This is my Magic hovering but let me tell you it is a handful. With a little head wind I can touch the tail right at my feet though. Without any wind it seems to be a bit trickier. I think it is a poor hovering airplane and is by no means a 3D machine. I just bought the U-Can-Do and I am looking forward to trying that after hearing all the great things you guys have to say about it.

i have a magic and it has a 72 satio engine its really hard to hover .would a bigger 3 blade prop help .does anyone know.

Move da cg back then its no prb to hover

Typically yes, a plane must be tail heavy to hover, but with that plane it didn't matter. I slowly added wiegh until i had added 4 ozs to the tail and found it hovered best right on the CG.

I've done mods to my Magic with a 46FX, and it is by far the easiest model to hover that I have ever flown. Mine weighs in at around 3 pounds 4 ounces. It took some fine tuning to get it to hover easily, mainly I needed to input alot of right thrust into the motor mount. I also have mine balanced at almost 5" with no lead added. Tail mounted rudder servo and I modified the radio compartment quite a bit to shift the weight to the rear. It will do everythhing in the 3D book except knife edge.

I'd have to say mine flies best on a dead calm day.

IMO, the 46FX is the largest motor that should be put on this plane, anything heavier kills the lightweight performance because the engine is not only heavier, but you will need to add alot of lead to the tail to balance unless you do serious mods... And you still may need to add lead...

What does yours weigh in at? wheres the CG? Really I just think right thrust is your answer to easy hovering.

Hope this helps.

I too find the magic hovers well with the Os .46fx. It was tricky at first until if moved the cg back.

Jason

I think TUMBLER is cheating! Look what is above his left wing!

Where can I get one of those little hands?? Tower?

I didn't like my magic when I first got it. Thanks to you guys with prop and CG suggestions I love it. I can hover a magic in any wind and love this plane in the wind. It's the only hi wing plane I own, so i can play in the wind without the constant stalling from side to side. I'm working on getting some carbon gear cause I've been through two sets of magic gear. I have just ordered a model tech Magic extra and hope it's half as fun. I've got an OS70 four stroke to put on it(thanks to all the favorable comments).

Phil

I use to have a Magic and i thought it was easy to hover.
i used some lead on the tail and if you go to
www.ytinternational.co.uk then click the magic then click picture im the one in the red and a black jacket.

heres a pic of me hovering the cougar
Dean

My magic is the first fun fly airplane I have owned. And let me tell you it has been a great 3-D trainer, best $100 bucks I have every spent in model aviation! If you burn enough gas you can get the magic to do any thing you want with the proper set-up! I'm running a .46Fx/mac's exhaust with a 11.5X4 APC prop,std servo's,6v 720 mah Ni-Mh battery pack and it a great 3-D trainer. That's just my opinion. Ricky

hey i got a manuver for you to try, while flying straight and level, (get a little altitude for the first time) give it full left rudder, full up elevator, and full right alerons. its a really goofy looking snapping thing. i have found that magics are the best planes to do this with. let me know how it works for you guys when you get the chance.

Stikman

I just got in from another flight on my magic! I haven't really gotten it to hover yet for a sustained amount of time. I am just going out as much as possible and practicing. I have elev-flap mixing and I do some really cool loops(flips) in place about 10 feet off the ground. I also have up flaps programmed to land so it sinks a little better with steeper descents and a nose up attitude. My friend flew it and he had it hovering no problem so I know I just need to practice. I actually just stalled it about 3 feet of the ground and it flipped into the ground and didn't get hurt. So how much should I move the CG back for best flying?

Thanks,
Caleb

question?
i have a os 46la on my magic 3d. What should be my cg? ne suggestions?

How about a os 40 la? Can this engine be enough power to hover the magic 3d

thats the new magic right?

i dont think a 40 LA will make it prophang they suggest a irvine 53 but i wont even put a irvine 53 in it.
If i had the magic 3D then il put a YS 63 in it should be nicewith that on.

The 46 may be enough power although i aint seen the magic 3d's fly yet hoping to see them go at a couple of shows

Regards Dean

The YS 63 is too heavy. The Irvine 53 is right on the fine line of being overweight... A 46 two stroke is really the best kind of engine for this plane if you want it to perform. This is my $.02.

Hi coulter na the YS 63 will go in it and pull it vertical it would be a great engine.
the 53 irvine i dont like but a OS 46 FX should be a nice one to that should prophang it.

But yea you can go with the Irvine 53.

Dean

I've seen one fly with a YS 63 locally, After all is said and done, He wishs he had stuck with the 46. Seeing as he has added 14 ounces of lead in the tail, and the extra ounces in the engine, his plane now weighs in at close to 5 pounds, and flies for 7 minutes on the supplied tank. His 3D, and slow speed/harrier flight is suffering.
Now, My 3.3 lb Magic on the other hand, will pull vertical out of a hover like a rocket with the 46FX and 11x4 Zinger. Except for vertical snaps, I fly at quarter to half throttle. It hovers at quarter throttle, and I fly for 15 minutes on 8 ounces of fuel. With this kind of unlimited performance, why spend another $130 on a big, heavy 4 stroke that would cause you to have to add lead to the tail, and supply more fuel?

Dont get me wrong, I LOVE YS engines, I have three of them in other planes, but in a plane like this, I dont see the need at all!

MAGIC . . . . No Bover in the Hover.


Mine has a good OS32 SX with 13" x 42 APC on 5% nitro and OS8 plug . . . . . Perfect.

Reviewing it in RCM&E at the moment . . . . .NICE

In a 0mph windless day . . . . .MAGIC !!!!

Tumbler,

Thanks for the picture. But I must ask: why did you have to load the picture on your pc monitor and take a digital picture with flash on? What's wrong with the real picture?

A friend has a plane that looked like this, but I can't remember what it was called and since he moved down to Florida for the winter I can't ask now. In any case, if this is the plane, I found it to hover fairly good, not the best but certainly not the worst. I’m sure there wasn't any tail weight, but that doesn’t matter once your in a hover, only in the transition. If this is that plane, Ed, the owner, allowed me to do a flat spin landing with it. It looked pretty cool. We have a video of it on our minnesotarc.com if anyone is interested.

Scott
“if it isn’t broke, push harder”

Sorry. A 13 inch prop on a 32?

Yes a 13" APC on my 32. This gives me prophanging at just under 50% power with loads of grunt for the verticals and power when needed for getting out of the prophang. The best thing is the lack of NOISE with this combo. Also the fuel lasts longer for more flight time. A mate of mine has the same model with a 10x6 master on the 32 and all it does is scream it's b0@@0x off. My model weighs in at 4Lbs on the nail.

As I said, I am reviewing the model for RCM&E in the UK (Radio Control Models & Electronics) This is a part of it.

Fitting Out:

As I said, I put in '3' 3001 servos for the ailerons and throttle control with a 9303 for the rudder and a 9204 for the elevator. The servo array is powered by a 4.8V 720Mah NiMh rx pack for 'Overlander' and a Futaba 129DP receiver, with a 'S.M Services' 4 cell battery checker fitted so it can be viewed from the outside of the model under the wing. The CG with this engine and R/C set-up was bang on 115mm from the Leading edge of the wing as recommended, the only addition of weight was 10 grams stuck to the underside of the left hand wing tip to achieve perfect lateral balance. The AUW of the model without fuel was 4lbs exactly. I set the throws as indicated in the instructions for the first flight. After that I increased the throws a smidge - about 45 degrees on the ailerons, 50 degrees on the elevator and as much as humanly possible on the rudder. (loads of expo though)

Flying:

As with any review that I have been fortunate to have been asked to do by our editor and chief, I always try to wait for ideal weather conditions to get some pictures and to evaluate the model. In this case the weather was absolutely bloody marvellous. It's first flight was during the 2 week Christmas break away from that four letter word . . . W O R K ! ! To get some good flying shots I had to head half way up the island to the Midlands MFC, so that 'Bouncer Bob' could do the honours with his new 'Brownie Box'. As this is my umpteenth fun-fly model, I was well prepared for any trick it might have up its sleeve. As I said earlier, the control throws were set as recommended but were a bit dull for my taste. However they would probably be lively enough for a first timer on a model of this type. All the controls were crisp as was to be expected with the closed wire system, 3mm push rods to the ailerons and gap sealed surfaces. To the OS 32, I had fitted a 10" x 6" prop for the first flight because it was all I had in the workshop at the time (lack of stock after a lot of flying in 2002). The performance was in a word, RUBBISH. Lots of noise but wouldn't pull the skin off the custard on the Christmas pud. Sure she prop hanged well enough, but she did so at 3/4 throttle and just had enough ummph to get out of those sticky situations while seriously disturbing the other members of the club by waking them up with the shrill tones of the piston hitting mega serious RPM's. Still I flew her for the day - 4 hours and got through 1/2 a gallon of 5% Model Technics in the process. Usually I fit a 12.25" x 3.75" APC prop to the 32 for funflying. However on day two of testing I fitted and APC 13" x 4" prop with the normal OS 8 plug and the same 5% fuel. Now she was transformed beyond belief. She prop hanged on 1/2 throttle and had loads of grunt to get out of the bad gravity sucking situations and was ultra quiet. . . . . So day two saw the remainder of the first gallon vanish into the air over my flying site at the back of my house in somewhat windy conditions (see Gale). Day three, back up to the MMFC and the day was a bit cold at 3 degrees C, but there was zero wind. Perfect for a full 6 hour day on the field. Scratch another gallon of juice, two ZAP tranny packs and very nice chicken salad roll. . . .and some chocky bickies.

Conclusions:


Well up to this point in time I have flown the 'Magic' for over 20 hours and she has seen the best part 3 gallons of nitro mix go up in smoke. Do I like it? What do you think? The only thing that I was worried about was the firewall and after this time on the sticks, my concerns were unfounded. One thing I have noticed though, is the tail skid is a bit long and this causes the model to sit on the ground at a shallow angle on the take off run, thus requiring fairly long take off runs. This could be also due to the Carbon U/C being a bit shorter that the wire version. But I counteracted this by adding in a mix of 30 degrees of flap with elevator to shorten the take off run to 2 feet. The 'Magic' will do the book. And is particularly good at the inverted flat, I mean FLAT, spin. Torque rolls are a dream with the big 13" prop but suck with the 10" version. You can hang it all day if you want and it's Breitling colour scheme is stunning it the air on a clear, sunny, winters day like we had at the beginning of this New Year. What I like most about this model is that I retains lightness but is made from harder/stiffer wood than most ARTF fun fly's out there. Some of them are made from sponge and break up in the air or flutter themselves to death. In a word I would have to say that 'Modeltech' have designed and produced and very good model which has a solid feel to it in the air and looks good too. MAGIC !