Jon H

In my experience there are (generally) two types of people. Those natural talent in a given skill, and those without it. I have taught naturals to fly and also plenty of non naturals too. The funny thing is, the non naturals ultimately tend to crash less and make fewer mistakes. The reason is that a natural pilot will whizz through their training and skip many of the basics as it just came easily. There was no need to teach (for example) the itemised procedure for a barrel roll as they just did it first time and it was pretty good so things moved on, without that lesson on planning things out ahead of time. Then with a touch of over confidence they stray into area's where their natural ability is not enough and the model ends up a crumpled heap. The non natural pilot has to work in a more procedural fashion, fly by the numbers so to speak and use their brain and careful adherence to step by step methodology to get them by as they lack the ability to just make it up as they go along. This is not a problem though as the non natural pilot can then brush up their skills within the framework of their various drills and procedures and ultimately may be able to out fly our natural pilot friend who is just winging it, making mistakes and not really sure why as they lack the core skills framework of our diligent non natural pilot. The best pilots are clearly a blend of the two. One of the chaps at my club who i have been helping with a large Spitfire is absolutely a non natural. That's no disrespect to the guy, its just a fact and one i suspect he would freely admit if it was put to him. What is also a fact is that he has responded very well to a methodical/procedural approach to flying the model and is now quite proficient with it. Proficient to the point where his landings are consistently better than many 'natural' pilots i have seen who have a crack at warbirds. He can now safely operate a model he never thought he would be able to fly. It just needed some training and a change of mindset. With that methodical framework in place there is less reliance on pure flying skill, which in turn keeps the model in the air long enough to learn the skills. On the rolling the wrong way, dont worry, i would imagine everyone has done it. As for a cure, its simply practice. Also, as is a theme, think ahead. You did a left turn, so chances are you need to move the stick right to level off. Have that in your mind before you start the left turn until your ability to assess the orientation naturally improves.

Leccy and GG. I think you are missing my point. I do not expect him to immediately take on a clubman schedule and deliberately broke a barrel roll (which most of us dont even think about performing) into a step by step guide of little building blocks, most of which have nothing to do with aerobatics at all. My comments about half cuban's etc were to demonstrate that the tiny building blocks to get you into loops and rolls then give you bigger blocks to build more complex maneouvers. While it sounds like a complicated thing to do, its not. If you can roll and loop you can half cuban as you only need to string the two together in the right order. When teaching i went into aerobatics often before takeoff's and landings as it taught several lessons which simple circuit flying does not..or at least, does but it takes longer. It also removes some of the fatigue of flying in circles, and forces a greater level of skill from the student as their errors are more apparent. Clearly careful coaching/guidance is needed but its not hard. I once took up a 10 year old lad who had never flown anything other than his 3 channel parkzone cub. I took off, handed him the tx for my 76 inch sport twin with 2 70 4 strokes and off we went. He could loop and roll it very nicely about 6 minutes later. For crying out loud the first thing i ever did on a model was a loop. I was only 5 and my dad told me to pull the stick back and watch what happened. His flair pup did a loop and that was that! Also even non flying people know what a loop and roll are. i know for a fact that many of my former students have been very excited to tell other family members or friends that they did a loop with their model. These family/friends are then excited for them as they understand what that means as the red arrows do loops. It makes them feel good as they achieved something they can share. In any case, the things you need in abundance for a nice landing are taught flying simple aerobatic figures like loops and rolls. Throttle control, attitude control, fine dexterity on the sticks etc. Slow flight and stalling is also something i would cover before landing, and the rudder too. Poor rudders, so oft forgotten. Training is just learning something you cant do already. Can you roll? no? Ok ill teach it. Its not hard just follow the steps. And you dont know the half of it. I would sabotage my students buddy box to make sure they did their control checks correctly. I wouldnt say a word if they missed it, just let them find out in the air. Some would say this was mean, but that was not the purpose of it. The point was, if they didnt catch it not being right then they either didnt check at all, or checked it incorrectly. Was it a mistake? was it laziness? or did i not make the procedure clear enough when i taught it. In either case, we would go back and do it again to make sure they got it right. The shock of them getting it wrong was also a wake up call to some who realised in that moment that their model was dead had i not taken control back on the buddy box. i would also disable their ailerons, or with them reversed due to sabotage teach them to land elevator rudder only. Why? Well i wont always be there to save the day or catch their mistakes. If they forget to plug in their ailerons, fluff their preflight, or the lead disconnects in flight then they need to have been taught how to deal with it. I would also give them a model miles out of trim and expect them to fly a perfect circuit before trimming it out. Why? well they will maiden their own model one day so its best to teach them how to handle a model that's imperfectly set up. How many times have you seen someone deck a model on a maiden while they fought to get it in trim? All this is the tip of the iceberg, but suffices to say that when i was done with them the requirements of an A cert were a walk in the park. 11 points out of a possible 10. if you get that procedure i wrote in your head, clearly understood and ready for deployment then you have it done. Even if it takes a week of reading it. Thinking it through, read it again. If you know what you have to do and can focus on doing it, practicing each part as you go. Where folk go wrong is they try and do it all on the fly. They get in the air and then start thinking about the procedure. With their attention divided between remembering what is next and flying the model it ends in tears. That's assuming they have a procedure at all. The point is, never fly the model into a place your brain has not already visited. Flying skill is important, but not as important as thinking ahead of the model. great, so its just a case of tidying it up. Actually as an experiment, using the procedure i wrote for the roll as a template, write one out for a loop. Add as many steps as you think you might need to complete a loop better than you did before. This isnt a test, there's no right and wrong, its just a way of getting the brain thinking about how you might break down something complex into smaller parts.

You can help yourself here by choosing some reference points around the field. A big tree, a building, power pole or whatever it may be. These references are handy especially when it comes to landing approaches. I used a variety of reference points to help some guys at my club with their move into larger warbirds. There's quite alot going on when landing one of those (gear, flaps, rate changes etc) so breaking it up into little pieces, and assigning each one a reference point makes the job easier. Clearly you arent landing a warbird just yet, but the principal is the same for you. A handful of reference points scattered about can help with your overall awareness when you catch them in your peripheral vison as you fly around and specific ones can guide approaches. A desired touchdown point for each landing can also be handy and if you overshoot, go around. This will prevent you flogging a dead horse of an approach and running out of runway. Like the other guys i wouldnt recommend that. as you are not in the cockpit you just just confuse yourself when not flying away. Aerobatics. If you havent already its time for loops and rolls. They demand accurate stick movement, circuit planning, careful use of power, show the model in unusual attitudes and a variety of other things that will strain your brain. I taught aerobatics way before my students ever went solo as they revealed shortcomings in their flying far better than laps of the patch and it was easier to nip those bad habits in the bud then than later down the track. They were also so deeply focused on their loop/roll that they forgot all about their circuit flying and it often improved as they were not over thinking it so much. Rolls are a great intro as they are relatively easy to do but can be tricky to do well. They should be split into several parts flown in sequence and you do not get to do the next part until you master all of the ones leading up to it. Dont just smash the ailerons over and hope for the best, you have to plan it as use a full pass from one side of the patch to the other so you do not rush it. For example. Fly a normal circuit round to start the whole thing. Pick a reference point to start the run in to start the roll. Be at this point at the right height, direction and speed with the wings level. Run in to a reference second point (only a few seconds after the first) and add a bit of power (you will have to learn how much you need). then wait a second or two. 3rd reference point pull the nose up say 40 degrees above horizontal and centre the elevator With that all stable get the ailerons over while holding the elevator in the centre. Once inverted pull the throttle back to say 1/4. Ideally you should be directly ahead of yourself as you reach the inverted point. once rolled out to wings level wait a second or two then pull up to level flight add circuit power back on the motor. Return to your original circuit. That little lot will get you one barrel roll and more or less any aileron model will perform it. Despite being the simplest aerobatic thing you can do there is a far bit to think about and it pays to break it down into these little chunks with a go/no go on each. Dont get the nose up enough or the wings arent level? dont start the roll. Fly out and start again. Its worth while going around as a rushed effort from the wrong position will simply end up in a crash. The point about being inverted in front of you is getting more advanced, and its even a point of note on the B certificate. But its still something you can achieve so why not start practicing it early? Its also another nice reference point to aim for and will be a challenge that will require improvement in all of your skills, which is sort of the point. It will also scare the life out of you the first few times, especially when you get it wrong, which you will. So do your first one's at a half decent height. Not in orbit so you cant see the thing, but not cutting the grass either...at least, not yet. Work your way down as you become more proficient. Being scared half to death is no bad thing either as you end up having to rescue the model from a bad spot and this, again, is good practice. Also if remember how you got there you can avoid doing the same thing again! Loops are another whole story, but its a similar procedure. With loops and rolls mastered you can combine them for a half cuban 8, immelmann, reversal or even a quarter clover once you get dead fancy with it. That little lot covers most aerobatic routines and its just a case of building on the basics of control, circuit planning, aircraft positioning and all that stuff. Oh and its more fun than flying in circles. Just expect your flights to be only half the length as metal fatigue will creep in very quickly when you start giving it a go.

No, its not. In fact its just rude and selfish. The mods know its broken, they are working on fixing it. What more needs to be said? I am sure their attention span is sufficient to remember they need to fix it and perpetual whinging will not enhance their mood or increase their speed. Its a popup, a tiny insignificant window that chills out in the corner of the screen. Just ignore it. I cant even begin to understand why this is such a big problem. The thought of anyone being so fragile that a malfunctioning popup on a toy aeroplane forum is causing such distress that they might leave is utterly ludicrous to me. Honestly what's next? Tears at Tesco as your favourite brand of biscuit has been out of stock for a few days due to floods? The staff perplexed as you sniffle out of the door saying you are going to Sainsburys from now on. Its just pathetic. Im complaining about complaining, so do i get double points?

When the Laser site went down i very quickly discovered that whinging about it didnt fix it. No matter how many incredulous modellers called or emailed to whinge it did not matter and the website remained broken as, apparently, whinging is not a cure for broken websites. Who knew? Being aware of the problem with the website i told the tech people, and while the tech people did...something, it remained broken until they were done hacking the matrix or whatever it was they did. This took many weeks as it was a bit of a dogs dinner and our web host is rubbish. Whinging will not fix it so why dont we just leave it alone? If my experience is anything to go by it is not in the least bit constructive and will only serve to cheese off those who are probably working hard to rectify the problem. It will take as long as it takes. They knew it was broken after the first handful of posts. The 3 following pages of whinging is not helping anyone.

Looks ace, and i wouldnt be worried about the hinge type. Control surface loads will be very low and more or less anything will work fine

true, but surely that is another reason not to buy them. At least you can take/send a branded servo back to the shop you bought it from. Flash website and shiny anodising on the product is easy. Not much good if the electronics suck. However many people shop with their eyes and bling sells.

everything apart from the servos themselves has been isolated and tested as good so i would say he has found the actual problem. You also do not have to spend any money as returning these servos as faulty will get you your money back.

I think the issue is with the quality (of lack of quality) of the servo. A quick google search reveals them to be bangood/amazon whizzers and prices as low as £10 A servo of this spec (30kg) with an unknown brand for that sort of money is a massive red flag and would not touch them with a 10 foot pole. I assume this mustang is a reasonable size? 1/5 or 1/4 scale? If so i would favour good branded servos from Futaba, Hitec, savox etc of a lower spec. A 10-12kg digital from any of these brands would easily handle a P51 of 1/4 scale and at 1/5 scale 6.5kg-10kg would still be more than man enough for the job. Not only is a branded servo likely to be more reliable and thus much safer, its also far more likely to meet the specs listed on the box as 30kg seems optimistic to me. The brands i mentioned all have ranges of standard and HV servos. Personally i used the standard stuff as my warbirds up to 1/5 do not need HV, but if you use lipo/fe power then HV is available. Its not worth risking the model or anyone it might hit by using cheap gear with questionable reliability.

As Ron says, it will be fine I wouldnt worry. Just mount it under the engine

I do not think you will be wheezing round and unable to loop. As Chris says its mostly an energy management sort of deal and it will loop for sure. Plenty of people have flown the 70 inch ESM warbirds using our 150/155 and they are normally around the 15lb mark. My pica p40 was this span and weight too, it was fine. You could use the 240v, then fit a bigger prop to tame it a little. But the 240's i have in service currently are delivering great performance in models of up to 23lbs so at 16, it would be speedy!

I have to admit, i tend to just guess. I have flown so many warbirds now i just take a gander at it and wiggle the rates around until it looks good. I have no idea what the actual measurements are. Again, my goal is not to set up the model for life at the outset, only to get it through the maiden. I adopted this policy years ago as i found most models have really excessive rates. Its frustrating as i have sufficient experience to make an informed judgement and ignore the book of words but I feel bad for those less experienced struggling with a model, or indeed loosing a model due to incorrect rates from the factory. A friend at my old club had a H9 60 size Spitfire that he simply hated flying because it was set up according to the instructions and impossible to land. He tried adding expo to help, but to no avail. I deleted the 60% expo, took the rates down from 75% to 20% and the thing flew like a trainer, sailing in as stable as a super 60. I recently helped a club mate with a DB 80 inch Spit, and while i cannot remember the settings we used in mm i know the 'maiden' rate was probably half that of the recommended low rate in the instructions, and i think i lowered it further afterwards. We had a 3 position rate switch with kit high, kit low, and my 'maiden low' option dialed in. I think i took off on kit low and found it excessive, went to maiden low right away. After landing changes were made to a bunch of stuff. I think Kit high was binned for good, kit low modified a bit (i forget which way) for landing/takeoff and we set up an elevator flap mix for landing too. With a gun to my head i would guess...8mm deflection for low? maybe 12 for high? Something along those lines. Its hard to say as a Spitfire has a wide elevator but Artto's 190 has a narrow one. 8mm on both would give very different deflection angles. I would say 8 and 12 are a half decent start point. On the elevator flap mix i consider these essential as most warbirds want to dive to their deaths with gear and flaps down so need large amounts of up elevator mixed with flap deployment. This is contrary to the expectation of most. In any case i set it all up on the ground so that lowering the flap deflects the elevator up. I set the value to 1% or something just to make sure it works then leave the menu open on the tx for the maiden flight. Once up and trimmed, i stall the model clean to get a clue about its behaviour, then drop the gear and flaps and keep adding up elevator to the mix until i get to a near stalled condition. If beeping the buttons on the tx while flying is a bit intimidating, employ a passer by to beep your buttons. I have done it so many times i can do it by feel so never take my eye of the model. With all that done you can do your entire approach without much (if any) elevator input as you can control the pitch of the model with power. More power to climb, less to descend. As its trimmed for this slightly over stall air speed it is completely impossible to stall the model unless you start tugging on the elevator. Just fly it in using power instead then a tiny tug of elevator to flare. It takes some getting used to, and if you are a little hasty and just chop throttle and dump gear and flap at the same time the model will probably loop all on its own due to the excess speed. Another club member i was helping with large warbirds discovered this the hard way as he kept rushing his approaches. Once he got used to a longer and more procedural style of landing approaches he has no trouble at all guiding his 30cc H9 Spitfire back down to earth. All of this applies to what i would consider a 'normal' warbird. Wood, fibreglass, maybe foam wing, ic/electric and of a weight appropriate for its span. So a 60/65 inch warbird is 8-12lbs, 70 inch 11-14, 75 is 14-16lbs, 80 inch 17-20, 19-22 for 88 inch, etc as ballpark numbers. For ailerons and rudder just max them out (unless that gives 3d levels of deflection), then set an aileron rate at say 75%. Get it in the air and adjust them down later. Again, i have a flying rate for ailerons on my warbirds set to give a roll rate slightly faster than scale at full stick deflection. Whatever that rate is, i then add about 15% and set that as a high rate to give me more authority while trying to land in a choppy wind and as a cover against an aileron servo/linkage/cable failing. Hope that all helps and makes some sort of sense and with the low/less sensitive elevator rate you can shift your cg aft without fear of nasty things happening. The ultimate goal is to keep the c/g as far aft as possible as this will be a great help in preventing your warbird spending its days sniffing the dirt. You can then taxi out, turn and takeoff like a right smug so n so with your propeller tips completely intact. Scale wheels will help with this too. I think 4.5 inch is right for a 6th Spitfire bah. Sounds about right. 22g servo, maybe 5:1 ratio tail:nose? 22x5 = 110g ballast needed. Personally i dont bother with steerable tail wheels any more. Mine all free castor and i only have issues if its a howling crosswind, which i dont fly warbirds in anyway. Also with a free castoring wheel you can do neat pinwheel turns which look really authentic.

+1

I have to admit the venessa rig is a new one to me and i thought he was doing something else. But having looked it up and educated myself on its operation i come back to my original assessment. The whole thing is a solution looking for a problem. Its over complicated and its operation is too reliant on the quality of the assembly of the rig. I am also not entirely convinced it will do what they say it will anyway. I will test it though just for my own information and to see if im just being grumpy. yes that would work. You can use a luggage scale if you want to see how heavy it is. I rarely weigh my models as i just dont care. They weigh what they weigh, i cant do much about it now its finished so why worry about it? Put them behind the retract units themselves. Makes the model more stable when you lift it. In fairness the screws are an addition to my efforts with the mustang to make it easier for you to find the points. I just went the width of a finger behind the retract mount screws and lifted it up. The balance was a bit nose heavy thanks to the inline, so i moved the battery behind the pilot which helped, but i added some lead i had kicking around to the tail and that was better so went with that setup. It flew fine, probably needs some adjustment with more in the tail, but its only flown 3 times as the retracts need attention, tanks need changing etc, so i will make changes after more stick time and in the final configuration. In any event, setting the c/g before the maiden took all of 10 minutes to decide what was going where. I just dont worry that much about it as i can guarantee i will change it after the first few flights anyway. As long as its not a mile out, it will be fine. All you need is for the balance to be close enough for the model to be flyable during the test flight. With the low rates already discussed, you make this window of controllability much wider. Im not saying you should ignore setting the c/g, im just saying dont get too bogged down in mm and g of adjustment. Broad strokes, get it in the ball park and just go fly. Anything 130mm to 150mm will likely be perfectly ok. Once flown you can make adjustments to suit the model, your own tastes, the feel of the model, etc. You cant set the perfect c/g on the ground, it is not a fixed entity set in stone. All you are aiming for is one 5 minute flight. Get up, trimmed, stall test, down. The model then returns gets stripped down, inspected, fuel use checked and timer adjusted, changes made to rates c/g etc. if its all good i will do one more flight, then its back to the hangar for a more detailed inspection and further changes if needed.

Your balance rig isnt doing to work the way you have it set up. An easy way to balance is to install a hardpoint on the c/g (140mm in your case) and install a small screw in hook. A loop of rope/string and its job done as just pick it up. You can do lateral balance while you are at it using this method. The alternative is to put a small screw on the c/g point just behind each retract unit. You can then add weights, and then just pick it up on your fingers using those screws to locate yourself. As long as its pretty close it will be fine. Remember that you will use up around 200g of nose weight (fuel) during the flight and it makes naff all difference to the model in real terms. Its not as sensitive as many people think. I used the screws/fingers method on my ugly mustang and have made no adjustments so far. Using the rope method i balanced my DB Hurricane on the c/g noted in the instructions. As we talked about before, it was mega nose heavy and i have removed nearly 1lb since. I also noted half way down my takeoff roll with the Hurricane that the elevator was over sensitive so kicked it to low rate before i had even left the ground. Once in the air it was still too sensitive on the low rate, but high rate was needed for landing, so this was adjusted after the flight. It then all changed once i removed the lead and finalised my elevator/flap mix. Again as discussed yesterday, a minimum of elevator travel will mean that even if the c/g is a little on the lively side its not going to matter. Excess rates are usually a far bigger problem than a c/g that is slightly out. In my experience the ESM/YT c/g placements have been fine, but their elevator rates excessive. My Sea Fury also has an incidence error built into the tail so it climbed like crazy on its first lift off from the runway. Trimmed back down it performs perfectly. Since then however i deliberately trim all my models nose down before their maiden flight to prevent them leaping into the air.

ohhhhhhhhh. Now it all makes sense. I blame Christmas excess slowing my brain. I would guess that 15mm x 3mm strip would work? Something along those lines. Depending on the grade you might need to anneal it before bending to shape. Some soap and some fire should take care of that job. However, the angles might be a bit of a nightmare to form at home so you may be better off making individual struts from 3mm threaded rod, adjusting the lengths to suit the rigging angles, and then decorating them with wooden pieces once the final settings are secured by soldering the whole lot together. It would have the added advantage that you can remove the struts and this will make covering less of a faff.

they look alright in the photos. What has happened to them?

The interplane struts are just lengths of spruce/beech. You could make them from 3mm ali i guess and paint them brown but wood was standard in the kit.

Yep. I see 30's biplanes doing Pitts impressions all the time and its just naff. Looking at the specs, your ST2000 runs a 20x6 a few hundred revs slower than the laser 180 i would always recommend for a model like this so im not surprised the performance is quite satisfactory. The Hawk and Tiger together make a handsome pair.

I certainly dont. There are far better trainers than that. In any case, the riot is a wot4 rip off so switching to a wot4 would be a sideways move

The just shy of 70 inch brian taylor models would fly fine with the 125 on a 15x8. There's a Spitfire, Hurricane, P51 and Bf109e to choose from. Personally i am not a fan of the BT models. Although they look great and fly well they are extremely old designs now and require substantial reworking to be viable. They are also very lightly built and will not withstand the rigors of week in/out club flying. 120 class engines sit in a strange place as they are a bit big for the 60 ish inch warbird and a bit small for the 70+ warbird unless they are light. On the artf front the seagull/escale seafire is nice. A clubmate has one and it looks great in the air. Its more scale in looks and performance than many of the ARTF offerings. The 63 inch seagull P47 would be a good choice too and i think they even offer the P47 as a kit these days. A number of customers are flying them on Laser 100's with no bother, so your 125 will be plenty. P47's are not the prettiest of models but if you are looking for an intro warbird with a full house of gear/flaps they are excellent. Large fuselage for getting all the gear in, wide track undercarriage with big wheels, nice fat wing, large flaps and generally very stable as WWI fighters go. I recommend them to everyone i come across looking for a first warbird.

whyyyyyy? why would you do that? oh...i wonder if their fuel tank was incorrectly aligned and fuel would leak/flood the engine and fixing the actual problem was not considered. i am an advocate for tuning your main needle at the start of every flying day. Its a 5 second job to open it a smidge to get a rich condition, then lean to peak, past peak, back to peak. Literally, all done in 5 seconds. Then you know its set 100% and you are good to go. slow run needles only need to be adjusted when the engine is first installed in the model, and maybe after a few years as the needle can creep over time. Anyway, if you think closing your needles after every session is bad, i heard from the boss that back in the 90's there was a troublesome customer who would check and reset his valve clearances after every flight 🤦‍♂️

In my experience this practice originates from not really knowing what you are doing, why you are doing it, or what it is you are trying to achieve by doing it. Unfortunately engine tuning is not taught well at all so its no wonder people struggle. Looking on a engine group forum thingo the other day made me want to put my fist through my pc screen. The advice being given was just flat out wrong and was only going to lead to problems.

yea the instant torque of electric really would make a car get up and go. I like the zingy two strokes though, its like a poor mans F1 event when a few are going round together. For a year or so a group of us at my old club had 1/8 buggies and we would charge around between flying. They were popular at club BBQ events etc due to the carnage that ensued. Alas it faded as lack of maintenance killed off the cars one by one. That club then lost its field and i no longer fly with them. I still have my car though, but its not run in ages and the half rebuilt engine has been sat in my 'to do' tray in the shed for about 4 years.

Much easier than a car. I have nitro buggies myself and while they are no bother to set up aircraft engines are much easier. They are typically run in a lower state of tune (carb size), have ample cooling compared to a car, do not spend their life in mud/dust, run far lower revs and need less exotic fuel. You can also tune the engine very easily by running the engine up to full power on the ground and tuning the needle. This is difficult with a car if you cant run at 40mph with a screwdriver!