Hey Will, I'm ALWAYS working on new stuff
The difference between me and the next guy is I'll never stop supporting my old stuff. If the time comes when I don't have the room or time for an old design, I'll simply give it to someone else to play with. My philosophy is that it's too darned difficult for anyone in the states to get a good 2 meter plane that's not fully composite, and even then you generally have to pre order and wait wait wait.... There's nothing wrong with a composite plane, but it doesn't have to be that way. Anyone could look around and see the success people are having with more conventional constructed planes. The exception being perhaps the top 10 FAI pilots, but even then look at Bryan Hebert's stuff. There's something to it, and it just seems to me there's a black hole where a good AVAILABLE 2 meter plane should be. Although for the money vs work it's hard to beat an ARF, many of us don't want to have ARF #24 on the flight line.
The problem is lack of options. Just a few years ago we could get plans and parts for Typhoons, Patriots, and a ton of other very competetive birds. Now? Nada. That has to change. I know that CA is working on something, but again you run into the supply chain problem of importation. When they have them they have them. When they don't, you're SOL. What happens if you lose a canopy over the woods the week before a contest? Crack a cowl on a hard landing? Roll the dice, you may get lucky. Maybe not. I HATE being at the mercy of someone else, so I decided to make my own, right here in my little shop in Woodstock.
Stay tuned, I'll be building the prototype over the winter. The composite parts will be the most time consuming, so the fly date is iffy. If all goes well, I should have a short kit, plans and parts available by late spring early summer.
As for the latest and greatest, well there's no such thing as a perfect plane. All planes are a compromise somewhere, that's why we constantly tweak, design and test. Plus sometimes it's just cool to have something new and different [8D]
-Mike