Great Planes Extra 300S

simonbloke wrote: Hi. Your new toy looks fab, I love the colour scheme, Bet it sounds great.

Hope you get it in there air soon...

Simon

Thanks Simon, Yes it doesn't sound too bad - not too noisy although it's not tuned for max power yet :evil:

Hope to maiden Saturday but I'm not rushing it.

MikeSeale wrote: Looks great, Alan. Did you cut the graphic by hand or did you send them off to a vinyl cutter? If hand-cut, I'm very impressed...I know how difficult it is to get abstract shapes looking the same both sides.

Mike

Thanks Mike, Yes the Profilm was cut by hand although not mine - My Sister in Law did me a whole series of designs based on my Union Jack brief, the best ones sadly were outside my abilities to implement although I did consider sending my favourite of to a vinyl cutter, and my Mrs scaled the chosen design and cut out the film. All I did was iron it on, in that respect I was the weak link in the chain. It's not too bad from a distance but doesn't stand up to close inspection.

So today was the day - to maiden or not.

Got to field fairly early, set up the and flew the Yellow POS, the wind was a little flukey but nothing exceptional for Cashmoor and had a couple of really nice flights to settle me down.

Time to drag out the Extra.

A couple of people made some nice comments about the Extra, which are always nice to receive. The engine started easily( I'm getting the hang of this petrol malarky) and with some help spent a little time fiddling about with needles and stuff.

To fly or not to fly!

Luckily JRI was on hand. After a brief discussion we developed a mutal feeling of confidence in each other and after a quick look over the model and some fine tuning John agreed to do the honours. To be honest I was ****ing bricks! not in fear of Johns abilities but the fear of my over powered, overweight, lardy home build taking chunks out of Dorset!

How did it go?

In my view, exceptionaly well despite being 2lbs overweight( 9 1/2lb instead of 7 1/2lb) John's verdict was " it's a pussy cat" Eventualy I flew it myself and I would agree, It's lovely to fly - and the power from that OS turning a 15*10 at 8500 rpm. isn't just unlimited vertical, its moon shot.

The downsides.

There has to be some. I had a look at the TX after John's trimming flight + 2 rudder, + 2 elevator - happy with that, but, +17 aileron - not so good. I've either built a wonky wing, screwed up the tail plane fitting or misadjusted the control surfaces. I'm sure I can live with it tho'

The other downside is that the plane is worh finishing properly, which means building a glass fiber cowl - anyone got some blue foam they want to sell me so I can make a plug?

Oh by the way Kevin - Your Yorkshire price fuel dot works a treat - it's the ultimate in anti-bling.

Alan - Well done, pleased to hear the maiden flight went well.
There's even more tension when you have spent all that time building & finishing her.
Any inflight pics ?
Regards
Colin. A

Sadly no in flight pics Colin and to be honest without the cowl , oversized wheels and no pants it looks a bit unfinished. Hopefully we'll get some at a later date.

Pleased it went well Alan

Alan, it flew well and looks good. Get finishing! Also, thanks for your help with the other matter, i.e. lending your model. It is actions like that which make this club what it is.

Stuart

We'll done, after the time invested in building and sucessful flights it all paid off. Looks a good model.

DaveBright wrote: Pleased it went well Alan

Thanks Dave, You wouldn't believe how nervous I was before the first flight.

While you're here - considering the weight etc of the plane we elected not to do a stall test, we thought we'd leave it to someone who would have to skill to recover an awkward situtation and would be willing to give it a try - just a thought like :whistle:

Stuartmck wrote: Alan, it flew well and looks good. Get finishing! Also, thanks for your help with the other matter, i.e. lending your model. It is actions like that which make this club what it is.

Stuart

Thanks Stuart, Considering the help I've had from the club so far I'm glad to have had the opportunity to give something back.