Eco's First Shockflyer flight!

[Hwkmn]

This afternoon Brett (EcoDragon) and I went to the park across from my house to fly the Shockflyer. This was Eco's first time flying this sort of model, and my third. On the maiden flight I found that the empennage (tail group) flexed a lot, as did the fuselage, which isn't a surprise as there is minimal reinforcing of the foam simply two trangular sticks of balsa which you can see along the fuse in the pic below. The CG seemed a little too far aft for the first few flights as well. We added some strips of packing tape to the horizontal stabilizer (can be seen below) and a few spots on the fuse. . .this added enough rigidity. When doing rolls you can still see the tail lag behind just a little, and when transitioning through the stall buffet you can see the tail shake! In any case today if flew great, and Eco commented that it flew more like a normal airplane than he expected. Eco was torque rolling it at 5 feet off the deck so I guess he was comfortable with it pretty quick. I grabbed some pics, they aren't great but we thought you guys might like to see it.



Here she is after the flights.



Slow, high alpha Pass



Torque Rolling

Ben "Hwkmn"

[TX-EcoDragon]

This was  blast!!!  If you are at all into 3D flying then I know you won't be dissapointed with this! It really blew me away, I expected it to be really obvious that it's all flat plates, but it wasn't! I have thought these were kinda cool, but also rather overpriced for something that seems rather unrefined and that hardly even qualifies as an airplane in my snooty "what do you mean no airfoil" mentality. . . I take it back. . . I can fly it at a park, have plenty of clean quiet fun, LOADS of power (hovers at 1/2 power without issue), I don't have to pay to fuel that Big Saito in my funtana, it acts enough like a normal RC aerobat to convince me it's an airplane, and it's just plain fun! It is also pretty durable (relative to it's weight), and once you have all the specialty microsized gear the planes are pretty dang cheap so dont kill the onboard stuff and you should be able to add your next model for only about 30.00 , or even less if you do a  plans built one. . .this may ease the sticker shock. Also factor in that you don't need club dues, miles and gas on the car, and I guess since I dont think the AMA will cover you at a park then you may as well not get that either. . . and don't forget that since you aren't burning 20 dollar a gallon glow fuel each time you fly it that it will probably pay for itself over a year or two of active flying relative to a glow model.  I won't turn in my Funtana or Ultimate for one of these, per se, but this is a great addition to the hangar and chances are good the glow planes will be gathering dust till I have the time for them. . . provided I can get some stick time on the first ShockFlyer owned by a university (well, i assume that its the first, and probably only one)I didn't have my fill with just one flight so we went back out after we posted the above, the lights were on in the park for about a minute then a guy shouts "I gotta turn off the lights" so Ben landed real quick and we decided tomorrow would have to do.Here are the specs on this one:Ikarus ShockFlyer Edge 540 3D Electric3x  Hitec HS-55 ServosHitec Featherweight FM receiverAXI 2208/34 MotorKokam 11.1v 700 mah 3 cell Lithium-Polymer batteryJeti ESCAnd a little tape=FUN!Here is a link:http://www.hobby-lobby.com/shockflyer-edge.htmS!TX-EcoDragonBlack 1TX-Squadron XO

[TX-EcoDragon]

32 Knot winds put a damper on the fun  :-(S!TX-EcoDragonBlack 1TX-Squadron XO