The next flights:


Well I picked up my new Ripmax trainer last week and spent last night building it all up. It took around 4 hours to have it flight ready. Althouh I have been flying my low wing Spacewalker with success I still feel a trainer is good to allow me to learn the manouvers more easily as it flies slower and is a little more docile and forgiving. Not to mention that I can fit my camera to it and also my little parachute man that I drop when the kids are with me. There was no wind today so it was perfect for sky diving!!

My friend came along with his Hi Boy trainer. His cub was crashed the other day and he is working through some extensive repairs but he's doing great for a beginner.

Well some of you guys are gonna fall out with me now but I decided to revisit the old Magnup GP 40 engine and see if I could get it working. Besides my Thunder Tiger GP is awaiting a new needle valve following my recent nose dive crash and the Irvine 40 is in the Space Walker where it likes to be. I have won an OS40 and a Thunder Tiger 46 Pro on Ebay so will fit one of those when they come. Probably the TT as the ball bearing engines seem to produce noticeably more power.

Well our first site was the local beach where the tide was out giving us some room. I got a flight in but unfortunately the tide was coming in fast and I only got the one. Well I tuned the engine in the way that seems to work for me now which is to start rich and then lean it out until I get revs without and spluttering.. I know I can go leaner to max revs and back off but this engine has probably only had 5 full tanks of fuel through it so I'll keep it rich for now to prevent overheating. I'm hoping to lean it out over a few flights to reach peak performance. I know you guys said its a crap engine but I've had it since a kid from new and just need to fly it. lol. I'll get a few flights out of it and then swap it for a better engine and keep it in my office as a reminder of my attempt to fly in my youth (where I failed) and my attempt now (where I succeeded).

My flight on the beach was okay but on take off the plane felt very twitchy once off the ground and seemed to be climbing very slowly. It almost seemed like it was tail heavy but surely not with a full tank of fuel and its a fair sized tank. Anyway I got the hang of the controls and flew a few laps to get used to the trainer again. No aerobatics until I knew it was flying properly and also that I could get it back down for some checks on all the screws and control connections. The landing was okay if not a little overshot. The plane seemed to glide forever into a slight 10mph head wind. Again I'm not sure if this is because its tail heavy. What are the characteristics of a trainer on landing when tail heavy?

Eventually teh tide came in and the runway was becoming narrower and narrower so it was time to leave. The beach is a great place to fly near us buut the sand gets everywhere and you have to be so careful not to get any in the carb.

We relocated to a large field nearer to home where wee w0ould have another couple of flights each. We had little fuel between us as the local shop had ran out except for a litre of 20% which he sold me for a ridiculous price that I can usually buy half a gallon of 10% for. Still I needed to fly.

Anyway on the field I flew again and on take off it was the same again where the plane was very twitchy on take off and seemed to pitch up at the slightest little gust of head wind or even if you lifted the nose slightly it would then seem to pitch up more on its own. Is this tail heavy?

When I did my balance check I kind of guessed the points using the side windows as a guage. I marked the windows on my old plane so I knew but this time I used my memory and estiamted the 85mm back from leading edge. When I checked it it seemed okay, if not a very tiny bit tail heavy but I assumed the fuel would cancel this out even on landing with a small amount left in the tank.

What I did notice in this trainer was that the servos were all further back than they were in my original trainer. I can only assume my original had been in a crash before I bought it and was therefore repaired and servos moved perhaps to aid the COG.


Again the flight was okay and I just tried to fly it around and use it as more of a test flight again with nothing fancy, just laps and a few stalls.

Landing was again quite difficult as it just didn't seem to want to drop even at low idle and even when I cut the engine at 6 feet it still went for some distance before touching down. Its a good job this time I have a steerable nose wheel to avoid the ditch at the end of the runway.

To be honest I found it easier flying the Spacewalker the few days before as it just seems more responsive and with more power.

I'll check the COG later and see if I misjudged it. there is defenitely something a miss with the way it was flying.