Lots of guys really miss out on the fun of having a trainer around after they solo.

Too many people solo and immediately strip the gear out of the trainer and then either sell it, or mothball it. I always keep a trainer in the fleet. Now, they aren't stock trainers, but still, flat-bottom wing, and box fuselage.

My current trainer is an LT-40 with a TH .75 engine. Stock dihedral with scratch built flaps and big barndoor ailerons. Taildragger. I've had it for about a year. I dorked my last one flying at 10,000' elevation and ran outta fuel. Deadsticked it into a pine tree about 10' above the ground. Pretty much shredded it to kibbles and bits. They don't glide to well at 10,000' elevation. Even with a TH .75 on the firewall, you have to keep it over 1/2 throttle just to fly. Anything under 1/2 throttle and it starts to sink. Landings are fun. I'll bet most of you have never seen a Kadet LT-40 land at 25-30MPH. It takes that much speed to keep it from just falling outta the sky.

I love my trainers. I can do all the aerobatic maneuvers with them. I had a local guy comment that most people don't even think a trainer will do aerobatics. He had been watching me ring-out the LT-40 and he was surprised to see anyone doing rolling circles with one. We had a nice talk about using trainers to practice aerobatics. To do knife-edge flight, you have to keep the wings kinda flat, not perfectly perdendicular to the ground--but if you slam in enough rudder, they will knife-edge. The inverted flat spin is the most difficult. You have to constantly fight the ailerons to keep it from rolling back upright, but you can do it if you get the CG back far enough.

You can put a rear mount in the fuse with some lite ply. Drop in a couple blind nuts, and you got an instant float mount. Pull your mains off and slap the floats on in about 5 minutes. Instant float plane.

They make great video planes. A friend an I strapped a viedo camera to the wing of my LT-40 with electrical tape and foam. Instant video plane.

Going to a fun fly? Want to fly a plane thats perfect for spot landings or the ground competition? Trainer.

The best part about it, is that if you tear it up--they are cheap to replace and your not heartbroken about it. It's just a trainer.