acdii

Thats what my friend said when I was doing tight snap loops with the Apprentice. On high rates that thing can do 10' diameter loops. He thought for sure the wing would snap on it.

Takes a barn wall to do that!

cutaway

An Avistar is perfectly capable of performing the IMAC basic pattern. I'm just saying...

mach2

My Feedback: (5)

here are some words from a new guy.

my success (aside from club guys giving me confidence that im not going to do something stupid) with my trainer has been mostly due to many hours on the great planes realflight simulator. with about 5 real flights under my belt, the club guys say "im flying the heck outta that trainer". And most importantly, im not afraid of when i have to bring it back to earth!  A few of the guys ask with skepticism, "so you've never flow any RC before this one?"

since there are many planes to play with on the sim (and it's so real to life) you can see what the different planes will react like. and as others have said, you can reduce the throw on a sport plane until you feel the need to get crazier.  the sim has a dual rate switch on the transmitter (thumbs up).

my method of using the sim is to fly the trainer (the nexstar is the closest thing to my tiger trainer) first and last. if i wanna play with other stuff, i make sure that the last thing i fly is the trainer. But flying the sporty stuff is still good for muscle memory.  Doing the manuevers in the trainer are harder to do nicely because the plane doesnt just go where pointed like mentioned previously.  They fly sluggishly.  The sim is awesome because you dont have to worry about killing your plane, and you can learn what to expect during a maneuver.  For example, while doing a roll, i have to pull nose high (pretty damn high) because it wont roll fast using only aileron.  Or I can roll and keep altitude using rudder imputs. Or i can snap the roll by throwing corresponding rudder.   Its a great feeling to fly maneuvers with confidence before ever doing it in real life.

so my advice is to fly the sim (a lot) for fun and confidence. Get a sport plane you like and fly it when you feel ready.

SO, what im doing is flying the sim and my trainer as much as possible in hope that i will be ready to fly my birthday/christmas present. I hope by the time i have it flight ready, i will be ready to fly it. Im gonna give myself lots of room (a full size airstrip outside of town) and have an experienced buddy with me just in case. Also so he can do some trim for me so that i can keep my hands on the sticks and eyes on the plane.

Good luck and keep us posted. Im not real big on video documenting everything i do, but ill try and so a little. However i will keep you posted on how things are going for me. I hope im not that guy that destroys a beautiful plane on its first time up!

oh, here is a look at what i will be building. Im copying almost everything on this plane. [youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BllA1VnwsSg[/youtube]

acdii

I find the sim difficult for landing since it doesn't give you peripheral as in the real world. I usually wind up too far out or behind me when landing at some fields.  Everything else though is good for learning.

mach2

My Feedback: (5)

yes, getting lined up with the runway on the simulator is more difficult than it is in real life. but it is still excellent practice and has helped my landings significantly. On the sim, try your best to get it lined up, but dont worry too much if you are just to one side or the other. Practicing the glide slop, controlling the plane while its coming at you at a lower speed all while finding the right amount of power is key to getting good landings.

Jeremy

JeffinTD

I started with realflite basic, and it is difficult to line up on the runway on
Most fields. I later bought the most recent advanced version, and it zooms in and out better automatically, you can move your pov, and some of the flying sites are really easy to keep perspective.

Anyway even with the basic version, just do a nice smooth landing out in the grass.

Where I fly isn't overly large, so most of the big gas planes land in the grass anyway.

guver

My Feedback: (325)

You guys have inspired me to take another look at shelling out some money for the real sim. Plus my last 2 crashes would've almost paid for it.

I hate the sim and I think it is because I was just using the keyboard (no TX) and I don't have a great  PC monitor either. I just seemed to get bored with it , can't stand doing video games either.

My last crash has really got me down lately , it was my best (at least my nicest looking and flying) plane. I feel ok now that I have a replacement on the way. The weather has also got me down big time. I might as well go ahead and spend some bucks and practice. The weather is only getting worse. I am reconsidering getting the full version of realflight because I like it and it may just match many of my planes.

JeffinTD

Yeah, I'm like you in that I don't care to play video games, and at first training on the sim was more of a chore than fun.

I didn't have a kit under construction at the time I started, and at least it kept me from cruising the net and buying stuff when the weather was bad.

Anyway, though it is no substitute for practicing in the air, I think a decent simulator can be pretty valuable.

acdii

What I like about the sim is I can use my own radio to train with.  I learn both the plane and the radio at the same time. The dual rates, expo, everything works on the sim as it does on the real plane. I also trained using the same plane I have but with more power.

guver

My Feedback: (325)

How do you'all connect your tx to the PC? I have a cheap Turnigy 9X I'd like to use since it is my best TX. Is it as simple as getting a cord and using usb plug?

Gray Beard

My Feedback: (-1)

Before you run out and buy something like a sim borrow one from a club member and try it first. I still have a G-2 that I loan to all my new students. Most people don't use them very long and like a puter game they upgrade them every week or two so the one you buy today will be old school in a week or two. If you can borrow one why waste the money.

guver

My Feedback: (325)

Good point , I was just thinking $200 is hard to part with. I just may know someone who has Realflight6.  scouring some adds and forums now. Thanks.

JeffinTD

Real Flite comes with a Futaba controller built like a 6ex, and some buddy box cables. I fly with a DX8 and haven't tried plugging it into the

mach2

My Feedback: (5)

yeah, dont buy one brand new. i got mine on ebay for 50 new, with the controller.

but there are lots of guys in the clubs you could borrow from or buy for dirt cheap.

way way way worth the money!!!!!

mach2

My Feedback: (5)

Well here is a short vid of me on my 5th flight with the thunder tiger MKII (GP 42 glow).

You cant see much because of the focusing and the camera man had never touched a VC before. Anyway, here is where I'm at. I did some more aggressive stuff on the first flight of the day. The flight during the filming had some winds kick up pretty good which made it a little difficult to keep smooth lines and it would screw up the exit from a maneuver a little bit.

anyway, I was pretty stoked because after my first flight today, one of the club guys who has been flying since he was 10 (47yrs. old now) told me that I'm ready to move up to a more aerobatic plane. He said id get a lot out of it.


[youtube]http://youtu.be/M7uqAYuSN6I[/youtube]

youtu.be/M7uqAYuSN6I

jester_s1

Guyver- I bought a used copy of Realflight and it was the best investment I've made in the hobby yet. I wouldn't have paid $200 for it, but I got it for $125 along with two expansions which I Ebay'ed. I had a phobia about getting upside down, so I practiced rolls, uplines and downlines, snaps, spins, etc on it. I set it with crazy wind settings and have flown aerobatics on it enough to be comfortable at the field in nearly any conditions. It's taken a lot of the fear out of the hobby for me and increased the fun factor dramatically.

guver

My Feedback: (325)

Sounds good. Money is hard to part with , but I may just go ahead and buy the new full version rather than upgrade a used one. http://www.rcuniverse.com/forum/fb.asp?m=10820185

About $200 might set me up real nice for the winter so next season I can go at it with many of my planes that I am not quite confident enough to fly right now.

I can't believe now bad that last crash got me down. Very sad. My unrealistic goal is "never crash"

CGRetired

My Feedback: (1)

Well, that's a good goal but not necessarily realistic. Things happen. I am not a nay-sayer, by any stretch of the imagination, however, I've crashed a few, not as many as some have, but a few. All could have been avoidable, especially the two where I forgot to raise the antenna on a 72MHz system.. but, the mitigating circumstances were that I had been flying 2.4GHz all day and the switch over to 72 MHz, well, suffice to say that I didn't even notice the antenna was down until it was to late.

One funny one was the same plane that I forgot to raise the antenna with, a SIG Little Something Extra electric conversion, well, the first time, it floated down and broke the prop. The second time, well, it was up and flying, then I flew it a bit further away trying to set up for a landing when I started to notice that I didn't have control of the ailerons.. then the rudder.. so I pulled the throttle back to idle as it went directly away from me. I found it later that day in the woods about 200 yards in, on the ground, and, again, with a broken prop. Wow, was I lucky.. Three's a charm?? I hope not!! I would prefer to think that I learned from those two... um three experiences.

But, again, things happen. The best way to keep the count down to a minimum is to do a thorough pre-flight, check the batteries, make sure you hooked the ailerons up correctly (if you are using ailerons.. a reversed aileron setup can ruin your whole day)... stand behind it and move the stick to the right.. the right aileron should go UP. If it goes down, STOP and check your setup. Next, of course, is to fly reasonably and practice practice practice. Do many low passes at low speed simulating landing, do many touch-and-goes to improve your landing technique, and go way high, somewhere in the sky, pull the throttle to idle and "declare a dead stick" and bring it on in safely. Do it downwind, upwind, far away, close in, do it a lot. Get the technique down.

You can also do all of this on the simulator... best part of that, of course, is the space bar!!! (with RF, this resets the flight).

If you practice what I've suggested, I can pretty much guarantee that your accident rate will be kept down to a minimum.

Best of luck!!!

CGr.

guver

My Feedback: (325)

My last 2 crashes were especially bothersome because I didn't quite learn anything from them. I don't know why either happened , and the only common links between the two were poor visibility , over confidance , impatience , and both had complete disorentation right up until they hit the dirt. [:'(] They were different planes, radios, places, times in flight, times in the day, experience with plane.

My flylite had never been repaired before and had maybe 100 flights. A new TX about 4 flights before, but was set up well and I flew it because it is the only plane I will fly in higher winds. I was very confident with it, and visibility was getting poor at night. I've been doing rolls, loops and practising inverted with it even though it is a 3 channel trainer. It was far away directly in front of me with high tension wires in the background. Last I remember I could no longer tell which way it was when I turned right it went left, I turned left it went right. I remember thinking that perhaps the wind had blown it over backwards. As a last resort I used some down elevator and sent it to the ground cuz I thought it was inverted. I think now that it was just going away from me. I'm not sure though.

My nicest looking plane (and maybe best flying) is my nexstar Mini EP. It was only it's 3rd flight and I had just taken both the training aids off the wings. It was doomed from the start because it pitched downward and needed a lot of elevator trim. This plane had been trimmed out perfectly and flew very nice and predictable. It was so nice that I removed both the speed brakes AND the other part on the front of the wings. The manual states that removing one would need elevator trim one way , but removing the other would need trim the opposite way. It says they would cancel each other out. This is what surprised me when it pitched down so bad. By the time I could get it high enough to trim it was pretty much the same disorientation story as the flylite. I had moved the trim somewhat , but don't know if I moved it enough. I had my hands full by that time , and  when I knew it was going to go down I throttled down all the way and removed my right hand from stick. Down to the ground it went as my heart sank too. []

My nexstar Mini EP is ordered and I think I'll be ok when it gets here ,lol.

Sitompoel

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mvIYx-X_AB4

Jim Thomerson

At some point in your progress, think about flying competitively. You will progress faster and learn more participating in contests than you will ever learn on your own, or sport flying at your home field.

t34pilot

I was buddy boxed on a high wing gas trainer, then switched over to the T-34 Mentor RTF I had purchased and all my training up to that point seemed to go right out of the window. I spent 6 weeks buddy boxed on the T-34 and just couldn't seem to stay ahead of it. Then I bought a Flyzone Sensei high wing foam trainer. We put it on the buddy box and I was instantly back in business again.

Maybe I'll finally get the hang of my T-34 during the coming flying season, as I am finally off the buddy box, but I would not recommend it as a trainer from my experience.

acdii

Wow thats unusual, that plane flies so gentle. If you were training with fixed flaps though, that could explain the problem. Iinstalled the servo for the flaps and find the plane really difficult to fly with the flaps down. The last time I flew it, I took off with flaps, and forgot Ihad them down and freaked when the plane would roll left and Ihave full right stick to keep it level. Then I discovered the flaps were down, and once Iflipped that switch, all was right again.

So far Ihave had 16 flights, and 2 crashes. Both were with the apprentice, the deadstick into the soybeans with the T-34 doesnt count, it came in softly even though it stopped fast. The first was a disorientation as it was coming towards me from my right, Iflew it into the barn, my left and its left were backwards. My second crash was after repairs, it was a bit too windy for the trial flight after repairs, and the wind caught the fin on takeoff, spun it 90 *and flew into a tree. It came down and landed on its nose munching the engine mount. It has been fully repaired but havent had a decent day to fly since.

t34pilot

My instructor would never let me use the flaps, even though I had put in the servo and had them working. He had this thing about me learning to take off or land by flipping switches.

The T-34 always seemed to come in hot and heavy for landings.

acdii

I would chop throttle about 10 feet out and get a nice soft landing, if I kept any power on it would glide forever. The first dead stick happened just as I passed over about 20 feet up, I was too far over the runway to bring it down, so my only option was to go around, and thanks to the nice glide time I was able to bring it around and almost made it to the runway, landed about 10-15 feet out in the beans. If the beans had been harvested, it may have made it all the way.

I am really surprised at the problems you had with the T-34. I flew mine without a buddy box after about 10 flights of the Apprentice. I didn't maiden it, I let my friend do that, good thing too, turned out I had the CG off. Once I corrected it, I then flew it and love the way it flies.