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As the weather has finally perked up , Ive been nipping out to do some flying . There is a fair gaggle of Fw190s buzzing about , so I dont feel quite so precious about the prototype . I didnt really get why everyone was raving about it so much , as I 'd only had two shakedown flights in the winter , to make sure it had a gentle stall and generally good handling. It was based on a previous 190 so not far from the beaten track . Having now flown it to the max in everyway on a sunny day with light to no wind conditions , I can honestly say it is one of the easiest warbirds you could fly . It literally flies like a Gangster 63 for those old enough to remember . The objective was an easy to build , no fuss warbird and in this instance , thats what we have . The Tempest has had a few shake down flights in bad weather and seems very similar . Interesting to compare the figures for the pair . The Fw190 has a span of 52" weighs 4lb 10oz with a 4s 3300pack , making the wing loading 24.42oz/sq ft . The Tempest has a span of 55" weighs 5lb 5oz with a 4s 3300 pack making the wing loading 23oz /sq ft . Both are now equipped with retracts (somebody had to test them ) . I would guess that retracts add around 7oz, which is included above . So your wing loading would be around 22oz/sq ft , which is very low . That wing loading is much more what you would expect from a low wing sport model than a warbird , so we have done well . The wing sections are very friendly too , so with even more weight , I dont think there would be a problem . The 190 is exceptional in its handling and I dont think the Tempest will be far behind . The cranked wing may make the rolls less axial but there again its shape in the air is more dramatic , so there must be a compromise .

All things being well I will start another build vlog next week!

Two planes got flown for the first time today, plan built GeeBee Model E converted to electric on an E-Flite 60 and 6s lipo and my second Flair DR1, this one has an OS120 4 stroke fitted. Today was one of those top flying days, sunny, warm and close to no wind topped by being lucky enough to own and fly these lovely scale models. 😁

If anyone is really itching to get on with their build but are not quite sure due to the (intentional) lack of instructions, why not hang fire for a few days and wait for Eric and me to get cracking as we can make the mistakes before you do!

Leprechaun day yesterday. Almost dead calm which helps. It’s always enjoyable although I can never decide what this model is - soarer, sportster, vintage looker, or a bit of each - but it caught a few upward draughts after a motor burst and stayed up for nearly 10 mins. Anyone got one? What do you do with yours?

Lovely day to be out. Unusually there wasn't a breath of wind down the old runway. My windsock is static unlike yours LF!. When there was any wind it was barely 2 mph as a crosswind ESE so even I can handle that one! 😊 I had a very successful session still adjusting the Capiche by degrees ........ almost there now - even the pilot complained of a hot backside so off came the canopy straight away.! Aaaah ....... Happy days ✈️ 👍

I reckon I and others, have edited and closed way too many threads because some can't control themselves, here we are yet again. Andy appears to have his questions answered, so with apologies to Andy, thread closed.

Braw morning up here 20 degrees by mid morning, fluffy clouds, blue skies, but a variable, sometimes blustery crosswind. It was beautiful at 5:30, with a perfect mackerel sky, and not a breath of wind, but the wind had got up by 10:30-ish when I got to the field. Managed to fit in a few hours of pleasant low key flying and blethering, but with that crosswind it wasn't the morning for a maiden of my replacement PZ FW190, that will wait for another day. Great fun with the SU-27 prop-in-a-slot Flanker just hovering and making high alpha descents into wind, plus beating up the strip with my venerable PZ Spitfire. An unexpected bonus today, as the forecast was for much stronger winds than that and I couldn't fit in a trip to the slope.

Waiting for 30 amp esc getting delivered, construction is done,it's a bit tight in the bay for the radio gear etc(I use Hitec)...,then balance and off he go's....his marra in the background.. Ken Anderson....me...1 ...Shifty dept.

The old driving instructor saying is never teach members of your close family and sons in particular. If a formal instructor tells him he has to do something in a particular way he will believe it. When you say the same thing it runs the risk of being treated as just "Dad's opinion".

Building biplane wings is like deja vu.

Just back from BMRC site...two days in a row I hear think....Vera and her crew are down our sea front doing some filming for her last two episodes.. Ken Anderson...ne...1....Vera dept/Pet.

Mine arrived just now, two hours later than the expected delivery time shown on the tracker. But after yesterday's performance, I'm counting that as a win! Looks great as normal, glueing starts tomorrow!

You'd need pretty bad eyesight to confuse an Osprey and a Hercybird... 🙂

Hi ,some thoughts to consider . I am very much like your beginner and have been for over20years. Landings and take off,s are my big problems . Why ? Too much to concentrate at the same time ,angle of landing ,speed ,aileron and rudder control spatial awareness etc To me it is not like riding a bike and I basically have to learn to fly all over again every year .I,m no good in cold weather and hay fever affects me in the summer so my flying season is quite short . Now you could say that I have useless coordination skills and to an extent that is true however I have and still am a competent drummer and percussionist where you need to coordinate four separate limbs as well as observing other band members, conductors and even perhaps singing on occasions .So I believe I am capable of quite a high level of coordination .So what is going on When learning to play a drum kit and practice drum patterns and rudiments you are taught to do everything very very slowly repeat and repeat and gradually build up speed .This develops what I believe is termed a Kinethetic sense and you can then do it automatically ,like riding a bike or changing gears in a car . So the key is slow and repetition .However this is difficult to achieve up the flying field with a beginner .The speed the wind and all the rest that need concentrating on are nearly all varying and perhaps there may be only the opportunity to have say four flights per session . I would suggest a simulator would be beneficial to this beginner to help with repetition and the other factors that can be tailored in. I,m extremely grateful for the patience of many up my club ,South Wales Valleys Flyers ,for putting up with me for over 20years. I realise I,ll never be much of a flyer but I enjoy the social aspect and the building side of the hobby .I.m now in the middle of building a one fifth scale VANS RV4 for one of the club members . By the way I have directional dyslexia ,I.e left and right mean nothing to me. Do not ask how I passed my driving test ! Hope you found this interesting You may have to bite the bullet and inform the beginner that he or she may never fly solo .I hope this will not be the case.

As I know that all the forum readers are waiting with bated breath to find out if the Rex 1a motorised glider actually flies, I can report that it does and very well indeed! The weather has suddenly looked up here in Lancashire so I have had the pleasure of two sessions with the Rex, no other glider fliers in my club so I felt a bit of a loner, tested it on a hand launch a couple of times just to make sue that it even had a glide no problems there, deep breath and first powered flight, the prop promptly flew off! I had forgotten tighten it properly, prop fell to he ground and Rex went off on a long glide and landed in the long grass, no problems reattached he prop, whilst refitting the prop a couple of members asked if I had a problem as it seemed that there was a lack of power, no I said , it was an unpowered test hand launch! Prop back on and off the Rex went no shortage of oompf in fact no need for more than half throttle to ensure a steady climb, my guesstimate of 3 degrees of down thru thrust appear to be about right. It climbed to nice high altitude very steady, cut the motor and straight into a thermal it would have stayed up for an age if I had let it, landing not so easy as it did not want to come down, the glide on approach goes on for ever, no spoilers....... but reapply the moto rand go around on a low circuit and a nice greasy landing on our lovely freshly mown and rolled patch.. To say I am delighted is an understatement.

Hello Jim Spinner(s) received in post 😀. Very generous. I owe you one. Donation to charity made. Thanks Mike

Just looked on RC Japan and Enya 90 valve springs cost 79p each ! The Uk has a free trade agreement with Japan so no import duties . The last spares I bought ftom them for OS cost just over £100 delivered and would have cost me over £300 from UK supplier ; plus arrived withib a week . British supplier was talking up to 5 months !!

Had a quick rummage through the Tempest kit that arrived today (wife was out!) A very complete kit, super laser cutting, nicely drawn plan and I wish I could cut cores like that. Start next week and attempt to keep up with Ron. Well, it is good to have ambition at any rate!

So, I’ve been making slow progress this week but the ailerons are cut and hinged. I had an idea to use commercial sprung oleos and a piece of aluminium bar to make my own undercarriage setup. After a lot of effort this is the result… I started on one with using a tap and die set to cut a threaded hole to put a grub screw in to secure the piano wire pin - unfortunately when I tightened it the first time onto the pin it let go, felt like the thread in the aluminium had let go. Fortunately I found an old stash of metal epoxy so I’ve used that to glue all the parts together (including the mounts into the retracts as they didn’t have grub screws either)… Itll be something I need to keep an eye on but fingers crossed the joints are all strong enough! I’ve not tested it in place yet - waiting for the epoxy to fully cure overnight. 🤞🤞🤞 oh and one lesson I’ve re - learned….. don’t hold the piece of metal you’re drilling! Funny how the only hole I managed to drill dead centre was into my thumb…. 🤦‍♂️

2 weeks to go, and the Ducks now have dry feet. 😉

I suffered a battery strap failure when a pack overheated and melted one of the two straps holding it in place. In the process of finding a strap of the right length, I came across this on Amazon with which you can make 30 battery straps for £7.99 delivered and, assuming a length of 50 cm for each strap, still have 4.5 m of velcro remaining! That's 26 p per battery strap. You can get 10 x 20 mm buckles here for £2.99 and make full use of that 4.5 m remaining velcro strip. The Velcro seems to have hook and loop embedded in it so it sticks to itself. I shall be using this for all my future battery strap needs, large and small!

Had a lovely few hours in the sunshine, near the East Coast of Gods Own County..... The Double Trouble, baby FW190, SE5 and Wotty had an outing. All well except for the exhaust falling off the Wot4! Had problems with it rotating and pointing rubbish at the fuselage and hoped I'd fixed it. Obviously not! I doubt I'll see it again.... Steve fpv'd his Flightline Spitfire and his Edge (Arrows I think) - must have had some good views of the Gulls and Buzzards. Prospective new member Ben came along, and I buddy boxed him for 5 incident free flights. "Not as easy as on a sim" he declared. Hopefully he will turn into an actual member. Came home with pink head, and arms. Has to wear my hat and long sleeved shirt to garden... Tomorrow looks good but I'll be away preparing some Gnats to be shot at! https://raisthorpeflyers.com/

Hi Richard, sounds good. We are fortunate to have a well mown and excellently maintained field at our club so the retracts should not be a problem🙂. Have a good break and I look forwards to the retract sets coming out. Cheers, Simon

They havent got wheel doors , so Its a bit like a lady with no skirt ! Im on Holiday for two weeks on Monday so Ron and Eric will be advising. When I get back , I will fit doors and I expect Paul Johnson will be getting ready to send out retract packs. Anyone wanting the packs could contact him direct with a pm . My thoughts on the retracts are this : How good is your runway ? If its a good flat , well cut grass strip or concrete then a lot of satisfaction can be had by doing a smooth landing . The 190 I was flying yesterday comes in as smooth as silk , but even or long runway has a spring wave effect until its rollered . That means you can come in beautifully , skimming the tops of the "waves" but if you touch in a low point , the model can flip onto its back . No damage done usually but out of our control . I think everyone should try them at some point and your chance of success is way better with a foam veneered wing . Flight performance is barely affected and you cant get a much more friendly warbird . Dont try to put the retract pack together yourself . Remember , Ive flown thousands of flights on this type of model and I know exactly the best compromise . Copying the practice of ARTFs is not the answer . (oleos etc and no shock absorbing coil spring ) .

That's a relief . I was beginning to think that you and Sebastian would be swinging hand bags come the weekend . 😬

The only problem is that I fly Mode 2 and everybody else flies Mode 1! I'll get an experienced Mode 1 pilot to fly it and trim it out.

Hmmmmm

Unisex toilets?

there must be a few thousand different phone,pc's,tablets etc who access the forum...and most are reporting the same problem,when you click to go back a page or to the first page of a thread you get a blank page with an advert for the header....so i reckon its the forum at fault ...not peoples settings...it all worked ok until a couple of weeks ago....we shouldn't need to refresh the page... ken anderson...ne...1..blank page dept.

I know, but we don't need lashings of epoxy and multiple cocktail sticks at the tail end..... even if the additional weight in the cowl maintains the balance. Use the minimal amount of heavy stuff - one of the reasons I use foaming Gorilla Glue not epoxy in many places - all those bubbles add lightness! Like practically all foamies in inexperienced hands, it'll need some additional glue in it's lifetime.

Stuck the Kavan Brushless motor C2830-1300 in with the 10x6 prop and it flew amazing. Only issue was about 5 minutes in it decided to jam on the rudder full and it fell out the sky. Luckily I wasn't too high so it's under repair as the break was perfect: What would be the most likely cause of this? There's no interference in the area as it's quite a way from anywhere else and there are no close cell towers. I'm thinking I stuck the ESC too close to the receiver or it moved a bit and caused it to jam on a servo. Or could it be a faulty servo? Not sure what the most common thing to cause this is... It was quite close at the time so it wasn't a lack of signal...

Problem is GG that China is dumping loads of stuff on us at below market rates. I sincerely hope that our leaders get a grip on the whole sale subsidy that is being given to the Chinese electric car manufacturers for example. I am as guilty as you in buying from China because it's cheaper but sometimes there is no other option as all the western companies that used to make stuff have gone to the wall helped by the Chinese. We may not enjoy such cheap prices for much longer methinks.

This is better than Coronation street or East Enders except their still running and Brookside has finished a bit like ...... engines . The contempt shown by Jon to other modellers is appalling, However he is now a modeller and has been a designer and builder of engines and his time has been and gone, In the past I had respect for Jon and his knowledge but the distain to other modellers is just plain nasty I wasn't going to post anything but this Just is too funny not to. I expect to get shot down but with 700 hours on fast jets I'm used to it.🤪

Well this afternoon I enjoyed the glorious weather flying this little aerobatics hack. It’s made from stuff I found in the shed and wasn’t even “designed” as such, but it’s the most fun to fly plane I own. Go figure.

Lovely sunny, warm, tad breezy day on East Coast of Gods Own County...... Had an hour with these 2. Now it's time for some noise with the petrol Wotty. After a coffee. I am billy no mates as my most regular flying chum is fishing.... Summer must be on the way as we now have Swifts, Swallows and Lapwings.

If they are then they will only be fit for the dump.

Here you go Chris

ok chaps , more tracking. surnames only West UX6282106 Bowlan UX6282110 Kece UX6282097 Exton UX6282123 BakerUX6282168 RobsonUX6282154 CrippsUX6282137 Meek UX6282171 BTW Nick Cripps , I will send decals separately .

OK, take 2! As already pointed out, the results were revised following Sainz's 5-second penalty. So here are our updated scores for the day; Pos League Rank Team Manager Pts 1 10 4 Pitts Specials john stones 252 2 5 2 Team Charles Picd Charles Pic 243 3 4 1 Revers Racing Pete B 238 4 2 0 Mannschaft Carl Brotherton 233 5 12 0 Torque of the devil Stu 218 6 1 0 Essex Racing Tony Clark 215 7 7 3 LetsGoTotoLetsGo GrumpyGnome 212 8 14 1 GASTON Formula Chris McG 204 = 8 1 Iqonic racing iqon 204 10 3 0 DMFC Racing Team Simon Webb 203 11 15 1 Norfolk Flyers Kevin Fairgrieve 186 = 11 3 teewrex John Tee 186 13 6 2 PSS Power Flyer 182 14 9 3 Hidden Cucumber fat brownie 179 15 13 2 The JP Specials johnpflyrc 173 16 16 1 Hans Brake Zoonie 134 Same top 3, though not quite so close on points as previously! Clearly something else was "missing" from the scores I posted on Sunday night, as we've all scored somewhat higher in the revised results... The overall table now looks like this; Pos League Rank Team Manager Pts 1 1 0 Essex Racing Tony Clark 1056 = 2 0 Mannschaft Carl Brotherton 1056 3 3 0 DMFC Racing Team Simon Webb 1022 4 4 1 Revers Racing Pete B 999 5 5 2 Team Charles Picd Charles Pic 967 6 6 2 PSS Power Flyer 946 7 7 3 LetsGoTotoLetsGo GrumpyGnome 917 8 8 1 Iqonic racing iqon 911 9 9 3 Hidden Cucumber fat brownie 907 10 10 4 Pitts Specials john stones 896 11 11 3 teewrex John Tee 895 12 12 0 Torque of the devil Stu 883 13 13 2 The JP Specials johnpflyrc 861 14 14 1 GASTON Formula Chris McG 856 15 15 1 Norfolk Flyers Kevin Fairgrieve 768 16 16 1 Hans Brake Zoonie 739 And now we do have a change at the top! Tony and Carl are now in joint top place. Simon remains in third place.

Lovely weather for a few sorties with one of my Flair Triplanes, three flights and all down in one piece, will test run the engine on the second one in the morning, if that goes ok it will get some air under it`s wings tomorrow afternoon.

Thanks for the support! Ok, a few more hours in the garage today. Today was far more fathoming out how to hold the main casting than machining it. This lathe is small so has small features. It came to me with a reasonable 'home made' face plate which is the chosen mthod of holding the casting. However, the 3" angle plate I now have is HUGE and weighs a ton, I would never balance it out for cutting, so used a nice piece of extruded alum alloy to be the substitute for the angle plate. This all worked out great and with the instructions to guide me managed to get the cylinder liner bore all done and re-jig the same parts to align the exhaust stub pipe ready for machining tomorrow. Hope these pics will speak a 1000 words: