Skyshark Christen Eagle
09-20-2005 | 05:51 PM
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From: okc,
OK
Skyshark Christen Eagle
Hello to all i need info on the sky shark christen and wish to know if any one has built and flown one of these planes ? Im looking to buy another biplane after along time and a little gun shy from buying arfs .Its been years since i have flown a biplane but i fly on a regular bases every week end and want to own another Christen .. So any and all info good and bad would be Greatful ...
Thank You and god bless Rick
Thank You and god bless Rick
09-20-2005 | 11:03 PM
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From: Essexville MI
RE: Skyshark Christen Eagle
Rick,
I'm building one now and will maiden it this weekend. By way of background I have been flying 20+ years and must of built a few dozen planes including a Bip or two, this is my 4 ARF. Most of what I build and fly are WWII 1/7-1/5 scale Here's how I see it.
Pros-
Very nicely built and packaged
Very nice finish but In Oracoat which is difficult to find and a pain IMO vs Monocoat
Looks not like all the other ARFs you see
Light for it's size
Cons-
You need to have built a few planes as the instructions are designed for an intermediate +knowledge, as example if you have a difficult time with say GP ARF's this would be a big challenge
The packages of nuts and bolt in my kit was a mess and contained both std and metric, missing stuff etc
The wheels provided are way to heavy and wide plus a pain to stuff in the wheel pants tighten the collars etc
The metal tabs that anchor the struts to the wings had holes to small for the hold down bolts, drilling out the holes after I had bolted them to the strut was a very big pain!!!
No hard point in the ailerons, elev, rudder just balsa, this requires you to bolt through the entire surface into a hold down plate looks like crap plus takes more time
I thought the fire wall and sides were to thin and beefed mine up plus added angle stock inside the forward fuse, keep in mind I'm using a ZDZ 40 so you may not need to do this
No incidence percents for wings are given, I will call Skyshark for degree and check before I test fly
Im concerned that the elevators will flex as they appear to need some spruce to strenthen them, I would suggest another hinge inboard and seal the hinge gaps as well.
Net Net nice plane at a good price but I feel it could of been better with alittle more attention to detail. The folks at Skyshark are great to work with and stand behind the product 100%.
Will let you know how it flys.
Kirk RC
I'm building one now and will maiden it this weekend. By way of background I have been flying 20+ years and must of built a few dozen planes including a Bip or two, this is my 4 ARF. Most of what I build and fly are WWII 1/7-1/5 scale Here's how I see it.
Pros-
Very nicely built and packaged
Very nice finish but In Oracoat which is difficult to find and a pain IMO vs Monocoat
Looks not like all the other ARFs you see
Light for it's size
Cons-
You need to have built a few planes as the instructions are designed for an intermediate +knowledge, as example if you have a difficult time with say GP ARF's this would be a big challenge
The packages of nuts and bolt in my kit was a mess and contained both std and metric, missing stuff etc
The wheels provided are way to heavy and wide plus a pain to stuff in the wheel pants tighten the collars etc
The metal tabs that anchor the struts to the wings had holes to small for the hold down bolts, drilling out the holes after I had bolted them to the strut was a very big pain!!!
No hard point in the ailerons, elev, rudder just balsa, this requires you to bolt through the entire surface into a hold down plate looks like crap plus takes more time
I thought the fire wall and sides were to thin and beefed mine up plus added angle stock inside the forward fuse, keep in mind I'm using a ZDZ 40 so you may not need to do this
No incidence percents for wings are given, I will call Skyshark for degree and check before I test fly
Im concerned that the elevators will flex as they appear to need some spruce to strenthen them, I would suggest another hinge inboard and seal the hinge gaps as well.
Net Net nice plane at a good price but I feel it could of been better with alittle more attention to detail. The folks at Skyshark are great to work with and stand behind the product 100%.
Will let you know how it flys.
Kirk RC
09-25-2005 | 11:37 PM
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From: Essexville MI
RE: Skyshark Christen Eagle
Rick,
I did get the Eagle in the air this weekend. Very mixed on the flying. First needed alot of down trim, my top wing was +2% vs the +1 that the instructions say is built in but I couldnt get it down to +1. With the ZDZ 40 the plane was by no means overpowered, frankly it could us a 60, the uplines were terrible, the temp was a friendly 60 deg but I fly at 4500 ft ele so that needs to be considered. Very slow roll rate for a Bip at the recomended high rates. Take-off tracked straight with very little right rudder, landings pretty easy considering the aircraft type. Pretty plane but way below my expectations in flight performance. My plan is to put alittle more down angle on the engine in the hopes of cancelling out the down trim in the ele. also experiment with different props to see if I can get better performance. Based on the time and head aches it took to set up/assemble this plane plus the current below average flight performance, at this time I wouldnt recommend this ARF, maybe my thoughts will change if I can get it dialed in. Lastly after only 3 flights the covering needed to be reshrunk in numerous places. I did of course tighten the covering during initial assembly.
Thats my 2cts.
KirkRC
I did get the Eagle in the air this weekend. Very mixed on the flying. First needed alot of down trim, my top wing was +2% vs the +1 that the instructions say is built in but I couldnt get it down to +1. With the ZDZ 40 the plane was by no means overpowered, frankly it could us a 60, the uplines were terrible, the temp was a friendly 60 deg but I fly at 4500 ft ele so that needs to be considered. Very slow roll rate for a Bip at the recomended high rates. Take-off tracked straight with very little right rudder, landings pretty easy considering the aircraft type. Pretty plane but way below my expectations in flight performance. My plan is to put alittle more down angle on the engine in the hopes of cancelling out the down trim in the ele. also experiment with different props to see if I can get better performance. Based on the time and head aches it took to set up/assemble this plane plus the current below average flight performance, at this time I wouldnt recommend this ARF, maybe my thoughts will change if I can get it dialed in. Lastly after only 3 flights the covering needed to be reshrunk in numerous places. I did of course tighten the covering during initial assembly.
Thats my 2cts.
KirkRC
09-29-2005 | 11:05 PM
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From: Denton,
TX
RE: Skyshark Christen Eagle
I loved mine. Yep ... past tense [:@]
I had a little over 50 flights on it ... and it was my favorite
I finally had it flying the way I expected it to. I added a bit more down and right to the engine thrust and moved all of the weight forward that I could (I was running an OS 1.60FX) ... and I was really happy with the way it was flying. On its final flight, I had done about 10 very hard snap rolls ... and I think one of my evevator servos came unplugged [&o] and my brain wasn't fast enough to figure that out before it went through a tree ... from top to bottom.
I will replace it ... I loved that plane .... but for now ... it is being replaced with .....
I had a little over 50 flights on it ... and it was my favorite
I finally had it flying the way I expected it to. I added a bit more down and right to the engine thrust and moved all of the weight forward that I could (I was running an OS 1.60FX) ... and I was really happy with the way it was flying. On its final flight, I had done about 10 very hard snap rolls ... and I think one of my evevator servos came unplugged [&o] and my brain wasn't fast enough to figure that out before it went through a tree ... from top to bottom.I will replace it ... I loved that plane .... but for now ... it is being replaced with .....
