Was thankful to be awarded 1st place for my Slick design scheme in the Aztech Scheme Contest! They also had a contest for their Raven which the talented Beerto brought home 1st and 2nd place! Here are my entries for the contest:...Continue Reading

She flies! Spent the past weeks taking my time getting her ready for her maiden...and I'm happy to report that her first flight yesterday was an absolute success!

Cutting Tape
Unboxing revealed one of the best looking ARF's I'd seen! No wrinkles, dings or dents...which is most likely because she was packed in what appeared to be battleship grade cardboard (I saved the large box that the fuselage was delivered in to serve as my casket). The hardware was all sorted, zip bagged and labeled...which made locating parts a breeze and helped me keep from guessing if I should have used this screw here or...oops...there.

Putting It All Together
The build was as simple and straight forward as any I've done in the 48" and 60" EF electric class except for the pin hinges...I was a little aprehensive about them but thanks to many great videos on the internet on the subject everything went off without a hitch! The only mods I had to make were the motor mount and cowl.

The motor mount mods were made for installation of the Hacker Q80-8M. Aero-model.com has CADD drawings on their site that show bolt locations for the built-in "X" mount. I used AutoCAD to make a template which helped me set the location for the 1/4" x 4" stainless steel bolts with blind nuts I'm using for standoffs. If you mount the motor in a standard "box" configuration then you'll have to remove a portion of the flange of two of the blind nuts in order to install them in...Continue Reading

6:30 PM. Arrived late today! Packaging looked to be in good shape with exception of a few areas on one box. About to start opening boxes and inspecting the contents!!!

8:30 PM. Boxes opened and parts all look great...after being around my 60" Extra EXP for a while this thing looks huge! Real nice accessory package included like wing and stab bags, pilot, cockpit kit, and canopy cover. The Yak was definitely worth the wait! Have an EFlite PA -20 I'm finishing up so it will be next week before I can start on her.

Was lucky enough to be in the area of Nall eWeek last week and decided to stop by to experience Triple Tree for the first time. If you haven't been and ever have the chance to go, I strongly recommend you do it...amazing place with wonderful folks!

After I checked out the vendor area for some supplies I headed down to the 3D area. Got there early so most of the folks were just sturring when I arrived...but planes were in the air. The Extreme Flight tent was closed up but EF team pilots Chris Manns and Chris Jewett were already putting on amazing flight displays with the 60" Laser and MXS. Another RCGroups member Chris Watkins was set up and flying a really cool 3D profile plane too...doing a great job with it I might add! He mentioned in one of our conversations that he thought Chris from EF had brought the new 91" Yak 54...he did!

So here are pictures of my first sighting and pre maiden of the plane with my design! This scheme is set up as an electric version with a Hacker Q80-8M, Castle 160 HV ESC, Mejzlik 24 x 10TH prop, the new HiTec 93XX series servos (cant remember the exact version) and 12S 5300 mAh packs. Didn't get to see her fly in person but some video shot at the event shows her doing well on this setup...which is good because it is almost identical to what mine will be! Container was supposed to arrive yesterday in Savannah, GA. so hopefully I'll be getting a few big boxes soon!

Had good luck with the EF contest so I thought I try my hand at the Slick 540 contest held by Limitless Aero & Aeroplus RC over on the Flying Giants site...didn't win but had fun with the contest.

Congrats to Beerto on another cool winning design!

Here are my entries:

First of the year approaching fast and with that comes my first "big" plane...the new Extreme Flight 91" Yak 54!

I was lucky to be one of the two winners in the design contest held for the new scheme. Originally the announcement was that the red and black shown below was going to be one of the schemes however, due to recent issues with black Oracover, a darker blue will be used in its place (edit...48" planes are here; 91" scheduled to appear around the first of October...).

The other design is by a very talented and cool guy out on the west coast. His really cool scheme is here: http://www.flyinggiants.com/forums/s...ad.php?t=75377

I based my red/white/blue scheme on the original "Russian Thunder" design but used the newer "splinter" type stripes and moved the focus point of the starburst up to the motor area instead of the front of the wing on the original. The new Extreme Flight 60" Extra (awesome looking plane!) uses the splinter approach too - it follows the original starburst layout more closely than mine. My design is also inspired by the 50e SebArt SU-29...love the red front but I didn't care for the curved lines at the rear of the fuselage so I used the splinter here too! I have it coming from a point about mid way up the landing gear to give the appearence of busting though the colors.

I'm going electric with her and have had lots of help from the RCGroups folks with setups! I think I've decided on:

Motor: Hacker Q80-8M
Prop: Mejzlik 24 x 10
ESC: Castle ICELITE 160HV and Castle CapPack with Jeti 150A anti -spark
Servos: Hitec HS-7950TH
Receiver: JR921
Batteries: (2) 6S 5000 mAh in series and a 2S 1200 mAh receiver pack

Here are some of the other schemes I submitted: