After getting some time off on a weekend (FINALLY!!!), I was able to get two of my beloved warbirds back up in the air: the P-47D and the E-Flite P-51D.



I got two flights in on each in some beautiful weather here in Texas, and it really did my soul some good. I will be going back out again tomorrow morning to fly before a dentist's appointment that will have me laid up for about three days. I'm expecting the flying will help to calm my nerves before the two-plus hour appointment and subsequent recovery.

I plan on flying more often. I talked with my wife about making flying a priority on Sunday mornings for me. She agreed, and has given me the green light. I am looking forward to getting fully back into the hobby. Like I said in my last post, it's been too long.

I haven't flown in over a year. Nearly a year and a half. Why? Because I'm in the National Guard, and I've been tied up on the weekends. Also, our club field has been under construction for over a year (county project), and coupled with the fact that on the weekends I don't have drill, my wife has either had me traveling with her or doing honey-do's, or the weather hasn't been conducive to flying. So, here I am: severely out of practice and longing to get back into the air.

I did get a DJI Mavic 2 Pro yesterday, and despite the high winds (gusting to 20 mph), I was able to get it up into the air and get some nice video footage. I can see now why these drones are both so popular and possibly dangerous; they are ridiculously easy to fly and require very little skill. They do get some amazing footage, though, and I have to admit that I'm really looking forward to some trips now with this drone.

I'm probably one of the very few who has my FAA, AMA, and contact into actually on my drone, but I figure the last thing I need is to have something bad happen and I run afoul of the law or the AMA. Anyway, I hope to be able to get back into the air soon with my beloved warbirds. I miss flying them dearly.

For Christmas this year, my wife purchased an E-Flite PT-17 for me. This is significant, because a year ago, after my wife and I had lost a bunch of weight, we went on a few adventures. One of these was her purchasing a ride for me in a PT-19 that turned into me flying the plane for 30 minutes. She had briefed the pilot before I was told of the flight that I was also a pilot. Once in the cockpit, the pilot asked me if I'd ever flown a biplane before. I told him I had not. He asked if I'd flown a tail-dragger before, and I told him that I did. So, he told me that once we were 100 feet off the ground, the plane was mine. Sure enough, he handed control over to me 100' off the ground, and I flew the plane for the entire flight except for the final landing. I flew us all the way to final approach.

It was a great experience, and the pilot commented that my flying skills were remarkably good, and he'd never have guessed I never flew a biplane before. He taught me how to do some tight maneuvers which I then performed well. It was a great and memorable experience.

I get to relive those memories now with this smaller version of the plane. I've not yet decided if I'm going to re-paint/number the plane with the same markings as the full-scale plane I flew, but for now, she's pretty enough as-is. I have not yet had an opportunity to maiden her, but I plan on doing so this coming weekend (weather permitting).

I finally had a chance to get out and fly today, if only for a little bit. I didn't have as many batteries ready as I'd have liked, so I flew three times for about 5 minutes each doing tough and go's. They were all pretty decent, but the last landing on my last flight took the cake; it was beautiful! Really capped the day.

My wife came out with me this time as she knew it was going to be a short trip versus the long trips I normally make. She took some photos of me flying, and the one above is my favorite. It's probably the best photo of me flying one of my planes taken. This plane is my E-Flite 1.2m Mustang. The weather was perfect today, and the plane flew flawlessly.

I need to get back out again sooner rather than later. I'm hoping the weather cooperates with me next Sunday which will be my next opportunity to make it out to the field.

It's been a while since I've been able to fly due to the wet and windy weather we've been having this winter in Houston, but looking through some photos, I found this pretty one of my Spitfire and Hurricane. I felt I needed to share it here.



These are the Parkzone and E-Flite birds, respectively. I enjoy flying them both, although they are quite different in the air. The Spitfire is very easy to fly and floaty on landings, while the Hurricane tests your abilities as a pilot on takeoff (needs a lot of speed) and landings (it feels like a heavier plane). I enjoy them both immensely and look forward to getting them both back into the air soon.

This past Sunday, I took out both of my E-Flite Mustangs for some great flying. The 1.1m and the 1.2m Mustangs both saw lots of action. The winds were only 2-5 mph, but crosswind directly across the runway. This proved to be no problem for the smaller Mustang, but the larger one weathervaned a lot on takeoff due to the combined crosswind and p-factor. I will need to add more rudder throw to this plane before I fly it again. On landings, both planes were stellar performers, but at slow speeds, the larger Mustang has a hard time staying on center line.

As for flying, both planes were true champs. The smaller of the two is faster and feels more nimble, but the larger Mustang carries with it a more scale flying appearance. With the external tanks, she's very stately and beautiful.

I did lots of low flying to allow some pattern guys to work up high, and the Mustangs were up for the task. They were stable and looked great making low passes. Once the pattern guys were gone, I was able to really let the planes stretch their wings and do some aerobatics. Both planes do great, but the little one definitely got faster on the power dive passes.

Both land great, although the little one requires a little more speed for the landings to stick, otherwise she bounces. The larger of the two settles down nicely and I heard lots of congratulations from the pilots behind me as I landed these planes. They really make you look good when you pull off good landings.

I'm hoping for good weather again this coming weekend. I think I need to bring out the Corsair sisters for the next trip.

I got a 3D printer a few weeks back and made myself some chocks.





The tables at our club field have carpet on them, so I put some velcro hooks on the bottom of these chocks so they will hook in and keep the planes steady. This will help to keep the planes on the table if a wind gust comes. I've had two planes get blown off the table before; hopefully, these chocks will keep that from happening.

The 3D models are available at Thingiverse for those who have a 3D printer.

I just got done adding some Archer inspired markings to my fictitious "Dangerzone" E-Flite 1200mm P-51D. Almost all my planes have some sort of Callie Graphic custom markings, and this Mustang is no exception.

I'm not happy with my covering up of the silver on this one. The Sharpie method worked perfectly on my smaller Mustang, but it's more obvious on this one. I may order more markings and airbrush the silver to fix it later, but for now, I guess it's okay. I like how it looks, otherwise.





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Today was a great day in South East Texas. The weather wasn't melting the trees, and until at least 10:30 am, the winds were relatively smooth. That gave me a chance to take out my two new E-Flite 1.2m warbirds: the Mustang and the Corsair.



The first few flights with each were with calm conditions, and they were textbook beautiful. The takeoffs and landings with both were worthy of being put into WWII movies. Then the gusting winds came.

The winds were directly in our faces with a 90 degree crosswind with steady wind at around 3-5 kts and gusts up to 12 kts. For these little foam planes, that's quite big.



I had some trouble with each plane's first takeoff. It was embarassing. Both planes got off the ground before they were ready which resulted in both planes bouncing hard on the ground before getting back in the air. Both sustained minor damage on the bounce: the Mustang knocked a dummy tank off its wing while the Corsair actually took damage to the landing gear mounting bracket that required repair at the field.

After taking a 20 minute break, I regained my wits and went out for touch and go's and made a lot of progress. While my last landing (or two) of the morning with the Mustang were not so pretty, they were safe and didn't do any damage. Since the winds were gusting pretty big at this point, I decided to pack it up and go home to charge the batteries I used during the morning's flights.

Then, something strange and beautiful happened: the weather...Continue Reading

Due to an amazing sale that I just couldn't pass up yesterday at the local hobby shop, I picked up the new-ish E-Flite 1.2m Corsair. She's beautiful!



The funny things about this Corsair are:

• I prefer the F4U4 over the others, which this one is.
• I love the squadron markings for this Marine training squadron and have always wanted to model a Corsair from this squadron.
• I love the colors. Green and blue? What's not to love!
• AS3X and 1.2m are a great combination and I want to get more in this size.

I got the plane together quickly and easily; connect servo connectors for the wing, add the horizontal stabilizer, five screws total, and done! The plane feels solid, and has one of the best wing to fuselage welds I've seen in any foamie. The larger fuselage allows for ample room for the battery compartment. I won't have any trouble getting batteries in or out of this plane. The Mustang fuselage is thin and it can be cumbersome to get batteries in and our easily; not the case in the Corsair.

I look forward to maidening this plane this weekend as long as the weather cooperates. I'll probably take this one and the new Mustang out to the field if I can fit them both into the car at the same time. The one downside of these 1.2m planes is that it's more difficult to fit them into the A4. I can typically take 3 1.1m planes, but two 1.2m planes pose difficulties. We'll see and report on this Saturday.

This past Saturday morning, I took out my two E-Flite Mustangs: the 1.1m and 1.2m versions.



Both are great flyers but in different ways. While the 1.1m Mustang is a great, solid flyer, it is the faster of the two with its two-blade prop. It does a good job of flying through the wind, but its small size still allows it to buffet noticeably. Landings are nice if you keep the speed up, even with full flaps. I now only aim for two-point landings and this ensures that the plane doesn't bounce. Three-point landings invite bounciness due to the springy landing gear struts.

The 1.2m Mustang is amazing, albeit a little slower. Its scale details are very nice, and the extra 4" of wingspan really do a lot to make this plane a more stable flyer. Landing characteristics are a lot better than the 1.1m version and with fully deployed flaps, acts just like a full-size plane: adjust approach speed with nose attitude (pitch axis) while regulating rate of descent with throttle. I have had some of the most pleasurable landings with this new Mustang.

After some flying, a club member asked me to do some formation flying with him and his P-38. We did some formation flying last week, and it was a lot of fun, so we went out for a sortie together. It ended up being a lot of fun. A few close calls that probably looked a lot closer than they really were, but the passes and circuits with the two warbirds flying together was quite spectacular. We put on our own airshow!



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I posted this in the Hurricane thread on the Electric Warbirds forum, but I thought it might make some sense to post it here, as well.

I finally had a chance to take out my Hurricane this past Saturday after repairing the nose. What a fun time!



First flight: takeoff was textbook beautiful with the tail coming up, riding on the mains as speed rose, and then a gentle liftoff. I retracted gear only to find one of them hung halfway. I cycled them three times in an attempt to get them all the way up but failed each time. Decided to keep flying and enjoy the plane and deal with the gear once it was back on the ground. I was able to do lots of beautiful, big maneuvers and enjoy the power of the 25 sized motor. It pulled through the gentle breeze like a champ. Landing was okay, but I was a little rusty and the plane bounced on landing a few times. No worries; we have more batteries. Checked landing gear; the door on the port gear slid up and was binding against the wing. I slid it down a bit in the hopes that this would fix the problem.

Flight two was a little more eventful. Although starting in the same manner as the first flight, this time the gear retracted fully. Yay! More big maneuvers and low passes before the time for landing came up. I flipped the switch and.... one hung gear. Port. This time, it was only about 1/3 out. I had a choice to make: gear up on the grass or gear down and try to finness it down to slow speed while keeping the starboard wing up as long...Continue Reading

I finally got a chance to go out to the local club yesterday, and I'm glad I did. Even though winds were 3-10 mph (gusting) from the North, those winds were predominantly down the runway and only sometimes at a crosswind from the North-East.

I took three planes this time: My Albatros, Spitfire, and the queen of the squadron, the P-47D. All three planes were flown twice for about 5 minutes each, and it was a great time with each of them.



The Spitfire seemed a bit twitchy on its first flight, having flown it after the P-47 which flies like it's on rails. I dialed in some expo on the transmitter and the second flight was far smoother and looked better.

The Albatros was a better flying plane than I remembered. I haven't flown it in over a year, and while I remembered that it required a lot more coordination to fly it than the WWII birds, what made the experience really nice was that I used 2200 mAh batteries in it installed far more aft than the usual 1300 mAh batteries that the plane calls for. Doing this puts the CG back just a little, but it really made the plane fly better, nicer, and landings/takeoffs were sweet. I will be taking this plane to the field with me more often. As always, it got the most looks and comments. People love seeing a red bi-plane.

The Jug was once again the show-stealer for me. This plane just flies so incredibly well. I like it so much, I have another one in the box just in case I crash this one up too badly. For me, it flies exceptionally well, and even when it's windy or gusty, it just behaves nicely. Always a pleasure to fly this plane.

All in all, it was a great day of flying. I wish I could have gone out again today, but work and such kept me indoors. Maybe tomorrow.

Here in Houston, winds are 10-15 mph today and I decided since it looks so pretty outside, I may as well go out and fly.



Of the two, obviously, the Mustang flies much better, cutting through the wind like a plane much bigger. The only caveat is landing where the plane begins to feel more like a foamie and less like a bigger plane. The Corsair, on the other hand, feels like a foamie through the entire flight being thrown around and buffeted like crazy.

The obvious victor: Mustang.

All that's left to put on the tail is the BuNo, but otherwise, this P-51D, named "Gellibean" (pronounced like "jellybean") after my daughter's childhood nickname, is done.



I'm quite happy with how it turned out. I did some light weathering/smoking but decided not to go overboard with it.



The markings, while fictitious, are accurately placed and sized. I'm really enjoying making my RC planes look like flying models almost as much as I enjoy flying them (which is A LOT!).

This past Friday, I took my E-Flite Mustang out for a little low-level fun at the local club. My son took some video and I put it together into this short three minute video.

It was a lot of fun, and I love flying this plane! It goes to the field with me every time I go.

Parkzone Mustang Flying Low (3 min 9 sec)

After talking to some guys and watching planes that others at the club are flying, I've decided to get back into glow and even gas. I'm not looking forward to the cleanup and the slime, but I am looking forward to the speed and the ol' dirty mechanical aspect. The smell of glow fuel reminds me of when my father and I used to mess with the stuff back when I was a kid. I wish he was still around to experience the electric flight revolution, but I know he'd also still enjoy flying the ol' smokies, so that's what I'm going to do. A fellow club member sold me some planes and engines (and field equipment!) and I'm in the process of making everything flight-worthy again (very minor tweaks and repairs which are understandable for planes not flown in a long time; hence their being sold to me).



Here is the Q500 pylon racer (which has an OS .25 FX on it) and an OS .45 F and an OS .65 LA. I will figure out what to do with the two bigger engines at some point.

I also picked up another P-47, this one is a Razorbac, made by FMS, and is electric powered.



I'm in the process of getting an AR635 receiver setup and working properly with it and I've already stripped off the markings so that I can repaint it and get it ready for markings to make it Robbie Johnson's "Lucky" P-47C. After reading his book, I think it would be a great tribute to a pilot with 20 German kills in WWII.

Within a few weeks, I'll be buying a 30cc Yak with a 31cc DLA engine on it. I'm looking forward to getting into the bigger planes and the gas engines. I flew a 120cc Edge today, and it was amazingly smooth and tight, even in the winds we had today in Houston.

I never thought I'd "go back," but the lure is too strong. I love my warbirds, but it's time to branch out a bit. That's what's great about this hobby; there are so many ways to enjoy it!

Here is my list of Horizon Hobby's planes in order of where I feel they fall into a ranking. As always, these are just my opinion and I'm not in any way discrediting or challenging anyone else's opinions.

P-47D This is, without question, the best warbird turned into an RC plane ever. It's almost as if the designers at Republic thought ahead. "When radio controlled aircraft are cheap and easy to produce, this design will be perfect for scale modeling." Indeed, the P-47 hits all the right points for a great RC plane: four-channel primary control (rudder/elevator/ailerons/throttle) as well as two options that complete this "full house" warbird: flaps and retracts. With the optional flaps and retracts, this plane is one of the best performing and easiest to land warbirds I've ever flown. The wide stance of the landing gear make it a dream for ground handling, although if operating from grass, a washer on the aft screws to add a little more forward rake might be necessary to combat nose-overs. Takeoffs and landings with the P-47 are straight forward, and with little practice, ground handling is easy and stable. In flight, the plane is stable, relatively fast, and very well mannered. While not a trainer, I would consider it to be a great tailwheel and aileron trainer for those moving from a Super Cub or T-28. The one down-side would be the silver color which can blend in to overcast skies a bit too well, but on a sunny or partly cloudy day, this is a great...Continue Reading

I'm now done with three planes after having utilized my airbrush and Valspar latex paints and Michael's generic paints. I am now very happy with the outcomes!

The Fw190A8 turned out really well. I finally re-did the mottling/spots on the fuselage and some subtle weathering. The results were very well received at the club flying field this past weekend.





The Bf109G is also complete, and while the ground handling still bothers me, now at least it looks as nicely as it flies.

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Well, I was able to get a lot more of the plane done today, but I think I will do a little more to make the spots on the fuselage bigger.



While I think it looks okay, I think once the spots are a bit bigger it will look better.