The Weekend

Well, a bit more flying this weekend - heh - what else would I be doing.

I also finally got a successful flight and landing with the Mustang yesterday. I've also found out why I've been having a great deal of trouble flying her. Made to spec she has a wingloading of 18.14 oz/sq ft, or 48g/sq dm - that is massive. To give you some comparisons - the Zero has a wing loading of around 11 oz/sq ft, and the Parkzone Mustang has a w/l of around 14.5 oz/sq ft.

Anyway, after the failed landing attempt with her on Saturday (yes there's a youtube vid of it at the end of this post) she went on a diet on Saturday night. After the landing on "Saturday" the flap servo had broken - so, ditched that plus linkages, and taped up the flaps - including using tape to make close the gaps between the flaps and the wing (so hopefully extracting every bit of lift from that wing) That saved about 12 grams (almost half an ounce). Then I flew her on a 3s 1500mAh rather than a 2200mAh which saved another 46g. The 3s1500 isn't the best battery in the world. It's already done 100+ cycles, so its voltage tends to be a bit average under load, but I just wanted to test what a difference being ligher made.

So, having saved 58g (about 2 oz) I flew her on Sunday. I wouldn't say she was a different aircraft by any means - still pretty portly, but at least she didn't just stall when the power came off, and the difference on landing was noticeable.

Anyway, with a slight breeze on Sunday the first successful landing of the P51 on retracts was pulled off - yeah.

Flew with a big mixture of people on the weekend. The Saturday flying (including the stang er..., landing) is on this vid - check it out.

See yas.

Cheers,
Oz.