Tigerdude,
Like I said, don't worry about looking bad. We all were there, and nobody is going to look down on you at all. If you try to teach yourself to fly you are going to have a real risk of actually getting fed up with crashing planes and give up on the hobby. A lot of people get themselves convinced that it doesn't look that hard to fly one of these, and will try to convince themselves that they can "work up to it" by using the smaller planes first. IMHO they are A) fooling themselves and B) just spending extra money with very little real gain. I know that there are those out there that have taught themselves to fly, but trust me they are a very SMALL percentage of those that learn. The majority of people that learn to fly use an instructor.

I'm going to make a statement that I am 100% sure will be correct. Even if you buy these smaller slower electric planes and practice with those first. And you may very well teach yourself to fly in the process, but I am 100% sure that you WILL CRASH your LT-40 if you try to fly it without an instructor. I don't know how much damage will occur. It may be repairable, or maybe not, but do you really want to see the plane you have spent so much time building crash?? I've found that people that try to teach themselves to fly usually wind up teaching themselves to repair long before they can actually fly.

A lot of people will come here and say that there are no instructors anywhere near them, but more likely is they just haven't found one yet. Where have you looked for an instructor?? Try asking at your LHS to see if there are any clubs/instructors near. I went to the AMA website and did a club search on your zip code and came up with a club that it says is approx. 10 miles from you. Here's the link to the search I did [link]http://www.modelaircraft.org/ClubZipLocator.aspx?z=01201[/link]

I'm not trying to put you down here, put you down here, or discourage you in any way. It's just the opposite. I've seen how eager you are to fly and you have been doing such a great job in building the planes you have started, I just don't want to see that eagerness shot down as you try to teach yourself to fly. Even those that do teach themselves to fly have a lot of frustrations as they learn. I am just trying to make it easier for you to get into this great hobby.

Hope this helps.

Ken