The WORST plane you ever had?

[Cuban8]

South Yorks Models Slingsby Firefly - weighed a ton and came with free inbuilt vicious tip-stall and flat spin Managed to pull it out half a dozen times, sometimes it would stop spinning after three turns, sometimes it'd be five or six,  but the inevitable one turn too low did for it. Hardly any damage IIRC, as it was built like the proverbial brick outhouse. In all, it flew about as well as their highly excellent building jig which I still have ...........the 'plane, I don't.

Close run thing with a very early Vmar Extra , a horrible looking model with horrible flying qualities just about horrible everything - don't know why I ever bought it in the first place - probably the cheap price at the time

Edited By Cuban8 on 18/02/2018 12:04:09

[Kevin 216]

Plan built electric powered Evans Volksplane, thought I had built in dodgy aerodynamics until I saw another flier's Volksplane stagger round the field.

[FilmBuff]

MFA Hi Sierra, a 2M class glider.  Looked pretty enough but a beast to fly.

Tip stall city and terrible wing joiner arrangement.

Edited By FilmBuff on 19/02/2018 15:20:29

[Trevor]

I know what you mean about the High Sierra but, since I did my initial flight training on one, I do have a bit of a soft spot for it.

Now the Wik Salto was a lot worse. If you tried to increase the washout to tame the vicious tip stall, as soon as it put on a bit of speed the wingtips would twist and the model would tuck under. If you had enough height for a half outside loop, this was survivable. if not. . .

Trevor

[BrianB]

As per Alan Hilton,I bought the ARTF Flair Cap 232 and it was totally un -flyable.It was so bad that I complained to Flair and was totally stunned when they agreed it was considered a complete dog of a model.I was told they only had 2 or 3 left in stock and when they were sold they would not supply any more!

I was offered a new Flair Giles as it was in a horrible Pink colour scheme! Turned out to be a fantastic model, and apparently in much demand,eventually gave it to my flying pal and he has just passed it on to another mutual pal.

[roger graves]

I have 2 contenders first a 1/4 scale pitts from KC models in Essex flew like a homesick brick the second was a Quest Thumper it shared many of the Pitts failings but wasn't as pretty.

[Cuban8]

Ah yes, the dreaded MFA High Sierra, I'd forgotten about that; we had a batch of those appear at my old club in the late 80s, usually bought by beginners,that model struck fear and loathing in all instructors. I don't recall anything produced by MFA being much good.

[TartanMac]

Had one of these Cap 232 40 size planes never liked it at all would roll out of loops because of the flex in the wires for the tail and you had to come in fast and it would drop a wing quick too. I preferred my trainer it ended up in a skip and some kids lifted it out and ran away with it lol.

[Tim Flyer]

My worst was my e-flight extra 300 electric . A great looking orange foam plane that I eventually destroyed. I think the wing profile was upside down . It used to love dropping a wing when turning in.

[MattyB]

I bet the OP never thought people would be spending time answering this question 10 years after his original post...

[bert baker]

High veiw Extra 230 in Sunday Express scheme,

It was a ARTF in late eighties--- early nineties ,,,, crashed on first test flight, rebuilt band retested it and crashed it rebuilt it and was asked to send my repaired plane back to check it had been done correctly, they found no fault with my repair and sent out a new plane,

I fitted it out and it crashed, so didn't bother anymore with it.

[ChrisB]

The Stinger

It was a big, heavy delta from an old plan back in the early 90's. It was a pusher with an MDS 48 and had a slot in the wing for the prop and twin fins.

Unlike most deltas it didn't glide.....at all!!

[onetenor]

Tartan Mac I hope you stripped everything first before skippng it. I couldn't do that without removing the lot.

[onetenor]

My worst plane. A KK Cub glider in Yellow tissue.Looked great but would only glide from a hand launch. No matter which hook you tried it would not tow it iether veered off to one side or other .No preference or loop off the line or nose dive on the line.A viking funeral was it's fate.

[Richard Harris]

VMAR CAP 231...truly awful

[Tim Chambers]

Posted by Cuban8 on 18/02/2018 11:51:56:

South Yorks Models Slingsby Firefly - and came with free inbuilt vicious tip-stall and flat spin.

Very scale like then. Stall and incipient spin training was done at 5000 ft to give a bit of extra room for recovery.

The US airforce scrapped all theirs.

Worst model I ever had was a Gangster 42 I was so relieved when it spun into the ground and I never had to fly it again.

[Martin McIntosh]

Having read a lot of this it would seem that most of them are ARTF`s. It would appear that the manufacturers just think up models and market them without even a test flight. The HK glider I mentioned above is a prime example, and as for their Lanc, it was totally unflyable in the state offered but three days` work turned it into a pretty good model. Why do they do this? It will put people off the hobby forever.

Not intending to knock ARTF`s in general because I have a few which are very good indeed.

[john stones 1 - Moderator]

Black Horse Decathlon, warped and heavy, gave it away.

[TartanMac]

Posted by onetenor on 19/02/2018 21:04:07:

Tartan Mac I hope you stripped everything first before skippng it. I couldn't do that without removing the lot.

Yes I took all the servos and the engine, tank, mount all that out still have the servos. It was originally a Hanger 9 and another company made it once they stopped producing it. I could not throw away an aeroplane without stripping it either.

[Charles Smitheman]

As far as the way it flew this has to be it, but what a laugh! I made Garfield for a club open day some years back. The family all helped, My wife and daughter made the pizza toppings out of modelling clay. I could not find a plan so just made it up as I went along. The first launch indicated that the cg was too far back, as it did a very tight loop and tried to take my sons head off (the launcher). I eventually added one foot of lead pipe to the leading edge to get the cg to 25%. It flew ok unless you touched down elevator, which resulted in an instant inverted snap roll. Eventually last year the Webra speed 61 went dead stick. The glide was abut a 70 degree angle. It "landed" on the runway, but the lead pipe ballast removed itself from the airframe. So long Garfield.

[Charles Smitheman]

Garfield showing off his pizza toppings

[Martin McIntosh]

That looks brilliant. Worth a bit of development maybe?

[Old Geezer]

A V-MAR Fournier, beautiful but deadly.

Those elegant tapered wings would tip stall with the least provocation, even at less than 1/2 throttle in level flight, so you learned to fly 2-3 mistakes high all the time. Very much a case of a dry mouth after every landing, the safest way was to turn on finals in a long shallow 180 degree turn keeping as much speed on as possible, then a shallow dive (keeping some power on) onto the patch - never trying to flare, just rounding out at zero feet for a very brisk roller ( to cries of "Open the gate!" ). Pretty hard on the single main wheel. Lots of experimentation with balance point, winding out a little up aileron on both sides - to achieve a bit of wash-out, etc. all to no effect. So I sold her for peanuts before she destroyed herself - and yes, I was honest about her handling with the guy who bought her.

[Martyn K]

I had a MFA (I think) trainer is about 1976. Horrible - Heavy plastic Fus and heavy foam wing and under-powered with a McCoy 19. Best I ever got was a long (full) powered glide resulting in crashing into a wall.

If you remember it please don't remind me. I don't want to know

Martyn

[Peter Christy]

Many years ago, I won a kit in a club raffle. It was for a swept-wing, low winger for a 40 size motor, and vaguely resembled a cross between a Chevron and a Sabre. It was fast! Very fast! But suffered from a severe tendency to snap roll, given the slightest provocation. Being a bit heavy handed with "up" elevator was sufficient to trigger several flicks!

One very experienced club flyer begged me to let him fly it. I warned him not to use too much elevator on take-off, but he still managed to snap-roll it as it left the ground - fortunately with only minor damage!

It finally met its end during a club spin competition. Having already made the greatest number of turns, I foolishly decided to let it have just one more. As I pulled out, I never even saw it disappear - it was that sudden! One moment it was in front of me, the next there was a crunch from behind me!

After that, I burned it, on safety grounds!

Despite all of this, I still reckon that the worst model I have ever owned is my Wot-4 foamie! I bought it as a "hack" for testing radio gear, but the radio bay is too tiny to take anything but the smallest of receivers. The instructions supplied with it gave the wrong CofG, resulting in the rapid demise of the original fuselage. The replacement came with a correction leaflet, which certainly improved its flying characteristics, but it is seriously divergent in pitch - probably due to the floppy tail feathers!

It is only good for stick-banging! If you want to fly in a straight line - forget it!

The swept-winger may have been treacherous, but it looked good and was fast. It also taught me a lot about tip-stalls! The Wot-4 foamie's only virtue is that it is quiet.

--

Pete