The Agusta 109 500 size kit is available from Hobby Distributors here in South Africa, but take note that Hobby Distributors only distribute locally. If you are a South African citizen, click on the above Hobby Distributors banner to make an enquiry. For international shipment you can buy the Agusta 109 kit from Rc-Fever.

As with all my previous Align scale fuselage kits, the Agusta 109 fuselage is a beautiful piece of craftsmanship. I'm sure that any r/c helicopter pilot will be impressed with the quality of this kit.

The Agusta 109 fuselage is moulded out of fiberglass with ply wood former ribs. The inside bottom front section is reinforced with carbon fiber cloth sheets that gives the fuselage some extra strength and rigidity. All three retractable landing gear mechanisms are included and pre installed. All you need is to fit two DS410 servos or any other high torque servos to operate the retracts.

The T-Rex 500 or CopterX 500 fits perfectly inside the Agusta 109 fuselage without any hazels and modifications. What else can one expect from Align. The canopy is held in position with strong miniature magnets, which makes battery access easy for battery changes. The Coast Guard paint scheme is perfect and gives the Agusta 109 fuselage a good scale appearance. It would have been nice if Align included some plastic antennas and wiper blades with this kit as they did with the EC135 kit. Maybe they will in the future.

I have installed the 7 LED Navigation Lighting System from rc-lights.com on my Agusta 109 fuselage for extra scale realism. The navigation lights need to be installed first before the helicopter can be fitted to the fuselage. The two 5mm LED lights (red and green) in the horizontal stabilizer needs to be grinded flat on both sides to a 3mm thickness to fit. Be careful not to damage the inner part of the LED.

Next you need to install the servos for the retracts. According to Align, two DS450 servos will do the job. I had some larger digital servos lying around which I installed with some modifications. The rear retracts share one servo, and one servo for the front retract, so some adjustments need to be made so that all three retracts locks in the down position. I cannot adjust the retract speed on my DX7, so I ran both retract servos through a 3 Channel Servo Speed/Direction Regulator. The up and down retract speed can be adjusted separately on the regulator that gives the retracts a realistic up and down retract speed.

Installing the T-Rex 500 helicopter to the Align Agusta 109 fuselage is fairly straightforward. Follow the supplied step-by-step instruction, and the installation will take about two hours. As with most scale helicopter fuselages, the helicopter will be tail heavy. You can either ad some weight in the nose, or build a new battery tray to move the LiPo battery forward for a correct CG. I have installed a Benedini TBS-Mini sound module with two speakers, and the extra weight of the sound system gives my Agusta 109 a perfect CG.

If you want to install a sound system, you need to build speaker box. I installed two speakers, so it took some really good planning to install the sound system so that the canopy can fit. I used 1 mm plywood to construct the box for the two speakers. The amplifier and sound module is situated in the nose. There is no air movement over the amplifier during flight, so I used a 3.5 volt DC computer chip fan to cool the amplifier down. The amplifier gets really hot, and will thermally switch down to protect the amplifier it the temperature gets too high. The small chip fan works perfectly, and is powered through the receiver's gear channel. 

With my initial flight tests, I found that the ESC and main motor get fairly warm due to the lack of sufficient airflow. Although the operating temperature of the ESC and motor is very high, I personally like cooler running electronics, as it will extend their lifespan. I used a small grinder tool to cut an opening for the ESC at the bottom of the fuselage. During forward flight, the ESC gets sufficient airflow over the heat sink, and ensures for cooler operating temperatures.

 The navigation lights are powered by a single cell 780 mAh LiPo battery. I did some tests, and the navigation LED lights use about 0.03 Volts during a six-minute flight. Very power efficient. You can run them directly from the receiver, but then you need a seven-channel receiver.

The Agusta 109 scale fuselage and sound system ads an extra 1.5 kilograms to the stock 500 helicopter, but still, the helicopters flies very well with the extra weight. Not only does the helicopter look good, but also handles like a dream due to the extra weight. It flies very stable and really looks the part, especially with the sound system and navigation light switched on.

My Agusta 109 flow with Benedini sound module

If you like my Agusta 109 helicopters sound, you can buy my sound file for 2 US Dollars. Take note that the sound file will only work if you have a Benedini TBS-Mine sound module.

I know that all R/C helicopter pilots will love the Align Agusta 109 scale fuselage. I highly recommend this kit. Great kit...Great realism...You will love it.