Just curious as I recievedd as a gift and have heard mixed things about it. I also noticed Hobby Lobby no longer carries it. I was also curious as to how well it fly's

I have one and have it set up with the standard gearbox and 280 motor. It is a very slow flyer and a bit of a handfull to fly. i plan to upgrade to a speed 300 motor and a 5:1 gearbox in hopes that a little more speed will help make it a little more stable. It is great fun to watch in the air but your fly it 100% of the time. Not a plane for a beginner. Mike Heer

I found one of these kits in my "long forgotten" stash of kits. Seems to me they didn't fly very well. I would like to try getting it together for the coming indoor season. Has anyone got a success story to tell about this model? I think that with the new lighter equipment and small brushless motors available these day's, it could probably be made to fly well? Whaddauthink?.........Jeff

Hi ,

I am a great fan of this Model. I wrote a lot about it in the past. if you interested,please start the searchmachine !

Rudi

I built one and as soon as the epoxy set I realized I didn't have all the wing incidences quite right. I figured it would never fly. Hobby Lobby had dropped it from their line so I frantically serched the web until I found one at a hobby shop in England. It cost 60 English pounds plus shipping. Didn't know how much that was but ordered it anyway (How much could it really be?). Turns out it was $106.00 US to my door. I paid something like $138 at Hobby Lobby (actually I think I took advantadge of their closeout and got it for under $100).

After I got to the point where I was landing my other planes much more often than crashing I got to looking at the "display model" hanging in my shop and thought "What the heck". I installed a gear drive Astroflight 010 and what I consider the Holy Grail of electric flight, a 900mah lithium polymer battery (3 cell, 12.6V.). It was a handfull to get it trimmed up (likes a lot of down trim and doesn't need a whole lot of rudder in the air) but flies great now that it (and I) are dialed in. It came with a note from the people at Hobby-Lobby warning that the center of gravity in the instructions was not recommended, I used their suggestion of 27.5mm back from the leading edge of the center wing should produce a slightly nose down attitude.

The third wing gets a little top heavy at low speeds, it doesn't really feel like tip stalling but more like just wanting to roll upside down. It's VERY manuverable. I think if I were a better pilot I could roll it inverted in a sharp bank. Right now when that happens I just pray for enough room between me and the ground.

I'm hard on landing gear so I reinforced it with Dave Brown carbon fiber strip epoxied to the inboard side of all the exterior balsa parts (gear and wing struts). I came in a little wide on a landing once and flew the wheels right into a curb. No damage. Without the reinforcement I don't think the gear (or the plane) would ever have been the same.

Back to flying characteristics. I practiced with this plane at an unbuilt subdivision near my house. Landing took a bit of knack. Like I said, if you try to come in too slow it gets a little tippy (unlike Kavan's Sopwith Pup which practically floats to the ground). So I started flying it under power right to the ground. If I tried to flair it would just balloon up (way up) then it was full power for another pass. I finally came up with this technique: From tree top level feather the prop and put it into a steep approach (something I wasn't comfortable with last year in my Fly-Repair-Repeat days). This keeps the airspeed up and keeps the handling predictable. As level out near the ground the air speed naturally bleeds off and just before the wheels touch down a little flair prevents a nose over (had a few of those). I can land it at my feet now.

For me the mark of a good slowflier is that I can fly it in the street in front of my house. With a few hours of getting aquainted with this ship I was able to do that. I'm not sure how long the lithium polymer battery will run but after about 15-20 minutes flying I am so adrenaline charged I need to go inside and tell the wife how cool this is (That's nice, Dear...).

I think if you're past the beginner stage and you can start to express the age of your planes in months rather than flights that this is a really nice plane. Not easy but fun.