Hi all

Just wonder why everyone is stressing that you need to keep the weight down on the Shock flyers? (still new in this foam, electric flying). The other night I attended an indoor flying meeting for the first time. There were 2 extra 330s shockey there - 1 light and 1 heavy built one. The heavier one was due to allot of balsa support and the nose was covered in ply (it was still brand new). Anyway, my point being the heavier one was much faster and more solid looking in the air. No idea what their actual weight were.

Worked out mine will come to 10.5oz, how does that sound??? (typhoon 6/3d motor Koham 3 cell 910mah 11.1v battery)

Thanks
Karl

heavy for indoors.... for indoor flying we used to have ours right at 5 oz which was extremely light. I would say with to be at 7 oz or under would be a reasonable weight to be flying a shocky indoor.

fast is OK for outside... but Gym walls come up fast with a heavy plane...

lighter shockies fly much slower (harriers, et al) which make it more enjoyable to fly indoors in a small space...

10oz is a brick for an indoor shocky... it will fly, but it will be a handful inside....
just my .02

Understand the weight issue now, thanks. Luckily I don't have a space problem as my local indoor club uses a indoor cycling track (Velodrome in Cape Town SA)

Well, you might be fine with a 10oz shocky if you are lucky enough to have an extremely large gymnasium.

Alot of us are flying in gymnasiums that are one basketball court sized, and about 20ft ceilings. You can fly a 10oz shocky in this sized gym, but you wont be able to do the maneuvers that a 5oz shocky can do in that space.

For instance, I can do a reverse cuban 8 in a space of about 15ft, and never get any higher than 10ft with a 5oz shocky. Id never get close to that with a 10oz shocky.

The other thing is that you cant slow down a 10oz shocky like you can a 5oz shocky. A 5oz shocky will cruise around level flight at about a brisk walking pace. A 10oz shocky will need a high angle of attack to slow down that much. In a small gym, this can mean the difference between "flying" and "fighting".

Its kinda hard to explain to someone that hasnt experienced it yet. You really have to get your hands on a light shocky and a heavy one, and take them out for a test flight in a small enclosed area. Then you'll quickly find out why we all strive for extremely light weight.

Basically heavier planes fly faster, and require more space to do maneuvers. The extra speed makes it difficult to keep from running into the walls, ceiling, floor, bleachers, etc. And during maneuvers, you'll quickly run out of space in a small gym.

bdavison,

I've read several of your posts and you provide a lot of specific and valuable information. I get the impression that one can only achieve a 5 oz. weight with an E-tec 2 cell 7.4V 250mah pack. Are you content with 3-5 minute flights?

Biplanes appear to be one of the ETOC trends. Is this an alternative way of slowing down a plane? It would be harder to keep the weight down with that extra wing.

I would appreciate hearing your opinions.

Well, while its true that a shocky below 5oz will require a very light battery, such as the one you listed, the plane doesnt have to be under 5oz to fly great. With a 2cell 340-730mah lipo, average weight is around 5.4-5.8oz loaded. This is probably the best option for most pilots. Offers great performance, and run times of up to 15min. Most of the guys here are using the Thunderpower 7.4V 430 or 730mah lipo's. So far I think Im the only one experimenting with the smaller batteries. A little 7.4V 340mah would be a good lipo for someone looking to fly with extreme light weight without sacrificing to much flight time. I can usually get about 12min out of a 340mah lipo by using power conservatively. Hovering sucks the most juice.

Ive also found that Im starting to use flying tactics like a military dogfighter. Flying maneuvers to load up inertia and kinetic energy to use instead of jumping on the throttle. Use dives to build up speed for vertical maneuvers, requiring less throttle for climbing. Using slow ascents for gaining altitude instead of rapid pull-ups. Using just enough throttle to keep it airborne during maneuvers, and not a touch more. Turn the prop brake off, and pull off all the power whenever coming down the backside of any maneuver.

At our local indoor meets, our flight times are limited to 7min. And then the next group of flyers goes up. With this time limit, Ive found that the little 250mah lipos perform fine. Ive got multiple batteries, so if it goes down during my time, I just land and pop a new lipo in, and go at it again. The performance gain from using a super light battery in my opinion is worth the lack of flying time. Most of the TOC guys are also flying the little 250-340mah lipos. Just because their routines are only a short few minutes, and it performs so much better.

Biplanes. OH boy...where to start.

Most of the biplanes you see at the TOC events are custom builds. They've been tweaked and modified so much to keep weight down, and they are flown by master pilots. For instance George Hicks Tensor4D. The plane he flys at the TOC has probably been tweaked ALOT to get it to fly like that. The ones that we get as kits in the hobby store need alot of work to get that kind of performance out of it. Stock tensors come out around 8-9oz which in my opinion is too heavy for indoor flying. Heavy weight coupled with the Tensors odd flying charectoristics = pain in the neck. There are three people here, myself included that have built tensors. NONE of them perform indoors as well as a shocky. All of us, (Tony Stillman included) really have to fight it to get the tensors to do the same stuff as we easily do with a shocky. Dont get me wrong the Tensor is a fun plane. Just requires more piloting to fly it.

In my opinion, as of current there aren't any biplane kits that can keep "pace" with a lightweight shocky, and the main reason is you just cant get them light enough. And if you do build it light, you sacrifice alot of durability. It ends up really fragile.

The latest biplane to get alot of attention is Great Planes new "Reflection", which promises to be the next anti-shocky indoor plane. The ones flown at the TOC look good, but only time will tell if the ones we get in the kit are as good as the ones the pro's are flying.

I have a strong suspicion that the reason for the delays in releasing the Reflection are due to them tweaking the design trying to get it to fly like a shocky. Have no doubt that Great Planes is going for the throat of Ikarus. They know that the only way they are going to get the huge Ikarus crowd to flip, is to produce a airplane that flys as good or better than a shocky.

Ive already got mine on backorder, only time will tell if it lives up to expectations.

I really like biplanes, and hope that sooner or later they will come out with one that can perform like a light weight shocky, but as of yet, Ive not seen one.

Ikarus also has a pitts special shocky biplane, but Ive been unable to locate one. If anyone knows where I can get one, please let me know.

Thanks bdavison. As always, great information.

I saw some pre-production Reflections fly at the JR Indoor Electric Festival here in Columbus. In the hands of an ETOC competitor, it's a very graceful flier.

Yeah, I really like the idea of "clip-on" control surfaces. Ive never liked tape. It comes loose, dirt gets under the tape, It leaves a shiny strip across the wing, etc. The other problem with taped on control surfaces, is if you have to replace one, the tape tears off the painted on graphics. Or in the tensors case, the graphics are sprayed on over the tape, so you now have a 1" wide gap in your graphics. Lately many of us have been flying KE across the gym, dragging the wingtips on the floor. And doing flat spin landings. It really eats the ailerons up. It would be nice to just pop a new one on.

I also really like those new control horns. 80 degrees deflection on all the control surfaces...yup, thats gonna be AWESOME.

clip on ailerons? I would really enjoy that because with my shocky I cant help seeing if I can just get the much closer knife edge to the ground and yes it does make the tips beat up and mine are bad now its almost time for a new one. (Pavement does it in the worst much worst than gym floors) LOL ever try it? It's like sand paper ...30 grit.

Yup, I hand catch outdoors, because of that.

Not to mention you mis-calculate a hovering tail-touch, and it folds the rudder in half....well you know....who wants to build a whole new airplane just because the rudder is bent.

If great planes new hinge system works, I think its going to be one of its hottest selling points.

have any of you seen the yak 54f big foamie fly indoors with the shockies and keep
up with them [link=http://67.18.81.100/rcuvideos/magazine/reviews/510/quiquesomenzini.wmv]this a frame design does limbo type stuff[/link]


[link=http://67.18.81.100/rcuvideos/magazine/reviews/325/etoc-quique-h.wmv]click to see yak 54f fly at toc games[/link]

bdavison About the hole rudder tail touch thing ... I do pull pull on rudder and elevator and this solves that problem because it will stretch the fishing line and not break the foam.... It works great and is lighter than carbon push rods.

about using the 2204/54....

i have the 2208/34,12 amp sc and 3C 720 lipo ........ is it worth me spending about $120 on a new setup for my shockflyer?
it fly's well but a bit fast and heavy. does a lighter shockflyer fly that much better?

Do you fly indoors or outdoors ? A lighter one will fly better and it will be easier to fly in smaller spaces and they hover and do aerobatics better becasue you have the same amount of control surface moving around alot less weight. A lighter wing loading also means you can slow it down more.

i fly outdoors... and it's always a bit windy. will a lighter setup make a different when flying outside? or it's ok to go with a 8oz plane? my mane purpose is for practicing hovering.

yes.

yes.