The HZ was my wife's first plane. It was terrible.....
I hope this Apprentice is better than the HZ. I'm kinda skeptical because the HZ also had great reviews...
The short version...........BUY ONE!!!
Longer version.....
After 2 plus decades of racing RC cars it was time for something different. Planes had always peaked my interest but that extra dimension (model to ground) had kept me away.
Started with a HZ cub with its ACT system and quickly disconnected it. As I worked out orientation,left stick right stick VS throttle and wheel in rc cars, I Had a few (dozen) crashes...... fixed things with glue and flew the cub some more. That was a little over 2 months ago.
Since than I had purchased and flew (and crashed) a PZ T28 and P47.
Walked into hobby store one day and the owner (who was doing a bang up business selling me, and another newbie friend I drug into planes parts) sold me on the Apprentice he just got in stock.
I charged the batteries that night and did the MINIMAL construction......and took it to the field the following morning.
Took off In Beginner mode......perfectly. Flew it around some and than tried to THROW it around.......no go.
No Matter how hard I tried to get the plane out of shape in beginner mode, it kept me flying like as if Ive been Flying for years.
Switched to Int mode while in the air, and like the review video, it woke things up a bit making things a bit more interesting while also retaining the oh crap function. I tried loops, rolls dives......while the system prevented any all out moves, it was possible to get into trouble and out .......almost immediately by yanking on the oh crap switch.
Switched to advanced mode......and the plane really came to life....(sloppy due to my relative inexperience) loops, rolls,inverted flight,dives towards the ground............ALL could be corrected and the plane brought back to level flight QUICKLY.....by yanking on the oh crap switch.
A month or so later......
The plane is no slouch, and CAN move along pretty quickly keeping things interesting.The oh crap switch has DEFINITELY saved the plane several times for me, as I pushed it to learn what NOT to do with it, or any other plane for that matter.
As mentioned above I also bought a p47.....lawndarted and Killed it the first time out. I have since reglued the fuse and replaced the wing and for SAG's pulled trhe Apprentice gyro/oh crap/reciever from it and stuck it in the p47.
Take offs with the P47 and the apprentice Safe system receiver installed turned out to be NON issue....nice level winged take offs with limited elevator movements had the P47 take to the air VERY nicely, while also limiting mid air flight VERY MUCH like it was in the Apprentice while Moving through all 3 modes from Beginner to advanced. In advanced mode there seems to be no limiting, yet the Oh crap switch remains available, and works a charm when getting into trouble.
Landings have become uneventful with the p47 by simply switching to beginner mode on final approach and concentrating on just Throttle. The system keeps the plane nice and level, and decreasing throttle nice and easy has me looking like Ive been flying for years instead of a couple months.
I guess you can call me an impulsive buyer as last week at a local clubs fly in breakfast I bought a nitro powered Hangar 9 P51 to add to my perhaps too quickly growing fleet of planes.
I trust the Apprentice's gyro/Oh crap/receiver SAFE technology so much more than my own "abilities" at this point, that my maiden (kinda "planned" for sometime this week) with the p51 WILL have the Safe receiver from the apprentice installed and activated. Ill be sure to report back as to how and or if THAT works out.
IMPORTANT to note....
if anyone plans to use the SAFE receiver from the apprentice in a plane that is NOT the Apprentice, you will have to make sure that ALL servo movements are the SAME as in the apprentice (as far as servo reversing goes) With the stock apprentice 5e radio all servo reversing switches are set to "normal". On the p47, I had to move the servo horn for either the elevator or rudder to push pull from the opposite side of its stock orientation rather than simply reversing the servo via radio. The receiver is "SMART", but the oh crap system thinks its still in the apprentice, and the gyros and oh crap setup only work one way( cant be reversed)............nother words If I simply reversed servo operation via the radio for say the elevator and pulled the Oh crap switch mid air during a dive, it would correct for a "normally set servo"..... and further drive the plane into the ground rather than bringing the nose back up.