Finally after finishing my mini-corado last week I was able to get out to the slope today to give her a test flight. Unfortunately the wind was SOOO strong I was too nervous to throw her off the top of the hill (its a serious hill guys). So a treck down the bottom and some nervous moments before I decided to give her a go. She flew straight from my hand and never looked back. I was amazed at the speed that I could pick up banging a few turns in and the whistle from high speed dives, awesome to say the least. Inverted flight, rolls, stall turns, loops etc were all performed with ease.
Now all I have to do is learn to DS it properly and I'm set....
.....that and a 2M blade :-)

Steve

Yeah--- foam has it's place--- but it's real hard to go back to it after tasting the energy retention and speed of the 'glass side' of sloping!!!!

Mmmmmm expensive glass... delicious Seriously composite performance is a Good Thing (TM). I will never stop flying foamies but the performance avaiable from glass/composite planes is VERRRRY NICE!

Steve

DS

Don't do it! Strong the dark side is...fight it you must

TFLG

hmmm.... could it be slope Yoda... ???



Steve

Hey flyonline, one thing I would seriously recommend: before emarking on any extended trip to the dark, dark side (i.e.: moldie DS), check with your financial advisor re: liquid assets. You're going to need them.

Liquidity is a Good Thing(TM) when one engages the soaring gods mano a mano in the arena of dynamic soaring. That or the ability to pump out quality planes from scratch on a regular basis!

Steve

Flyonline,
I'd love to see or hear more about a "mini Corrodo", I have never heard of such a plane.
I have not DS'd yet, but the sane recommendation is to get practised up on a foamie first, then toss out the pride of your fleet.
Also, is the MC a one piece wing? If not the joiner had better be up to the task!!
Post pics of your Mini, if you are able. Or, how about a link to the distributor??

Goodluck!
Target

West systems, cabosil and wet sanding paper
droydx

Target, here's a link to a product page on the Mini Corado:

Mini-Corado Product Page

Manufacturer:

VV Models

Steve, I'd also be really interested to see some more flight reports, as well as pics and videos of the plane. It certainly looks/sounds good.

Anton

Thank You!!

Vaclav makes beautiful planes, and flies them well too.

Ok just got back from a days flying at a new slope. Mostly a mixture of high winds and thermals, though there were periods of scratching around waiting for the next thermal to come through. The wedgies (wedge tailed eagles, our equivilant of the golden) were thermaling very happily on the larger thermals and flew some of our slope lift with us as well. Awesome watching a huge raptor cruise past 50m away.

Onto the flying. As it was basically a maiden I started with a little more lead up front than usual, rather an over stable plane than a twitchy one. After 10min or so of cruising around, I landed her and took the extra lead out. Time to wring her out good and proper. A few gentle legs to gain some height and a quick dive across the slope. The whistle was something to behold, it seemed to hold the same note no matter the speed. Rolls were nice and quick, though a little less axial than I would have liked. Inverted flight was easy and almost no elevator was needed, climbing inverted after a dive was a lot of fun. Cuban eights, stall turns etc etc were all easily performed.
However the thing that amazed me (and my flying partner) was the ability to keep the speed through the turn and "grip" the air and turn very fast without falling out of the sky or loosing the speed.
After a few thermal turns and some decent height it was time to put the nose down and really motor her a long. The dive was near on vertical from about 80-100m up and the scream across the slope face was worth every cent of the $1000. She seemed to loose the noise as she when she was REALLY motoring along, though it soon came back with a quick roll
Landings were a breeze despite the rotor and high winds, though it took a bit of experimenting to get the brakes dialed in right.
Although I haven't had a chance to thermal her from the flat field, I think that she would do fine as I had no trouble at all catching the thermals from the slope, and a bit of flap would slow her down in the thermals if needed.

As for DS, well I've already nearly lost my other crunchie so I won't be putting the MC through the darks side for a while (though low high speed passes through a small boundary layer are a lot of fun). I'll have to buy myself a foamie to kill first. The MC is a one piece wing, though the hex screws and pre moulded nuts make it very easy to remove.

Photo's will be hard to come by as I don't have a digital camera :-(

Steve

Steve,

Sounds like an incredible maiden flight! It's fast becoming clear to me that any of us that fly foam and think they will never get a composite/crunchy high performance job is simply in denial and/or delusional!!

Whereabouts in Canberra did you fly it?

Did you get the plane from Model Flight?

Would still love to see some pics/vids. Can you get a friend to take some?

Anton

Forgot to add - the $1000 worth, would you mind breaking it down and also letting us know what gear you put in it? Thanks.