- Hi, it's Parris from Epic Review Guys
and I've always like making paper airplanes.
I basically only know how to make two kinds
but it's always fun to take a piece of paper
and turn it into something that can fly,
for a little while at least.
Well what if your paper airplane could fly and fly and fly?
That's what the PowerUp 3.0 says they can do.
♫ Epic Review Guys ♫
This neat little device fits in certain designs
of paper airplanes like you see here.
Up at the front there's the battery as well as
a Bluetooth receiver that lets it talk to your phone.
At the back, there's a propeller.
This will actually let you, from your phone,
control your paper airplane to have it fly around
for up to 10 minutes, to have it turn,
and do different tricks.
I got to see if this works.
This is not inexpensive however, it's about $50
and I'll put a link to it down below this video.
It started out as a Kickstarter project.
People thought it was a pretty cool idea so they funded it,
they developed it, and here it is.
What I really wish is I had my brother here to help me out.
He's really a wiz with flying remote-control
airplanes and helicopters.
But I'm on my own here with the PowerUp 3.0.
Now this is for kids ages 14 and up so the propeller
really is right out there so I think
they don't want younger kids trying to do this.
They don't want them to get hurt.
The only thing in my favor I see here
is it does have a crash-proof bumper in the front,
well I'm gonna be putting that to the test.
And here is the piece that does all the work.
I'm not sure if this front portion is going to light up.
It would be kind of cool if it did,
but you need electricity to make it fly.
That's what you got the propeller for.
It charges up from anything that charges
a standard five-volt USB phone or other device.
I'm not sure if you can see the little antennae here.
This has a range of 180 feet, that's a pretty good distance.
Regular Bluetooth is just over 30 feet
so I'm not sure how they manage to have my phone
be able to talk to this at that distance,
but I guess I'll put that to the test too.
Also included in the box appear to be
charging cable, extra propeller pieces,
and some papers and the instructions
on how to fold the papers to turn them
into the right design of airplane.
There's actually quite a lot involved in this.
The first thing I've done, is get my Ingress Power Cube
and start charging this up,
supposed to take about 20 minutes
to get the full charge.
Need to go on my phone to the Google Play Store,
download the app for this,
then read through the many pages of instructions
and figure out how to fold an airplane
that will work with it.
Here's the app, a fairly small download,
gives you the view that you'll see
when you move the phone to control it.
And then the various things here,
how much flying time you have left,
the amount of fuel, and how good the signal is
for controlling the plane from the phone.
In other words, when it's getting out of range,
this should notify you.
Two of these pages are included.
This is the simplest model,
easiest to fly model, the Intruder.
There are some markings on here to help
you when you're assembling it
and then in the User Guide they show you how to fold it up.
When you've mastered this basic model,
they also have the Nakamura
which is more complicated with instructions for that
and on their website, they have additional templates
so you can print those onto a regular piece of printer paper
and you're ready to make even more airplane designs.
Okay, I'm going to give this my best try,
not the best with straight lines.
Took me about five minutes to fold up the airplane.
I did watch the video that they have on YouTube
on how to do this.
It was just a little bit clearer
than the instructions in paper
and they do mention where you have to cut
back here and fold this up, and anyway.
We're now ready to attach this piece,
it is charged up, so once we have this attached,
everything seems to be working correctly,
ready to take it out and try to fly it.
Now the way this looks to me is this piece
actually needs to come through the rudder here.
It's got the clips on the bottom which will clip on
to the front of the wings here and then it slides back
till flush, that actually looks about right.
I think this is about right.
They do talk about adjusting the control surfaces,
the dihedral and anhedral
and I'm just gonna try it like this.
I'm going to actually fire up the motor
right here and see what happens
and then I'll take it out in the backyard.
Now they recommend you have a very large space.
Like a soccer field to fly it around in.
So I may get to that in a later video
if it survives its first attempt.
I just want to see it fly a hundred feet
in a straight line and I'll be happy.
They're looking for each other right now.
(scratchy static)
Okay, I've got the, at least understand,
you take the red little dealie there in the middle
and you push it up to make the propeller go faster.
So let me try that, there we go.
Okay, we have Bluetooth connection.
It's a little too windy out to be doing this
but I'm gonna give it a try.
Propeller going, there we go.
Here we go.
(wind buffeting)
Don't seem to be getting any lift.
Also not sure about the tipping of this.
Maybe I want to hold it so it looks like it's flying.
Here we go.
All right, the clips came off the paper
but no real damage.
I'll be able to put this back together
and give it another try.
Here we go.
(wind buffeting)
Engine power up.
Okay.
(buzzing)
So that was my experience with the PowerUp 3.0.
I tried it a few months ago.
Made those first flying attempt videos.
I tried it on windy days, not windy days,
into the wind, with the wind.
Then just sort of put it away for a few months.
Came back today, watched the videos fresh.
Got a fresh piece of paper, made a fresh airplane,
charged this up, started all over again.
Still with the same result.
So it just didn't work out for me.
From what I've seen of reviews online,
it seems to be about half the people
get this to work and are happy with it
and the other half of the people are like me.
It's such a cool idea, you really want it to work,
but you're just not able to and it's hard to tell
is the problem with the app?
With the way you built the airplane?
With something about how the things are attached?
There are a lot of variables
and I just don't have time to keep trying
to figure out which thing has gone wrong.
If you're interested in it, I'll put a link to it
down below this video.
I may bring it up to my brother.
He has a knack with any flying remote-control
helicopter and airplane.
Maybe he'll be able to get this to work.
If that's the case, I'll definitely update this video.
Otherwise we'll be back with another review soon.
Hope to see you then.
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