G'Day all from the land down under!!
After many woes (due to the fine postal workers and their size 12 boots!!) I have now soloed the LiteStik several times !! Pretty darn happy chappy!!
I am running a 7 pack of 280 mAh NiMH and getting around 7-10 mins. It flies quite well and I haven't had to add more dihedral for manouverability -- I think the postal damage fixed that for me (:-)
I am concerned about the durability of the motor as I have to keep it at almost full throttle to keep a resemblance of controlled flight -- does anyone have a line to replacement goodies that might be available down under??
As the new stik has arrived I hope it will perform much better -- Also I am building from scratch a full moving rudder and tail version (Amazing what you can do with a couple of used butchers meat trays!!) If that works out I have already built a couple of wings that are crying out for aileron -- as a newbie I am wondering just how much you can replace and still call it a litestik? (:-) I gotta say I'm falling in love with this wee beastie!!!
Kind regards, Simon Wilson
I want to share my rookie experience with other LiteStick newbies. I am a 65-year-old with no flight experience for the last 40 years. My, how things have changed.
I am a pretty good modeler, so I had no trouble assembling the LiteStick (although, I missed any mention of CG in the instructions). My first two flights ended with minor crashes but damage was minor in both cases.
The third and fourth "flights" were less destructive because of a new battery discovery. The WalMart 9V battery has a number of advantages for the new flyer:
- It's cheap: about $7 each and $7 for the overnight charger.
- It's light (about half of the weight of my 6-cell 270mAh
pack).
- It has more power for take-off @ 8.4v vs 7.2v for my 270
mAh pack.
- The best feature is the lower weight / mass does less
damage when I get sucked into the same LiteStick-eating tree (:-)
I have read hundreds of postings on SFRC, but none of you told me that this plane needs to be trimmed to avoid a right turn on take off. After four flights, I have finally figured this out and made the necessary preflight adjustments. Flight five was hand launched by my wife of 45 years who is philosophical about this sort of thing. The plane flew straight with a slight climb that missed my neighbors fence by comfortable 2 feet (:-) Right turns are easier than left turns (must have to do with installation of wing skewers). A flight time of roughly 6 minutes ended in a very nice looking landing; my first in 5 flights.
I am enthusiastic about slow flight and sure that I have nowhere to go but up after getting by the rookie jitters. If I can be of any help to other first-timers, please drop me a note.
Regards, Ed Cote
I have two LiteStiks but one is still in the box. I fly the first one stock and built just as the book calls for. I use two very very tiny servos, the Wattage switchable speed control unit, and a 150 mAh 6 cell wattage battery pack. I am using an FMA dual conversion feather lite receiver with a Futaba FM transmitter. My daughter used a Polarid to take a not-so-good photo of my LiteStik.
Roy Friedersdorf - Gas City, Indiana - Newsletter Editor and Spokesperson for the Converse Flying Eagles R.C. Club Inc.