Interactive Toy Concepts Micro Mosquito
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The Interactive Toy Concepts Micro Mosquito is an indoor-only, radio controlled micro helicopter designed by Interactive Toy Concepts of Toronto, Ontario, Canada and marketed exclusively in the United States by RadioShack and in Canada by The Source by Circuit City.
Introduced in 2006 and touted as the world's smallest digital proportional three-channel model helicopter, the Micro Mosquito received immediate favorable writeups both at Yahoo! and The New York Times with the former lauding it as the "RoboSapien of the 2006 holiday season." Videos of the model appeared on YouTube soon after. The Micro Mosquito has even come to the attention of Hollywood, with the toy soon to be woven into the plotline of the Fox Network series 24 and the upcoming motion picture Homeland Security featuring Antonio Banderas and Meg Ryan.
So named because of its intentional resemblance to a mosquito with its segmented "body," insect-like landing legs and bright green LED "eyes," the Micro Mosquito comes fully assembled, needing only six "C" batteries for the combination charger and display base and one 9V battery for the transmitter. A 7.5V AC adapter with positive tip polarity may be used as well but is not included with the helicopter.
The Micro Mosquito utilizes counter-rotating coaxial blades each driven by its own motor in order to cancel the rotational torque found in conventional helicopters, resulting in an extremely stable hover. Since the toy features neither collective pitch nor cyclic pitch, forward motion is accomplished via a horizontally-mounted tail rotor, again with its own motor. Tail rotors with more aggressive fixed pitch for faster forward flight are included; replacement main rotors are available as a separate kit. Two operating frequencies of 27 MHz and 49 MHz are offered, allowing two Micro Mosquitoes to fly at the same time.
In spite of the awards, performance of the toy is highly dependent on local elevation. The product manual notes that the toy is unable to fly above 4000 feet due to excessive density altitude. In addition users report trouble trying to control the helicopter in level flight, due to the apparent inadequacy of the design for cancelling yawing tendency.
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[edit] Clones
As with the Picoo Z, the Micro Mosquito was quickly cloned. A nearly identical (but much cheaper) version called "Alany" exists, as well as a "Syma" version. The "Syma" model differs in rotor design, having 2 large blades per main rotor, as opposed to 4 small blades per rotor encircled by a plastic ring. The "Syma" model is also heavier and has more power. It weighs 37 grams (opposed to 20 grams for the original) and has been reported to fly at altitudes up to 9000 feet.
[edit] Specifications
- Length: 6.5"
- Main rotor diameter: 6.375"
- Weight: 20g
