Windy weather,my first plane??

[Fly Boy 3]

I do think the advice given by Chris ( first answer)  should be looked at. These models look beautiful and by all means buy one if you can afford it, but as another forumite said, “ both water based like swimming and fishing” 

     You know your own capabilities, so go for it if you think it’s the right thing to do.

   Best of luck.

[GreyAce]

25 minutes ago, Fly Boy 3 said:

I do think the advice given by Chris ( first answer)  should be looked at. These models look beautiful and by all means buy one if you can afford it, but as another forumite said, “ both water based like swimming and fishing” 

     You know your own capabilities, so go for it if you think it’s the right thing to do.

   Best of luck.

Yeah I am certainly thinking about all the advice and next month is my birthday hence I want to get something at that time,at first I was thinking a heli as there's so many available but the wind situation is tricky or a plane which I am actively looking at now and sim work,I was even gona get a henglong leopard 2 pro version rc tank but I figure you can only do so much on the ground before getting bored but either way I have been flying for a few months now and I certainly ain't giving up on this flying hobby,I really enjoy being outside and enjoying the flying of whatever I have. 

Edited April 27 by GreyAce

[Matt Carlton]

6 hours ago, GrumpyGnome said:

Good suggestions, but GrayAce doesn't fly in a club environment, and it's pretty much certain those planes, with their greater inertia, will be damaged (possibly terminally) very quickly if he's going it alone. And they will need an even bigger flying site for any element of safety.

 

My apologies, I missed that part. In which case, I think the combination of lack of space, wind and relatively inexperienced pilot renders the question moot. 

Ignoring the potential to lose the model in a tree, on a road or whatever else, it'll only take a moment of disorientation and a close call with a member of the public and there'll be a "no model flying" rule slapped on the park. 

Stick to the heli and calm days, or find a more suitable place to fly when the wind is blowing is my advice.

We're on the radar as it is with all the drone incidents and the powers that be don't differentiate. 

[GrumpyGnome]

@GreyAce there are two of those Trainstars (or clones) in our club. Although they look benign, they seem quite challenging to fly, and fall out if the sky unless the speed is kept up.

 

Although it doesn't look much like a 'real' plane, the Volantex Ranger (small one) is VERY easy to fly and possibly a better entry point...

[Matt Carlton]

There's also the smaller version of the FMS Easy Trainer. Might be a bit tricky in a wind. 

 

Depending on skill level, perhaps a UMX Crescendo might work. You can start on 2S and move to 3S for more performance on the same model. Enough ability to keep you interested. AS3X should help in the wind to start with. Might be a bit quick (visually, small models get small very fast so appear a lot faster) 

[GreyAce]

34 minutes ago, GrumpyGnome said:

@GreyAce there are two of those Trainstars (or clones) in our club. Although they look benign, they seem quite challenging to fly, and fall out if the sky unless the speed is kept up.

 

Although it doesn't look much like a 'real' plane, the Volantex Ranger (small one) is VERY easy to fly and possibly a better entry point...

The volantex planes are the ones I'm eyeing up at the moment,from the high wing to lower wing I'm seeing all my options,I do like to really do my research before I do my next move in the future and not do something silly etc. 

[GreyAce]

This was at the local park but don't really fly there much now but yeah I got this but what's next could be a plane,I will keep looking and researching but on a day with ok winds this is great fun 🙂

[GrumpyGnome]

I'm pretty sure we've suggested this before, but visiting your local club may provide inspiration, in a different direction.

 

I used to have a bunch of planes for the club field, and some tiddlers to fly in the park on the way to/from work.

[Wookman]

3 hours ago, GreyAce said:

the high wing one above seems a good bet. 

A fine plan. 

[GrumpyGnome]

Have you seen one flying?  Although it looks benign, it certainly doesn't fly nearly as well as the baby Warbirds - at least both of the two I've seen.  They need to be flown at at least 75% throttle to stay in the air.......

[leccyflyer]

I'd say too many trees too close to where you are flying to be comfortable with even a small fixed wing parkflyer, especially in windy conditions when they will create lots of turbulence and make for an uncomfortable experience.

[GreyAce]

21 minutes ago, leccyflyer said:

I'd say too many trees too close to where you are flying to be comfortable with even a small fixed wing parkflyer, especially in windy conditions when they will create lots of turbulence and make for an uncomfortable experience.

I have a big field elsewhere,the vid clip I wouldn't go there,I have a large field for planes if I had one. 

[GreyAce]

28 minutes ago, GrumpyGnome said:

Have you seen one flying?  Although it looks benign, it certainly doesn't fly nearly as well as the baby Warbirds - at least both of the two I've seen.  They need to be flown at at least 75% throttle to stay in the air.......

Only YouTube vids but I am more interested in the warbirds especially the f4u corsair. 

[leccyflyer]

If you have your heart set on dipping your toe in the water with one of the wee Volantex gyro stabilised offerings you might be better to start with the Sport Cub, rather than the warbirds. My pal Bob has one of these and reckons it's the best flyer and easiest to fly of all of them, it can also be got a wee bit cheaper than the warbirds. Make sure that it's the four channel, rather than the two channel one.

 

https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005005012060190.html

You also need to check very carefully that what you are ordering includes the radio, charger, battery and spare props - click through the pictures at the link above to see the options.

 

Edited April 27 by leccyflyer

[Matt Carlton]

1 hour ago, GreyAce said:

Only YouTube vids but I am more interested in the warbirds especially the f4u corsair. 

 

That's all well and good and many a beginner has said the same thing and come to regret it. There's a lot of experience on this board and it's sometimes worth listening to that. Otherwise, there's very little point in asking the question if you already know better. 

[Geoff S]

Oddly enough the model I used to fly in strong winds (before its demise) was my scratch-built Limbo Dancer.  It was relatively light and had quite large control surface movements but it was fun to fly (hence Funfly, I guess) in marginal conditions.  I particularly liked landing it vertically when the wind speed exceeded the stall speed - or thereabouts. The other 'any weather' model was my Riot.  I'm less adventurous these days, sadly.

 

The last model you should choose as an 'any weather' flyer is a scale warbird - at least until you have a good few hours in your flying fingers in something less demanding.

[Glenn Philbrick]

Oddly enough a young lad turned up at our field with one of these. He has never flown before so I had the first flight, in intermediate it coped with the wind reasonably well, in expert it is a nightmare due to the wind. The lad had a couple of flights with it once at a decent altitude and it servived him getting it back in the ground as it is so light that a hard arrival does not damage it.  I could see in a calm day it would fly quite well.

[GreyAce]

5 hours ago, leccyflyer said:

If you have your heart set on dipping your toe in the water with one of the wee Volantex gyro stabilised offerings you might be better to start with the Sport Cub, rather than the warbirds. My pal Bob has one of these and reckons it's the best flyer and easiest to fly of all of them, it can also be got a wee bit cheaper than the warbirds. Make sure that it's the four channel, rather than the two channel one.

 

https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005005012060190.html

You also need to check very carefully that what you are ordering includes the radio, charger, battery and spare props - click through the pictures at the link above to see the options.

 

Yeah the high wing ones seem very good and a decent start for sure. 

[GreyAce]

58 minutes ago, Glenn Philbrick said:

Oddly enough a young lad turned up at our field with one of these. He has never flown before so I had the first flight, in intermediate it coped with the wind reasonably well, in expert it is a nightmare due to the wind. The lad had a couple of flights with it once at a decent altitude and it servived him getting it back in the ground as it is so light that a hard arrival does not damage it.  I could see in a calm day it would fly quite well.

Nice one that sounds really cool,these planes are so cheap but they seem really decent from all the vids I've watched etc. 

[GrumpyGnome]

8 hours ago, Glenn Philbrick said:

Oddly enough a young lad turned up at our field with one of these. He has never flown before so I had the first flight, in intermediate it coped with the wind reasonably well, in expert it is a nightmare due to the wind. The lad had a couple of flights with it once at a decent altitude and it servived him getting it back in the ground as it is so light that a hard arrival does not damage it.  I could see in a calm day it would fly quite well.

 

One of which?  As I say, my FW190 flies beautifully, but both Trainstars have challenged seasoned fliers even in Intermediate mode.... 

 

The key fact here from this text is that an experienced flier performed the initial launch and climb-out, handing over control at height...... and in a decent location in the sky I guess

[Nigel Heather]

Is model flying in ‘windy’ weather a phenomenon brought on by modern electric foam models?

 

When I first got into model RC aircraft in the late 1980s, you typically started with a 40 sized two stroke powered trainer that had a 60” wingspan.  It would be typically built from a kit using balsa and ply for the fuselage, fin and tailplane and veneered foam wings which were joined with an epoxy soaked fibreglass bandage.  On top of the 40 stroke metal lump up front, it had a fuel tank and full sized servos, receiver and RX battery.  The result was that we started with a trainer that was heavier and more powerful than the foamies that we fly today.  And the follow on aircraft would be similar build, either with smaller wingspan or you would go up to a 60 engine.

 

I remember that it had to be pretty windy before I would think “it’s windy” and consider not flying.  By comparison I find that much slighter winds these days has the guys at the club claiming “it’s a bit windy”.

 

I think the reason is that heavier, bigger, more power aircraft are less likely to be pushed around or buffeted by the wind.

 

Some with helicopters by the way, fly a 450 and it is squirrely, gets pushed around and impacted by even the slightest changes in wind than compared with a 600.

 

So maybe, the answer is, if we want an RC aircraft that are more suitable for windy weather then you should go back to glow powered traditional builds. For example if you want an intermediate aircraft, how about building a Wot 4 classic kit and sticking a 55 two stroke on the front.  If you don’t fancy building then similar second hand models can often be seen on the BMFA Classified at very low prices.

 

 

Edited April 28 by Nigel Heather

[leccyflyer]

I think it quite likely that inexperienced beginners literally do not have the first clue of what constitutes a windy day. At my old club you would often find several beginners waiting to fly, on completely unsuitable days when they would have been better off staying  in the shed, where the more experienced flyers were on such a morning, As they grew more experienced, they were able to more accurately gauge the weather, to learn which were the wind speeds and directions which would give less enjoyable flying. They might also progress from battered trainers to better models, where the consequences of heavy arrivals, compounded by unfavourable wind conditions, turbulence and crosswinds were more extreme than breaking a few wing bands as their Hi Boy cartwheeled down the strip.

 

There are models which are my go-to models for windy days and they include foamies as well as certain balsa builds -such as the Wot-4 , but also my Mini Flying Machine- and the key to having the more enjoyable flights in the wind is power to weight, to be able to punch through the wind, rather than having an overly heavy models that is supposed to not get buffeted by the wind. As mentioned above, the technology onboard the wee 400mm Volantex models is such that a stable flight is pretty much guaranteed in a moderate windspeed - say 10-15mph without any concern about crosswind landing, since you can drop them at your feet under power. Until you've flown, or seen, these remarkable wee models operating in windy conditions you possibly wouldn't believe how well they do. 

[Outrunner]

1 hour ago, Nigel Heather said:

So maybe, the answer is, if we want an RC aircraft that are more suitable for windy weather then you should go back to glow powered traditional builds. For example if you want an intermediate aircraft, how about building a Wot 4 classic kit and sticking a 55 two stroke on the front.  If you don’t fancy building then similar second hand models can often be seen on the BMFA Classified at very low prices.

Why would a 2 stroke engine make the model more suitable for windy weather flying than say a 4 stroke or an electric motor given the same power output?

[Geoff S]

14 minutes ago, Outrunner said:

Why would a 2 stroke engine make the model more suitable for windy weather flying than say a 4 stroke or an electric motor given the same power output?

 

Exactly.  Both my windy weather models (Limbo Dancer and Riot) I quoted earlier were electrically powered.  The Limbo Dancer was originally glow powered until I converted it and there was no difference in its behavior. 

[Piers Bowlan]

So something bigger with a slightly higher wing loading and semi-symmetrical wing section I suggest, to enable it to fly a little faster and penetrate a bit of a blow ( UK usual weather). Not so much a trainer but a good second model. One not suited to public open spaces but a club environment.