Flyswamper

Again, I appreciate all the advice.  Sounds like there might be some sort of flying group near me at the Grey Eagle Casino area.  Can't say for sure if I'll heed all the excellent advice or just get my wallet ready for being hard-headed and impatient, guess we'll see.  The weather may have a fair bit to do with that as well (might make me wait longer) especially since the days are awfully short up here in Canada this time of year (no time for flying after work cause it's already dark).

Anyway....I fully realize this is *JUST* a simulator, but this is the kinda stuff I've been doing with the little plane in the simulator.... just trying to get ready...

http://youtu.be/SEQPCT-g2G4

hugger-4641

My Feedback: (6)

Nice sim video. You are obviously getting the muscle memory needed to land the plane while flying back towards yourself. But........(you knew it was coming didn't you!) I see three things that will be very different when you get the real cub in the air and you might want to work on these.

1. You took off very quickly and maintained a pretty steep rate of climb. You need to practice in a setting with more room and perform longer roll out with a more gentle climb, maybe even try taking off with only 3/4 throttle to get the feel of actually flying the plane instead of relying on the power of that brushless motor. A great many of the crashes I've had personally have been from trying to fly in a place that really didn't have enough room. If you push the limits of the plane before your skills are up there with it, you won't like the results.

2. You made a nice sharp turn and descent into final, but.......the reaction of the real plane to rudder and elevetor input will be more responsive and you will be very likely to enter a cycle of oversteer-overcorrect etc. Try practicing more gentle turns and maintaining level attitude of the plane while doing some figure 8's.

3. Your descent was very fast and in the sim video, your plane touched down quick and hard. Looked ok on the video, but the real cub will bounce up and keep flying if you come in that hard and fast. Try landing in a place with more room and get the plane to touch down by decreasing the throttle more than with elevator control. Keep the "attitude" of the plane level with the elevator, but drop the "altitude" of the plane by reducing throttle. Practice doing "touch and go's " and develop a slower glide path using the method I describe and you will have less surprises when you go to make your final flair and touch down.

HighPlains

My Feedback: (1)

The best thing you have going is the 16 - 17 hours of daylight in the summer. Much better than the 16 - 17 hours of night.

colmo-RCU

Did you learn to drive on your own? Ride a bike? Eat? Dress? Wipe your behind? Well, rc is much more difficult than all of those beause it is done from far away. Your plane will become smaller much faster than in the sim, and you'll almost surely give the wrong side input, spinning it into the ground. I can't believe you are so thick as to go against 98% of the experienced people's advise! It's your kids' gift, why would you willingly put it in an almost-certain destruction path if it's so easily avoidable? And what does that teach your kid? That is the typical new money mentality. Just buy a dozen more if needed, my uneducated pride is more important.

I hope you don't hurt someone with your little experiment. You may be 57, but you need a lot of growing up to do.

Mariano

PS. By the way, any size of space you THINK you need is too small. Triple it and then it might be adecuate.

do335a

"I *think* we are comfortable with self-teaching ourselves"

Unfortunately, regardless of your confidence, you can't teach yourself anything. You don't yet know anything about the subject. You can learn on your own but you can't teach yourself.

Teaching requires that you know something about the subject and more than the student which can be presented and explained to the student. The teacher also can present the identical material in a different way to help lead the studen to the correct end. The teacher will also correct false deductions.

Only if you knew more than you know at any stage of the progression might you be able to accomplish this. However, since you'd already know, there would be nothing to teach.

Trial and error in aviation gets very costly, takes a lot longer and can become very discouraging in a big hurry. Happy crashing and $pending!!

do335a

Maybe I was wrong.

I watched your video.

You really are misinformed (clueless). However, that will change in a big hurry when you get that plane into the real world.

Anyone who would trry to fly any plane RC or otherwise in a congested area such as that shown in the video, is in for a Big Surprise. That will be even bigger due to your admitted intransigence.

You may be impatient now. Your desired course of action, if followed, will drown that quickly due to failure to achieve the objective. You will learn patience, the right way to do it or abandon the effort.

In any case, it will be a learning experience for you. And you'll have been the teacher - not for yourself but for your child.

Happy destruction!!

BTW - do you have any liability insurabnce coverage for the inevitable damage you'll do to other people's property resulting from this folly?

vega406

My Feedback: (73)

i won one of the
SuperCubs in a drawing and had it flying in a few minutes and let a few people at the event fly it with help of coarse..the friend that has it now has crashed it many time,s in his front yard cause he won,t get help or come to me but i will say it is a pretty fixable plane..i am actually going today at my field to train and video a beginner on his trainer that has hours of sim time like you and i will send it to you on youtube and get an ideal what you are in for...the plane getting smaller and wind on your turns will be what to watch out for but i must tell you the park you are showing us is ok but be carefull of kids coming up in the danger zone not realizing this is not a toy...and i see 60 mph traffic sign so you do not want to hit a windshield...any i mean any flyer you can get a hold of to meet with you even if not at a club would also be a help...The guy who taught me had not flown in 5 years and he got it up for me and helped me with 8 flights that day out in a field and i am glad i waited for him

Flyswamper

Thanks for the feedback. Your points are well taken. In fairness, that isn't anything like a situation I would really put myself in and I wouldn't fly like that anytime in the forseeable future. The point of the video was just to show that I seem to have enough control to get it down in a tough spot (i.e. hand-eye-stick coordination) ...not that that was the sort of flight I'd *EVER* actually attempt or fly like that. Because I wanted to keep the video file-size really really small, Ipurposely took off very awkwardly, climbed fast, and accepted lots of "sim" risks getting back there to setup the approach. I also turned off the sound and recorded only 10 fps for the same small-filesize reasons.

When it comes down to it, my intent is to make that first flight as very gentle *everything* (takeoff, turns, landing, etc....). I just didn't save a vid of me doing that because it didn't seem that interesting and I didn't imagine it leading to much useful advice. On second thought, however, perhaps I *should* record a little video that more closely resembles how I *think* a first flight should go and see if you guys have helpful feedback on that. I wasn't thinking it would be that interesting, but... who knows it might surprise me....


As for colmo-RCU, I appreciate the advice and any constructive criticism, but do not appreciate the attitude. I'll freely admit that I don't know what I'm getting into. But, I hope you'll afford others (such as myself) the freedom to think for ourselves and make our own mistakes. Personally, I'd much rather make a few mistakes crashing a plane than make the mistake of treating people (even in posts on an internet forum) poorly. It's a matter of priorities and what's important in life. But that is just me....
(and pssssst... by the way, Ihaven't *yet* gone against all that advice you mention.To be honest, many of the replies here have pushed me in the direction of getting help... but if I'm equally honest, your post actually has the opposite effect that you seek (i.e. the attitude just makes me want to prove you wrong that much more)... but I digress and I'm not being helpful myself so I'll stop right here....

Thanks again everyone, please don't stop sharing your words of wisdom. I *am* listening carefully to everything written and am soaking on it. Also, you never know what other beginner will come in here with the same ideas and perhaps find this thread and gain from your words of wisdom. As it is right now, I'm thinking that *IF* we do go it alone I'll try to commit to video the first flight and share with you all the gory or glory as it were... (I'm hoping for the latter but know that odds are for the former).... The video could serve either as a warning to other newbies that dare to think they can do it on their own, or it might serve as inspiration for risk takers. Time will tell I guess...

Hoping for calm weather this coming weekend!

Flyswamper

Thanks for the reminder/feedback, I can see this being something that would be easy to overlook/forget.

In Canada, thats 60 km/hr.... but your point about windshields being a bad place to land is taken...
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Twin_Flyer

My Feedback: (4)

My .02 cents.

As others have said, find a club and seek help.

WHY try by yourself if you don't have to??

This should help: http://www.modelaircraft.org/clubsearch.aspx

If there is no local field, that's different...

Good luck and welcome to the hobby!

Bill S.

daytonarc

My Feedback: (5)

"A newbie inviting criticism of his plans"
OK, you may want to subscribe to the crash and rebuild forum for future pointers.

Getting experienced help will save time and money 99.9% of the time

Your simmulator airplane banks a lot more in turns than your model. Your model is three channel and does not have ailerons, if you land or take off with any crosswind, and the wind gets under a wing leveling it again at low altitude is difficult.

Your model has ACT anti crash technology. This uses light sensors on the top and bottom of the plane and is supposed to help you if you get in a wierd attitude (the plane's attitude not yours). If the sky is bright and the ground is darker, and you want to fly straight and level it works, but if it does not "see" what it thinks it should it chops the throttle and takes control away from you. This is a problem flying over bright or reflective ground like snow or water (could be a problem in Canada). It can also be a problem if the sky is particularly dark where it is "looking" and it wont allow you to make intended radical manuvers that may be needed to get out of a situation. Although you can turn it off on your transmitter, an accidental bump of the switch turns it back on and you will not know it is on untill you have no control! COMPLETELY DISSABLE THE ACT. This is done by finding the wires from the sensors, the 2 wires to the receiver that go to the little holes in the fusalage, 1 on top and 1 on the bottom, that have the little light sensors and unplugging those wires from the receiver. Make sure you do a preflight check of all controls after disabling this to make sure you did not accidentaly remove a servo wire.

It is your plane, fly it any way you want as long as you don't put others at risk.

If all goes well your super cub is a fun plane.

omnidynmc

I would definitely find a local friendly club and have them take a look at your build. They will be able to offer great advice on your first flight and help you with balancing the CG of you new plane which is critical. The first flight of an untrimmed plane can be very challenging for beginner pilots, even for experienced.

All in all though it is an outstanding hobby especially for a parent/son relationship and there are a lot of folks out there will to help make your experience a positive one!

Greg

Chucksolo69

Every once in a while a thread like this pops up and I just read through it and have to shake my head in disbelief. Very few members on this thread have offered any kind of encouragement and alot have been downright negative and close to rude. About 10 months ago I was in the OP's exact position and learned to fly using the aforementioned HZ Super Cub as well as a HZ Champ, HZ Firebird Stratos and the Ares Gamma 370. At the time I was taken to task by members here who ridiculed me and wondered why I was bothering with so many trainer planes. I was told that Iwould certainly crash them all and one even asked why I was wasting so much money.

Well, 10 months later, I have 15 planes, mostly warbirds, I fly at least 3every weekend. I crashed the Firebird Stratos once in all that time, on it's maiden, and have never crashed the Champ, Gamma 370or Super Cub. In fact, I have given away those trainers to friends and family, all but the Super Cub, which I still fly. Yes, I used RealFlight 6.0 after buying my first trainer, the FB Stratos, and it helped. I quickly realized that sim training, while useful in some aspects did not prepare me for the "real" world of RC flight. I guess six years of flying RC helicopters helped a bit too.

My first 4 channel plane, a Parkzone T-28 Trojan has suffered 1 crash since I have had her, and only minor damage was done to her, and she has been flying for over 6 months now unscathed. My point is this is today,not the 70's, 80's or even the 90's. With the advances in technology and materials, it is very POSSIBLE to learn to fly RC on your own now. Yes, I belong to a club, but only joined after I was already competent atflying my RC aircraft. Don't be too harsh on these newbies, after all this is a new age in RC flight. These aren't theearly days when it was almost required that you learn from an instructor. Nowadays, not so much.

My final thought is, we all crash, I have crashed my warbirds of course. Ihave fixed my warbirds to fly again. Don't forget, we were all newbies at one time or another and remember, every new pilot we get just strengthens the hobby we all enjoy.

jetmech05

I have no idea why you posted at all....you already know the answers
The best and safest why to learn to fly is with an instructor
I was 46 when I learned on a buddy box....don't let the cord bother you just learn and keep your plane intact

CGRetired

My Feedback: (1)

I think he heard enough. Since this is going downhill fast, I'm shutting it down.

CGr
Moderator.