I've never owned a plane that wasn't a trainer. (beginner plane)

I've always heeded the advice about a plane's intended audience in regards to skill level and I've never questioned that an Extra 300 or a Bipe is not for beginners.

However...

I started thinking tonight. (dangerous as that may be)

What exactly makes any plane so difficult to fly?

Example:

I take a the Sukhoi out to the runway. Give it some throttle and pull some elevator. Get some altitude. OK, maybe it is going to fly and land faster, but would I be able to fly it around in a circle at 1/2 throttle or will it fall out of the sky?

Face it, Trainers can be difficult for beginners.

Of course there is the obvious like speed, dihedral, flat bottom vs. symmetrical wing, and such but are the more "advanced" planes that significantly different when it comes to basic flight?

If so, how?

Elaborate

Why can't I fly that Giant Bipe??


Thanks

You probably can fly them. The big trick is landing them. Things happen faster. You have less time to react. Your muscle memory training isn't fast enough yet to allow you to correct things in an instinctive way. You may react wrong and there may not be time to realize it and correct it. Its all about the landing. However, experienced pilots will find advanced planes EASIER to land. They just slide right down the pike and land without a great deal of correction for wind or gusts. They are actually less work to land, if your brain can keep up.

Another few other things to think about.

Self-correction. Most aerobatic planes go exactly where you point them. Trainers are designed to have self-correcting factor built in. The dihedral of the wing will cause the wings to want to return to level. So if you have to plane banked all you need to do is release the aileron/rudder and the plane will return to level flight. On the aerobatic plane it will only return to level flight when YOU return it there.

Speed of controls. Aerobatic planes are designed to give you quick crisp movements when the controls are applied. This can cause overcontrol more than normal in these types of plane. The trainer is designed to be given gentle controls that give you time to see what's happening to the plane. And to be totally honest with you, most all new pilots will have major overcontrol problems with the trainer itself.

Speed of flight. You can slow the trainer down more than the aerobatic plane. I'm not talking about landing speed, but rather just regular air speed while flying. This gives the new pilot lots of time plan his next movements. One thing that is funny is that when you are training you think that the plane is flying so stinking fast, but later after you move on to other planes and you come back to your trainer you wonder how a plane can fly so SLOW!!!!!

If someone insists on trying to fly an aerobatic plane for their first plane I do have 2 great pieces of advice. First, bring along a large hefty bag to carry the plane home in. And second, put down the antenna on the transmitter. Because there is going to be a pretty spectacular crash coming and you don't want anything obstructing your view!!!!

Ken

So is it just experience that helps you get used to the speed, position, and the tendency to overcorrect? Practice makes perfect?

Yup

The landing is extremely important. However, there are some other factors that need to be considered.

1. The plane will take off, fly and land faster than a trainer.

2. The power-to-weight ratio will be much greater than that of a trainer.

3. The wing loading will be greater than that of a trainer.

4. It will maneuver more quickly, even at low speed, than a trainer.

5. The design of the airframe, airfoil, dihedral and other things you mentioned will make the plane less forgiving than a trainer.

What does all this mean? Because this plane will fly faster and react more quickly to stick input, it requires an advanced/experienced skill level and developed instinctive reactions to fly safely. A novice with a trainer doesn't have this skill level.

Although you may see sport and 3-D planes doing maneuvers at extremely low speeds, this requires extreme concentration and a delicate touch on the sticks. This only comes from experience.

A properly built and set up trainer will not be difficult for most novices to fly.

Like most sports and some hobbies, there is a learning curve that most people should follow in order to move from simple trainers to the giant bipe. Decide what type of advanced plane you want to fly (giant bipe, etc), and select your intermediate planes accordingly.

Dr.1

What DR1Driver said!!!!!

Ken

You can land a trainer plane by cutting the throttle and just working the elevator, all you have to do it keep the wings level.

Most other airplanes require working all 4 controls at the same time, to land the plane. Thats if you want to fly it again that day.

I have seen way tooo many people who had a mustang and they could fly it, however landing it would be dumping it in the high grass so minimize damage.

So what would be a good progression from my current High Wing Trainer (1. Alpha 60)?

2. Sig Four Star? (or what else would you recommend)
3. ?
4. ?
5. Super Duper Giant Bipe

2 stick (any stick).

3 low-wing trainer or sig 4*.

4 small bipe (profile ultimate or any stout bipe).

5 Big ***** gasser ultimate bipe with smoke and a mortgage ta boot.

You will find that the larger models fly better.....MUCH better, but the 'pucker-factor' increases with size and dollar amount.

I had a chance to run a simulator on several planes, and the low wing sport planes were the easiest to land. They just go where you point them, and ground effect is stronger so you can put it a few feet above the runway, level, then cut the throttle and give it a slight bit of up elevator and it settles right in. A trainer is a bit more tricky, as wind tends to have more of an affect and the wings have more lift, plus the response is slower. To me, that's good because it will help you keep your Sig 4-Star or CG Tiger II looking decent after the first few flights.

OK, so I mentioned about low-wing and high-wing trainers, with the low wings being easier to land. There is an exception, however (there always is). That would be the YAK-54 that you get with RealFlight G3. Slow it down too much, and it tip stalls. Go too fast, and you overshoot the runway due to too much wing lift. Torque steer is strong on that big motor, so careful with the throttle and use that rudder often. The YAK-54 will go exactly where the beginner points it, and then tip stall for no reason at all! I know, because I tried it believe me. Which, of course, brings us to the bipe with the bike engine (pun intended). My theory is, the bipe handles like the YAK-54, only it tip stalls and does its thing faster, quicker, and more efficiently. A clipped double winger like a Pitt's can literally fall out of the sky if you you're not careful. Since the wings are so much shorter and body chunkier, and they're HEAVY for the amount of wing surface, you're gonna need some speed to get it back down in one piece. Believe me, some of these planes you actually have to FLY them into the runway (a hot landing) or they won't land at all (you get to use that plastic bag).

Get the trainer first, get good at landing. Get the G3 flight sim, and practice practice practice. Then, get your low-wing trainer (they're actually quite nice, and reasonably fast too). Keep both of them, you want the trainer for utility purposes and the low-wing for knocking around. Then get the flying motorcycle with the second mortgage as long as you don't take blood pressure meds. If you ARE prone to high blood pressure, the big bipe with the bike motor's gonna raise that a few notches. I hope this helps some.

NorfolkSouthern

Age is right, and his selection of progressive planes is good. I might suggest sticking with one more shoulder-wing plane, since one of the bipe's wings is "high".

Dr.1

The SIG Four Star is a very nice plane that is easy to build. If you feel safe with take-off, flying and landing your present trainer, you will have no problems handling the Four Star.
Another aircraft that is just about as easy to fly, and more capable when it comes to aerobatics, is the SIG Somethin' Extra (SSE). The SSE is available both as a kit and an ARF.
If you have the slightest inclination towards building your own aircraft, the kit is the way to go. It builds like a dream and the flying qualities are very good with no bad habits at all.

/Red B.

P.S. I noticed that your trainer is a .60 size and presuming you hava a .60 two-stroke engine (or equivalent four-stroke), the Four Star 60 may be your best option as you can continue to use the same engine in the new model. A .60 is too much engine for the SSE (at least if it is to be used as an "advanced" trainer). D.S.

Before building that big bipe, fly a small biplane for a while, something .40 size or smaller. They will land really ugly if you don't use all four channels but the consequences of an ugly landing are small.

They aren't that popular anymore, but back in my day, the (THE) advanced trainer was the Sweet Stik, (or Ugly Stick). You still have the high wing stability and you have the maneuverability and speed of a symmetrical wing. It had a good thick wing that was capable of high angle of attack, low speed approaches. This was great for learning how to slow down the hot planes still yet to come. They were rugged. And if you threw away the wire gears and installed aluminum one piece main gear, you could slam them in all day and not worry about damage. They are like tanks. And if you eliminated the dihedral , (simply throw away the stock dihedral brace and cut a straight one), you would have a pretty hot and agile aerobat. It was common to see 6 or 7 Stiks at the field, sometimes in the air all at once playing chase !! Thats funny because they were all mostly red with just some white squares and black iron crosses.
There are some ARF versions available. But they just don't fly very well with the factory dihedral, ( in my opinion). Modeltech sold a great ARC version with a foam wings covered in balsa. It was a simple matter of holding the wing section on a belt sander for 1.2 seconds to take the dihedral out and transform them into a T38's ugly sister. And I see OOP Sweet stik kits on Ebay. I'm not certain if they are still produced.
If you ever saw a Sweet Stik on approach, nose high, slow, and sinking like a Learjet, you would see instantly the appeal of the design. They teach you to land properly. They teach you to use the throttle on approach. The 4*s are the popular Advanced Trainer today. But I see too many folks successfully land them with very poor technique. They seem to glide them in. The Stiks will reward you for doing it the right way. Add they fly just fine in gail winds or calm air.
Biplanes can be pretty tricky to set up properly. Lots of test flying and adjusting. And they glide like bricks with all of that drag. I would wait for a bipe. Test flying and training , even advanced training is a poor mix.

Something you will find is that when you move up to your first "Intermediate Trainer" you will think that it is actually EASIER than your Trainer was.

This is due to the fact that you are no longer "Fighting" the Self-Correcting abilities of your trainer.

By the same token, if you can fly a trainer well, you probably COULD fly an advanced airplane - HOWEVER (and this applies to an Intermediate Trainer as well) the rub comes when you get in trouble.

As long as you're just flying around and having a good time, all is well. But it's when that gust of wind flips the plane, or something else unexpected happens, that you hesitate, or panic, and before you can say, "Oh Shi------", you're in the dirt

I second the Stiks! I will also add that I read on here somewhere when I was first learning to fly that before I moved up to my second plane,that I needed to be able to fly my trainer inverted at will and do a few complete laps around the field that way.Whoever said that sure helped me.

Got the trainer already. I've been playing with the Cockpit Master software, but frankly it is not that great. Often crashes to the desktop. Also, since it is the "Hangar 9" version I am sure that the developer won't be much help. Everyone recommends G3, but it is pretty expensive. $200 is pretty steep for what is essentially a video game. Plus, no Mac version. If it was $49 for a bring your own transmitter version I would jump on it.

Message heard though. Need practice.

So something like:

[link=http://www.horizonhobby.com/Products/Default.aspx?ProdID=HAN2325] Ultra Stick Lite 120 ARF [/link]

[link=http://www2.towerhobbies.com/cgi-bin/wti0001p?&I=LXBMM8&P=ML]Great Planes Big Stik 60 ARF [/link] or [link=http://www2.towerhobbies.com/cgi-bin/wti0001p?&I=LXKJY0&P=ML]Great Planes Giant Big Stik ARF[/link]

but not:

[link=http://www2.towerhobbies.com/cgi-bin/wti0001p?&I=LXMUX9&P=0]Great Planes Giant Aeromaster Biplane[/link]

Any other "sticks" to consider?

I have a GP Big Stik 60 with OS 91 four stroke. I've only flown it a few times and it's much more maneuverable than my trainer. The first flight, I thought it was "too much" on high rates so I programmed low rates and exponential for the next flight. It was much better (for me) with the milder setup. My brother (who has a half dozen planes of various flavors) flew it with everything maxed and liked it set up tht way so there's plenty of room for me to learn with this plane.

I think any '60 class' two stroke would be fine for this plane. I had the four stroke in the drawer so I used it.


Modeltech has the Joss Stick
Hangar 9 has the Ultra Stick 40 & 60 in addition to the 120 you listed
GP has the Big Stik 40 in addition to the others
Thunder Tiger has a Stick
Goldberg has a Stick

I'm sure there are more but this at least gives you several choices. Some are small, some big, something for everyone.

Ideally, I think I would like my next plane to be sized for this engine:

[link=http://www.horizonhobby.com/Products/Default.aspx?ProdID=EVOE1100]Evolution 1.00NX[/link]

Of course a lot of planes seem to call for a .90 or 1.20 but not 1.00.

When we were in the hobby before, one of the parts I remember that I did not like was playing with engines to try to get them tuned correctly. I also did like breaking them in by running a few tanks of gas through them.

GP recommends .61 to .91 two strokes for the Big Stik 60. The 1.00 is almost exactly the same size as a .61/.91 and weight is also very similar. I wouldn't hesitate to use the 1.00 on the Big Stik.

Hangar 9 recommends .61 to 1.00 for the Ultra Stick 60.

The only reason GP doesn't recommend a 1.00 for anything is because OS & Super Tigre do not make a 1.00

GP Big Stik 60 is what I am flying a lot right now.I do have the Evo 100 NX hanging on the front.Set up with trike gear it don't have a lot of prop clearance. 14x6 as recommended in the manual bites the ground on the grass runway a little.It don't take much runway on take off.Straight up and unlimited!However the sound got me in trouble at the club with noise complaints.I switched to a pitts muff and that didn't help with the noise but gave more hp. I switched to 14x8 prop and I think it might pass the 96 db test now.Lost some pulling power but gained some top end at lower rpm's.

I noticed the Hanger 9 version had flaps. And the flaps were down in the picture while the ailerons were up. Thats called "crowing". Its an old technique stolen from the glider guys. Kind of advanced stuff. We want to teach you , not the plane.

The problem I have with those big versions of Stiks is the wing loading isn't high enough. They are kites. The 40 size sticks were dense little rascals that felt like a fighter. Thats one of the things they teach you to do, fly high wing loading airplanes. The big ones miss that point.

If you fly a plane with a higher wing loading it will start preparing you for warbird flying if you are interested in those eventually. Virtually all of those have higher wing loads.