pashto

Hi

I want to get into rc flying and have been steered towards the firebird xl. Can anyone tell me how long it would take in yards or metres etc for the firdbird to reach 50 feet.

Thank you for your help

goofup

Here's one vote to steer you away from a Firebird XL if you really want to get into RC. Get a Slow Stick or Tiger Moth instead. Either will get to 50 feet pretty quick and flies about 5-6 mph.

Read this.

ballgunner

My Feedback: (1)

goofup is right. The slow stick will give you a lot of experience at little cost. For $35 US it comes with all you will need except battery and ESC. I use a HiTec 3FM with 2 HS55 servos and a GWS 5a ESC. GWS sells a battery for the Slow Stick rated 400mAh. I have a total of $188 US invested and the radio is usable for other projects. With the 400 mAh pack it runs 7 minutes static and over 10 in the air. Very simple flying machine and will reach 50' altitude very quickly. In a 5 mph wind it will get to 50' in about 10 meters.

Bill L

[img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-cool.gif[/img]Here's one vote to send you out to get the Firebird XL. Mine would clear 50 feet in about 100 yards, when hand launched into a 5+knot breeze. Don't put the little piece of plastic under the trailing edge of the wing untill you learn to control it. Then put it in and go much faster. I put my XL into a tail spin, and could not pull it out, and burried about 3 cm into hard mud. That was in the morning, and by supper time I had it into the air again, repaired, wing and all. [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-happy.gif[/img] Let's see you try that with a slow stick, or a tiger moth.[img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-smile.gif[/img] You will never make sharp turns with an XL like you could with a moth or stick. Fly what you want, but fly, Fly, FLY![img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-happy.gif[/img]

Dead St!ck

I have to agree with goofup and ballgunner! The Slow Stick or the Tiger Moth are definately the way to go! The main rasons I would recomend it are those already listed and to again note that it uses a NORMAL RADIO and ESC. not one that is specifically made for the kit! If you want to use the radio out of the Firebird for anything else your pretty much SOL. Also from what I have seen the Firebird is pretty fast and not as stable as the Tiger Moth or Slow Stick, I have seen both fly and I would definately say that the Slow Stick would be choice number 1, Tiger Moth choice 2, Pico Cub or Pico Cub F choice 3.

scott88

I learned on Real Flight G2 and then I went with the Beaver. The Beaver has very good flights, but use a GWS 8.4V 350mah battery. I love my Beaver and Zero.

XxNEALIOSzPLANESxX

stay away from The"firebird models".. They have parts that are made just for them so if you plan on getting another plane(you will, the birds get boring when your good...[img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-smile.gif[/img] Go with the tiger moth or the pico sticks, you can use the esc and servos and the battery on your next kit. they fly great from what ive seen and heard. I personally fly with that scott88 kid behind his house..dogfight'n my p-51 and zero. great fun,only prob is my stang came with wrong motor so i gatta get a new one.......[img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-sad.gif[/img] well i hope you get in the air soon have fun...!(ps dont ever get a wattage f-86!!!THey are pigs in the air!!!

Tommy632

I started with a Firebird XL, I think it teaches you bad habits. After flying my Tiger Moth and liking it way more, it was hard to fly the Firebird again. I'm going to teach my 7 year old on a Slow Stick.

aeajr

My Feedback: (2)

The Firebird XL is fine, but for similar money you can get an Aerobird.

How about a personal review of the Aerobird from a new RCer, me. I looked at
the Firebird II, XL, Fighterbird and the Aerobird. With three channels you
can do a lot more, so I went with the Aerobird.

I was not interested in building. If I spent a month building and then
wrecked it, I would be crushed. I wanted a RTF that could take some
punishment.

I am a first timer. However I am also one of these guys that goes into intense
research when I get interested in something. After several months of research,
talking to people, flyers and non, I bought an Aerobird. It is a super value
but there are other good starters. Here are the plusses and minuses in my mind
of the Aerobird.

Very inexpensive and rugged for a three channel starter - $140-$170
The plane comes complete and fully assembled. Charge the flight battery, put
on the wing, put the batteries in the transmitter and up you go! Even the
batteries for the transmitter are included.

New flyers like me are going to crash, so you don't want something costly to
start with. There is a full line of parts available at reasonable cost. You
can replace the whole main fuselage for $49 including the motor and all the
flight electronics. A wing is $15 and the tail is $9. So, if you crash badly
you can get everything for under $75 and you are back in the with a three
channel plane.

Batteries and charger:

The battery will run for a full 5-6 minutes at full throttle and 10-15
minutes+
at half throttle. Many planes in this class run 4-6
minutes. And unlike many of the 2 channel starters, it comes with a peak
charger that you can use in your car. If you pick up two spare batteries you
can stay in the air all day. A full charge takes about 40 minutes.

Another plane I liked was the Sky Scooter Pro, now the Pro II. You can get it
as a base plane and motor and add your own electronics or get it ready to fly
with a 72 MHZ Hittec 3 channel radio for about $150. This was my second
choice to the Aerobird. I like it a lot!

The Aerobird also has an X-Pak hop up kit available for $30. It includes a 7
cell battery (the basic is 6) and a larger tail. This makes the plane faster
and more maneuverable. So, once you get good you can soup it up! I bought the
X-Pak when I bought mine. I will use the 7 cell as my second battery and save
the tail for later.

WIND

All new flyers should start in winds under 5 MPH so that you are learning to
fly the plane rather than fighting the wind. I didn't do that and crashed a
lot because of the wind. However, now I am very comfortable flying this plane
in 10-12 MPH winds. Handles it very well.

27 MHZ vs 72 MHZ Radio

The Aerobird uses a 27 MHZ radio which is assigned to general use for planes,
cars and boats; mostly low end stuff. There are only 6 available channels. So,
if you have a kid with a RC car in the same area where you are flying, and he
is on the same channel you are on, and he is close enough, when he switches on
his transmitter, you will lose control of the plane and probably crash. Even
with 72 MHZ radio systems, this will happen if you get two flyers on the same
channel, but 72 MHZ is dedicated to airplanes. High end RC cars are on 75 MHZ
so they won't interfere.

The flight control is a single stick radio with rudder and elevator on the
stick. Throttle is on a slide on the left top. It is similar to a Futaba or
Hitec single stick arrangement. I find it very comfortable to use and other
flyers who have tried it say they find it easy as well.

If you are going to join a club, check with them. Some clubs will not admit 27
MHZ based planes because they can't be flown with a buddy box, a training
system, like a dual controlled car, that is used for pilot training. After
long consideration I bought the Aerobird, but these are things I took into
consideration. My club, www.lisf.org has many firebird pilots, so the
Aerobird was welcome The Sky Scooter Pro, mentioned above, is on the 72 MHZ
band set-up so you don't have any of these considerations.

Resources Aerobird, Sky Scooter Pro

Here is an internet site that sells the Aerobird. They also have a
link for a video of the plane flying:
http://www.parkflyers.com/html/aerobird.html

As I said, my alternative plane was the Sky Scooter Pro. It had been about
$260 RTF, but they recently released the Sky Scooter Pro 2 at about $160 so
you might want to give it serious consideration.
http://www.hitecrcd.com/Funtec/Pro2.htm

Videos
http://www.hitecrcd.com/Funtec/videos.htm

So, that's my evaluation of the Aerobird and why I purchased it. I fly as
often as I can. I have about 40 flights on my plane since the end of March.
I am fully self taught. At this point I am just loving it. My friend has a
Wingo and liked flying my Aerobird so much he bought one too.

daddy/ben

My Feedback: (3)

[img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-blush.gif[/img]k come on you guys,we all know about the FBXL,its really not that bad of a plane! it is in my point of view the easy choice of a plane,anyone can fly one of these.I started on this plane and still have it,and it is more easy to fly than the aerobird.. sure you can buy a slo stik for 35 bucks but then your going to stick another 150 more into the eletronics ,so yes it gets my vote.....

aeajr

My Feedback: (2)

There is nothing wrong with a Firebird XL. It is easy to fly, but offers limited control. You can go left and right and you have to use the throttle to try and control climb. You can't force it down by hiting the down elevator, so if you get into a windy situation you might have trouble landing the plane since the force of the wind plus the speed of the plane will make it climb. Many are lost this way. You also can't loop it like an Aerobird.

The Aerobird gives you elevator control so you can direct the plane down or up without having to apply power. You can also go to full power without climbing.

The Aerobird can be flown exactly like the Firebird XL if you don't use the elevator, so it is just as easy to fly. In fact the Firebird XL wing will fit the Aerobird so you can have a Firebird XL with three channels if you get an Aerobird.

The last benefit of the Aerobird over the Firebird is that the radio is a single stick arrangement which works just like a Futaba, Hobbico or Hitec two or three channel single stick system. So, if you move from an Aerobird most other single stick radio systems will feel very familiar. The two stick arrangement of the Firebird is not a common way to fly two or three channel planes, and using throttle to control attitude (nose up or down) is not a common way to fly a plane.

You can get a Firebird XL for $100-$120. You can get an Aerobird for about $125 on e-bay, $149 on the interent or $160 in a hobby store. Also the Aerobird comes with a 12 volt peak charger that will charge the battery in 40 minutes or less from your car. The Firebird comes with a house current charger that takes hours to charge your battery and can not detect when the battery is fully charged.

All of this is documented in my post above. It comes to the value of what you get for your $$, how much you can learn and how well it prepares you for the next step. And, of course how much fun you can have.

I love the tiger moth and plan to get one some day. If you have very limited space to fly, say 150X150 a slow plane might be the best choice for you. Slow means you need less room. An Aerobird or a Firebird need about 600X600 for a beginner and about 300X300 for an experienced pilot. Teh Tiger Moth will cost more to get it into the air. However, it doesn't do well in the wind and it will not stand up well to crashes. The Firebird and the Aerobird are both very crash tollerent. The Aerobird, once you become comfortable with it, flies quite will in 10-15 mph winds.

For a pure fun flying experience with a high probablity of success, value of package, transfer of experience and the ability to do loops and other simple aerobatics, the Aerobird is a far better purchase than the XL. It will give you the ability to learn and do more for very little extra money. That is why I bought it.

My other recommendation is the Sky Scooter Pro II or a Zagi, but these are somewhat faster planes needing more room.

dpw567

I have owned both the XL and Aerobird.

Tommy632 is accurate that it will teach you bad habbits because you use full left and full right on your transmitter in order to tunr the birds.

A real rc plane you dont need as much control throws to maneuver.

However if your new to R/C it wouldn't hurt to get the aerobird. It fly's much like the firebird, in a sense throttle will make you go up, but you also have the elevator option. The default tail for the aerobird does not respond very well when throttle is low (hard to have a stable landing). Therfore if you get the aerobird, I recommend picking up the X-PACK upgrade you can get for it. The XPACK gives you a wider elevator, therefore more control (the origional aerobird tail should have been the X-PACK tail). With the XPACK you also get the 7-cell battery. Shorter filght, but goes like a bat outa hell.

If your considering the XL, spend the extra $20 or $30 for the aerobird.
[img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-cool.gif[/img]

Kipper

Here's another vote to stay clear of the Firebird XL or any of them in that family. They fly up well if you are lucky enough to have a super calm day. They are good planes for psychics as well, because they are CRAP in turns. The experts call the turns "TRANSITIONS" because they need fifty acres to change direction. Almost any electric trainer will be better. For that matter, any trainer at all would be better. To keep one's interest in the hobby, a plane must be enjoyable to fly. The Firebirds are not enjoyable, they are a task!

aeajr

My Feedback: (2)

rckip17

I find your comments interesting. I have not found the need for regular extreme stick movement with the Aerobird. My experience with the Firebird XL is very limited, so I won't comment there.

I am more of a relaxed cruiser, but one guy who has spent a lot of time practicing, can do loops with it at 30 feet and has achieved inverted flight several times, however only for short periods. The under camber wing is not intended for inverted flight. He has almost rolled it and is working on that. He does tight figure 8s, I think he does outside loops, tail slides and lots of other manauvers. After his flights he just flys it back to himself, slowly, then cuts to a glide and catches it in his hand. Every time! That sounds like pretty good control to me. I have never done it, but this is his standard routine and he is not afraid to fly in wind either.

Clearly this plane is intended for mild behavior out of the box. Of course if you move the control lines down to the bottom hole on the control horns you can get more response from the elevator and rudder functions. Change over to the X tail and the plane becomes fairly aerobatic within the confines of a rudder/elevator only plane. The limitations are primarily in the pilot and their abilty to manage the plane.

As for wind, I regularly fly mine in 10 MPH winds and have flown it in 15 MPH winds. The only advice I give is that the wing should be undamaged as any weakness in the wing from a crash, combined with the forces exerted by the wind can cause the wing to fail. Of course flying with a damage wing on any plane is asking for trouble.

I have not needed to do this, but I am told that if you put a mild shim, like a popsickle stick, under the back of the wing, she penetrates even better into a strong wind.


dpw567

I rarely find I use full throw on any position on the Aerobird except, perhaps, when at very slow speed or in pure glide. Then, the Aerobird, like any plane, has less flow over the tail feathers, so more throw is needed.

Actually I glide my Aerobird a lot though I have never thermaled with it. Several of the the guys in the club like to thermal Aerobirds and T-Hawks, a similar plane with a standard tail. They climb, catch a thermal and ride the warm updrafts along with the gliders, to stay aloft a long time with no motor at all. I have even read posts of people slope soaring them with very good results.

Anyway, any plane that flies is fun. The XL flies. Power on the left stick and directional control on the right. Just like any mode two dual stick radio.

The Aerobird uses a single stick radio so it is attitude and direction ( pitch and yaw) on the right and throttle under the left thumb, just like other single stick radios. ( some put throttle under the left index finger)

Most planes will climb on increased throttle unless you trim this out. You can't trim it out of an XL or it can't climb, but you can trim it out of an Aerobird. I do it all the time, when that is how I want the plane to fly.

Frankly I find this whole discussion great. All sorts of views coming out. Good stuff.

Net net, we all like the planes we like. We like them for different reasons. Of course satisfaction will be determined by the pilot and their goals and objectives. As there are many different pilots, different flying situaitons and different levels of experience, there are different expectations.

I thoroughly enjoy my Aerobird. It has been a great first plane. I would readily recommend it for someone with similar goals to myself.

The Aerobird is completely different from my 2 meter sail plane, my second plane, which is also three channel blane flown with a single stick Hitec radio. This plane has a traditional tail with elevator/rudder and I will soon be enabling spoilers in the wings for the third channel.

My third plane, the electrajet, that I plan to start buliding today. This one is a flying delta wing, elevon controled plane. This will give me a chance to work with aileron functions, inverted flight and the flying that these features enable. This will be on a two stick Hitec Prism 7X radio. throttle on the left and attitude/roll on the right. Since there is not rudder, direction is a combo of roll and attitude.

Three planes, all different, yet all using the same flight principals to teach me, to thrill me, to add to my enjoyment. I am having a ball flying RC planes and I hope all of you are as well.