JXD 340 Drift King Mini Review
JXD 340 Drift King 4CH RC Helicopter w/ Gyro
You guys know me as the Syma Freak-no I am not jumping ship here, however I am always on the look to see if their is competition for the Syma Helis, especially my baby the Syma S107
I came across this mini bird JXD 340 Drift King that interested me because it is a 4 channel heli: To explain more-Let me put some specs below:
SPECIFICATION
* Body Length: 250mm
* Width: 50mm
* Height: 115mm
* Main Rotor Diameter: 200mm
* Total Weight: 41g
* Battery for helicopter: Rechargeable Li-polymer Battery
* Charging Time: Approx 30-40 Minutes
* Flight Time: 5-7 Minutes
* Control Distance: 15m or less
* Battery for controller: 6 AA batteries (Not Included)
ITEM INCLUDED
* Helicopter x 1
* Remote Controller x 1
* USB Cable x 1
PACKING
Per Unit
* Dimension :46 x 19 x 9cm
* Gross Weight : 543g
* Dimension: 54 x 48 x 39cm
* Gross Weight: 7,560g
My Experience With The JXD 340 Drift King:
The S107 is a great 3 channel. The controls are different for the 4 channel JXD 340. The throttle will be on the left stick on both transmitters but the elevator to go back and forth, and the rudder will be both on the right stick on the S107.
Providing the transmitter used by the JXD 340 is set up as a "mode 2", the rudder for yaw will be on the left together with throttle, and the elevator, and aileron will be on the right stick.My personal opinion it can be difficult to learn both types in your beginner flying experience. It may actually be more difficult for guys that have been flying 2 and 3 channel exclusively.
I bought from Ebay-bad move, parcel was damaged and missing USB charge cable-luck was had a few spare cables that fitted ok-Took a hour to charge and gave me less than 3 minutes flying, not a happy camper at this stage. Paypal is trying to resolve this problem-just been unlucky. hence hate Ebay some times-However have got one from Amazon I buy a lot of helis from them and like their backup to return goods.
So a little pissed off as really wanted to do a review of the JXD 340 Drift King- However stay with me here-have a friend that has one and reckons flies well.You know me guys I love Syma helicopters and always see if there is a better indoor mini heli out there-My Syma S107 Review
07/22/2011 Well have been flying the Drift King for awhile now-my verdict-takes ages to charge,only gets me four minutes of flying and gets a bit bogged down and needs to keep throttle up-All in all not bad to fly but not a patch on the Syma S107-only my opinion. Especially now with the Syma s800g that drifts
Video below
Where To Buy The JXD 340 Drift King
Amazon -Safe Buying for JXD Helicopters
JXD Spare Parts
Comments are more than welcome on the JXD Drift King below-Tell me your experience with this heli if you have bought one-guess I will stick with the Syma Helis at this stage as have heaps of them and I can fly these birds like hell-found this link to a forum on the JXD RcGroups hope it works ok.
Just got a great email from Shawn on his first flight with a JXD 340 Drift King----
Hello, just opened my eBay Drift King. Superstition Hobby did a great job on shipping. I have 2 Promptness Speed 3 ch helicopters, those 2 where my first and only until I got the JXD. Wow! What a difference. My JXD flies the normal length time. The round knob on upper right of controller is Sweet. Trim knob. I don't have a lot of time flying, but I will say the JXD is very smooth, and super nice to fly.(Shawn sent me a video below)
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Tagged with: JXD 340 Drift King • Syma S107
I received a brand new drift king yesterday, and it was AWESOME!! But for some reason it has started flying in circles on its own. It has only been through minor crashes. PLEASE HELP!!!
I purchased the moving replacement part that allows the 340 to move side to side, but i dont know how to replace this.Can Anyone help me? I love my 340’S
D
need a manual for jxd 340 drift king
I bought my Drift King about a month ago, and love it so far. Having flown several helis before, it only took me a day to master this one, even though it was my first 4CH. Unfortunately, during that day I cracked the back rotor. It still flies well, but the instructions do not explain how to utilize the replacement parts. Help please. Thanks. Otherwise, great heli
@Josh you can get most spares from RcFever Let me know how you go.
I’m pretty happy with the JXD 340. Flight time is as good as any other little heli I’ve flown. The Syma S107 (and most of it’s duplicates) are pretty cool, but 3 things make me glad I bought the 340: 1) turning off the LED increases flight time slightly, 2) left/right drifting, and most important 3) ability to change the JXD controller to match other 4 channel helicopters. I have a Blade CX3 4 channel heli, and since I can make the JXD 340 match the CX3 controller, it has prevented some crashing which would result from getting the controls confused switching back and forth. If you plan to move up to a 4 channel, or pitch control heli (i.e, the more expensive stuff), you’ll need to make this transition. It’s a little more difficult to get used to, but better in the long run for flying 4 channel helis.
I also have a SH Swift LS6020 (sold at Fry’s Electronics as Sky Invaders LS6020 Metal Frame Series – very similar to the Syma S107) which doesn’t have an electronic gryo (ya, I know – didn’t notice the package didn’t say Gyro). The newer LS6020-1 has the Gyro, but not the LS6020. Anyway, I solved that by putting a JXD 340 circuit board in it ($10 shipped from eBay, perfect fit after unsoldering the LEDs), and now both fly using the JXD 340 controller. The LS6020 doesn’t drift side to side, but more to the point, I can use the controller configured to match my CX3.
I mentioned the LS6020 because though I like the JXD 340, I prefer flying the LS6020 sometimes. It reaches greater speed in forward flight, and with the “boost” turned on using the JXD controller, it really goes. The difference is the LS6020 tail motor is bigger, and tail boom is shorter than the JXD 340, so I think the tail motor is able to lift the rear of the heli higher and hence get more speed. You would think the JXD’s longer boom would give it more leverage, but I think the extra weight of the longer tail boom makes it not lift as much – even with boost enabled. It could just be the motor though.
The main con for the JXD is it isn’t popular like the Syma S107. So parts are a little harder to find.
Great post,there are spares available at RcFever
Love the sight and figured I’d send in my experience with the Drift King. My son got the Best Buy Protocol TigerJet (basically a Syma s107) for his birthday in mid December. My wife got me the Drift King for Christmas a few weeks later.
Since we’ve had the Protocol in the house longer I have more experience with it. The Drift King is (almost) as easy to fly as the Protocol TigerJet. Once you get the hang of it, the flight characteristics are very similar to me. The Drift King seems to have more power and will head to the ceiling faster on take-off but you get used to it and learn how to control it easily. The Drift King also has a different feel in the throttle since it is not spring loaded. You can find a good hover height and let go of the throttle and it will stay there for the most part. However, without that spring loaded throttle, you have to remember to shut it down when it crashes. Otherwise the blades will keep spinning and probably break something.
The remote also has buttons to turn off the lights on the helicopter. I find with the lights off, I get a longer flight time so I tend to leave them off. with the lights on, both mine and my sons get about the same flight time. With the lights off, mine will last longer. There is also a button for supposedly increasing the speed but I haven’t seen any difference when using it on mine.
The one feature the Drift King has is the ability to drift… It does work, but it’s not easy to do. When trying to drift one way or the other, it’s easy to increase or decrease the throttle accidentally and loss of control is easy.
I will say that this thing is durable. Everyone in my family has crashed it into something or other and it’s still going strong.
Overall, I’d take either of them. The Protocol: (Syma) is a tad easier to fly and parts seem to be more readily available, but either one should be easy to get up and running pretty quickly
Hi,
I stumbled across your website while looking up info on the JXD340. I had flow a few various helicopters prior to receiving my 340. The 340 was by far the most stable and easiest to fly. Now, with that said, I must state that I just received my S107 today & will compare them this evening.
Two of the strong points of the 340 are that
1. You can turn the lights off from the controller
2. The rear rotor’s motor is “captured” and held tight within a plastic shell. The same motor on the S107 & other helicopters are not held as securely into place and hence I have seen then break free during a crash and pop out. When they pop out they subsequently sever the wires which power them and render the helicopter useless.
DM
I got used to playing with this heli in n00b mode because just like you guys I couldn’t figure out how to switch the damned controls. Once I mastered the JXD 340, I wanted a bigger challenge so I bought a Xieda 9958 4-chan single prop. The 9958 had the “Pro” controls set as default, so it was difficult trying to relearn everything. I wanted to play with my JXD 340 while the Xieda 9958 was charging, and vice versa but I kept crashing from confusion on the controls of each heli. So, one day I sat down with the JXD and the receiver until I figured out how to switch to “Pro” mode. LOL Enjoy!
To switch controls on the JXD 340 you do the following:
1) Power ON the heli
2) Press & hold both triggers together & turn the receiver ON
3) Give it full throttle to set signal, and then full decel
3) Enjoy the PRO controls 😉
Got my Drift King for Christmas. It’s a great RC helicopter and pretty easy to fly. I’m not sure how much flying time I get because I keep forgetting to time it (probablly about 6 to 10 mintues though). It does take about 40 minutes to charge up though. I broke one of the landing skid legs the first day but it still flys fine. A new one will costs around $5 but I have no plans to buy one yet. I would like to see if anyone can recommend a stronger landing skid to use though.
I got mine last night as a belated birthday gift from my gf (the “real” present is still shipping apparently, lol) so to keep me happy she got me this, and I LOVE IT. I get about 5 to 7 minutes of flight with lights turned off (which I find annoying but its a personal thing, however I like the front spotlight) but I agree it is long to charge. I’m thinking I might get a bigger battery and replace this one but will it cause a problem?? hope someone knows, cuz I would love to get it flying for at least 10-15 minutes if not more (but dont want to burn the motors u know) so if anyone knows it would be nice, thanks, anyways, it flies great and handles very well, speed control is nice especially in small places. the 4th channel is really helpful and cool but need more time to get used to it cuz it keeps changing the throttle so goes a bit up and down, lol. as for the switching of the controls, it says to press the light and speed control at the same time when turning on the remote, but never tried it cuz I prefere the controls as they are right now.
so why does anyone want to switch the controls?
anyways, great buy and really fun, but can someone help with the batt question i have, thanks everyone.
Just had one delivered and your right not much fying time, did you manage to get a bigger battery to fit?
i just ordered it but not much bigger than the one thats with it, i gotr a 400 mah just to be sure it fits, according to the dimensions it will so we will see. i also ordered a few plugs so i can take it off easily but that would require some work
I just got the JXD-340 and have had no problems with it.
As far as the USB charger cable, mine glows red while it
is charging and goes off when it is done.
The Accel button as stated above only works for forward and backward flight.
What page number in the ‘book’ is the instructions for swapping
the control functions????
Just got the Drift King yesterday and have gone through 4 flights. Really like the crabbing, but takes some getting used to because it’s difficult to do the drift while maintaining the proper throttle. Just need some more practice I guess. Enjoy the capability to toggle the LED lights (but will probably permanently disconnect the side lights. Just find them distracting.) Of course I’ve crashed plenty and the lower props have some dings on them, while the upper ones are fine… but it comes with 2 replacement sets. Got mine off Amazon for ~$30 and it arrived in great condition. I also noticed the same 4 minute flight and 40 minute charge… which is a good excuse to buy multiple helicopters. haha
Three minor issues. 1, the USB charger does not give an indication when the copter is charged (like my Syma) and 2. despite my best efforts I can’t swap the drift and rotate controls per the instructions in the book, and last 3) I see no noticeable difference when pressing the accelerate button.
If anyone figures how to swap the controls or can define what the accelerate button should do, please let me know.
I purchased the Drift King, and also have not been able to figure out how the controls can be swapped. The instructions clealy state it can be done.
As far as the excelerate button, the only thing it does it give a higer speed to the rear motor. It works pretty well on mine and I can hear the higher pitched wine of the motor when giving full forward or backward Elevator.
I bought this to have a small inexpensive 4 channel to fly at work. According to the english manual, you should be able to switch to mode 2, which places the rudder (yaw) control on the left stick and aileron (roll) on the right. All of my other 4 channel heli’s are configured this way and I didn’t want to have to change just for this bird. The manual suggests holding both the light and accelerate buttons simultaneously to achieve this change. But that never worked. After fiddling with it a bit, I figured out that you had to power up the heli first, then hold in both the light and accelerate buttons while powering up the transmitter. Sadly it doesn’t retain the mode 2 configuration and I have to repeat this process each time I fly the Drift King. But at least I don’t have to learn to fly in another mode.
found this info at amazon from E. Aamoadt and it work for me