Hey all, I've flown Foam trainers for a few years now, just because they're simple, rugged, and cheap to replace when they crash. I recently inherited a pile of Nitro RC Plane "stuff," and I'm not even sure where to start with it all.
I have 4 planes that all seem to be complete, 2 transmitters (Futaba T9CAP and TX6a I think is what they are) which seem pretty old, albeit complex, a milk crate full of motors, and a bin of odds & ends including servos, wheels, etc.
Well,, I've flown a friend's Nitro plane before, but it was just a basic .40 Trainer, and everything I have is a low-wing plane. From what I understand, these are more "nimble" and not as forgiving, is that correct? Also, the planes all have motors on them, and with the ones in the crate, it looks like a mix of .40-.60 sizes, both 2 and 4 stroke O.S. engines. The only person I know personally who flies would be my uncle who's in Upsate NY, and I'm in NC, so our communications are few and far between.
If anyone would like to chime in and give pointers on where to start, this is my tentative plan in no particular order:
Clean everything. There's a bit of dust.
Buy new Tx/Rx, what I have is "dated." Look for 2.4ghz instead of 72mhz?
Clean, test, and tune all engines.
Test all servos.
Update the field box to something with a battery for electric start, instead of just a start stick.
Once I've done all that, I figured I would just drive the planes up and down the road for a bit until I get comfortable with how everything handles, then work on take-offs and landings, touch-and-go's, etc.
Sorry for the subpar pictures, but this is when everything was picked up, I blacked out planes that I didn't take, but it shows the planes themselves. (The wings were on a storage rack, not shown.)
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Now, all the planes seem in good shape, but I wonder if it's better to just buy a new ARF/BNF kit, and keep the motors. I've never been big on building planes or dealing with Monokote, so if any of these crash, it will be their final flights.