I learned to fly helis on a GMP Cricket back in 1980. It was a great little heli that was able to take a LOT of abuse! A few years back I came across a Cricket kit here in the RCG Classifieds and, on a whim, I purchased it!

I had planned on building it as a glow model, but the more I fly my electric stuff, the less interest I have in flying anything glow powered. I considered selling the kit, but then it hit me.....why not try an e-power conversion? So that's what I've decided to do.

The kit seems to be complete right down to all the paperwork. In the enclosed pamphlet there were even a couple photos of a two very familiar clowns as seen in the last photo below!

This will be a relatively slow build for a heli since I have to make a lot of the parts for the conversion plus I plan to incorporate all the little tricks that we learned back in the day to make the Cricket fly as well as it can.

The build thread is located here.

Ralph

I have the next eight days off from work and I thought this would be a good time to update my Align T-Rex 700e with a Black Shark Fuselage.

I've been a big fan of this fuselage design from the very first time I saw one which was probably close to 30 years ago, give or take. I've had this fuselage kit for about four years now and it's high time it gets flown!

Ralph

This past flying season I flew my new Sebart Mythos 50e for the first time and I really liked the way it flew and presented in the air. The only real complaint I had with the model was the spongy aluminum landing gear. The gear was not up to the task of handling the rough grass field that I fly from.

I liked the model well enough that I decided to splurge and purchased a pair of carbon fiber landing gear struts (Item #543) from f3alorenz.de. The carbon gear are a perfect match to the aluminum gear.

So, I spent part of this Turkey Day upgrading the landing gear.

Ralph

I purchased this model about 10-12 years ago(I think ) and I've never been completely happy with how it flew, so I'll be stripping the covering and making a few minor changes to the airframe. The main issue is with the stab, the incidence is out a little making it difficult to trim. Had to fly it with a considerable amount of up elevator trim. I also want to change the color scheme. Not sure how long this project will take. It'll run parallel to my Super Kaos .60 build, so it may take a while.

Ralph

After a 13 year, give or take, hiatus from helicopters I've recently been bitten by the bug again. I made the mistake of watching several WC and Nats videos which put me over the edge! As a result I've pulled the trigger on an Align T-Rex 700e F3C.

Thought I'd post some photos of the build.

Eventually I plan to wrap a Black Shark fuselage around this heli, but not until I fly it in pod & boom form for a while to workout the rust in my fingers. Might even try competing again at some point!

This is also my first serious foray into the world of electrics.

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Maiden fight was on July 21, 2013.

Number of flights as of September 28, 2013 - 35

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