Logan_24

Are the foamie bi planes hard to fly/barly fly at all because im thinking of getting the tensor 4d but my friends say bi planes barely fly.

Iturnright

I don't know why they say they barely fly, theres no reason they shouldn't. Now, I have a Tensor 4D and I hope you don't mind if I can give you some advice. Firstly, when building, be sure you have everything checked and correct, since this plane is one of the tougher foamies to build. Secondly, be careful about the cg, seeing as how it has a very small range. One more thing is the landing gear. Be sure that you install them correctly so as to lend at least some stability on landings.(I didn't) On the plus side though, this is supposed to be one of the best planes for knife edge flight, with the large side force generators. Additionally it has to be one of the most beautiful foamies, it has an exellent roll rate, and I've found that low speed performance is quite exceptional. So I would certainly recommend this plane to you.

invertman

For indoor Gym flying the Tensor is for very good pilots only. I flew mine outdoors many times with no problems. It would hover and knife edge with the best of them. After I broke it indoor flying for the third time I gave it to a friend and went with epp planes. The Tensor is an incredible flyer but too fragile for me.

Flypaper 2

As said above, a bit of experience is necessary. Has Quirks all its own. Steers much better with rudder, so you'd better be good with the left stick. With CG in the right place, Knife edges with ailerons only, just to keep the wings vertical. No rudder input needed. Steer it around with the elevator. Some mods I did were to move the holes where the LG legs go through the wing 3/4 of an in. forward. as ot flips over on landing in the grass with any landing. Did away with all the carbon fibre wing rods and used dental floss instead. Little 1/2 in sq. patches of 1/64 ply where they go through the wing. A real funplane

Fred420

My Feedback: (1)

Flypaper,
Could you show some pictures of your Dental Floss wing mod?


Thanks,
Fred

lwatson

My Feedback: (2)

I think I am confused by the statement "barely fly" does that mean the biplanes they are familor with where underpowered? I think you need to give us more explaination on what you are looking for. One of my favorite planes for outdoor flying is the Fancy Foamy Ulitimate. Very tough, I put a himax outrunner in it with 1320 TP 3s. Totally vertical, but slows down very nicely.

Larry

Flypaper 2

Fred:
Just got back from the field a while ago. I'll see if I can get some pics up tomorrow.

E*nealio

My Feedback: (10)

One thing i suggest is not to "land" the tensor. I did that a few times, after that i decided not to buy another bottle of glue and just hover right next to me and catch it by the main wing. It bit me the first time but after that i wasnt bit again....just a little advice to make that plane last as long as possible.----that advice only goes for flying it outdoors like i did. if your indoors, you dont have to worry to much about a crappy runway. I just wish the principle at the local high school would let us fly indoors.....(he thinks it will screw up the floor....that is 18 yrs old!!!!!--its a huge gym, better use it for something good seeing as our basket ball team sucks....hahaha)
nealio

jooNorway

Of course bi-planes fly!
Unfortunately some pilots never touch the rudder during flights except on take-off. Most of the foamies and especially the bipes require active use of the rudder to behave properly. So, it is not the bipes but the pilots who can`t handle the birds

bdavison

My Feedback: (1)

Biplanes are fun, but most of the electric foamy type have odd flying charectoristics that take a little getting used to.

The Tensor is a ok plane, but is WAY to fragile for my tastes. One little love tap, and it will explode.

Get yourself a Reflection biplane from Great Planes. Its the best foamy biplane Ive flown. It takes a while to build it, but once you get it all together, its a very durable, sturdy, fantastic flying plane.

gmilo

My Feedback: (39)

Here is a winner foamy biplane in my book....www.sebart.it. 18oz AUW, Hacker A20-22l, APC10x4.7, and TP1320 prolites....

video link below....

http://www.northeast3d.com/videos/[email protected]

bdavison

My Feedback: (1)

E-nealio,

Our local high school gymnasium has just finished a COMPLETELY new gym floor. Hurricane Ivan destroyed the old one, so they put down a brand new one. Real pretty shiny new gym floor.

I can tell you this, we've already crashed planes into that new floor. No noticable damage. Im guessing since weve started flying there, there have been over 100 airplane crashes, and probably about 4-5 helicopter crashes, and there has been no noticable damage to the floor. Honestly if that helicopter spinning a rotor blade at 2300 rpm's doesnt bust that floor, nothing will.

Most of us use prop-savers, so that might help. Most of the scale planes are using those GWS style rubber spinners. There's not much that can damage the floor. A student dropping a pile of books or something has more of a chance of doing damage. Our planes are styrofoam for cryin out loud.

Vertical3-D

My Feedback: (20)

Yeah, I would agree with all of you who said they fly uh different. The two I have had fly or perhaps flew is a better word, greatly. takes getting used to. With my flatana I could pull the old "bank and yank" to turn and it worked fine, still needed a little rudder but not much. The biplanes roll 90 degrees and keep right on going.I have really started to like them, just ordered an Ultrafly Radix tonight to replace my smashed EPP bi-plane(gave itself to science i geuss, testing a vertical thrust vectoring thing I'm working on)wait till you see that system when its all worked out. I did standing loops so fast and hard something let go and it spiraled into a tree, then after getting shhok out and falling it was a pile of foam. gotta tame the system down alot. anyway, I'd say go for a biplane if you like the tensor, its kinda the same deal as the radix i ordered but a bit tuffer, then again I have gotten the 3-D thing down really really well, so crashing is few and far between, though a few bumps and bruises never go away it will happen sooner or later...

SAslinky

My personal experience is that the bipes fly better less wing flexing, prop hang better, more aileron area, trust line closer to the C.G. I fly a tensor and it is the best 3D foamy I have flown.
Get one you won't be sorry.

Lionel Smith
South Africa

Jet Jaguar

One of my favorite foamie biplanes is the Eflite Ultimate. I loved this biplane, i outfitted mine with a 6160kv brushless, CC phoenix 25, a 12x6 prop, and a TP 2cell 1320 lipo, and i was getting unlimited vertical at half throttle. This bipe was a great tail dragger. it would hover and harrier with very little input. I always set mine up at half throttle so that if you are hovering on the deck and your lipo decides to drop voltage, you still have room to pull out. biplanes also tend to fly better because of the very light wing loading compared to single wing planes.

WhtBronco

My Eflite Ultimate is great as well. In fact mine will even taxi, land and take off on our grass flying field. It's much more rigid than the mono wing foamies I've seen. I love biplanes though, the Ultimate is hands down my favorite model to fly and I have 2 of them. The Eflite and a DPM Ultimate. Both fly great.

As has been said sometimes you need to sue rudder with a bipe, no big deal though. This thread is in the 3D forum so you should be comfortable with rudder use or you can't fly 3D, IMO. I also fly helis so a left stick workout is perfectly normal to me.

push rodz

My Feedback: (5)

Ditto! If you can't proficiently use rudder input in conjunction with aileron and elevator - you're not going to fly 3D! It takes constant input on ALL the sticks to make it happen sucessfully.

Bipes, for all practicle purposes, are some of the best 3D birds out there..........you just have to have one that's designed well and then it has to be set up properly. Without this you're basically screwed from the get go. Many folks take a perfectly good plane and do not take time to set it up to its optimal configuration and so you hear stuff like..........it's not a good plane......or this plane sux.......... when allot of times, it's not the plane but the pilot. Sure, there's some "junk" on the market but by and large, most of the planes available today are being refined to the point where they can function in many different venues while some are targeted for specific flying styles. Just make sure that the plane you're flying is intended for the style of flying that you want it to do.

The best way to learn all the tricks is to find someone >>>>that knows what they are doing<<<< to help you at first. Not only with the set up but also to help guide you in the different maneuvers. From then on it's practice, practice, pratice.........until you get it right or at least until you get it where you want it to be. Work on the areas where your flying skills are lacking and you'll find that in no time you will overcome your weaknesses. In other words, work on improving your skills first before taking on a plane that is way beyond your capabilities.

You'll find that every plane has its own flying characteristics and bipes are no different. Each one handles a little differently. You just have to get in tune with the way a plane flies and if your skills are up to speed..........you can fly just about anything out there. Bipes are one of the sweetest flying planes going!

jmir

My Feedback: (1)

I have the E-flite Ultimate FX and it flies great. Yes, you have to get used to flying this type of plane, but it only took me one flight.
I quickly learned you have to use rudder often to properly control it. Harriers and hovers great! It also looks great -- regular fuselage hiding all "the stuff".

Ronbo

My Feedback: (12)

Bipes are actually getting more popular, even in indoor competitions. Look at QQ's Yak bipe as well as the other bipes sold by foamy makers out there. Myself, Im an Ultimate fan. I fly the Eflite profile and working on the FX now. Not to mention my Hangar 9...probably will try some of the plans i have also. I also have a tensor kit, will try that after the FX for indoor. Flew a friends in Vegas, flew well. Different for sure.

They are not any harder than any other foamy, just different until the pilot gets used to it. I flew my brand new E flite Yak, then switched to my ultimate. the ultimate is noticably more sensitive than my Yak right now. I need more throws on elevator. but the ailerons are soft, but still quick if that makes sense.

WhtBronco

Another thing I like about bipes is they often have a much faster roll rate due to the shorter wings and dual ailerons.

SuperKaos

My Feedback: (2)

Yeap, however, let me add this - especially at LOW speeds I can't get enough of my Reflections, as of this morning I now have 166 flights on it. each flight time is counted by one full flight of a 1320 pack The plane looks like hell too

WhtBronco

I lost count of the flights on my Eflite Ultimate, but it has 41 hours on it. I just track the time. It's starting to look kinda rough as well, but still flies great.

This week I plan to maiden my first mono wing 3D park flyer, a Skeeter 30 built with landing gear as well.