I've been chatting with Sean Headrick of aerotestra.com and he brought over his latest thinshell model, the Hugo to fly. It was pouring down rain, but no problem! Everything but the props are enclosed in the body, including the motors. There's an interior shelf that holds 2 3S 2750 batteries. Sean gets about 20 minutes of flying around (not just hovering) with this.
The units look really nice, and are pretty light. The frame is 440 grams. It's two halves are permanently bonded together, and each arm has a hatch for accessing the motors and ESCs. There's a top shelf in the center for the flight controller, receiver, and any other electronics. I'll be helping him with some testing and flight controller selection/tuning.
As a bonus, we did some crash tests. Quite sturdy! The last crash took a prop off and pulled a motor loose; Sean's got a new double-cup design that will strengthen up the motor mount.
Here's some videos... flying around in the rain, and then crashing the unit to see how much of a hit it could take. To best see the rain, watch in HD!
