Pixelito Pixelito is a 6.9 gram radio controled helicopter. It has 4 channels like it's far bigger brothers.  Infra Red is used to create the link with the radio system.  By the way, a 45mAh battery is on board.  

Born on Monday, November 24, 2003 3:24PM


6.9 grams

4 channels

full carbon

no servo's

no swashplate

InfraRed control

Pixelito is the latest member of the ever growing Pixel Radio Controlled Helicopter family. It's been a fantastic journey since the birth of the Pixel 1 in 1997.  Six years of experimentation, 6 years of technology evolution made it possible to further reduce weight by a factor of almost 20 times. Weight is a mere 6.9 grams with the 45mAh LiPo battery.

Pictures, Videos, Specials


 

 

 


Alexander Van de Rostyne


The Pixel Family

The buttons below show some of the ancestors of the Pixelito . There are quite some famous ones. The Pixel 290 was actually one of the prototypes for the Piccolo from Ikarus. The Pixel 2000 became as famous as the chick next to it, and was for years the lightest RC helicopter in the world at 49 grams.

Click on one of the small pictures if you want to visit my old site for more details. Be aware that this site dates from 1999 and is a bit 'shaky'.


I must admit that the race for making smaller and smaller is starting to hit barriers . One day it will become very difficult for even de most skilled modeler to cope with that. The biggest challenge for the Pixelito was the size of parts. Manipulating, gluing, adjusting, even just see them is a problem. The funny thing is that it was relatively easy to make the Pixelito compared to the effort required to make the first Pixels. The main reasons for this are the progress in battery technology, the availability of micro motors, and the flood of micro electronics that come to us. 


This is the master frame. In spite of my desire to make everything as light as possible, I could not resist to design an original shape and structure, that is more about form than about function . The landing skids and the canopy frame are one long curved rod of 1 mm carbon.  Difficult to say this is anything else than tiny. The tail boom is a super light tube of 1.3 mm diameter. Perfect to guide the wires for the tail rotor motor. WES technik is since 1996 one of my preferred spots to find new stuff. Walter and Karin Scholl, the owners of WES, have greatly contributed to this journey. A full tail gear sitting on a 2 Euro coin. It's equipped with a 4 mm motor. Modulus of the gears is 0.2. It's actually a nightmare to make it run smoothly. The axle is a 1mm carbon rod turning in teflon bushings made from cyano super glue nozzle tube.
Thumbs up or thumbs down? Notice that the gear is on the top side of the structure. This is usually made impossible by the presence of the swashplate. No swashplate here! The little motor is a 6mm pager. To the right on the tailboom is the infra red module acting as the 'antenna' to capture the signal. The tail rotor is molded over a CNC cut form. For testing, ABS is used and heath-pressed over the mold and cut to shape till results are satisfactory. Once the shape is final, a carbon cloth copy is made. Most of the components made have a zero weight. Well, not really. However, my weight balance is only reading 1/10th of grams and that's too much for most parts. The tiny Infra Red receiver is a wonderful development by Didel from Switzerland. It is light, compact, and professionally assembled. One major challenge is the soldering of all the exit wiring. I needed a lens to do it.
Apart from the hamster, this looks like a very normal Futaba T9CHP system. But then you discover 6 LEDs sticking out at the bottom. And yes, seated in the same place where usually clips  the HF module, one can find the IR transmitter from Didel from Switzerland. The tiny Infra Red receiver is a wonderful development by Didel too. It is light, compact, and professionally surface mounted. Weight is below 1 gram with the 'antenna' included. A big thanks to Jean-Daniel Nicoud who is running Didel. A bit unfortunate for Jean-Louis Coural from France that his gear was not used in the Pixelito. He made me a very nice radio system too, but because I did not have the correct TX quartz for a while, I could not use it. I am sure it would work fine too. Here is his site.
The hamster is really alive and kicking. If you look carefully you will notice it has the hiller paddle in a firm grip. The small lake in my garden was lightly frozen. An opportunity for a nice picture! The idea of the hamster was inspired by the shape of the 'canopy'. Somehow they both seem to 'sit' the same way!