I'm not a complete newbie - but close.

A few misc questions:

1. On an LT-40, say, it is wise to check the battery voltage after every flight, right? If so, the only way I know is to remove the wing, and lay it in the grass, pull the battery connector and measure the voltage, then reassemble. There has got to be a better way.

2. Wind - In a fairly breezy day, these airplanes like to get blown around with the wind on the ground. What do you guys do to lock them in place? Do you have wheel chocks or push a screwdriver in the ground and wrap a line around the airplane and anchor it?

3. When running a glow engine at home for tweaking, break in, etc - do most folks go outside? I live in a fairly compact neighborhood and am a bit apprehensive about firing up my glow engine in the front yard. Its going to attract a lot of attention. I thought about doing it in the garage (open door of course), but don't want to have a 6 foot blast trail of glow fuel on the floor. What is the best way to do this? Also, how to you guys anchor an airplane in this case?

4. With a .46 size engine and an 8 oz tank - how long could I fly at 3/4 throttle or so? 20 min? Assuming that, how many flights could I generally get on a charge with a 4.8V 600mah battery? (5 servos). On the LT-40, the battery is buried deep inside the belly up front. Swapping packs out at the field would be laborious I would think. So after 2-3 flights (just a guess), I am done, eh? Would a quick field charger work? Would it kill the battery faster over time since a trickle charge is considered better for the battery? Maybe this is where having two or three airplanes comes in, eh?