What did you fly today?

[f4u ausie]

Grate shots again Dave.. after checking over my Corsair I disabled the flaps... One sero had the jitters.. anyways 4 flights this morning. .. same 4 me this Saturday morning.. no wind clear sky (picture perfect).. needed heaps of right aileron trim... Flaps need some adjustment I'm sure.... It's been a while.. it's not as locked in as when new.. that's to be expected after so much time in the air.. but looks awesome in the air as always... And lots of fun fun fun.. hopefully order new something in next 2 weeks.. thinking the new90 fms Avanti oh it lands great without flaps.. just don't look as cool

[davegee]

I took my Flightline 1.6m Corsair and E Flite 1.5m P-51D up for some flights this morning. Beautiful morning, very little wind and brilliant sunshine. I hadn't flown the Corsair for a while, but it was time. Tested it on the bench at home last night and it was ready to go. It didn't disappoint and I had three great flights on it. I wouldn't say it is "easy" to fly necessarily, but I've got dozens of flights on it over the past 4+ years and it is pretty much a "hand in glove" comfort feeling when I take it up. Just a really solid, scale performer, in my opinion. BTW, this is a replica of a plane flown by the top ace in the Corsair aircraft of all time, Lt. Robert M. "Killer Bob" Hanson, USMCR, who scored 25 kills until he himself was killed on a mission in the South Pacific in early 1944. He was awarded the MOH and promoted to captain, posthumously.

My other airplane is one of two P-51Ds I have from E Flite. Today's airplane was called The Hun Hunter from Texas, flown by double ace Captain Henry "Baby" Brown, USAAF. He eventually had to execute a forced landing in enemy territory, was captured and remained a POW for the rest of the war. But up to that point he had scored 14.2 aerial and about 14 ground kills of German aircraft. This plane is another favorite of mine, although maybe not quite as easy to fly as I find my other fighters like P-47s and the Corsair.

[shortround91]

Today was double Raptor day, tossed the 70 around and started some maneuvers with the 90 finally. 2 great flying jets starting on a new scheme on the 70 now can’t wait till she’s finished up

[Grossman56]

"So get the lead out" as they used to say on the radio before playing Led Zeppelin
It's funny, this one needed no lead to hit the CG, my other one need like 4 oz right up front to hit it. Used the same battery in both cases. I swear some of the rear fuse sections were slightly heavier than others. As for the power, I usually begin my landing descent at 25% but get a little throttle happy and maybe roll it down a bit too far. Last landing I dumped full flaps as well just to see how much it would slow down, wow, big difference. I have them set so that full flap matches the real Spitfire but haven't really used them as she's such a floaty bird. All my other warbirds get full flaps when landing so I guess I'm going to have to get back in the fighter pilot discipline with this one. Thanks for the response!!

Grossman56

[paulrkytek]

Got out to the field around 10:00 and it was perfect. no clouds temp creeping up through the 60's and no wind!
Took the Spitty out to make up for last Mondays gear issues and she flew great. On the landing approach, she does this sudden drop, similar to when you have your hand out the car window. I'm thinking she may be a tad nose heavy, any thoughts?? I usually fly with the 4500s all the way forward, maybe I'll try easing them back a 1/4 inch.
Anyway, she came home in great shape.



That's her in the middle with Jeff Deines, our club president flying.

Grossman56

Done that once on a nice dead calm day, just a bit too slow and plopped down from 18 inches but got away with it Now I just make sure I have a little power on to create enough lift and speed to keep it flying all the way in to touchdown. I would not alter the cg backwards but just land under power on 2 then throttle back and watch the rear gently settle down. You were lulled into a false sense of security by the beautiful conditions I fly n 4500mah 720 gm packs with additional lead at the front to gt cg. Original recommendations for the model was for 840gm packs. no lead to get cg

[f4u ausie]

Got out to the field around 10:00 and it was perfect. no clouds temp creeping up through the 60's and no wind!
Took the Spitty out to make up for last Mondays gear issues and she flew great. On the landing approach, she does this sudden drop, similar to when you have your hand out the car window. I'm thinking she may be a tad nose heavy, any thoughts?? I usually fly with the 4500s all the way forward, maybe I'll try easing them back a 1/4 inch.
Anyway, she came home in great shape.



That's her in the middle with Jeff Deines, our club president flying.

Grossman56

Hrb 5000 all forward...4 me flys well.. i had 2 flights yesrerday morn(sunday here) first landing was a bit too slow.. droped a bit last minute.. (not so pretty).. second landing was an absolute greaser,,, bit speed ,and settled in nicely on mains then settled on to tailwheel.... i think most like a little speed on landing🥳

[Grossman56]

Got out to the field around 10:00 and it was perfect. no clouds temp creeping up through the 60's and no wind!
Took the Spitty out to make up for last Mondays gear issues and she flew great. On the landing approach, she does this sudden drop, similar to when you have your hand out the car window. I'm thinking she may be a tad nose heavy, any thoughts?? I usually fly with the 4500s all the way forward, maybe I'll try easing them back a 1/4 inch.
Anyway, she came home in great shape.



That's her in the middle with Jeff Deines, our club president flying.

Grossman56

[davegee]

Entice Someone in your club with a steak and egg, pancakes early breakfast just for them to get up early and snap a few good pictures. Always works for me when someone asks for my help that early. LOL

Good idea!

davegee

[jetfool]

Entice Someone in your club with a steak and egg, pancakes early breakfast just for them to get up early and snap a few good pictures. Always works for me when someone asks for my help that early. LOL

[davegee]

Today I did my first test of dropping relatively scale M40 Para fragmentary bombs as they did from B-25s in WWII Pacific Theater. I have made up five of them, only four chutes at the moment, so I dropped four of them from a scale altitude of abut 300 feet, or about 25 actual feet above the ground, being this is a 1/13 scale aircraft. Again, even with these new bombs that had not been dropped by me before, they all landed within about a 10 foot circle, which would have been enough to play havoc with a ship or Japanese airfield. I don't see a problem at all with just carefully packing the chutes and bombs in the bomb bay, closing the doors, and it is ready for dropping in flight as soon as they are opened. I've never had one hang up in the bomb bay yet.

I'll probably drop at least 5 of these for any scale events I might do in the future, and about 4-6 of the scale printed 500 lb. that use the bomb rack to set up for dropping.

I've been busier than I thought with this stuff, especially since the best weather flying days for the year are rapidly closing. Today was beautiful and I got accomplished what I wanted to. I've had this model less that a month, and have 23 flights on it so far, with 14 of them testing different bomb configurations. I don't know if anyone else has played around with these parachute bombs for the B-25 like I've been doing, probably so, but I have never seen any photos or stories on them, myself.

Bomb Groups like the 345th were converted to low altitude strafing airplanes, and dropping bombs from about 200 feet altitude, sometimes even less. Thus, the parachutes for some of their missions. To be sure, these tactics were Extremely dangerous, and even the plane I'm honoring, Cactus Kitten, lost its crew during one of these raids in Indo China in 1945. This bomb group alone had almost 800 crewmen killed during the war, so that goes to show you the incredible courage these men had in trying to win WWII for the good guys.


I"ll attach a photo taken after today's flight of the scale M40 para frag bombs and somewhat scale sized 6 inch diameter parachutes I used for this test today. These are Estes rocket parachutes. I ordered two more so I can drop 5-6 of these at a time.

I hope to get some decent photos of these bombs dropping once I can coordinate with a friend to be out at the field and help me take some pics as I drop these bombs.

Davegee

[davegee]

Beautiful Fleet, Hugh!!

Davegee

[Hugh Wiedman]

Got out the other day with the last few aircraft I've converted the Spektrum AS3X gyro RX's to Plus. I've done about 20 now. While that upgrade helped all the EDF's incredibly, didn't expect it would make much of a difference on the prop warbirds. Boy was I wrong! Helps substantially in take-off as it tends to track straighter with only a slight right rudder correction needed. Additionally, the airframe tends to remain level much easier on take-off, preventing it from lifting off early and stalling. In flight, rock solid, but it was before as well. Helps on landing as well, keeping the airframe and the wings perfectly level so you can execute an easy, fairly slow scale 2 point landing. I'm definitely sold on the Plus upgrades!!



Hey, how did that F18 get in there!! It was the last EDF upgraded to test out as my other F18 was getting all the air time!

[davegee]

Weather forecast for northwest Wyoming shows some SNOW coming! Not too much, but looks like changes are indeed coming. Beautiful morning to fly this day, though. I brought my FMS P-47D razorback out to get a couple of flights in. This is my newest jug, and I just now have 40 flights on it. A real pleasure to fly with the mods I've made to all three of my flyable P-47s. I try to fly it as scale as possible, and I love the big V3 Corsair prop which works beautifully for that kind of flying that I do. The FMS jug and the Flightline 1.6m Corsair are my favorite warbird fighters to fly for me.

[Elbee]

Really miss that gentleman.

[Grossman56]

Thanks, I wanted something a bit different as I already had a Flying Tiger. I'd tried Flite Metal on the P 51 and thought the P 40 would be a perfect 'next'. Thanks to Hardway, who generously donated a new P40 to the cause when I was down in the financial end of life. Such generousity is so rare and never forgotten, she's always referred to as "The Hardway P40"

Grossman56

[Elbee]

Grossman56, That is one BEE-U-tiful model. Best, LB

[Grossman56]

That's the FMS 1400 P40. I also have one done in FliteMetal.



I originally had the old style roundel on the fuse aw well, but eventually I want to put the Hat-In-The-Ring insignia on instead, the Squadron actually flew the P40 but I can't find any pics of it.

[Hugh Wiedman]

Got six flights in today, three on the Tigercat and three on the old Flying Tiger P 40. That B25 prop system is the only way to go! Coupled with the 760kv motors and the F7F handles like the racer she's modeled after. As for the P40, the 6s system doesn't fail to impress.





Grossman56

Outstanding Warhawk, must be a blast to fly. Manufacturer?

[Grossman56]

Got six flights in today, three on the Tigercat and three on the old Flying Tiger P 40. That B25 prop system is the only way to go! Coupled with the 760kv motors and the F7F handles like the racer she's modeled after. As for the P40, the 6s system doesn't fail to impress.





Grossman56

[Elbee]

We got out there around 3:30 or so. Left within a 1/2 hour. Ate in Yoder, yummy.