood at around $10 each.

You need to order the right propeller for the plane and install it correctly.  Easy to get this step wrong.

Propeller- This plane takes an 8x6 Propeller, CW (clock wise).  There are small numbers on the propeller that say 8x6.  They have to point toward the direction of flight (forward).

Bullet Connectors

Bullet Connectors- This is what connects the motor to the speed controller.  You will need to solder this on to the ends of the speed controller and motor if this hasn't been done for you.  The reason why this is important is that the batttery frequently comes off during landings and occasionally it pulls the speed controller with it.  You need a second disconnect to make sure you don't break wires.

Pushrod connector Linkage- Oh yeah, you'll want this.  The good news is that it installs with an Allen wrench.    There are some that come with the plane, they aren't very good.

TowerPro 9g servo

Servos- You'll need only two, but you'll have some spares.  I can't say that one brand is better than another when it comes to cheap servos, but I've seen Tower Pro around quite a bit.  You may want to be brand loyal because each servo has control arms that won't fit on other servos.
There are only three things that move on the plane, the motor.  From that, you can achieve flight, do amazing tricks and have a wonderful time in the air.   This is perhaps one of the simplest planes around because there isn't much to it.   Because the ailerons move, you can do rolls and spins.

Carbon Fiber Rods

Carbon Fiber Pushrods- Chances are fairly good you won't need this.  But if your connecting rods come up short you'll appreciate having this around    They can also get lost during a bad crash.  It's cheap and you're ordering other stuff, you may as well order this as well.  Eventually, you'll need it.

Lithium Polymer Battery (LiPo)

Battery-1.5mAh Lipo- There are many different manufacturers of batteries.  I've used these and they work great.  The only downside is that they need to be charged, used, and then recharged until all three cells seem to charge at the same rates.  Notice it has the XT60 connector.  This is one of the more common battery connectors these days.  You may want to buy two or three batteries.
This is a similar technology that cell phone batteries use. They are very light in weight compared to nickel–cadmium battery (NiCd battery or NiCad battery).  Because of this these batteries, the Evo 1000 can exceed 30-minute flights fairly consistently. 

Balancing charger

Balancing Battery Charger- You'll need a way to charge your LiPo batteries.  I have one similar to this one, it works well.  What you think of as a battery is really three smaller batteries run in series (3S).  Batteries are rated by the number of cells they have, from 1 to 6.


Extra

Goop Adhesive, sold at Home Depot

Goop
Goop is a combination of silicone and other adhesives, possibly natural rubber. Since it's cheap, easy to find ( $5 at Home Depot)  and a decent adhesive you may be tempted to use this to glue your cores together.  I wouldn't suggest it.  It's not the strongest adhesive.
What this is amazing for is a covering around the front of the plane (the leading edge).  It turns the EPP foam into something that is softer and more rubberized.  It resists cracks and tears and absorbs the shock of impact better with it around the front of the plane ( the leading edge) and close to the motor mount.   It's amazing how well this stuff works.

30 Minute Epoxy

Motor mounts are made out of thin wood similar to balsa.  They can come apart fairly easily.  My suggestion is to coat it with 30-minute epoxy and let it dry.   You may also want to paint the motor mount before putting on the 30-minute epoxy.  Give it another color besides the dull wood color.   If you don't wish to do this the next best step is to coat the motor mount with wood glue.  I prefer the 30-minute epoxy, it gives a plastic coating to the motor mount.  Mine has never broken or come apart.  You can find this at a craft store such as Hobby Lobby.



Putting it all together

If you were to order all the parts at the same time, the plane would show up first and all the parts from Banggood would show up in a couple of weeks if not longer.  For whatever reason the UHU Por shows up fairly fast.

I know you'll  be excited to build this plane it's not the kind of thing you can assemble in a morning and fly in the afternoon.    The first build will take around 10 hours. I suggest doing it over the course of  3 or 4 days so that you allow things to dry.

The first time getting in the air is tricky.  You have to set your radio up right, and it's easy to set up the radio wrong   Once you're flying you need to know how to control the plane.  which is easier to do when it's flying away from you then when it's flying toward you.  The best way to learn how to fly an RC airplane without the frustration of watching your hard work come crashing down into the ground is to use an RC Simulator program.

RC Flight Simulator

This is the one I learned to fly on.   It comes with a controller and copies of many different planes.  Most of the planes are very expensive Balsa Wood models.  You won't get bored, and they actually have some pretty good lessons from instructors in the software.  There is a special edition that is also available.  You have to have a very serious gaming machine to run that software, whereas RF7.5 runs on just about any fairly modern PC.

Even after you set up the plane and spent untold hours on the computer learning how to fly a plane toward you, you'll still need help getting your plane in the air first time.   That's when you need to ask help from someone who knows how to fly RC planes.  They can help set up your plane and take it up for you the first time to make sure it's ready for you.

The Evo 1000 is less than a 3.5 foot plane, it weighs less than a pound and can usually be flown in empty parks.  Please don't fly it near the freeways or near crowds of people.  It's an ideal trainer plane.  Once you get it flying, you'll be hooked!


Total cash outlay for the plane including radio is under $150.    The plane without radio is less than $90.  As far as hobbies are concerned, this is an enexpensive one.

Buy two Hacker Hotwing Evo 1000s

So good, you'll need two!

At face value, the Hacker HotWing  Evo 1000 is a winner.  If you do your best to follow the instructions (they can get a bit confusing) and build a stock plane, you will have a copy of the best under $40 planes available and perhaps one of the better under $100 planes around.

Though I wrote about the plane before, here are the top three reasons why the plane is so wonderful.

1. It's sporty-  This plane flips, spins and inverts without a problem.  The extra fins on the wing help it track with ease. It's so light that if you built it right, you shouldn't have to worry about it falling apart in midair.  That means you can get a little wild with pulling out of intense nosedives.   It's a lot of fun to fly and you will look forward to having this baby in the air!

2. It's a floater-  Following the stock build, you will have a very light plane.   On our warmer Southern California mornings, it seems to defy gravity and refuse to come out of the sky like a 5-year-old child refuses to go to bed at night.  There are many times I've set my timer for 40 minutes, taken the plane down and then discover that the battery is around the correct storage charge.   This means that it's possible to get close to an hour flight on a 1500mAh battery

I like to gradually take it up at very slow speeds, it handles slow speeds without a problem. When you come across a thermal or a good source of up draft the plane looks like it's taking the elevator up to the heavens. It's quite fun to make it fly so high with so little effort.

3. A trainer you won't outgrow-  There are numerous trainers on the market.  They are designed to suffer the sins of your learning curve. When you graduate to new planes the trainer usually gets put aside.  Perhaps you will help teach someone to fly and pull it from the mothballs?

The Evo-1000 at the stock build is forgiving, very forgiving.  If you're not being stupid or reckless, and you're doing your best to fly a plane with the best care you're capable of it will overlook most of your mistakes.  It can take a bit of a licking.

The Evo-1000 can fly very slow, it doesn't fall out of sloppy turns and is simple enough to help the total newbie learn how to fly.  This isn't a glider or sailplane flying experience where you have a rudder and elevators  Instead of an up-down, left-right flying experience you get the joy of ailerons with this no-tail plane.  This means that the plane is capable of spins and flying inverted.
When someone is done learning how to fly the Evo-1000 on their own they will keep flying it.Why give it up?  It's far too much fun!





Why I love the stock build

There are different flying scenarios for different folks. Some people want to take a plane out and have it hit close to 100mph.   They don't stay up in the sky all that long but the short time they are flying is certainly eventful.
I have smaller, much faster planes that can do an insane amount of tricks.   But, my favorite flying is getting something out that can explore the sky.  I like a floater experience that can take advantage of thermals and gusts of wind.  At times you can barely hear it on as it gradually climbs out of the park and starts gaining altitude. Then it hits a thermal and within seconds its up to four hundred feet.  I can turn off the power and watch the plane take a 4 minute gradual fall back to the ground. Just as it looks like it's landing I turn up the throlle to full, find an angle of attack and send it back up to 400'.  This time I take a nosedive down pulling out of it in the last 50 feet.  It's time for a few minutes of stunts and then it's back up to the clouds.  After about 30 minutes I am done flying and  move on to another plane.  I try to fly 2 to 3 different planes each time at the park. The Evo 1000 is always my favorite.

My mod plane

The underside of the modded Evo 1000

Paint-    I didn't something that I thought was pretty cool, at first.  I painted the back of the plane green and orange to match with the paint scheme on top.  It's not a bad idea, except against the blue sky the plane is darker on the bottom and thus can be hard to see.  If I were to do it again I would put Day Glow fluorescent green and orange paint on the bottom.    I do like the way the plane looks with the paint on the bottom.  If you're not planning to use laminate on the plane, you can forget this step. The paint will flake off with repeated landings.

Laminate-  I put on a durable 5mil laminate on the plane.  The laminate provides extra protection and help the plane cut way down on friction.  If you're going to go for a faster motor you'll want laminate as well.

Carbon fiber rods-
3mm rods on each leading edge.
3mm rod close to the motor mount (watch your tail weight)
6mm rod close to the nose

Had I to do it again, I would use 2mm rods to cut down on the weight.  With all these firm rods the plane is very rigid.  This means it doesn't flex when it spins.   This is a  plane made for stunts.

Metal Gear Servos-
Yes, they are sporty.  A bit too touchy however so I moved the travel down to 80% travel.  But yes, the fun never ends with fast action servos.

Motor-  I was good with the 1000KV motor like on my other plane.   I am worried about noise and I don't have enough space to make this plane a speed daemon.  The motor will be replaced soon with a D2826/6 with a 6x4 prop.


How different is it?

If you have a scale with "Floater" on one side and "Sporty" on the other side the stock  Evo 1000 60% floater and 40% sporty.   This moded version is more like 60% sporty and 40% floater. Battery life is cut down by 20% with this build.    It's a blast to fly and with flights lasting over 30 minutes  you won't need to bring a fleet of spare batteries.  On windy days this plane penetrates through the wind a bit better than the stock Evo-1000.   When you make a turn however it does catch the wind so be careful.

The big question is do you really need two of these planes?  Yes, they are different enough from each other that it doesn't feel repetitive.  But, similar enough to appreciate the finer qualities that this model offers.

This plane just screams when it's flying.  It's a tad bit heavier, a lot more rigid and loves any stunt you can throw at it.

Buy two and save

The hot ticket is to buy two from Omni Models  (Ebay link) (Website Link).  Pick up a set of these while you're at it.   There is free shipping and no tax if you happen to live out of state. (They are in Illinois).  My advice is to build the stock build first, fly it for a couple of months then decide what to do about the modded plane.


If you can wait a couple of weeks for stuff to show up from China this is a pretty good connector.

These are the motors I use.  You can get

PopWing 900mm, same as Turnigy TekSumo

Compared to the Turnigy Tek Sumo/ Tech-One Pop Wing

The Turnigy Tek Sumo/ Tech-One Pop Wing are essentially the same plane.  They are a tad bit smaller at 900mm compared to the 1 meter of the Evo 1000 plane.  They both  have a pre-cut battery compartment which seems to ideally work with many 1500mAh 3S LiPo batteries.  And yes, during a nose crash you'll be gluing the nose back together.  This is the weakest feature of the Popwing/ Tek Sumo.  When the Tek Sumo/Pop Wing is dialed in right, it flies very nicely.  It seems to thrive on having a  heavy battery near the nose.  If you put the wrong battery weight in the plane won't track.  Worse yet it can tail spin in poor turns.

The Evo-1000 seems to be balanced better.  It doesn't suffer from needing exact battery weights like the Pop Wing.   It just feels a lot more stable in the air. When you have it tail heavy it still flies but will wander around a bit more.

Ripped in half?  Nothing a little glue can't fix.

Testing the "Indescrutability" of the plane.

The plane says "Nearly indestructible" on the box.  I, unfortunately, had to push it to its limits.

Oh, the day started off fine.  I had a 2200mAh battery that needed to be used up so I attached it to this plane.  It's a newer battery which made it lighter than its older counterparts but heavier than my usual 1.5 or 1.8 amp batteries.  Despite the extra weight, it flew well.  A bit clunky but it was okay.
Then it hit a thermal and went up into the clouds. And then it was gone.   I went around the neighborhood for an hour looking for it.  I did manage to find it a couple of blocks away in someone's driveway.

The damage- The plane ripped in half, one servo was broken, parts of the  foam were missing.  But it came home with me, and I've actually fixed worse.   I ripped out the fiberglass spars and won't put them in any more planes. My secret combination of glue is  UHU Por and Gorilla Glue.  The Por bonds tightly and the Gorilla Glue fills in dwells.   Then I cut in grooves for 2mm spars both on top and bottom with carbon fiber rods.  Yes, the plane isn't as pretty but the flex is gone.

It's back to nearly the same condition it was in before the crash.  If anything it's better with the carbon fiber rods adding for stiffness.

How to build the Evo 1000

Since the instructions aren't the best, here's my suggestion how to build it.

Day 1 (5 minutes)
Take around 3 water bottles per wing and weigh the wings down overnight on a flat surface like a kitchen table. Keep the wings out of the sun

Put bottles on plane overnight to flatten it out.

Day 2 ( 2 hours)

Let  UHU Por stand for 10-15 minutes, then attach cores

Take a generous amount of UHU Por and make a bead on each side of the wing's center.  Let it dry for around 10 to 15 minutes.  Then push the two pieces together.  Use long pins to lock the cores solidly together.  Keep the plane out of the sun and let it cure for around a day.





Get your electronics together.  Make sure the motor and ESC has the proper bullet connectors and the ESC is equipped for the right connector for your battery.  Do a nice job with this step so that you don't have it coming apart later or having shorts.  Hook up your receiver, bind it to your radio and center your servos.  You do not need metal gear servos for this build. The generic 9g servos are fine.
Use wood glue to glue the motor mount together. After it dries for around half an hour I like to use 30-minute epoxy to coat the mount.  It makes it very durable but use it sparingly because it will add weight to the tail.

Day 3 (2 hours)

Buy better control horns, it's worh the money.

There are some parts that come with the kit that are worthless. You'll need better control horns and something like a DuBro's EZ connect for the control arm to mount the 2mm carbon rod. The carbon rod and little connector for the control horns are fine, but use a heat gun instead of a match to secure it.  You may need a bit larger piece of  heat shrink than what comes with the kit.

It's time to layout your wiring on the plane.  Get the servos installed but don't glue them yet. Put the control arm on (making sure it's still centered) and figure out where you would like the control horns. Cut the servo wire routes into the plane.

This attaches control rods to the servo horns

Next it's time to install the spars.  If you have 2mm carbon fiber rods in 1000mm lengths  handy, be sure to use them instead.  Don't use larger diameter carbon fiber. 2 or 3mm is fine.

Once that is installed and the servo wires are cut in, you can start gluing.  Glue your control horns, your servos, your motor mounts, your carbon fiber rods/ribbons.  Last glue in your motor mount. It doesn't matter if it's a bit sticky from the epoxy.

Let everything dry for 24 hours.

Day 4 (2 hours)
Remove the pins you installed on day 2.  If the servos are well glued in,  install the control rods. Attach the motor to the mount. connect the speed controller and figure out where and how you want it mounted to the plane. You can use zip ties and velcro to hold it in place.   I like to keep mine inside the motor mount fins.

The instructions suggest cutting a spot for the battery up front.  I DO NOT LIKE THIS IDEA.   You need the foam in case of crashes.  Instead, buy heavy duty velcro and create a 4" strip from the nose to where the first compartment is located. Using a combination of zip ties and velcro straps you can strap the battery down to the velcro.   This is my little secret to the plane, experiment to where the best battery placement is for your plane.  Use UHU Por to glue the Velcro to the foam.

At this point you can finish building the plane. Figure how to do Elevon mixing on your radio.  If you've never done this before this will take some time. Both ailerons need to go up when you pull back on the stick and  down when you push  up, left the left aileron needs to go up while the right goes down. Attach the propeller making sure the little numbers on the prop face the direction of flight.  Glue your winglets on, use Por and the pins once again using the same technique.   Let it all dry overnight. If you leave the pins in you can get away with  the winglets not being dry for your first flight.  Remove the pins after a few days.

If you're conservative with the build, and you didn't add extra weight to the back, put a 1500mAh 11.1v 3S battery  Center it between the nose and the first compartment.  Keep your elevons perfectly flat for your first flight.  It should fly.  You may want to put in 3 clicks of uptrim after your first flight.

You'll like the first plane, so why buy a second one?  It's because it won't be long before you figure out a few things here and there you would like to change about the plane.  Once you stray from the script, it's not the same plane.  So, one is your stock plane, and one is your mod plane.

This plane was designed exceptionally well, it's a steal at the price that it sells at and you're trully will love it!