ORIGINAL: forestroke
gboulton - i agree that a bipe could be a good second plane given that the bipe in questions has a generous amount of dihedral and a long fuse. the problem i see with bipes is threefold:
1. they don't fly themselves. unlike trainers, bipes don't fly themselves. the best second plane is a high wing without dihedral or a low wing with dihedral like the WM super sport.
I submit, however, as with any other type of airplane, that this is a generalization that's simply inaccurate. To say that few bipes are designed to 'fly themselves' is probably accurate...to say that bipes don't, simply because they're bipes, however, is misleading. There is, again, nothing inherent in the presence of absence of a second wing that makes the aircraft incapable of 'flying itself'. A Staggerwing and some Waco models are as "self-righting" as any "low wing trainer".
2. orientation is more difficult as bipes can look the same right side up as it does upside down at a distance. i've sent myself into a panick multiples times trying to reorient myself after being distracted and looking away from my plane or having the sun in my eye. what saves you is not that you can SEE the plane but that you can judge, due to your inputs, which way it's oriented. i would think that a beginner would have more difficulty getting out of that situation. i've seen people fly their bipes right into the ground, looping crazily all the way. i suggest, if a beginner is flying a bipe, a spotter (instructor) should be present at all times.
Again...you're attributing a statement that's true of ANY airplane to bipes specifically. Of COURSE if you look away from an aircraft you can lose orientation on it. If the location of the wings (up or down) is your only clue, you're as doomed with a midwing aerobat as you are a bipe.
If anything, i might even suggest that for some, bipes are EASIER to track, given the rather wide variety of patterns the eye can see depending on point of view. 2 wings gives me FOUR surfaces to color and pattern, each differently if I so choose. If we want to say "What if...", heck, one could not only tell inverted from upright based on patterns, but even tell nose in or nose out just from wing covering patterns...
Again...the whole thing here is that the danger of losing an airplane if you look away from it is very real with ANY aircraft...bipes are no easier or more difficult to pick up than anything else.
3. they are short coupled and thus have bad ground handling. it would not be the best first taildragger.
I've never understood this line of reasoning. Why must the addition of a top (or bottom) wing suddenly make an airplane "short coupled"?? The Staggerwing is anything but, the Hog Bipe is LONGER than its ancestors, and a well built PT-17 is arguably one of the most docile taildraggers on the planet.
furthermore, they tend to be far more difficult to fly in gusty wind and less forgiving of pilot error.
...
ground handling, landing and flying are all more difficult in wind but that is accentuated with a bipe.
Now you're just making gross generalizations.
last but not least... balancing a scale bipe is very very sensitive.
Bipes have no more or less range of "acceptable CG" than any other aircraft...and even if they did, should we honestly suggest to a relatively new pilot "Oh, no, don't get that airplane...we don't want you to have to be precise in your setup, you're not ready to do high quality work"?
Due to the short nose and two wing layout, it is not easy to balance the bipe (imho).
*blink*
Ok...now I'm just confused. A short moment (again, a generalization that's simply NOT true of all bipes) makes balancing LESS sensitive, and thus EASIER...not more sensitive and thus more difficult.