ORIGINAL: Jack Hyde
On the other hand you don't need to crash 100 times or even 1 time to learn 3d. I have never crashed a plane trying a 3d maneuver but I am methodical (boring ). I have a UCD 46, Mojo 40, Mojo 60, Burrito and 4 3d foam planes. I have crashed more than once but at this point its when I have a loose servo arm, wrong model on radio and other dumb stuff. I can hover , spin , harrier etc. I got a good knie edge loop with my Mojo 60a few days ago.
I have a Copperhead Extra that I got for durabilty. After flying it about a year I pulled the Hacker off and will put it on something less tough but that flies like I like. Get something that is made to fly and be a little careful. Full scale aerobat pilots don't crash a lot and some are pretty good.
I dunno. The
freedom to crash takes a lot of the apprehension away.
If you're trying to find the limit of what your plane can do, it's a LOT quicker just to go past it (crash) than try to get there in baby steps. Sort of like doing a binary search vs a linear. You get to your 3D flight goal asymptotically without crashing, but I get there a lot quicker with crashing. Once you get over that stigma, you can learn faster. Practice on the rubber airplanes, and use what you learn on the balsa birds. There is a lot to be said for both.