I recently completed a Formosa II using a 3 cell A123 2300mah stick embedded in the fuselage as a power supply. I hollowed out a section for the battery and hot glued it in with a ply tray above it for the RX. I had my doubts about how it would fly, but I'm very happy to report that it flies beautifully. The nice thing about it is that I don't need any other batteries and when I'm at the field, I can recharge the battery in 15 minutes and I'm ready to go again.

I've also switched all of the batteries in my larger planes over to A123's. They hold their charge forever and charge really fast with no worries about puffing, overheating, catching on fire or whatever.

The man in brown just delivered my new H9 Twist 40. I decided that I couldn't live without a smaller plane that I could wring out at the field and not have to worry about trashing my big gassers. Guess I'm just not comfortable enough with flying the bigger planes yet. To be honest, they kind of scare me. Obviously I need more air time with them.

I've decided to put an OS 70FS in the Twist. I want a lot of pull without excessive speed and I think the 70 will be the ticket. We'll see. I hope to have it in the air by the end of next week.

Sitting in the shop considering putting a .25 glow engine on the mini pulse, I sat there looking at it and asked myself why I was going to waste all that valuable time and energy on a plane that I really didn't like, looked like crap from a previous repair and would probably disappoint me again. That was a bit of a turning point for me in a way. I decided that I'm only going to spend my time on planes that really intrigue me. That offer me some serious new learning/flying experience. I have 3 vintage planes in my shop that might find a new lease on life. We'll see....

Let's see...my last blog entry was 5 years ago. I guess you'd have to say I'm not a prolific RC commentator! Since that time My flying has progressed like many...from electrics to giant gassers, and just about everything in between. This winter our club secured an inside fly zone at a local National Guard Armory and we all had a lot of fun venturing into the micro plane/heli world. I ended the season by building my own micro 3d plane and I'm happy with how that worked out. I also built a 1/2A Ace Simple Extra that hasn't flown yet, but I'm curious to see how the Norvel .061 engine performs. Everyone has good things to say about that engine. I also converted (don't ask me why I do these things) a semi beat up E-flite mini pulse to glow by putting an old OS .15 on it. It flies, but definitely needs more power. I think it's going to get a .20 next and I'll see how it performs. Now I'm just waiting for the field to open up and in the meantime, installing new RX's in my planes 'cause I got a new Hitec Aurora TX.

Well...I'll get right to it. Not too long ago I purchased a Blade CP heli from someone on this group. This was after doing some considerable research about "first" heli's etc. A buddy of mine always says "Suppliers are liars" and when I read reviews of just about any RC machine, it's always a glowing report, so sometimes it's real hard to separate the sizzle from the steak.

I would say first off that the CP is not a beginner heli. It's not only a challenge to set up (and keep it set up) but it's a supreme challenge to fly as well for a first timer.

I do seem to be getting the hang of it, but it's really squirrely and difficult to control.

This weekend I'm determined to get into a sustained hover.

I'll keep you posted