John Stainforth

I really don't see much difference between the prices of Lasers, Saito's or OS 4-stroke engines. (The prices depend a lot on where you buy the engines.) They are all wonderful pieces of engineering and worth the price. I have much more difficulty shelling out the cash for batteries for electric powered planes.

An American style walk-in clothes closet is ideal for storing model aircraft. One cupboard will take lots of fuselages stacked vertically against the walls and there is usually a shelf above the clothes rack that will take a stack of wings. And there is still room to hang quite a lot of clothes in front of the fuselages. (Mind you, those who favour lecce planes will not have the added benefit of their clothes smelling of glow fuel!) Then you just close the cupboard doors and you would not know there are any model planes in the house.

I thought it was outstanding. So vivid did it look, I could hardly believe it was not a re-enactment.

Martin, Autotrimming sounds like a brilliant invention. So good, I think other manufacturers are bound to follow suit. I don't think this innovation is in any Spectrum sets yet, but I could be wrong.

I think you should go for a DX7 or DX8 Gen2, and probably the latter. To start with 5 or 6 channels (Aileron, Aileron, Elevator, Rudder, and Throttle) is probably enough, but most modellers graduate to more. On larger models, I now like to have two independent elevator channels, and then many scale models have flaps and undercarriage - that brings you up to eight channels. A good transmitter should last you five or more years, across many models, so it's a pretty good value proposition. Also, as others have said, don't be tempted by cheap "imitation" receivers - it's not worth risking good models with those.

One would presume that one distributor's 10% (say) nitro fuel would be more or less the same as another's. I'm shocked at how different they are in practice. In the UK, the one I trust the most (or distrust the least) is Optifuel. I am seriously considering weighing every can of fuel I buy. Nitromethane is relatively dense compared with the other glow fuel ingredients, so this should be a fairly simple way to uncover the cheats.

Well, unlike an ARF, the customer doesn't have to do the final assembly of a 737, he just has to shell the necessary dollars (130 million of them!) A few weeks ago, I went round the other Boeing factory at Everett, where they make most of their other airliners. This made me realise that I need to get my workspace much tidier and better organised!

Things have changed so much in my lifetime. When I was growing up (in the 50's and 60's) we did not have phones, TV's and computer, so children were forced to be far more active than today. When we were not doing homework, we were playing organised sports, or playing in the streets, or climbing trees and making things - tree houses, tunnels, models of cars, boats, aeroplanes, theatres, balloons, kites etc etc. We ran or walked to school or the buses. Virtually no one was overweight, let alone obese...

There is probably not much in it between a 15X8 and a 16X6, the choice depending more on the type of plane and flying you want to do. I have a 16x6 on my Saito 125 in an aerobatic plane where I want best performance at quite low speeds, particularly in vertical climbs. I ended up with a 16x6 by trial and error - no science in that at all, and that certainly may not be the best possible prop. Also, the altitude of the field one flies from can make a surprising difference. When I moved some models from near sea level to over 600 feet above sea level (DRCF at Ashbourne, Derbyshire), I was surprised by how much effect that had on performance - I had to increase the prop diameter and/or pitch by about an inch to get reasonable vertical. Now that I am back at lower altitudes, I've moved some props back down again in diameter or pitch.

The best way to check that your expo is working in the way you intend is just to watch the control surfaces while you slowly move the sticks.

Sounds OK, but I usually use more nitro with my Saitos, typically 12 or 15%, and with the Saito 125 I usually use a 16x6 prop.

For what it's worth (which probably isn't much) my standard procedure when setting up a new plane is as follows. Start with all throws in the TX at 100% and expos at 0%. Set up control surfaces to give full manufacturer's recommended throws at 100% and all servos at dead centre when surfaces are centred. Then I go to my position 1 on my flight mode switch, which is what I use for low rates, and drop the rates down to 60% on elevator and aileron and leave rudder at 100%. Then I fly the plane, and only change these rates if they are not satisfactory for standard flying. After this I set expo on my high rates (switch position 2) to (100-low rate)%, e.g., if low rate is still 60%, the expo on switch position 2 is set to 40%, and the switch 2 rates are all left at 100%. Switch position three is left at the defaults of 100% rates and 0% expo. i.e., the % rates (and %expos) on aileron, elevator and rudder Switch posn 1: 60(0), 60(0), 100(0) i.e., "low" rates with no expo Switch posn 2: 100(40), 100(40), 100(100) i.e., "high" rates with expo Switch posn 3: 100(0), 100(0), 100(0) i.e., default "high" rates with no expo. Those would still be my "initial" settings. I usually end up tweaking these up or down by 5 or 10 % or more.

In the US, the federal government steps in to shut down the flying of drones (which includes all model aircraft) completely when this is deemed threatening. Yesterday in Houston there was a NOTAM forbidding drone flying in a circle with a 30 mile radius for about 4 hours - when The Donald flew into town.

The 777X should make an even better slope soarer with its high aspect ratio wing.

Stik 50, Revolver 50 - 10 years Aviststar, Spitfire60, Funtana125 - 9 years Twist40 - 8 years Beaver40 - 7 years Katana50, Macchi72 - 6 years Revolver70 - 4 years Turbobeaver - 3 months Not counting... 1 unbuilt, 1 under construction Several electrics foamies 5 written off in crashes

Jon, OS 2 strokes are still very popular in the US. What I have noticed in the US is that the cost of glow fuel has shot up in the last couple of months from around 20 dollars a gallon for 15% nitro to around 30 dollars. Locals say they think it is because of Trump's tariffs on China, where nitromethane is made.

Laminated wingtips are vastly superior to those cut from sheet. They are quite easy to do. No steaming required, just wet strips of 1/16th sheet one at a time and glue them to the rest with aliphatic resin. Of course, you need some kind of shape jig. The strength to weight ratio of laminated wingtips is astounding.

CA is slightly tricky. It has a habit of either setting instantaneously or taking longer than one would like to set (I don't use activator), although it never fails to glue skin together immediately - so it is useful also for first aid, should one slice oneself with a modelling knife! I often use aliphatic and CA together, although not at the same locations. I use the aliphatic to give me a bit of maneuvering time and CA to quickly tack parts together instead of using pins. I usually do this when sheeting: I put aliphatic on spars, ribs and longerons, tack down the starting edge of the sheeting with CA, wrap the sheet over the underlying structure, which is coated with aliphatic, and then put CA along the finishing edge. Edited By John Stainforth on 02/10/2018 21:56:44

I used to fiddle about with stick length and tension until an experienced American flyer told me it was a waste of time. Now I just use the transmitters as they come straight out of the box.

When it comes to aviation and security, there is very strong alignment between US and Europe, in everything from airport security, to air traffic control and bar codes on passports. Most of the airport security devices we see in Europe were invented in the US. I would be very surprised if the eventual regulations on drones and model aircraft are not more or less identical on both sides of the Atlantic.

The red kite didn't like another red kite invading its airspace!

I am away from the plane at the moment, but my electronic logbook records it as having a 2.5" diameter. I started with a plastic one (which I think came with the kit) but that proved inadequate with the OS155P engine I am using. Luckily I had an aluminium TruTurn spinner at hand, which works fine.

This is very disappointing for the AMA - they worked very hard with the US government on this, which led to the good outcome of 336. I think it is a sign of the times and the current administration. Unfortunately, the UK tends to follow the US. BTW, we already have the registration requirement in the US with the FAA. Another worrying trend in the US now is that some of the hobby shops are running thin on model aircraft and RC stocks, partly because of the problems with Horizon, but also because the Trump tariffs on Chinese goods are putting a major spanner in the works

Generally laser cut parts are very accurate, but there are several problems. (1) The cuts are very slightly tapered (narrower away from the laser), which means that many of the slots (in ply sheets at least) have to be filed slightly. (2) The cuts are generally at right-angles to the wood, whereas as many of the cut surfaces need to be at slight angles from 90 to conform with the directions of spars and longerons etc. So this necessitates some sanding of the cuts in balsa or filing of cuts in ply. (3) Most laser cut kits have a lot of tabs that fit into slots in other parts. These slots are designed to be the nominal thickness of the piece with the tabs. The problem is that wood thicknesses are *very* nominal, so that 1/8" sheets might actually come in thicknesses that vary from 0.12 to 0.13", say, and 3mm sheets of ply in thicknesses that vary from 2.8 to 3.2 mm, say. In the UK, balsa sheets are generally sold in fractions of an inch, and and ply in metric sizes, but I have found that sometimes the ply thicknesses are closer to the fractional inch sizes and v.v. for balsa sheets! This means that slots are often slightly too narrow or wide for the interlocking tabs. The slop in slots that are too wide is generally not serious, but the ones that are too narrow require some filing out, especially in ply pieces. (4) The burnt surfaces. I am not convinced this is much of a problem with most modern glues. Anyway, by the time (1), (2) and (3) above have been dealt with, most of the cuts have had some filing or sanding that has removed most of the burnt surfaces. So most laser cut parts require some (generally very minor) further "processing". When that has been done, everything fits together beautifully. Which is another way of saying that laser cut parts should always be dry-fitted together before getting the glue out!

The behaviour in turns was perfectly normal. I always use some rudder in turns - I learnt that way and it's instinctive for me, so I can't say (without experimenting) what the turning behaviour would be like without any rudder input. The flaps did not produce much change in pitch.