I recently picked up an Apprentice 15e RXR, mainly because too chicken to fly my T-34. Right out of the box, no flaws. Wing joined together well, but dont be fooled that it can be flown the same day. You have to join the wings with 30 minute epoxy, which takes 24 hours to reach full strength. Once the wing was cured, I then proceeded to assemble the rest of the plane. I checked all screws, nice and snug. Tail went on quickly, two screws from underneath, but dont over tighten or the plastic will crack. Clevices lined right up, and once I had the RX installed, I used an AR600, I powered it up and centered all the servos. All the control surfaces were right on, I did not need to make any adjustments. Landing gear snapped right in, nose gear is a little difficult to get in, the screw is inside the cowl, but flexible enough to be able to tighten the screw without cracking. A note about the nose gear, it is short, too short with stock wheels to fly off grass, even very short grass. I put a 2 1/2" wheel on in place of the stock one, and also check the screw, it should be flat against the plastic, you should not see any threads, I had a few issues with the wheel turning sideways because I didnt have it in all the way.For the main gear I installed 2" wheels instead of stock for more ground clearance. Once that was done, and the wing was installed, the plane was ready for flight. The plane uses the same battery as the T-34, which was the selling point for me, only need to have one type of Lipo on hand for both planes, saves a lot of money. The radio setup is straight forward, bound the AR600 to my DX6i under airplane, then set the 3 channels to 50 percent on the low rate, and set the timer to 8 minutes, which I plan to adjust to 10 and so until I find the correct flight window for the Gen Ace 3300's I have for the planes. After my first flight I noticed it had very little rudder control, so I switched the rudder to 100% and changed the rudder dual rate switch to control all rate switches instead. One flip of the rudder switch and both elevator and ailerons change rate.

One thing I do notice though, not sure what it is yet, the rudder is slow to return to center, which may be the cause of my left drift. I need to find out if the link to the nose gear is bindig, or if the servo is just weak.

Time for flight, took it to my back pasture which has very short grass from the horses. Powered it up, walked to one corner and taxied the plane to the other end for a radio check, passed perfectly, walked to the area I designated as my pilot box, and taxied the plane to the other side so I flew into the wind. Thorttled up and was off the ground in 15 feet. My first ever take off was a success. I trimmed it out, it had too much up elevator, and it rolled to the left. Once it flew hands off, then I flew it a few times around and lined up for a landing attempt. The first one was off, it drifted away from me towards a fence, so I gave it throttle and up it went, then I lost orientation lining it up again, and did a quick loop and roll and got it right where I needed it, brouught it in for a landing, got over the fence and chopped throttle. It floated down the field towards me and landed just past me on all 3 wheels. My first true solo was a success, and I was shaking pretty good throughout the entire flight. I called it quits at that point, didnt want to push my luck. A couple days later, took the plane to my friends house where there are no fences just soybeans, and had 2 more good flights, though only one landing. After the first take off, I had a mishap. The grass was a bit tall and the prop was hitting the grass, so I had given it full up elevator and hit the throttle, but forgot the set the rate to low. Well it took off alright, straight up, stalled, and nosed over, but since I have flown mini helis, I was quick to cut the throttle so other than a slight scuffed wing tip the plane was fine. My second attempt at low rate this time, the plane took right off and leveled off perfectly, though I had to retrim it since I somehow messed up the previous settings. Since my take off was a bit hairy, and I started getting the shakes again, I let my friend fly it and put it through its paces. The plane flies remarkedly well, it rolls, loops, and does some pretty good manuevers, all at low rates too. He didnt want to try high rates on it at this time, so he brought it in for a nice landing. Well, a fresh battery, and time waiting while he got his glow airborne, and off I went again, this time I didnt think the plane would ever get off the ground, but after a few bounces, and rudder corrections, it finally cleared enough grass to get speed up and away it went. This time I flew it for 8 minutes, and was not shaking when it came time to land, and after a few attempts to get oriented, the sun was just setting and the plane was coming in from the west so I couldnt see if the wing was white, or had red stripes to know if I was turning towards me or away I eventually got it the right direction, and brought it in, the first time it drifted away, still need to work on that, the second time though lined it right up and was able to correct the drift and landed it, though a bit heavy on the nose gear. All and all the plane flies very nice, and if setup correctly on the radio with the dual rates, is very docile, especially at half throttle. Another thing I noticed, after 8 minutes of flight, I still had plenty of battery left. The voltage was only 3.8 per cell. Storage voltage for a Lipo. I could probably squeeze out 5 more minutes of flight.

Even with the rough nose heavy landing, and the goofy stalled take off, the plane held up perfect, so with any luck and no mishaps this plane should be getting a lot of air time. I found it to be a very good trainer for beginners.

Now here is something to take note, I started flying mini Heli's like the Blade mCX and mSR, 120SR, then traversed to a UM T-28, along with several hours of sim time on real flight, so this wasnt my first time flying a plane with a radio, just the first time I actually took off from the ground, flew it and landed it back on the ground in one peice, and a plane that actually had some weight to it. My previous flying with the T-28 shows well on the little bird, it looks like it went to war with a smooshed nose, bent prop shaft, cracked wings and tail, but the little bugger can still fly good, it just cant take off and land, has to be hand launched, and flopped onto grass, and the flopping is rare, more like flip flop instead. So IOW, you cant take this plane up if you have never flown before, BUT with a buddy box and a good pilot helping, you can learn to fly it quickly.<br type="_moz" />