Dear Sirs;
where can I find reading materials on the web on how to choose an 3d airplane and how to set it up and how to hover it .Thanks.

Quick primer.

Buy a plane that's listed as a 3D plane.

Set it up with about 45 degree throws on the rudder and elevator, 30 degrees on the ailerons. Move the CG back to approxiamtely 30 to 35% MAC, Be careful, because the plane will be extremely twitchy, and it might be best to set up dual rates for taking off and landing, or exponential to soften the controls around neutral.

Then practice, practice, practice.
Dennis-

Do as Dennis said, and then practice some more.

BTW The best way to learn 3-D is to get a flight simulator.

Then you can practice 24/7 without breaking planes or using fuel. A $200 flight sim will save you many time that much money

Wanna hover getta helicopter.

Yea, I'm with khodges. A hovering airplane looks silly after a while!

meschmidt,
can you hover?How about hovering in a wind?
I find hovering be complicated task to learn and do and it's an eye pleaser....
FYI I dont know how to hover but would love to learn.

Oh no here we go agian.[8D]


With the right plane it can be realy easy to hover. However even with the easiest to hover plane you can get into troulble quick if you have to stop and think of the controls you need. A sim can help alot when it comes to this. Some of the planes you can get on the sim are easier to hover than you will ever find in real life. Which makes them perfect to learn on. 200 bucks is cheap compared to the amount of fuel and balsa you might go thru trying to learn in the real world.


Hovering is just another envelope to fixed wing flying. Is it realistic........no. Is it fun........to some. Just as pattern is fun to some, just as scale is fun to others.

http://www.rcuniverse.com/forum/tm.asp?m=566133

Click on the above link for a thread with some good info.

http://www.blaineaustin.com/3d_tips.htm

Blaine Austin also has some good info about 3D on his site. Nothing specifically on hovering, but still worth a read.

Eric

Im with Khodges too. Helicopters are your answer. There is nothing worse than flying with someone who hovers their plane 10 feet off the ground over the runway. Then someone always gets a deadstick and its a big pain in the ***** to get him out of the way. Thats the only reason I have begun to refuse to fly at public fields.

Mike

I would suggest you first before learning 3D, you learn basic then advanced IMAC, this will help you to control your plane much better. Its nothing to balance the plane on the prop as you don't have to think near as much, same goes for harrier rolls. IMAC will teach you better rudder control along with the other surfaces.

I made this mistake and have later found that IMAC should have been my first step. I'm in that process now.

Edit in

helicopters are designed to hover Planes in a since aren't that's what makes them so interesting when you do manage hover them. The question was how to make a plane hover not a heli.

Blackie

I disagree with a flight Sim. At least my G@ wont let me hover. It gets confused as to what is really going on. Maybe some will, but mine does not. I bought a cheap Ikarus electric to learn to do 3 d. I am glad I did.

I assuming you meant G2? Mine will let me hover, but it takes alot of practice. If you set up the Ultimate Bipe with ridiculously high throws it will hover, but its tough. The best way to learn is to go to miscellaneous under options and set the simulator speed. I started to practice hovering at half speed, and now I can hover anything thats hoverable at regular speed(at least on the sim).

Good Grief!

All the guy asked was how to select a plane for 3D and how to set it up to hover.

Somehow this simple question compels some to share their feelings on how boring/inappropriate it is to hover an airplane, and to suggest he postpone his desire to 3D and take up pattern. [:@]

Eric

Hi!
A cheap..relatively at least...way to learn to hover is to get a small electric airplane like the
Shock flyer from Icarus (German manufacturer). This airplane with the standard geared electric motor will hover at half throttle.
This airplane is much easier to hover than a large (1,5m-2,0m) glow or gas powered airplane.
Regards!
Jan K
Sweden

Oh well, go ahead and remove my post, as you stated it dosen't fit the question.

While doing actual hovering probably is somewhat hard, getting a 3d plane that will hover cant be too hard. It all depends on what type of plane you are looking for. If we are talking about expensive, a-pain-to-crash balsa-kitplanes with glowengines and stuff, then you are playing with fire here. But if you just want an airplane that can hover and you want it as easy as possible, im sure you can go to your local hobbyshop and get a eletric PROFILE 3d airplane. Those things are light as air, perhaps made of foam or some other hard-to-destroy material and can easily withstand a crash that would have been fatal for any glowpowered balsa-craft. If you are up to eletric flight, then ask this question in the eletric forum. They can help you get started with a 3d plane easily, im sure. Also, i bet its easiler to learn hovering with an eletric profile than others

i learned to hover with a u-can-do .46 and a rossi .45. But,i just flew a magic extra on a tired .40 that was the easiest (and cheapest) plane to hover that i have flown.both these planes would barely hover with the engines they had,but it took throttle management out of the picture.which i think made learning to hover easier.look into a magic extra and a .46f.x.and a 12.25x3.75 prop,you dont need anything more than the standrd servos that probably came with your radio.one things for sure if you play around down low,you're gonna get burnt! STAY HIGH,get used to falling out at awkward angles, and just do it.enter your hovers with the wind blowing the plane AWAY from you.good luck and never mind what you hear from single minded people.L.O.L.

Unless you want to hover a plane. Then you need a plane. [:'(]

$

Joining late here, but here are my thoughts:

I own a few 3d capable airplanes and have tried to hover with limited success. The problem was always when the plane spun around in a roll - I would lose my bearings!

I bought a simulator (AeroFly) and tried something new. I slowed down the simulation speed to around 75%. This allowed me to learn the correct recovery methods and figure out the important input (like nose orientation) without the simulator going at full speed. I've since bumbed the speed back to 100% and simulation hovering is much easire and it's become as natural as it once was to learn how to fly.

Just my 2 cents...

Want to hover?

Buy this:
http://store.yahoo.com/raidentech168/3dgi40arfrac.html

And put this engine on it:
http://www2.towerhobbies.com/cgi-bin...?&I=LXUR78&P=0

Use 2 elevator servos and mix them with this:
http://www.smart-fly.com/Products/Eq.../equalizer.htm

Glass or pin the firewall in. You WILL rip it out if you don't glass or pin it in.

Buy an extra canopy from www.giantscaleplanes.com

This plane costs less than $100. Engine costs less than $100. I had over $400 worth of servos in mine- but thats not necessary.

This is a GREAT entry level 3D plane. It hovers easily. It does harriers. It torques. It flat spins. It will do anything you can throw at it.

FLY IT SLOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! It's NOT designed to fly fast. I wouldn't recommend full throttle unless your going straight up and even then only for a couple of seconds--- then you'd better back off the throttle. It will ACCELERATE when going straight up, with this engine. It can accelerate and go tto fast for the airframe.

Use a 13-5 APC prop and 5% fuel. You won't need a bunch of nitro with the engine/plane combo.

And finally--------TEAR IT UP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!