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Decided on a new flying direction


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I have decided to take up thermal soaring again after a period of about 30 years of sport and scale flying. Things have moved on since then and now I need to be brought up to date. I envisage I would need a glider with the following spec:

1. An ARF of about 100 inch ws (2 seperate wing panels because of my small car)

2, Electric (because of convenience and my age (Im 81)

3.A RX which has Return to Home (just in case!) and is compatible with Spektrum Tx

I have tried to find something which would cover my wishes, but the more I searched, the more I simply became more confused, and therefore decided to ask the forum of their view.

What do you think? Am I asking too much, or should I do more research. Any recommendation of model, Rx and anything else to get me going, would be appreciated.

Thanks, 

Harry

 

 

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1) & 2) = Multiplex EasyGlider. Tough as old boots & flies brilliantly. You will find many experienced flyers take an EasyGlider along with them for flying sessions, they just fly so well. Slightly smaller than you state at 1800mm = 71inches, for something a bit bigger the MPX Solius & Heron are very good but I'd still go for the EasyGlider.

 

Can't help with 3) I'm afraid.

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+1 for the East Glider, Solius and Heron.

Alternatively, have a look at the models by TopmodelCZ which offer excellent flying performance and good value for money. Their Prelude/Ava and Marabu are within your specs. Only negative is that they do need some work to put together which you may not want. 

Edited by Steve Colman
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Easy Glider RR is the way ahead if you are restricted for workshop facilities. The Heron and Solius have 4 servo wings which may be a step more than you need or want.

As for return to home, that's your job. I am sure that with 30 years experience, landing within walking distance is not going to be an issue!

Put some foot wide black stripes on the bottom of the wing to aid visibility at height.

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For RTH without too much complexity you could try a ZOHD Kopilot Lite. I've just been experimenting with one and the RTH works an absolute treat. I have around 10 flights on it and have even tried the RTH from an inverted orientation. A limitation is that it only has one aileron output, that would necessitate a Y-lead to 2 aileron servos. My trial installation has been on an old electric flying wing, so the control surfaces are elevons. There is a bit of a learning curve and the manufacturer's instructions are not comprehensive, however Painless360's channel on youtube has the information I needed to get it working.  There's no plugging it into a computer or anything like that. The setup is all accomplished by a plug-in setup board.

 

It does offer stabilisation, but that's not of much interest to me. I have tried it, and the control surface movement is so small that turns are enormous. that's probably a setup issue that could be overcome, however I don't intend to address it at this time.

 

For me, next steps are to move it to a Bixler that has a 4 servo wing, however that's not at the top of my project list. However my understanding is the ailerons would need to be on a Y lead, and the flaps would be driven direct by the receiver. So complex mixing of ailerons and flaps for crow may not be possible - however that's a path I've not yet trodden.

 

Edited to add, the Zohd lite is a flight controller that is used in addition to a receiver. I use FRSKY radio gear and connected the Kopilot Lite to the Receiver with using sbus. I can't comment on Spectrum compatibility, however I'm sure your reading will point in one way or the other, if you choose to follow up on this.

 

https://www.zohd.net/_files/ugd/9960f7_82868356a2bd4c259bf39a21d8184c7c.pdf

Edited by Graham Bowers
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25 minutes ago, Wookman said:

Easy Glider RR is the way ahead if you are restricted for workshop facilities. The Heron and Solius have 4 servo wings which may be a step more than you need or want.

As for return to home, that's your job. I am sure that with 30 years experience, landing within walking distance is not going to be an issue!

Put some foot wide black stripes on the bottom of the wing to aid visibility at height.

Thanks Wookman for your input, it seems Easy Glider is the better recomendation for my needs, especially in regards to work space available now that I have a much smaller shed.

Btw I was referring to RTH in case the model got inadvertantly too far away for my eyes!

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28 minutes ago, Graham Bowers said:

For RTH without too much complexity you could try a ZOHD Kopilot Lite. I've just been experimenting with one and the RTH works an absolute treat. I have around 10 flights on it and have even tried the RTH from an inverted orientation. A limitation is that it only has one aileron output, that would necessitate a Y-lead to 2 aileron servos. My trial installation has been on an old electric flying wing, so the control surfaces are elevons. There is a bit of a learning curve and the manufacturer's instructions are not comprehensive, however Painless360's channel on youtube has the information I needed to get it working.  There's no plugging it into a computer or anything like that. The setup is all accomplished by a plug-in setup board.

 

It does offer stabilisation, but that's not of much interest to me. I have tried it, and the control surface movement is so small that turns are enormous. that's probably a setup issue that could be overcome, however I don't intend to address it at this time.

 

For me, next steps are to move it to a Bixler that has a 4 servo wing, however that's not at the top of my project list. However my understanding is the ailerons would need to be on a Y lead, and the flaps would be driven direct by the receiver. So complex mixing of ailerons and flaps for crow may not be possible - however that's a path I've not yet trodden.

 

Edited to add, the Zohd lite is a flight controller that is used in addition to a receiver. I use FRSKY radio gear and connected the Kopilot Lite to the Receiver with using sbus. I can't comment on Spectrum compatibility, however I'm sure your reading will point in one way or the other, if you choose to follow up on this.

 

https://www.zohd.net/_files/ugd/9960f7_82868356a2bd4c259bf39a21d8184c7c.pdf

Thank you Graham for your reply. I would have to read it again to take it all in, and the information may just be beyond my understanding.

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56 minutes ago, Harry Glover said:

Thank you Graham for your reply. I would have to read it again to take it all in, and the information may just be beyond my understanding.

Out of interest I looked up Spektrum and TRH and it appears they have something called  "AS3X Safe Plus " that offers RTH capability. I'll leave it to others who may actually know about this rather than searching and parroting what I read.

 

https://www.spektrumrc.com/Technology/AS3X.aspx

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Quote

Thanks Wookman for your input, it seems Easy Glider is the better recomendation for my needs, especially in regards to work space available now that I have a much smaller shed.

Btw I was referring to RTH in case the model got inadvertantly too far away for my eyes!

 

I would be wary of relying on RTH in the context of a relatively lightweight thermal glider. Sure, it will point the nose in the direction it came from, but if you are in a big thermal (where the best exit is normally at 90 degrees to the prevailing wind) or the direction home is into a headwind (which it normally is when thermalling thermalling as you will have followed lift downwind) then RTH is unlikely to help much. One of the main skills of thermal soaring is judging how far downwind you can safely go before you need to return to find the next thermal; over multiple flights you will learn that (with the odd land-out!), but RTH is not really going toh help you with that. 

 

PS - If you are really worried about your eyes you are better off just going for a larger machine of 3m+ (with a 3 piece wing) that you can see better.

 

Edited by MattyB
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2 hours ago, Graham Bowers said:

Out of interest I looked up Spektrum and TRH and it appears they have something called  "AS3X Safe Plus " that offers RTH capability. I'll leave it to others who may actually know about this rather than searching and parroting what I read.

 

https://www.spektrumrc.com/Technology/AS3X.aspx

Thanks Graham, I completely overlooked Spektrum! Confused.

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Another recommendation for the Easyglider - it's a marvellous model and it thermal soars better than it has any right to. Agree completely with adding some stripes under the wing to help with visibility. The Easyglider rigs very easily with nothing more needed than a friction fit of the foam wing roots onto the fuselage and wing tube. It's very simple to knock up a wing bag from plastic foil-backed insulation wrap for hassle free transport to the field.

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22 hours ago, leccyflyer said:

Another recommendation for the Easyglider - it's a marvellous model and it thermal soars better than it has any right to. Agree completely with adding some stripes under the wing to help with visibility. The Easyglider rigs very easily with nothing more needed than a friction fit of the foam wing roots onto the fuselage and wing tube. It's very simple to knock up a wing bag from plastic foil-backed insulation wrap for hassle free transport to the field.

 

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  • 4 weeks later...

I flew an Easyglider and the only problem was getting it down. So I changed to a Heron and the addition of crow braking made it perfect. TBF If I flew a slope I'd probably have stuck with the Easyglider. I'd also say get a vario installed to make it easier detecting and staying in thermals.

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