Hello all! A while back I posted asking advice on a second plane. Well, I had decided on the Sig Somethin Extra ARF (Purple).

I have been flying an LT-40 for several months. Never had an incident. Even kept the same prop throughout training (an excellent trainer btw). I moved all of the equipment from the trainer over to the SSE. This included a .46AX 2-stroke swinging an 11x6 MAS prop.

Today was a beautiful day here in OKC. Close to 80 degrees and no wind. So I decided today was the day to maiden the new plane. I had set the radio up for duel rates. For the high rates, I used what Sig recommended for the low rates, and for the low rates, I used 60% of what I had set for high rates. Luckily, not additional weight was needed to balance the plane.

I had one of the LHS owners, who is a member of our club, maiden the plane. The plane flew beautifully. The only thing that was recommended was to add 30% expo to both high and low rates.

Moment of truth: Took off with a little up elevator, and the plane climb as normal. Took it way up and purposely stalled it. The plane just dropped the nose slighly. Went to high rates (recommended lows in the sig manual, remember) and never looked back. Had a lot of fun doing rolls. It rolls about once every second. Did some tight loops, cuban eights, etc. The addition of expo seemed to really help. It was definately twitchier than the LT-40, but was very controlable. I was glad that I added two large red squares to the under side of both wings, since with the ARF, bottoms and tops look the same.

Landed with no problem. Bounced a little bit, but still okay. It seemed to desend a lot smoother than the trainer. Also lands a little hotter (I've heard it can land as slow as a trainer, but I was tending to come in a little too hot, just need to get used to the plane). I think I may try a 12x4 APC prop to slow it down just a little.

I have had a ton of sim time (G3) and have been practicing with the more acrobatic plane. I think this helped a lot with the surprise of the faster roll rates.

Overall, an excellent plane. Brought it home in one piece. This is going to be a fun plane! I can't wait to get more experience with it and improve on my flying precision!

Thanks!

Septic,
Glad that you had a good day for flying. Down here in Lawton it was overcast and hazy all day, no flying here. Who maidened your plane for you?? Mike?? He's a great guy, good for Oklahoma and for the hobby. Have fun with your SSE, they're a great plane and loads of fun to fly.

Ken

Mike is a great guy. He maidened my last plane, but not this one. Lots of great LHS guys here in OKC, so I try to divide my money whenever I can.

Sorry about Lawton's weather. It was partly cloudy here, and there was so little wind, that the entire field and parking lot got smoked out by all of the helis. There wasn't enough wind to clear out the smoke!

I love my SSE. That's the bottom of it in my avitar. Just a few things to watch out for. It'll land slow BUT make sure you don't get it too slow because when it stops flying it STOPS. I hade mine coming in a few months back and got it a bit too slow and it dropped the last two feet onto the runway. Luckly I use nylon bolts to attach the landing gear so I didn't do anything but shear the heads of those off. Second thing is, you will notice that the tail of the plane is a little soft (best word i can come up with at the moment). What I mean is when coming out of a dive it's really easy for that tail not to start flying as soon as you pull up. Doesn't hurt anything if you are prepared for it and pull out of a dive before you get too close to the ground.

You should also put the high rates on it that sig suggests. They are insane! Right now I've got all the throw in every surface I can. That's about 2 1/2" in the ailerons. Wicked fast rolls.

Septic Shock - thanks for sharing! I have an LT-40 that I am still working to solo on. For Christmas I got an SSE kit. Looking to start building it this week.

csdawggie - what size of nylon hardware did you use to attach your landing gear? Cool idea.

Same size as the regular bolts. I've heard that some people use bigger bolts when using nylon but I have seen no need to. I've had all sorts of landings with the nylons ones and never had them shear off unless they needed to. Just make sure you carry extra ones and you have a flat head screwdriver with thin small head. When they shear off you just stick the end of the screwdriver in the shaft of the old ones and unscrew them. Saves many a landing block. MOST of the time the plane flies right over the gear and belly slides. I get all of my nylon hardware from Lowes. MUCH cheaper than the LHS.

OUTSTANDING! And to think, I missed it! But duty called, and I had to get my building area set up for my Stinson Reliant, Uproar40 #2, and my newly acquired Sig Kougar! Did I mention the Praque swapmeet was great?,Anyways, I will be seeing you soon out at the field, and look forward to more follow on flights, maybe Derek can join us with his Twist? We all know how Uproar #1 loves those Twists.

We were thinking about you Sooner and wondered if the Housefly was enough to keep you busy for awhile! You should have seen the field yesterday, I think that is the most people I have seen there yet. What a day.

I maidened my Twist yesterday as well. It was a beautiful day for flying. The Twist, like Septic's SSE, flew alot different than a high wing trainer! It was alot of fun and flew outstanding. I never did figure out how to dial in any expo until I got home last night after I was done for the day so we'll see if that will smooth out my flying this coming weekend (Saturday looks to be beautiful according to the forecasters). Did I understand you right in that you are doing another Uproar? If so, what happenned to #1?

Hey septic, do you know if they got any pics of the smoke at the north end of the field??? It was pretty cool hovering in that stuff right befor darkl!!!

I too went from an LT40 to a SSE. Its an absolute blast to fly. I put a 12.25 x 3.75 APC prop on it, and it just snatches off the runway, and can harrier it all day long. You will have a blast with the SSE.

I don't know if anyone got a pick of that. It was eerie. We don't have dead come days like that here. I'm surprised that with all of the wild fires going on around the state, that the OKCFD didn't show up in force!

I'm building my SSE right now. Looking foward to getting it up in the air and creasing the sky with it. I need to finish it quick... seems that this is usually our rainy season but for the last few weeks we've had 75-80 degree days with no end in sight (per the news) great flying weather!