tclaridge

I think Mr TBone is right on. Sounds like a bad battery or bad charge. I haven't flown with the stock NiHy, but the LiPo is GREAT, and the cg is just right. This thing flys out of my hand and up to 100 ft very fast with a full-throttle hand launch.

jonwhatley

I wrote my initial impressions of the mustang earlier in this post and gave it some positive reviews. However, after flying it for a bit, I have to take some points away. The propeller breaks way to easy on even the softest belly land. (I've gone through three) My gear box busted so I replaced it only to discover the smaller gear on the engine was stripped off as well. Apparently you can't buy the little gear seperately so I had to buy a new motor. Again, this would have been an excellent candidate for some simple spring loaded landing gear that you could trip w/ the Xport. You could re-cock them again when you were ready to hand launch. I think this would save a lot of belly and prop damage. I've also smashed the wing but I'll take responsibility for that ::sigh:: but I'm well over 200 bucks into this plane. I'm liking my stryker more and more. [&o]

phat742

i'm just the opposite. i have well over 50 flights on mine and haven't had a single thing go wrong on it except the battery cover breaking on the third flight (i just use masking tape to keep battery cover on now). i use the nimh battery just as much as the 3s lipo battery (alot of jumper switching) and like the performance of both. of course the flight time on the lipo is significantly better. like 4x better. i did leave it in my truck one day with the windows closed and in the sun and the paint on part of the wing bubbled up but it didn't affect the flight performance at all. i still love this plane with the stock setup but i can't wait for the motor and gearbox to break so i can put an uber brushless setup on it and get some incredibly unrealistic flight performance out of this thing.

Monitor

Hey phat742......

Do you take the wing off each time you change jumpers, or do you have an easier method?

If you DO go brushless....... let us know what you do!![8D]

phat742

yeah i do change the jumpers by taking the wing off. i am really good at getting those damn screws back in now too. as for the brushless setup i was thinking maybe a multiplex 480-4g put into that gearbox on a 3s2100 lipo with the same prop. i think that setup would be pretty much a drop-in swap. or maybe an axi 2212-20 or a 2808-24. both with the 3s200 lipo and the same prop.

dbateman

My Feedback: (31)

I don't have any electrics but my son bought the PZ P-51. It's a nice little plane but somewhat under powered. I can't believe guys are flying combat with this model, as ours won't loop from level flight. A guy at our field has a Hobby lobby Corsair , 32" span that flies like a bat out of ----. We have the lipo up grade 2100 mah but the voltage increase is minimal. A small plane like this has to fly faster than scale speed to look right , IMHO. Is there a way to match a brushless motor to this setup? And could it be direct drive? I know it will probably involve tossing the provided radio and electronics . A better option for this plane would be airframe only and outfit yourself. My son never listens to me ! Any help welcomed. DB

tclaridge

Dbateman,
Something with your plane doesn't sound right. I would have guessed bad battery, but you said you are flying Lipoly? Is it a Thunder Power battery? The thrust to weight ratio seems pretty healthy to me. I fly my little SU-27 at a T-t-W ratio of .9, and the P51 feels like about .65 to .75. That's plenty for a war bird!

I can do a loop no problem from level. I cruise at 65% power (just above the half tick on the Tx), and do all stunts at 100%. Also, at 40 mph, this model is almost scale speed. Although I am not sure that speed scales, it does look right to me in a high speed pass compared to WWII footage I've seen. PZ P-51 scale is about 1/11th, and at a 450 mph top speed, that scales about right.

Could you have a bad motor, or do you just fly a lot of planes with high thrust to weight ratios?

3D-Kid

LOL....Crimper I know EXACTLY what you mean. I own a Futaba 9cap and I hate having all these transmitters that go to this certain plane. That would be nice if I could just tie in diferent receivers with my radio.

SigMan

My Feedback: (21)

can you switch out the supplied connectors with some Deans ? is there enough room?

dbateman

My Feedback: (31)

Im not talking about using the P-51 as a pylon racer. We just want some performance out of the aircraft. Comparable to all the electric stuff I have seen fly this thing really lumbers around with enough power for level flight but climbing and manuevers you have got to be carefull. Maybe the parkflyer thing is a little more laid back than we expected. It looks like it is doing around 40 mph. A 50% increase in speed to around 60mph should be about right. 40" span , 29 oz. flying weight. How do I figure out a combo to get us there? DB

subarubrat

My Feedback: (1)

SO is it foam, plastic covered foam, plastic, built up, what is it made of? I didn't see any styro grain. Amazing, Cox built an almost ding proof plastic arf 30 years ago but today the foam just gets weaker and weaker.

Airbourne in Japan

My Feedback: (3)

got my p51 on saturday, put deans plugs on it and added a length of wire to the battery wire from the esc as the wire would no way allow me to connect the bat. flew it this morning. at first it wouldn't fly, kept mushing to the ground and the bat cover and rear wing mounting kept coming off, but i had only run the motor for a minute previously to check if it worked. should have run at least one battery thru it. anyway, the firth time, i was beginning to get pissed off when it suprised me and flew away and climbed up high. excellent. did some loops and general handling to get used to it and it was fine. as the battery was getting low it was losing height when it suddenly went into a spin - must have stalled it or something. anyway it recovered by itself and i had to make a head on landing but muffed it up at the last - must need a bit of speed when landing - and nosed it in. broke the prop, cowling and spinner, but miraculously everything else was ok. nice plane, i'm going to stick with the stock batteries, just ordered another one, although i did have a 21oomah tp 3 cell lipo, but it was duff and i've returned it and still waiting for a replacement. my first flying warbird and i wanted rtf to get it in the air with no messing. the bat cover is crap and i used 2 rubber bands to hold it on. the rear wing mount could do with being better but as long as the wing doesn't come off in flight i'm happy. can't wait till the next outing ! by the way, these guys in Australia sell the airframe, no electrics for $99 http://www.modelflight.com.au/hobbyz...51_mustang.htm

Allan Aguilar

Hey,

I saw from ebay that there is a guy selling some Parkzone P51 parts, maybe you can check it out. Prices are cheap compared to horizon and any other retailers considering that the parts are only 1 week old (as mentioned from the ebay listing).

Check out this link, http://search.ebay.ca/_W0QQsassZpinoyQ5feh

For the information of everybody only.

The Marsh Man

Well I see that I am not the only one who has issues with this new plane from parkzone. I already fly the stryker and liked it untill the rx would lose reception at about 20 feet. Before I tell you about my experiances let me tell you what I feel the weak points are - The battery cover - it came off almost every landing or would at least mow some of the lawn, why could they not design a better non obtrusive cover, I have put some packing tape over it to aid in the retention of the cover. Handling - I don't know if I am too demanding, but this thing reacts awful slow, have you seen the response from the aileron servo? it takes about 1.5 to 2 seconds to go from one position to another, when you try acrobatic maneuvers, you really have to plan ahead. The elevator - The supplied tape came off after the first flight, I then used hinge tape that is still there and holding. Prop - This belly landing crap is killing me! the whole balance of this plane is to lean forward upon landing, I have gone through four props even though the landings were good ones! Flying characteristics - I feel that this plane is too sluggish, I have to fly it pretty much full throttle and it feels squirrely the whole time, trimming this thing is worthless since if you have the ailerons one way and then release the controls it does not go back to a nuetral position, but instead needs a little nudge to seat it again. Let us also use our own receivers so that we do not have a bunch lying around for each plane. How about selling a full plane without the receivers and transmitter for those major crashes.
My feeling is that Parkzone is nickel and diming us to death with al these fragile and cheap parts, I love the looks and the concept, but would not recommend this to anyone who did not want to spend more money and time on a plane that appears to be designed to crash or fall apart even when you fly it good. I do not feel that this plane flys very stable, the Wattage p-51 and the kyosho model both fly and perform much better. (Though they have thier issues too, but fly much better). So in closing I feel that with some improvements they may have a winner here! but untill they open their eyes and fly this thing for themselves, the next thing we will see is this plane flying into the sunset, without its battery cover!
Thanks

Airbourne in Japan

My Feedback: (3)

i agree with you Marshman, that this plane is not as good as the f27 in many ways, but i think it's a pretty good warbird for beginning on. i've only flown mine twice, had it go into a spin, had it tipstall on launch and brok a prop everytime i've tried flying it. i'm going to use gws props in future. the battery cover is not very well designed and i keep mine on with 2 rubber bands. the other thin is that the rear wing mounts come out easily if you make a hard landing, but hopefully they wont break. i also noticed how slow the aileron servos are. but i've really enjoyed my 2 flights with it and want to fly it lots. i've had a wattage corsair that wouldnt fly and a gws me109 that would only tipstall on take off (and also the first gws plane i built, not that well) so i'm glad of the parkzone mustang to get into warbirds. i'm going to master this plane, but will leave it stock as i've got a wooden mustang to build in the future and that will be brushless. you could buy the fuselage wings and tailfeathers and build your own, but my wooden mustang was less than $60 and is really nicely made - you can get it from raidentech. however i want to do any crashing on the parkzone plane.

The Marsh Man

Yeah I agree that I also want this thing to work! there were some other items that I forgot to mention like the canopy and Frankie the pilot poping off when on a fly by. Aside from the slow reaction time and the quality issues, it is a good flying plane. I also had trouble with that rear wing cowling. I am thinking of modifying it, but I already spent over $240.00 on this thing. I too have a gas powered P-51 and enjoy flying it, but was looking to get into electric. I can only hope that Parkzone reads these posts so that they can improve on its design, I am still in the thought that they designed this thing to break up relatively easy so that we have to keep buying into this plane. (Do you see how the parts are broken down) If only they were slightly sturdier. On one rough landing that I had I lost the spinner (Which I am flying without) and had some internal damage where the battery mounts. One of the corners of the inner rails that hold the battery broke, so the battery move around. It still flies, but sometimes the battery shifts around. I also wish they would tell you where the CG is so that I can balance this thing or at least check it. If only they would make a plane with all the servos and stuff already installed yet without the receiver or motor. Well anyway, have fun flying!
Thanks

SigMan

My Feedback: (21)

try designing a landing gear made of out of music wire, just to cusion those hard belly flops, i dont know why PZ didnt do this ! at least we could have the option to use it or not ! [:@]

aramirez

Chesie2,

This airplane will fly if assembled exactly as the manual says, even with a half charged battery. Make sure you are using the control horn holes indicated, use the included 4 pieces of tape for the horizontal stabilizer. Align the elevator and ailerons as indicated. Do not modify a thing. Out of the box the propeller/spinner is design with a right/down angle. do not straighten it. Also aileron have more throw in one direction (cannot recall to where).

I got one a couple of days ago. The supplied charger is as expected, a battery burner. If leave unattended will overcharge, reducing flight time. I stopped it when the battery gets warm. I flew 2 times for each charge. Both flights were at full power for take off and climbing, then mostly half for sustained flight. The airplane did not needed much input to flight except when wind hit it. It can make this small plane tumble faster than the ailerons or my eyes can compensate for it. I ended up going to unplanned routes, but never crashed.

I never got a secure feel of control, it is quite a handful, wind can flip it in a split of a second.

Landing is better in tall grass or soft weeds. Tall grass stop the prop and slow down the plane so no damage is done. For take off, hand launch into the wind with the tallest grass in front of you so if it goes down it may not break.

Good luck.

zagimon

Hey guys , just got the plane a couple of days ago and had a good first flight. Plenty of pull out power and I was in 10 mile an hour wind. Only about 9 minutes of flight ,but I was in wind having to use alot of throttle. I need a screw driver to wedge my battery compartment off. I noticed that the stock battery was too loose in the bay and could cause a cover failure so I put foam in there.
But anyway, on the next day I went to the field and a newbe was there with a firebird on chan 6 also. Of course he flew his plane while i was setting mine up. The mustang was on the ground so the prop wasnt spinning, so I didnt notice. Well smoke came up from the cowl and i quickly pulled my pack off. Now , I have a smelling motor and burded about 300 ma through the speed control. The plane now has no power in the engine and I am wondering if it is just the motor that burned out or the speed control also. The servos function and the motor works , it just lacks power. Can anyone tell me if my flight system is damaged or if its just the engine.

Flytuff
Zagimon

The Marsh Man

It is probably the engine, they are not real expensive type. Call up Parkzone, even though their planes are cheaply made, they do have a great tech support. The number is at the last few pages of the manual.

Glacier Girl

My Feedback: (4)

Though for the day. With the canopy falling off problem, did anyone think that maybe "Frankie" was just jettisoning the canopy before he bailed out of his stricken bird?

Mine is patiently sitting in it's box. Am going to wait till the faults are compiled, correct them, and switch out all the electrics. Gotta Mega just begging to be put to work. Maybe I'll even work out landing gear snafu the Pz presented us with.
Thanks guys for all the good tips and fixes.

Airbourne in Japan

My Feedback: (3)

good luck Glacier Girl !!

The Marsh Man

I think glacier girl is the smart one of this bunch! As for Frankie the pilot I CA'd him and the canopy down, he's not going anywhere, if I have to put up with this plane so does he!
LOL when you do fly it though!
Thanks
Steve

aramirez

Glacier Girl,

With the factory setup, this airplane does not likes take offs from the ground. With landing gear you can probably land but not take offs. The reason for that is the build in (by design) offset in the propeller. On the ground the airplane under power will turn left quite sharply. Adjusting the gear to the right will only work while traction is strong, as the plane gains speed it will turn again to the left. At that time if you cut the power it will turn to the right. The only solution is eliminating the horizontal offset, but changing or modifying the motor mount will make hand launch impossible. The motor/prop offset is there to keep the plane from rolling on hand launches under full power. I suggest to stick to the original design and instructions.

About the airplane design weak points that can be improved:
1- The factory battery compartment is the result of a constraint of surface area to make a door large enough to place the battery flat under the wing. The vertical placement brings mass above the CG point making the plane more prone to roll and the worst, it does not ejects in a crash easily. The battery mass is the #1 contributor to airplane damage in a crash. I think placing the battery under the fuse like a belly tank may help.
2- Battery loose inside compartment, place light foam inside the compartment before placing the battery.
3- Short battery cable, tie a string to the connector so you can pull it when needed.
4- The cockpit falling off, use electrical tape in the front part. Do not use glue because you may need to remove it to reposition the pilot figure.
5- Tail tape, use more tape, do not glue because you may need to replace the horz stab if it gets damaged.
6- Do not straighten the spinner/prop/motor, the angle is intentional by design.
7- Do not let the charger cook your battery, unplug it when warm, and check its temperature very often while charging.

Good luck

L0stS0ul

Here's a few...

1. RX is tied to the part of the body that the wing is screwed into. If you tighten the screws down they will go into the RX. I have moved my RX so that it is velcro'd to the right side of the body. This also gave me a ton more battery lead and has not changed the flight characteristics.

2. Use hot glue to glue the tabs for the canopy inside the fuselage. This will allow you to still be able to get the canopy off if you need to but will help to secure it. It also won't effect the look of the plane.

3. Use elmers white glue on the tail. It will hold it very well but will easily come loose if you want to take the tail off. The tape does not work well IMHO

4. I've not had issues with the charger cooking the batteries. When the charger says it is done the batteries are just as warm as the ones coming off my hobbico MkII. I'd actually say that they are a little more than warm but not hot. The charges are good and the plane has great power. I'm not a battery wiz though but I've not seen "cooking".

5. Pull the cowl off and check that all of the screws for the power system including the ones that hold the motor into the gearbox and the screws on the firewall. Make sure they are in good. Mine have been getting a little loose and I need to tighten them up every few flights.

6. Check the aileron linkage tubes near the servo in the wing for movement often. I check them after every flight. I also added some more glue just to make sure that they don't come loose. If they do come loose you will no longer have full throw on the aileron thats tube is loose.

That's what I've learned about this plane so far.

I love this plane. The more I fly it the more I love it. I will eventually replace the electronics but for now they are fine. the aileron servo is a little slow on high rates but it will roll fast enough and the plane looks so darn good in the air.