I recently acquired a Checkmate kit. The kit is in excellent condition, but the box was held together with about a roll of duct tape (so much you wouldn't know what was in the box except for a small area where 'Checkmate' appeared.
Anybody have any experience with this airplane? Does it fly well if built stock or are there any modifications that make it better?

THANKS!!

If you look in my Gallery, you will see a photo of the one I flew for years. During that time it placed or won many contests, saw several engines, and survived two midairs and a major ground accident. I slapped it together in six weeks in 1986 when I was in an extreme airplane drought. Sometime in the early nineties I passed the plane on to Tony Arnaoutis and then to Joe Walker and Ryan McGlaughlin and it's oil-soaked carcass still resides somewhere....
You have to speak good about any plane that can take the rigors of several years of contest flying like that. I recall that it was a very neutral airplane that would keep up with the best of them until 4-strokes and 2-meter planes took over. The design was based on Matt's Joker and will make a good pattern trainer today. By all means, build it.

Thanks for the info/memories
I've built several Jokers (5) and loved them all. I'll have this one done this summer (I hope). I love flying the older .60 sized designs - they still fly well and are lot lower maintenance than the 2 meter pattern ships!