Getting in to Warbirds

[thisguy65]

Short story, haven't flew in 16-17 years. Bought a Carbon Cub and with getting my skill set back wanting to get in to warbirds. I'm between the P47 and T-28. Leaning toward the P47 because it has safe. I don't relie on Safe Select but like to idea as a bailout. I do not have the experience to know how it will fly, until I get it in the air.


Was on the other forum and few people kept stating to get Hellcat, P-51, Spitfire..lol

Motion RC mention Bearcat, T-18, and a friend I hold in high regard here agreed on a p-47 when I asked.

[farmflyer]

The 1.2 Eflite P-47 is a pretty docile flyer I prefer it on an Admiral 3000 4 cell but you might want to start out on a 3 cell until you get a few flights to get used to it. I don’t have the new 1.2 T-28 but I’m sure it’s also going to be pretty easy to fly .

[rifleman_btx]

Go with the P47, i really think you will be happy with it

[Ole-Timer]

Their both great planes that are forgiving to land, pick your favorite and enjoy!

[AirHead]

The P47 has "wide stance" landing gear which is a good feature. Another warbird I dig flying is my FMS 1400mm A6M Zero. You can still find them out there....

[BRGT350]

I have the older and smaller E-Flite P-47 and it took a little bit to get comfortable with it. The plane was my second warbird, if you can really count the Corsair S as the first one. The Corsair is really a low wing trainer with the look of a warbird. I have had the P-47 for a few years and was always intimidated by it. This summer I focused on really getting it dialed in. I had a few things wrong with the alignment of the control surfaces, mostly a flap that was out of alignment. Once dialed in, the P-47 flew just wonderful. Everything I have read about the newer 1.2m P-47 suggests it is even better.

If you don't mind hand launching and belly landing in the grass, the Tower Hobbies F6F Hellcat is actually a pretty good warbird to start with. It is super cheap, has all the warbird looks, small so it is easy to toss in the car and go, very stable, and not very fast. I found one at an estate sale for $35 and decided to give it a try. It turned out to be a wonderful little plane. Tossed in a Lemon RX and off into the sky I went. While it isn't very exotic without flaps and retracts, it is a very stable and easy flying plane that looks the part when in the air.

Tower Hobbies F6F Hellcat Rx-R by Bryan Redeker, on Flickr

[thisguy65]

The P47 has "wide stance" landing gear which is a good feature. Another warbird I dig flying is my FMS 1400mm A6M Zero. You can still find them out there....

Morning guys. Thanks for the help! Really want to stay with safe select until I gain more confidence. T-28, while it doesn’t have safe I do feel I can handle it..but the “what if”. We can talk about what if until we are blue in the face but I rather have a back up plan that may be able to help save the plane. My carbon cub I yank the gps out. If I had a crash it’s from the farm environment. Meaning my parents have this little natural area where had this little 4ft dog wood tree. The way I was standing that small tree blended in with the tree line. I made a right hand turn and on finally approach. Plane is coming in nice and smooth. Everything is spot on and right when the tires about to make contact the plane does just stop and spins 270. I’m like wtf? Got the plane, repairs (tore tail section off). Got to keys to our CAT 289D. And leveled that little natural area. Dad been wanting it gone for a while. lol

P47 just looks bad ass to me. Love the Razorback


I did put flaps on my carbon cub s+ and holy crap it just floats as if it’s hanging with a string. Really have to drive it to the ground with it’s high lift wing

[vdanger]

I always recommend the T-28 because it is a nosewheel plane. Most other warbirds are taildraggers.

If you are handy with modding, get a Dynam, it is the most bang for your buck and it flys fantastic. You will however, have to improve some things (the retracts being one). If you are not handy with modding, get the Eflite, more expensive but ready to go from the box.

Start with 3 cell power, then step up to 4 cell. Believe me, you can do everything with a 4 cell T-28 that you can do with any warbird.

Taking off with a taildragger requires a different skillset and I say get used to a higher performance plane first, then step up to a high performance taildragger.

[vdanger]

By the way, you can take the Safe receiver from the apprentice and put it directly in the Dynam T-28 with no changes whatsoever. Then you have a plane with SAFE. I know because Ive done it.

[xviper]

Was on the other forum and few people kept stating to get Hellcat, P-51, Spitfire..lol

It's always easy to recommend stuff that they, personally, would like to have. A P-51 or a Spitfire is what you aspire to once you've minimized your "dumb thumbs". Those people are only setting you up for failure and a smaller bank account. Well, at the very least, those planes will make you extremely good at repairing foam planes. There's a real nice guy at my field who has both those planes. He's had them since he started several years ago. Every time he brings them to the field, he takes them home in pieces. Anyone of weak determination would have become dejected and gave up long ago. But he takes them home, glues them all back together and brings them back the next week. They both look like crap but he still tries. Are you that determined?

[xviper]

I always recommend the T-28 because it is a nosewheel plane. Most other warbirds are taildraggers.
Taking off with a taildragger requires a different skillset and I say get used to a higher performance plane first, then step up to a high performance taildragger.

BINGO!!!!!

[thisguy65]

What’s different in my current plane (Carbon Cub S+) that’s a tail dragged vs warbird? Always have to get right fudder to counter tq from the motor.

[xviper]

What’s different in my current plane (Carbon Cub S+) that’s a tail dragged vs warbird? Always have to get right fudder to counter tq from the motor.

You'll need more rudder to keep the tail in line on a warplane. A Cub is a slow trainer, usually with a big rudder, big horizontal stab. This helps to keep the tail on the ground so as to promote more steering response from the tail wheel and help with steering at that critical moment when the tail gets light. It can maneuver on the ground with smaller inputs to steer it. A warbird (of course, there are tame warbirds) tends to need more of a roll to get flying, require a different technique to keep it straight while doing so. If done wrong, no amount of rudder will keep it straight. It'll just curl to the left and hit the weeds or worse, just get off the ground and do a left wing over into the ground. A tail dragging warbird also has more of a tendency to nose over when the wrong take off (or landing) technique is used, resulting is a lot of buried and broken props. But I guess you'll have to find that out for yourself. A stabilizer with an aggressive rudder gain will help.

[Ole-Timer]

Back around 1992 when the Collings B-17G 909 was being rebuilt here at Beaver County Airport, a guy named Scotty was in charge. He’d been a B-17 mechanic in England during WWII and had learned to fly after the war. He was going to be the pilot to take 909 down to Florida for the final fitting out.
As we worked on installing the B-17’s fuel tanks the topic for a bit was flying taildraggers. He said over the years he’d checked out dozens of pilots in tail wheeled aircraft. His experience was the earlier in a pilots career that they learned to fly taildraggers, the better. Pilots who had hundreds or thousands of hours in tricycle aircraft generally had developed some hard to break bad habits. Pilots with less tricycle time were easier to train. There were exceptions, but that was the general rule. Typical comfort level times for him were 10-20 hours of instruction before he would let a student go. He did have a good friend with several thousand hours in tricycle that he was still working on and at that time he had 37 hours invested in instructing. He was still not confident enough to let his buddy go alone.

Rc flying is very much the same. Building good habits as early as possible is bonus. You will either get it and learn better skills or be the guy who crashes constantly. Most get it in a reasonable amount of time and a very few just don’t...

persistence, patience, and practice always pay off.

[thisguy65]

Thanks guys. I did pick up P47 Razorback. Setting it up now. May run full flaps so I can taxi aroun the yard. Get a feel for how different it is. I honestly don’t know what to expect but It does have some
protction, safe select. Take it to the field and buddy box with somone

[Ole-Timer]

always take the airplane up high and see how slow you can fly it. Stall it up there clean ... flaps n gear up... then dirty... flaps half gear down... then flaps full gear down so you can see and judge what to expect in a stall.

only use half flap to land at first and do not use full flaps to land in windy conditions.

[Pilotguy]

Great advice given in above posts. T-28 is the way to go for a first warbird. Tricycle gear and very docile. It has been said that a P-51 would be a good follow-on to that. IMHO.

[fhhuber]

If the radio is capable... 5 flap positions. None, About 5 deg. 15, 25, 50. 5 is take-off. The others are the assorted approach conditions varied by wind, how steep you need and how short the runway is. 50 deg will need some power on.

[thisguy65]

Thanks guys. Did end up picking up the P47 from eflite. Friend, who has been my mentor is buddy boxing with me tomorrow. They had this on sale for $225.

[rifleman_btx]

Excellent! And congrats!:Cool: