ORIGINAL: BMatthews
The trick is to fly a light model with minimal control inputs so that the model is smooth and slow to respond. This can give the impression of a big heavy model but while it's flying at the more scale like speed that can only come with super light wingloadings. Sailplane pilots are often good at this since they've learned that pushing the controls around just causes drag so they tend to just breath on the sticks and wait patiently for the model to SLOOOOOOOOWLY respond with course changes.
BMatthews,
Yes, I forgot to mention that aspect of scale flight. We can break "scale motions" into three general areas:
1. Linear motion. That is, travel along the longitudinal axis of the airplane. Speed, if you will. That's where fourth power scaling looks good.
2. Turning motion. That would be level turns and loops. Third power scaling works good at that weight.
3. Angular motions. Especially angular accelerations. These are motions around the axes of the airplane. Think rolling, wing rocking, and turbulence response. Full size airplanes have lots of inertia, so they respond slowly to control inputs and turbulence. Smooooth control inputs are definitely in order for scale-like flight. I once experimented with rate gyros in a park flyer (GWS Tiger Moth 400) and was surprised at the beneficial effect of the gyro in the roll axis. The roll gyro made the little Tiger Moth seem much larger, both visually and in pilot feel.
Dick