I started assembling my Fly Baby today. This is made by Taft Hobby. It was also sold by Hobby King in a blue color scheme. It's a nice looking scale model.

There were a few minor mistakes from the factory. The first one was the hardware. It was supposed to come with several different lengths and sizes of sheet metal screws, but they were all identical. So I drilled and tapped for 3mm screws and used them instead. Another issue was the rudder control horn. It was not glued in properly and came out as soon as it was touched. I re-glued it. And then there is a large plastic piece that supports the landing gear. It also connects the two wing halves. It broke off as soon as I was working around it, again for lack of glue. It had only one little dot of glue for a rather large piece.

Other than those issues the assembly is pretty easy and fast. I still have to string the wire bracing and install my Rx.

Receiver installed, servos connected, linkages adjusted and connected, and flying wires attached.

Did some detail painting on the gas cap and exhaust pipes and joystick. And today I painted up a pilot for it.

The instruction manual calls for a CG location of 80mm from the leading edge of the constant chord wing. The chord is 220mm. That makes their recommended CG at 36% MAC, which seems like it might be too far aft.

Typically, 25% MAC is a good starting point, and I do not think the CG ever goes beyond 33% MAC except for an extreme aerobatic plane. Well, anyway I am going to set my CG at 27% MAC and go from there.

I have decided to use a 2800 mAh 3S battery in this model. A 4S is really unnecessary imho. It's not supposed to be a speed plane after all. I am not using the stock kit prop, I am using a 13.5x6 Rev-Up Pro wide blade prop.

I have set the CG at 27% MAC with this battery.

I wanted to test how long this battery would run the motor until LVC. I was surprised! At between 2/3 and 3/4 throttle, it ran for 19 minutes before LVC kicked in, which had drained the battery to 25%. Suffice it to say I can do a 10 minute flight without any worries.

The last thing I need to do is put some Blenderm tape along the hinge lines. They look a little thin to me, as is.

Fixing lots of problems on this airplane, before I take it out to fly. Some of the issues are:

Flying wires too tight, pulling the sides of the fuselage outward. I stretched the springs to loosen the wire tension.

This model was molded with pockets for pin hinges on the control surfaces, yet they did not use any. Instead they relied on just the foam being a hinge. On a little tiny park flyer that would be okay, but this is a .40 size model, so come on. And the "hinges" were mostly broken thru already from out of the box. I reinforced all control surface hinge lines with Welder brand adhesive.

The control rods for the ailerons were too short, different lengths, and barely screwed into the ball links, and by only one thread on one of them. Impossible to align the ailerons level with the wings because one of them the ball link fell off the wimpy rod before the aileron could line up. I replaced the junk from the factory with 2-56 links and rods.

The maiden flight went well today. The aircraft flies at a realistic scale speed on the 3S battery. It did not require any trim adjustments. Wind was around 10 mph and it did not seem to be bothered by it.

Taft Hobby Fly Baby 1400 Maiden Flight @ Apollo XI Airfield (5 min 58 sec)

Nice write-up and video. I had the blue version from HK and really enjoyed it. It flew very well in the wind, and I had a blast "hovering" or even flying backwards sometimes. Eventually it became my "canary in the coal mine" - if the conditions were too windy for the Fly Baby, nothing else went up.

I did do some support work in the battery compartment, including lining the sides with plywood strips, and installing a tie-wire across the compartment to help support the wing wires. I also replaced the rear plastic supports for the landing gear with metal L-shaped plates that really made a difference.

Enjoy!

*

Hi, thank you for the comments and info, I appreciate it!

Are these still available in the US?

Thanks

Originally Posted by headshot001

Are these still available in the US?

Thanks

Nope! Discontinued model like 90% of all models made. Sucks because I missed out on a lot of good planes over the last few years since I was out of the hobby basically! With that being said I just bought a Taft Fly Baby from Bangood China warehouse. Only 1 left from there, and it was right at $200 with paying $35 expedited shipping and using a 20% off coupon. There is another China shop selling them for $300+ not including shipping. No way would I pay that for a foamie. I really wanted to grab one before they r all gone, so I bit the bullet! Last month I picked up a Starmax 1400 mm J3 from EBay from a US seller so got lucky with that one...

OK looks like no surprises with this kit. I got my 'kit' from Banggood as well - stateside supply ($125.99 + shipping $14.00). Arrived fine in about 10 days.
Looks good and as mentioned there are some shortfalls. The kit comes with the two aileron control rods and the ball is already on the aileron horn but no ball end for the servo. (Kit doesn't include servos so those are on order too along with motor and ESC. Exact match on motor wasn't easy to find but I did find a Detrum.). I read several comments by other reviewers about the hinges and using pin hinges but haven't figured out what size to use.
So a couple of questions if I may:
1) Where did you get your control rods for the ailerons?
2) Same for the pilot figure - most I find are "Jet pilots with helmets or odd looking bearded guys etc. Don't mind painting it that's fine.
Hope this flys as good as it looks.

Thanks for all the excellent posts about your experience.
'PS My kit also didn't come with ANY wing decals or the "Fly Baby" on the nose. Apparently those would add too much to the kit price. lol

Should link these threads together.
https://www.rcgroups.com/forums/show...9-by-HobbyKing

I'm flying with skis this winter.
https://www.rcgroups.com/forums/show...&postcount=572