After looking at prop balancers I went for the small handheld options and planned to make my own frame. The only thing I need was some magnets. I got these out of a white board paper holder. they were the perfect size 10mm diameter, they may be a little strong but will do the job.
First task was to use a screw driver to pry the magnets out so I could glue then to the frame arms.
As you can see they can easily hold the balancer and a 10x4.5 prop.
I measured the upright arms to be long enough to allow for the 10x4.5 prop, I cut two arms this length and glued the magnets to the top of the arms.
Next I cut some feet that were long enough to allow for the width of the prop balancer, arms and extra footing to give a stable base. This was all done by eye and the feet weren't measured.
Once cut the first arm was glued to the feet, the square was used to make sure it as perpendicular to the feet. Once dry the other arm was glued on giving 2-3mm extra clearance for the prop balancer so one end was floating.
Completed home made prop balancer.
First stage, balancing the blades, as you can see they took what I considered to be a lot of tape.
Shot of the props with the blades balanced one set it didn't rotate.
Next was to balance the hubs, wow these were way out... I used both sanding and hot-glue to get them balanced. I second guessed myself was I doing this right .... then one blade was nearly perfect out of the box. So yeah there were some very out of balance props. I would hate to think what it would have been like without balancing the props.
Shot of a prop with the hub balanced.
After this exercise and doing more reading I ordered some 8x4.5 props from Hobby-king From my reading they should be more than enough for my initial needs and hopefully be closer to balanced than the ones I currently have.
Still the waiting game for all my other parcels so I can get at least one quad flying.