...unlikely but groovy Some while ago, while trying the throttle with the Floater Jet on the ground, it occurred to me that, since the Floater has a high-mounted prop, it would be feasible to take it off from the ground. Theoretically anyway.
Without undercarriage, however, and just a smooth-bottomed fuselage, control on the ground wouldn't be very good. Also, as my first attempts showed, the Floater can tend to skid around, especially if the controls aren't all centred, as I sometime have them in order to keep it trimmed straight for power flight. Nevertheless, as you can see from the Floater's take-off run, ground launch is possible and a novel change to the usual hand-launch. And its pretty cool as well...
...disappointing but not disastrous Today was the day I'd been anticipating for a while; the Trainstar floatplane had been adjusted and fettled following from its initial water test, I'd decided on a flight test venue which provided acres of open water and the weather was immaculately calm after weeks of windy weather. Despite the anticipation, or perhaps because of it, I was anxious rather than excited at the prospect of finally getting the seaplane into the air. Nevertheless, with golden opportunities like this afternoon hard to come by, especially lately, I wasn't about to postpone proceedings due to indeterminate uncertainty.
Arriving at the lake the conditions were absolutely ideal, a far cry from the windswept expanse of water I'd experienced on my reconnoitre here. The Trainstar was unpacked and installed on the lake without much ceremony or excitement, nerves serving to rather deplete the joy from the occasion, despite the fact that the Trainstar cuts a most appealing figure in floatplane configuration. The first few runs didn't offer much encouragement, with the Trainstar suffering from the same take-off skittishness it exhibits in wheeled form. Not having been too fussed with ceremony, I've always just worked around this characteristic of the Trainstar, after having abandoned my efforts to get it taking off straight; flying off a field means no runways to follow. Unfortunately the flipside is now that the Trainstar is much heavier, being able to haul it off at an indecent angle is no longer possible.
In fact the Trainstar is only just sufficiently powered; the "oversized" battery at full power now seems decidedly moderate with the extra baggage and drag. Having said that I did once manage to get the Trainstar into the air, however it was heading for the dam wall and, being too low to start turning, I just cut the power and let it land. This, in itself, was an enlightening experience, with the Trainstar actually bouncing on it's floats several times before settling down. The landing was rather unsupervised; I really hadn't planned it much, but I was rather expecting it just to splosh straight down onto the water. In another more alarming incident the Trainstar, approaching planing speed, actually dipped a wing and prop into the water but then managed to right itself, in a testament to the stability of the floats. However I wasn't able to get the plane airborne again, which was disappointing. However, having had the experience and having some video to review, I'm hoping that i'll be able to return for another, more enlightened, attempt to get the floatplane flying...
...getting the taildragger airborne Launching the Trainstar is always entertaining; it's such a characterful aircraft that it's always fun to fly. It does, however, does take a little experience to get it right, and I still can't get it to launch perfectly straight. The battery location is excellent, housed under a clip-off cover under the nose. The battery is held in place, inverted, by the provided velcro as well as a velcro strap. So connecting power is easy, although you do have to flip the old girl for a second!
I fly with the 3S 2200mAh battery; being a big heavy plane I certainly wouldn't recommend anything less, and I think a few people fly with larger power packs than this. Having said that, the 2200mAh will drag the Trainstar out of most awkward spots and gives reasonable flight times.
The Trainstar will launch off grass fields, as long as the growth is not too thick. If you're picturing launching from a wildflower meadow, it's not going to happen. The best advice is to have full elevator during the takeoff run. This keeps the tail planted on the ground until the wings are airborne, preventing ungainly, and potentially disastrous, nose-plants into the ground. I find, for whatever reason, the Trainstar tends first to the right then, after it builds up some speed, to go veering off to the left. Anyway, I'd recommend getting it off the ground sooner rather than later; you can always hit max power if necessary to drag it up. That way you've got less chance of running into anything, or running off the runway, or disappearing down a rabbit hole...
...never a dull moment
It was another lovely calm morning so I packed the Radjet and Walrus and headed to the field. Having got to a manageable skill level with the Radjet I was looking forward to getting some good airtime to explore capabilities and responses. And I got just that, plus a little more than I expected.
As said before, the little jet flies beautifully and it's speed is now not so intimidating with a little better understanding. It climbs without bound, rolls well and does beautiful loops. I did encounter something completely unexpected - a flat spin. As often with the gliders I put the Radjet into a vertical stall, expecting it to flop over and continue flying. Well, it did flop over but into a flat spin. And, like a Tomcat, I've discovered the Radjet doesn't recover from it - don't do it. The best I could manage was elevator and opposite aileron which helped to slow the spin so that the Radjet sort of fluttered to the ground. Landing in longer grass the damage was limited to the tip of the nose coming off, again. This time I couldn't recover it, but it flies well enough without it! I was about to pack up the Radjet when I had an urge to do a bit more launch practice, that being the a little nerve-wracking as it usually rolls and dips to the left, requiring quick correction to keep it off the deck. On my second launch the Radjet climbed steeply so, to avoid another flat-spin scenario like earlier, I let it drop until the speed was well up before I started to level it out heading back towards the field.
Unfortunately its trajectory coincided exactly with a goal post, so its swift progress was suddenly reduced to a burst of parts. It didn't look pretty, however putting on the wing and aileron should be fairly easy, however restoring the dented leading edge will take some doing, if at all.
I returned to the car for old faithful, the Walrus, for a bit of post-traumatic stress therapy. The Walrus is great because you can launch it at almost any power and it just cruises up. Well, this morning I flipped up a little more throttle to get it buzzing right up.
Unfortunately, and most unexpectedly, the prop pulled off the front and the Walrus turned into a real glider for a second or two. As it turns out the circlip retaining the motor shaft got a little tired and went to lay down in the back of the fuselage.
So a little work to be done at home so I've got something decent to fly. Odds are on the Radjet, just hopefully it doesn't get crashed again as it's running out of lives...
