XJet

I built my first 1/2A RC model back in the 1970's and it was a semi-scale F4 Phantom (own design). It had the swept tip-dihedral wings and the anhedral tailplane -- looked really cool.

The wings were built-up but fully sheeted and inside it had a 500mAH battery pack with 2 Futaba S128 servos (heavy!).

Up front was a poor old Golden Bee that (quite surprisingly) hauled that little plane along at a pretty respectable pace.

A few years later I picked up some S20 servos (nice and small) and built a *loverly* pattern ship. I also switched to a 225mAH battery pack and had a TD 051 in the nose with crankcase pressure.

That was the sweetest plane I *ever* had and it grooved better than all my bigger planes. In the evenings I could fly from the local park (before the term Park Flyer was ever invented) but on the weekends I could put in a *very* respectable perfomance against the .40 and .60-powered ships others in the club were flying.

In fact I recall numerous instances when I was the only one flying because it was too windy for everyone else.

I tend to think that these little ships often do good things for one's flying skills too. They need fast thumbs and, since the old Cox engines had no throttles, every landing was a dead-stick so learning to control altitude and speed on the glide became second nature. Those guys with the *big* planes would almost have a heart-attack if their engines ever stopped during a flight "Look out -- deadstick!" they'd shout and everyone would slowly edge away from the strip :-)

Now I should get my finger out of my ear and finish my new 1/2A ship and get back into the air after 20 years of being too busy for aeromodelling.