Amazing. Thant's all I can say. Amazing!!

I have a Sportsman Aviation Waco. Takeoff's were a hand full at first, but a bit of practice, and we got it down. The landing gear was a little weak. Broke it in a dead stick, and re-did the area.

Now it is strong. How strong?

Well, I took it out last weekend. I was really out of it. I'd been working really hard on a work project recently, and hadn't been out to the field in 3 weeks.

On my first landing, I dropped the throttle too far, the Waco likes a little throttle on landing, and it dropped to the asphalt at the top of the runway. No damage except a broken prop.

Second flight, and I got greedy, flew to long, and dead sticked it into the bushes. This time, no damage at all.

Third flight, and I hit a clump of grass on the runway on landing. Plane nosed over, but no damage.

Fourth flight. Now this one was a doozy. I had the CG way back practicing flat spins. It entered a nice spin. I could tell it wasn't right though, and tried to pull out. I tried it all, but nothing worked. It spun down down down. Nose down, off to the right of the runway beyond the brush. Everyone told me they were really sorry. We walked over to where it had gone down to pick up the pieces. There was only one. The plane was completely unscathed. No idea how it happened. It was sitting on a patch of asphalt, on it's gear, looking as sharp as could be.

Put six more flights on it without incident that day. It's a fun plane, beautiful in the air, and fits in my Honda Civic without dismantling. Best of all though, it's tough.

Ivarb

someone at the field wants to sell me this plane.
what engine did you use?
did you use standard size servos or smaller?
is the plane still going?
we tried to ballance it today and having no experience with a bipe it was a little dificlut to ballance. it seemed to ballance almost anywhere I put my fingers.
is this plane balanced right side up or up side down?
how far back from the leading adge of the top wing do you have your cg?
I have a 32sx i'd like to put in this plane. too much power?

ivarb,
Sounds to me that you've also got a lot luck on your side !!
Good luck,
Electropiep

Hi. Yes I enjoy my Waco a lot. I got it on sale for $119. It is small and fits easily in my Honda Civic without removing the wings. I put a Saito 30 in it. It flies very scale like with it, and the sound is perfect for the scale effect. By that I mean not over powered. I used all HiTec HS-81 micro servos. I'm not an expert pilot, having flown for only about a year. The Waco was my 3rd plane. I have flown it for about 6 months now, and it is still going strong.

CG was spot on without the addition of any weight.

I have to be careful to get enough speed up on take off, or it will flip over on it's back instantly. Flight is nice and smooth, but loops tend to be a little tight. It rolls phenomenally, and tumbles with the best. Snaps are beautiful, and any maneuver involving them is very pleasing. My Hirobo p-47 scale warbird is much easier to take-off, fly and land. That isn't to say the Waco is not a fun plane. It is just very challenging, especially for me. That challenge ensures it is one plane I always want to take up. My knees still get weak before every flight though.

Flight time tends to be around 15 minutes with this combo. That is good, because this is the kind of plane you really don't want to dead stick. Power off, it drops like a rock. I would think a bigger engine would shorten the flight time and play hell with the CG. Dead stick landing would be unbelievable then. For 2-strokes, a 25 might be a sweet combo. Probably excellent vertical and light weight to boot.

It stalls predictably. I do get a wing drop once in a while, but stalls are usually easy to recover from, excepting the flat spin all the way to the ground.

It is a tough tough plane. I have put a lot of not so pretty landings, and even worse take-offs on this plane, and it still looks and flies great. The version I had, gray on black, was hard to see on cloudy days. I recovered the whole plane in a more easily viewable pattern, and was pleased to see the quality of workmanship throughout.

I've read of several people having their landing gear block fail. Well, I didn't think it would happen to me. Of course it did. I re-did the whole section before re-covering. strengthened it up, and fiberglassed it. You will end up doing the same sooner or later if you get the plane. It isn't a very big deal though.

The hardware seems cheap, but I used it all. I've actually grow quite fond of the adjustable clevises used on it. Drop some screw lock on them, and they are plenty tough for the plane.

So, my advice; if you enjoy a challenge, go for it. It doesn't fly like it is on rails, but with a little Saito putting away up front, the scale effect is terrific. Low passes bring a smile to my lips every time.

Ivarb

Ivarb, have you wieghed your Waco? I'm curious. I was considering one of these, but I recall the box saying a flying wieght of 3.5 lbs. Looking at how light wieght the parts felt, and how small this is, I find it hard to imagine it being so heavy.

By the way, did you know Saito now makes a 40 that's about the same size as the 30?

Mind if I ask, what part of Japan are you working in? (If you're still there).

You can email directly, [email protected]

Ivarb, I can identify with you and your Waco bipe. I used to have an All Star that gave me fits! I knew it would fly, if I could ever get it up there! It too was a tough little bipe, thank goodness, or it wouldn't have lasted as long as it did. Hand launched or ROG, it would start doing a fast tango with me trying to get "in step" on the TX! I finally just got fed up, set it on the runway, started it up, gave it some throttle and let it go. I didn't touch the throttle, just stood there watching it flying out like a drunk duck, waiting for the roll and dive that never came! The fool thing went up about 30 feet doing the drunk duck thing and settled down to gently climb away like an airplane should! I could not believe it. I landed and did it again, set it down, fired it up and let it go on its own. The same thing happened! One more time, only this time I set a tad of right rudder and it rolled away and lifted off and flew out straight as an arrow! After that me and that little bipe had some memorable times. After it finally had to be retired, I made a .40 size and it behaved exactly like its little brother once I got with "the dance!" I love bipes. But you got to treat the short coupled ones with respect, or they'll get you! Good flying.