Time lapse build WARNING - Not sixth scale; tenth scale instead.

Wow. Super impressive, Tank Girl. That video was cool. (Perfect landing.)

Dadrab, that’s a very cool and heart-warming story, I enjoyed reading that very much. The advice from you dad was brilliant, he sounds like a really cool guy. And thank you for curbing my curiosity about those canons.  

TankGirl, your planes are an astonishing marvel, I really enjoyed watching the flight video. Also, I thought the pilot in the cockpit was really neat, the flight helmet, the goggles, and parts of her uniform look really cool. And man! All those jets in the line-up, just stunning!

Thank you both of you, for sharing all these marvelous creations, this thread has been an eye-opener.

shazzdan wrote:What? No flamethrowers or autocannons?

 Naw...can't have everything on one build. HA!

Thanks very much, sir.

tankgirlfuzzy wrote:That is one cool looking boat, dadrab! Do you have any pics/video of it in the water?

Thank you, Tankgirl. I do have photos, somewhere, but I'll have to either dig them up and scan them OR, charge up the batteries and go shoot some new ones. That sounds like a plan...

Your planes are beautiful. I especially like the Focke-Wulf. It's so nice looking, I'd be scared to fly it...same with your foamie. Wonderful paint work. The time you put into it shows.

Damn fine flying in the video, too. Stryker pegged it...beautiful landing.

That's a skill I do not have and I have great admiration for those who do.

That pilot head isn't supposed to resemble anyone we share forum correspondence with, is it?    The shape of the face is close.

Fact is, I've been working on a flying model (scratch build) for quite a while and can't get the damn thing off the ground. Needs more thrust... If it ever goes airborne, I'll show it here as it does have to do with sixth scale.  

BAD WOLF-787 wrote:@ dadrab: Very impressive boat, WOW!

Thanks for sharing!

Thank you, Wolf. Mighty nice of you to drop in and look.

Fox915 wrote:Dadrab, that’s a very cool and heart-warming story, I enjoyed reading that very much. The advice from you dad was brilliant, he sounds like a really cool guy. And thank you for curbing my curiosity about those canons.  

Thank you both of you, for sharing all these marvelous creations, this thread has been an eye-opener.

Well, I reckon I grew up like most of us...parents suck. However, with age (hopefully) comes a little wisdom and one day it dawned on me that my folks weren't nearly as stupid as I'd given them credit for being. My mom had a stunning singing voice (truly) and my dad could knock on the door of genius from time to time. Wish they were still here.

Glad you've enjoyed the thread thus far. I appreciate the interest...I really do.

Now, let's see about charging those batteries...

And, I forgot a cool/sad tale from the days of my youth as a newspaper reporter.

@tankgirlfuzzy - I have seen RC jets fly...and then...

...here goes.

It must have been in the mid 80's. I worked at the daily newspaper in Anderson, S.C. and part of my gig was covering everything on Sundays. One Sunday afternoon, I was sent to a rather large RC air show in a nearby town.

When I got to the airport, the place was packed...no where to park...people all over the damn place.

I walked around for a while and looked at all the beautiful aircraft - and, there were a lot of them in all shapes and sizes.

Folks were flying and watching and having a good time, in general.

There was one guy who flew RC helicopters. Man, was he good. The boy could roll the chopper upside down and hover...and hover...and just stay put. Lower and lower he'd go until the blades were actually cutting off the tops of the fescue grass risers on an unmowed part of the field. He was killer.

Then, another guy stepped up to fly his jet. I don't remember the exact make, sorry. But, it was a beautiful build. I'd already talked to him about the plane since it really stood out and it was huge. He showed me around it and explained about "ducted fan" engines and all that.

Well, he did all the pre-flight stuff and finally taxied it down the runway. All the way down to one end, it rolled. He turned it around and goosed the throttle coming back. The plane took to the wing beautifully.

Once he was airborne, he throttled back a little, but didn't put his nose down. The big model began to slow...he was stalling and he knew it.

He throttled back up, leveled it out a little and then nosed back up to gain some altitude.

I don't know if he lost throttle control or exactly what happened, but at about 100 feet, the big bird just stopped...stalled with the nose up going nowhere fast.

He began to slowly lose altitude. But suddenly, the nose went down and he powered right into the ground.

There were pieces of that plane scattered for 50 yards.

While I felt really bad for the guy, he kind of shrugged it off and began collecting pieces. (I could have sworn I saw a tear, though...)

Despite my sorrow at his misfortune, it was one of the coolest things I've ever seen.

BAD WOLF-787 wrote:@ dadrab: Very impressive boat, WOW!

@ tank girl: Amazing looking airplanes and video and extremely cool lineup of jets!  WOW!


Thanks for sharing!

Stryker2011 wrote:Wow. Super impressive, Tank Girl. That video was cool. (Perfect landing.)

Fox915 wrote:
TankGirl, your planes are an astonishing marvel, I really enjoyed watching the flight video. Also, I thought the pilot in the cockpit was really neat, the flight helmet, the goggles, and parts of her uniform look really cool. And man! All those jets in the line-up, just stunning!

Thank you both of you, for sharing all these marvelous creations, this thread has been an eye-opener.

dadrab wrote:
Thank you, Tankgirl. I do have photos, somewhere, but I'll have to either dig them up and scan them OR, charge up the batteries and go shoot some new ones. That sounds like a plan...

Your planes are beautiful. I especially like the Focke-Wulf. It's so nice looking, I'd be scared to fly it...same with your foamie. Wonderful paint work. The time you put into it shows.

Damn fine flying in the video, too. Stryker pegged it...beautiful landing.

That's a skill I do not have and I have great admiration for those who do.

That pilot head isn't supposed to resemble anyone we share forum correspondence with, is it?    The shape of the face is close.

Fact is, I've been working on a flying model (scratch build) for quite a while and can't get the damn thing off the ground. Needs more thrust... If it ever goes airborne, I'll show it here as it does have to do with sixth scale.  

Thanks to all for the compliments! I'm glad you like the vid and pics! As far as perfect landings, well, let's just say you didn't get to see the other not-quite-as-smooth one! Seriously, though, I'd say that video was taken around my "peak" skill level when I was doing a lot of flying and dialed into my planes, especially that one. I'm far more rusty now and probably would have trouble with that plane, as it has a pretty high wing loading. I'll need to practice a lot with easier planes (high wing trainers like Cubs) before I'm ready to go back to flying that one.

@dadbrab, forgive me for being dense, but I didn't quite get your meaning about resemblance of the pilot head. You mean to me?  Well, if I were a hot redhead with model-like features, maybe! No, I had an extra and liked her look so just used her. She was one of those generic heads that fit on Cy-Girl bodies back in the day, and I had a couple of extras leftover from old projects.

Look forward to seeing your flying creation. Yup thrust/weight is key, but so is high lift wing shapes and center of gravity. Sounds like you're pretty knowledgeable, though.

And about that jet that crashed I've seen my fair share (not just jets, all types), including my own, and sometimes the most spectacular ones are the ones you get over quickest! Sounds like that old ducted fan (probably nitro--electrics just couldn't cut it back then) just wasn't up to it, but it also sounds somewhat tail-heavy, which is asking for plane death for most jets. Today's electric ducted fans are pretty incredible, the technology has leapt light years in just these past 10 years. When I started they were mostly barely flyable, now the big ones can rival turbines for power, and they have a whoosh/whine that is almost turbine like, though not quite as loud and deep. But your jet crash story sounds exactly accurate--most designs (esp. the scale ones) are not meant to fly without adequate airspeed or thrust, they'll just fall out of the sky. I've never heard of a successful model jet dead-stick landing. By contrast, I've brought in several deadsticks of prop planes, including an emergency P-51 landing where a fellow club member handed me his transmitter in panic when it became clear his battery tray had broken loose and slid all the way to the tail, rendering it unflyable under power. I successfully landed it by reducing power to idle and going full down elevator, literally diving it straight at the runway to gain airspeed, then flaring it level at the last second to give it a controlled hard landing on its mains without damage. Luckily it was a very robust airframe that could handle it.

My most spectacular crash was when my receiver on a foam Sea Fury burnt out its battery bypass and became unresponsive, and the plane literally dove at full throttle into the ground from about 200 ft while I helplessly jiggled the sticks! Total toast, but I saved the motor and built another and still fly it to this day!

As all the old-timers will tell you, "crashing is part of flying!"