Showing posts with label arf. Show all posts
Showing posts with label arf. Show all posts

Saturday, 20 June 2015

Canadair Flips on Takeoff...and Survives!

bad and good...

The other day, after a long hiatus, I finally got the Canadair back to the big lake to have a bit of a fly. The big lake is good for its large expanse of water, meaning less issues with dodging trees or having to constantly turn.

Being a large expanse of water does however mean that it does pick up more of a breeze though, due to the large expanse of open water. Nevertheless, on the afternoon, there was a moderate westerly blowing in, noticeable but not sufficient to unduly affect the water.



So I got the Canadair ready to fly and, at the last minute, decided to shift the battery back a little to help with the landings, where I kept on finding I didn't have enough elevator to float it in for gentle touch-downs.

All ready then, and I hit power with full elevator to get the Canadair on the plane. Unfortunately, the combination of the fresh westerly and th enow nose-light Canadair meant that, as soon as it begun to rotate it just kept on lifting and, quickly reaching a stall, the left wing dropped and dipped into the lake.

So, within a second of hitting the throttle, the Canadair was floating upside down, both motors immersed in the water. I didn't feel like getting the inflatable out, so I waited for the breeze to transport the Canadair to the far side of the lake.

Finally fishing it out of the lake a leisurely quarter of an hour later, the Canadair had shipped just a smidgen of water, and the receiver and ESC's were all dry and safe, ready to go again...


Friday, 30 January 2015

Raptor Glider Unboxing

...high quality with some missing promises

The Raptor glider arrives double boxed and with all the components inside bubble wrapped and bagged and taped in place; in short no likelihood of anything getting scratched or damaged in transit.

The fuselage is very impressive; nicely moulded with a smooth finish and a remarkably curvy shape. The wing mount also looks very secure, with the leading edges of the wings tucked into the fuselage and located with a small pin, and then screwed in place at the trailing edge.



The wings are also nicely covered, and apparently feature GRP reinforcement of the D-box leading edge. I say apparently as no GRP is visible at the wing root and it sounds like balsa when you tap on it, so I'll have to take their word for it.

The wings are also supposed to include "smarty pull-wires" for installing the wing servo extension leads, however these wings seem to be without that handy feature, unfortunately.

Also apparently also lacking are the promised Cunning Simple-Lock Cabin Cover, and the Finished Servo Horn Screw-hole, of which I can find no evidence in either the wings or the tailplanes.

A pity, as these minor annoyances rather spoil the enjoyment of what is a very high quality and well presented ARF package...