Today was one of those days when the weather continually surprises you; this morning was heavily overcast and still, giving one the anticipation of a dull day, possibly even rainy. Then, looking out the window a little later, one is surprised with the grey dissolving into little patches of cumulus, feeding off the warming earth. And then, a little later still, the sky is almost clear and a cool afternoon is blowing, a gift from the Southern Ocean.
Although a little breezy, with such lovely weather I decided to make a turn past the field just in case, and happily found a steady and quite flyable breeze, especially as the car had a boot-full of little buzzies.
The recent smash, and possible destruction, of the Phoenix (now there's irony; perhaps I should set it alight as a shortcut to repairing it) has left me a little nervy to fly, especially the high-speed brigade, despite the crash not being pilot-related for once. Anyhow, the opportunity to get out and enjoy the lovely afternoon whilst the planes headed skywards towards the pure white clouds was too good to let go begging.
It was the first outing of the Stinger since its repair, following its three-day stay in the paddocks after it went MIA. While suffering only minor damage, test-flying something that's been repaired has potential to be heart-stopping. Fortunately, apart from a slightly hair-raising launch, largely as a result of me throwing it skew causing the Stinger to hang on knife-edge, it flew perfectly well.
Having not flown it for some while, however, I'd lost a bit of touch with its, well, touchy behaviour, and for most of the flight I felt as if I were courting disaster. Nevertheless, all went well and the Stinger ended up in a long glide in for a safe landing.
The Radjet, flights of which book-ended proceedings, once again enhanced its reputation as a solid high-speed platform, giving relatively effortless performances and outrunning the Stinger in most departments, except the distinctive jet whine and apparently effortless performance. I have, on a number of occasions, especially since I learned how to launch it properly, have considered getting a new Radjet kit, my rough-lived example bearing barely any resemblance to the original.
However, despite appearances, which would be desirable especially during low fast passes when its chequered past becomes more evident as it approaches, as it still flies remarkably well, and fast, trading it in for a replacement would seem like a rather poor deal for a faithful plane which wears the scars of lessons learned discovering how to actually fly it...
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