Hi guys. A few updates on my progress and my recent changes to planes.

I took the magnum out of the trainer as its way too little power for trying to fly with. The ripmax is quite a large 40 trainer compared to some others I've seen. Even running at full revs it struggled to climb with a full tank and a camera attached and the plane was balanced properly too. I did have to add around 60g of ballast in with the fuelmtankmthough.

Anyway I've put my Irvine 40 red head in and it's got bags more power and flies like a dream with that baby. I don't want to remove this engine as its great but I've got a Thunder tiger 46 pro now as well so I'm going to have to fit that I think. Or buy a plane for the 46 I suppose.

ive flown my trainer a few times and had some fun with it. Still learning but I can always get it down in one piece. Still some bumpy landings and I need to smooth them out. I kinda get carried away with flying when really I should spend a day doing touch and go landings.

My friend crashed his planes so I sold him my Space walker II air frame for a low price. I fitted his sc46 and tested it for him. It flew great with bags of power and very responsive. I had to test fly it twice it was that good. I sold this as I also have a Seagull Pilautus pc-9 low wing. After flying the pc-9 yesterday I may have made a mistake selling the Spacewalker but I had too many planes for my storage space.

So last night I flew my pc-9. It has an os46 ax 2 in it which I fitted a 11x6 prop to. Is this the right prop?
Pit was struggling to transition from idle to high end revs which I assume is the low end needle. Unfortunately I was on the field with no tools to remove the cowl and carry out the adjustments. So you guessed it I flew anyway. What surprised me with this plane was the length of run it needed to get airborne. Easily double or more than the Spacewalker. I can't see the wing loading being much more than the SW so I assume its down to the angle of the wings when on the ground as when it did get light I eased back and it went up steep and fast almost like a jet. Wow this plane was fast and rolls were very fast indeed and very axial like a red arrow or something. After what seemed like a short flight I started setting up to land. I lowered power and lined up to land. I was 100 yards out and it dies on me. I wasn't sure I was going to make it over the trees onto the field. I just cleared the trees but the planes air speed was low and I was quite a way back on the elevator trying to maintain height and make the field. A gust of wind lifted the plane 6 feet and I thought it was happy landings. I carried on gliding in knowing I was easily on the field now. Then all of a sudden at around 6 feet it just tip stalled and nose planted into the field. It landed right in the nose wheel and forced it back cutting through the fuselage. It's a poorly mounted wheel and where it's mounted is a bit soft if you ask me but it probably saved me any major damage this time.

on my return home I did some research into the pc-9 and found several articles than mention its tendency to stall at low speeds and also the fact that its a JET TRAINER! That would explain the take off and landing characteristics and also why the rear wheels are wounded wide on the wings.

so I sold my easy to fly low wing and left myself with a jet trainer. Hmmmmm, not my best decision of 2013 but like I've said before I like a challenge so ill go back to the trainer and totally master landings. Even landings a little hot and not floaters to try and prepare for a return to the pc9. The pc9 is a gorgeous plane so I don't want to crash it badly.

Im going to spend today modding my trainer to take the larger camera and also fitting a better release mechanism for the parachute guy.