I maidened my Extra today!! This is my first gas plane, can you say nervous!! All for nothing though, plane flew AWESOME! My setup includes a DL 100 on stock mufflers, 4 Futaba 9155's on the ailerons, 2 hitec 7985's on the elevators and one 7955 on the rudder. I used Tom's hardware kit which worked very well. I also used his A123 battery setup with 2 2300 packs and 2 Smartfly switches. Great system!!
Take off was uneventful. Applied throttle smoothly and the Extra tracked straight and true. Lifted off very easily. Added 2 clicks(or beeps) of down trim and one click right aileron and it was flying hands off. I kept it pretty tame since my knees were shaking so bad I was lucky to be standing! Loops tracked great, rolls were nice and axial, all on low rates. I had the cg right on the front off the wing tube and that was perfect for the first flights. In knife edge is tucked to the gear some, but nothing I couldn't handle. It might tuck a bit more as I move the cg back but should be able to mix that out very easy.
Now came the landing! Knees were really knocking now! I held a few clicks of throttle on final, cleared the end of the runway, pulled the nose up slightly and went to idle about 5 ft above the runway and it settled in soooo nice! Wow, easier than a trainer!!
I want to thank Tom for the great service and super fast shipping! He's got a great plane and made my transition to big gassers a great experience. I'm looking forward to many more great flights with this plane!!