Here's an update on its second day of flying. Sorry no new pix yet. Once again I had the local ace Carl Lindou do the flying while I shot pictures. Later, however, we did hook up a buddy box and I got to experience the feel of sitting in the pilot's seat of my EIII. I just wanted to report on how it flew this time out.

First of all, Carl reports that it seemed to have a little more power this time even though I hadn't changed anything. It's a new engine with relatively little break-in time on a stand so maybe just running it helped out. Also we (Carl) tweeked the throttle a bit. It's still a bit of a handful but Carl was able to put it through a more extensive set of paces today including a loop (starting with a bit of a dive as you suggested, John) and a simple roll. Landings have been picture perfect each and every time. The take-offs today seemed particularly scale -- long and slow.

As it turns out having the tank above the servos and therefore way above the carb turned out to be no problem at all. I don't even need the clamp I was using. No fuel runs out. And it starts as easily as my trainer. In fact the biggest pain in the a** is that damn green bare prop plug that you stuff into the electric starter. It comes out just about every time we start no matter how hard we push it in. Seems really dangerous!

Now on to my experience flying it. Carl took it up high (which takes awhile -- no "going vertical" with this plane) and we spend a few minutes getting the trims on the buddy box right. This turned out to be a little difficult. We never quite got the throttles sync'd. Anyway, I was able to wallow around the sky in lazy circles. It definitely needs rudder on the turns and is a little sensitive. But I'd still say it's pretty stable. Being small it is also quite susceptible to turbulance and occasionally bobbles around. It wasn't squirrly though and I think if I had a few more days with it, I'd be ready to solo (again).

All in all, it flies like the original. It sure isn't fast but then that's just right. It can do a loop and a roll -- and probably an (real) Immelmann though we didn't give that a shot today. It takes off and lands with the grace of all scale taildraggers -- particularly in the hands of an expert.

Oh how I wish there were just someone around with a 1/6 scale FE2 or Nieuport 11. I'd even be willing to go toe-to-toe with an S.E.5a!

Oh and here's me, AbuFletcher (AKA Don Carroll).