I’m going to end the suspense right off. The Runner 250 is much more impressive sitting in the box than it is in the air. Walkera really dropped the ball on this one because with their deep pockets and marketing muscle this could and should have been the DJI Phantom of racing quads. I REALLY wanted to like this quad, because I think this is exactly what the mini-quad racing segment of this hobby needs to take off the way AV quads have – an easy to set up, ready to fly quad that comes with everything you need in the box to go out and start flying and having fun. And the Walkera Runner DOES do that. Unfortunately what it fails to do is actually fly well, and when you get right down to the bottom line that’s what matters the most.
Review Parameters
This review was done using the stock runner 250 including the included Devention 7 radio with the following exceptions:
1. I tried various different props, including the stock props
2. Most of the flying was done using an Immersion VTx (Video Transmitter) due to the fact that the connector to the onboard VTx was broken early on in testing in a minor crash when the battery lurched forward (something I was concerned about in Part 1)
Setup and First Flight
The Runner 250 was very easy to get set up and flying right out of the box as advertised. I did not review the package with the included goggles but I was able to connect it to my own setup no problem. One thing I should mention here, while I was able to get the video to work straight to my Fatshark goggles, the included VTx does NOT directly support Fatshark channels. It was able to work due to channel bleed (typically a VTx transmission will “bleed” into adjacent channels). While this is good news for Fatshark owners, you should be aware that your range may suffer as you are not actually receiving on the channel the VTx is transmitting on. Also, this may be a problem if you’re trying to fly with other people. If the included VTx has enough channel bleed to allow you to fly on Fatshark channels there may be enough to interfere with other flyers video reception as well.
Charging the battery on the included charger took nearly 2 hours (presumably from storage charge level), and worse than that it actually overcharged the battery by .3 MAH per cell, and was still going when I finally checked it. This is really, REALLY bad. Not only will it severely limit the life of your battery, but over charging a lipo battery is quite dangerous. If you buy this package I highly recommend you throw this charger in the trash and purchase a decent charger (iMax B6-AC is an excellent starter charger).
Other than the charger getting the runner ready to fly was a snap. The props were clearly labeled and really can’t be put on wrong (they really should include an extra set though), and the receiver bound easily to the Devo 7.
My first flight was a hover test and short LOS (Line of Sight) flight up and down the driveway just to make sure everything was configured right. One thing I noticed was that the runner had a strong tendency to drift forward in the out of the box set up. This meant I had to dig into the settings on the Devo 7 (not the most user friendly radio in the world, but not rocket science either) to adjust the sub trim to get the runner to hover level. Once that was done I was ready to try FPV.
Flying the Runner FPV
The runner is being sold as a FPV racing quad, so how it performs in this capacity will be the basis of this review. The first thing I noticed when I strapped on the goggles to fly FPV is that the rates for pitch and roll are set very high for a beginner, and the rate for yaw is set extremely low. Ordinarily this is something you would adjust in the FC (Flight Controller) setup, but since there is nothing included in the box to allow you to do this and setting up a Multi-Wii FC is beyond the scope of this review I dove back in to the Devo 7 settings again and made some adjustments to the Expo (Exponential) and rates to make it easier to control (please ask in the comments if you’d like me to go into setting up the radio a little more). Once that was done the runner was a lot easier to control, but still far from a dream to fly.
The next problem I ran into was frequent control link dropouts. I found out later that this was at least partly due to the fact that it came with the antennas tucked in under the frame, but not before a drop-out caused the fateful crash that took out the onboard VTx. Once I noticed the antennas and extended them the control link improved, but the range was still awful. I’m not going to harp on this too much because the problem was at least partially exacerbated by where I had to mount the replacement immersion VTx, and also I understand that the Runner is now coming with longer antennas on the receiver. However it was still worth mentioning as I’m sure there were hundreds sold like this.
Once I got a new VTx installed and the control link issues at least partially resolved I was able to start trying to get a feel for how it flys. Unfortunately this is where I think the runner misses the mark badly. I tried the runner in both angle mode (self leveling) and rate mode (no self leveling) and I honestly wasn’t very impressed with either one. It’s certainly flyable, but it just never gives you that comfortable, “locked in” feeling that I’ve gotten with other mini drones I’ve flown that have a 32 bit flight controller. In angle mode I felt the self leveling was overly aggressive, and I always felt like I was fighting the flight controller. In rate mode the Runner had a tendency to pitch up (I verified the center of gravity was correct before each flight) and required constant corrections to stay level. The flying felt very “bouncy” even in very low wind as compared to my Indy 250 Plus for example, which is an “ARF” (Almost Ready to Fly) quad I got from RC timer for $140. The Indy uses a 32 bit CC3D based flight controller, and compared to the Runner it feels like it flys on rails (See the short video at the end for a compraison).
Lastly, the Runner 250 is not particularly fast. The camera can be tilted up to allow you to fly at a higher angle of attack and still see where you’re going, and you’ll need to do so if you want to get any speed at all out of the runner. For comparison, the Indy 250 quad flys faster with no camera tilt than the Runner 250 does with about a 20 degree camera tilt.
One thing the Runner does do very well out of the box is flips and rolls in rate mode. This is due to the rates for pitch and roll being set rather high out of the box. The few rolls I tried with it were very snappy and didn’t seem to cause much altitude loss.
Durability
The Runner does seem to be reasonably durable, it withstood several minor to moderate crashes with no damage other than the VTx connector which broke early on due to the battery lurching forward. It’s probably not going to survive a major crash into a tree or from high altitude, but I think you need to expect some compromises for a quad in this price range, and as long as parts are available and easy to replace I think this is an acceptable one.
Summary
Despite the fact that the Runner 250 in intriguing for the overall package, I simply can’t recommend it due to what in my opinion is a poor flight experience. This is simply not a quad that’s comfortable to fly. To put it another way, the runner requires constant attention to fly, and forces you to focus on the flying rather than the flight. Mini quad racing is taking off, and there will soon be plenty of competing options to choose from. Even now there are a couple to choose from such as the Storm Racing Drone from Helipal for $359 which comes with the same Devo 7 radio, or the new Nighthawk 280 pro which also comes with a radio (probably not as good as the Devo 7) for around $250. You would have to buy some goggles or a screen to fly it FPV, but there are plenty of options available for goggles that you can get far cheaper than the Walkera package which includes the goggles.
In summary, this is a good idea that simply cut corners in the wrong place. My advice is to either sit tight and wait for something better, or look into one of the quads I mentioned above. As for the Runner, on paper it looks like a good value for the money, but if the drone doesn’t fly well, there is no value.
Below is a short DVR video showing what the view looks like when flying the runner from a set of goggles. Some short clips flown with the Indy 250 are included as well for comparison.
