Sunday 17 November 2013

Radjet Take Three

...and it flies!!

This morning I packed the Walrus and the Radjet. Having enjoyed several days of great weather I was happy to send up the Radjet understanding there would be reasonable probability at having to play fetch. However, finding the cattle grazing in the vicinity of the field, my resolve waned and I hauled out the Walrus instead.

Of late I've been practising inverted flight, although having to feed in lots of "down" to keep it flying level is a bit alarming, especially at first. While I have managed to sustain inverted flight no quite comfortably, I have only done this at comfortable elevation as it is too easy to get spooked and go the wrong way. I think I'll maintain the altitude buffer, sufficient to loop downwards safely, until my capability in this endeavour has progressed far beyond novice...



Walking back to the car having flown the Walrus until the battery gave out, thoughts turned again to the Radjet - the weather was still calm although with a gentle northerly which would help things. Yes, why not? So I swapped the Walrus for the Radjet and returned to the field for attempt the third...

I set the rates to high, gave the elevons a test then cranked the throttle to maximum and gave the little plane a good throw to launch it into the cool morning sky. To my amazement the Radjet arced into the sky and responded to the aileron inputs with a gorgeous roll. However not all was good - slacking off of the elevator input had the Radjet nosing down heavily. I found I had to keep about half elevator for level flight, still better than the first attempt where a flat trajectory was the best it could manage.

After a few circuits I decided to give landing a go, so I cut power, put full elevator and hoped for the best. To my surprise the Radjet still flew (I had suspected it might drop like a brick), and was quite even still manoeuvrable! I also managed a pretty good landing, which i was happy with. Not exactly greased it, it just sort of plopped down, but then it's certainly not a glider.

All up, a very good morning's flying...

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