Hey Hatty,

Well, I can't say that I sit comfortably in a position to give advice on landing this sucker (A.C), but I have brought it down in one piece a few times. It's a tough ballance for me as a newbie. I want a nice smooth surface so I can land, but something a bit more forgiving for the type of landing (Nose down) that I've been doing most often. The park I've been flying in is one of those multi-purpose schoolyard deals, used for soccer, football, softball, etc... but is not so booked that I seem to get lucky 80% of the time and have it to myself (Saves embarrassment). The softball field infield is a "Skins," all clay, surface and is situated such that I can approach/attempt pointing upwind and over grass. If I'm coming in a bit hot, I can usually abort, or hold out for the softer surface. If all looks well, I can catch the stretch of clay I'm lined up for. The plane rolls good enough on the surface.

Things that I have been doing to try and help the case: As I mentioned earlier, I ended up buying and after-market ESC (Watt-age 15A) to solve a speed glitch problem, which it did. The other added benefit, which I didn't think of as a pro at the time, is that the auto cut-off feature can be reset during flight (No little red button). It's kind of hard thinking of so many things when anything goes wrong, but a little extra juice on final apprach is handy. I try very hard not to do "dead stick" landings, as it takes a piece of crap flyer and turns it into a piece of crap stone. So, if my timer lies to me and I end up dead, hopefully high enough to affect directionality, I can pull the throttle to neutral, and leave it there until I need a little kick. The battery pack will ballance the residual charge and come up above the cut-off threshold, as long as you don't floor it when you kick it back on. It does help to stay horizontal during an otherwise dead landing.

As for grass mods, your guess is as good as mine. I know bigger wheels are always better, but I can't imagine what the extra payload would do to the flight characteristics. Longer wire-type gear like what is provided, with bigger wheels might do it, as long as the grass was pretty short, and the wheels didn't function like directional air-brakes. Then again, I tend to bounce my landings pretty good and longer wire might just flip me prop-side. Just some thoughts, I'm with you on the "Learn as you go" thing, and hopefully won't go broke in the process. Good luck!