Success - finally!

[jpuke]

I recently "finished" a 900 series deHavilland Chipmunk. I put finished in quotes because I really didn't do much of a good job as a scale model but it looks somewhat like a Chipmunk.

What I'm really happy about is that it actually flew today! This is the first time since I started doing these models that one has actually climbed under power rather than doing a powered glide to the ground. I tried to make it light but it ended up at 24 grams without the rubber. Either way, I got it trimmed with some acetate tabs on the left wing and rudder. It was rolling to the left under power until I added the tab with a downward bend - this corrected the roll and soon it was flying out of my backyard with ease. I added the tab to the rudder to get it to fly in a circle so I wouldn't lose it.

Thanks to all those who post their tips and photos - it's taken this hobby from interesting to exhilarating for me! I've got a long way to go to get good scale models that fly but this is a good start.

[Xanadu]

Great to hear........enjoy!

[jpuke]

I went out again because we had a suprisingly windless day here in Nebraska today and had some great flights again. I got a proper rubber motor in the plane and was consistently getting 30 to 45 second flights that consisted of six laps and climbs to about 60 -70 feet before descent. It was climbing so much and getting into the breeze that it was drifting too far outside the field I was in and started getting mixed up in the trees. The last long flight ended up with the plane ramming a pine tree 60 feet up and then stopping in a branch 15 feet from the ground. My kids got to watch their old man climb a tree and extricate the airplane from the pine needles it'd been skewered on.

No major damage. My dad volunteers in the restoration hangar at the Air and Space Museum near Omaha, NE on Saturdays so my plan is to fly it inside the giant hangars next weekend and see how it does with absolutely no wind. I'll try to get a video.

[flash52]

Nice to hear about your Chipmunk success. It was one of my better scale fliers. It ROGs real nice too.