F4U Corsair

My Feedback: (22)

We maidened the bashed Big Stik 40 last night. Flys like a dream, doesn't float as much as my Avistar used to (found that out on my first dead stick after running out of gas), but flys like a trainer on low rates. My instructor flipped to max high rates and put it through it's paces, talk about wild, flat spins and a lot of other 3D like manuvers, he said I'll have my hands full on high rates, but to slowly increase the low rates until I get used to it. He said that is what he likes about the Stiks, they are a good 2nd, 3rd, or 4th plane. Here is what I changed on it: flattened the wing, no dihedral, made it into a tail dragger, with a custom wire front landing gear and a ply tail skid. Built a fuel tank hatch, and installed a seamless 10 oz. tank vs. the 7 oz. it came with. The wing really helps for inverted flight, very little if any down is required to maintain level inverted flight. Powered by the OS 46AX turning a 12x5 prop and running on the rich side for additional break-in it still has plenty of power, most of my flying was at 1/3 throttle and the instructor did a takeoff at 1/3 throttle but used most of the runway. I'll need a lot of practice as the tail dragger is a bit different beast to get used to, especially without a tail wheel, but it tracks nice and straight, and the large rudder aids in ground manuvering. Can you see the big smile on my face I like it! Here is a few pics. DG

brett65

My Feedback: (18)

Good looking plane! I like the gear, I hope it holds up well for you. It would probably fold under in the grass next to our paved runway, its pretty rough. If someone hasn't already told you, you can apply down elevator when you're on the ground to take the weight off the tail and get it to turn easier.

F4U Corsair

My Feedback: (22)

Brett, so far so good with the wire landing gear. Our field is grass but the runway is cut short to regulation width, although a little bumpy. The grass on the sides are higher and I did have a little trouble getting it to move when stopped, even with holding the elevator up. Yes, my instructor told me to give it a little down elevator when needing to turn in a tighter radius as this would lift the tail off the ground, but so far the rudder seems to do an ok job with the elevator neutralized. I really need more time on it to really get the feel for it. Once you get it pointed straight it really seems to track well. I really like the way the tail would lift at a certain point while applying throttle on take off without any elevator input, pretty cool but maybe all tail draggers do that! I've heard so many folks tell me that they hate tail draggers and it's really hard, but to be honest, I think it's easier than my trike geared trainer. DG

Charlie P.

Nice! I had a Big Stik converted to tail dragger with an OS 70II Surpass that I flew a bunch. Wonderful sport model. Lost her *sniff* in a mid-air. I moved the stock gear forward, reversed it and added flying wires (20# wire musky leaders) to beef it up for the added nose weight. Had a set of skis on a seperate monel gear bracket that I could swap out with four machine screws for snow flying.

Flat spins are not "3-D like". They are real maneuvers that real airplanes can do and therefore respectable.

OzMo

My Feedback: (3)

Well, I am not the first to say it but, STIKs are classics for very good reasons

Nice redo by the way. Sounds like it is better than before!

F4U Corsair

My Feedback: (22)

Charlie P., just curious, did you add the leaders to beef up the landing gear or did you add them to the stab/fin to beef up the rear? I thought about adding wire to the stab/fin for strength and because I like the way they look. I plan to add a pilot, windshield and machine gun to the wing down the road. I just have to be a little different, there will be no mistaking it from the other Stiks at our field . Ahhh, I didn't know flat spins were "real" airplane manuvers, good to know.