Good Slow Trainer for Newbie with no buddy box friends

4U2NVME

Member
Hey all, been driving my wife crazy for quite a while with Flite Test, I can't watch it on the TV anymore :mad: but hey I always have the PC.

I know this has been asked a few times, but before I get the hey its in here, look ( I already did ) or just build this... i want to give you some background.

I have already built two FT planes, I built the Tiny Sparrow, and the Tiny Trainer, I even got some success with the Tiny Trainer but found it flew faster then my brain could work.... I did get the plane in the air, and even impressed the wife, but in the process I destroyed about a dozen props.. .1 per flight... ok 1 prop lasted two flights... Repaired it quite a few times until the wings folded in flights and well you know the rest. I do have some before and after pics and video of the Sparrow and Tiny Trainer...

What I would like to let you all know is what I am building with. For the Sparrow and the Tiny Trainer I was using:

1000 mah Battery 2S
DX 2205 KV2300 Electric Motor.

I had figured that a 2S battery would keep it slow.. but they still moved pretty quick for a new flyer.

The main parts i have and like to build with if possible are:

Motors:
A2212 KV1400 x2
DX2205 KV2300 x4

Batteries:
2200 mah 2s
2200 mah 3s
1000 mah 2s

Radio:
Spektrum DX6

Servos:
9g Servos.

Using these parts if possible, what would be a good, SLOW, trainer to fly with, when there is nobody to buddy box with? Thanks in advance for a good direction to move with, I have the foam board ready to go :)

-Brad
 

foamtest

Toothpick glider kid
It looks like you could use that A2212 KV1400 motor and build an Old Fogey, its supper slow and flies really well. I have also designed a plane a while ago to run off of those smaller motors you have and it flies even slower. Here's links to both articles. Unfortunately for mine I have not made plans for it because I don't know how to, but I may just have to revisit it again so I might try and make plans.

Old Fogey
https://www.flitetest.com/articles/FT_Old_Fogey_Scratch_Build

My design
https://www.flitetest.com/articles/foam-test-basic-trainer
 

foamtest

Toothpick glider kid
Also feel free to tell us a little about yourself, where in the world you're from, etc...
 

4U2NVME

Member
Also feel free to tell us a little about yourself, where in the world you're from, etc...

Foam test, thank for the quick reply back... I'll take a peek at that one. I am a Canuck from Southern Alberta, where its cold and windy most of the time, at least during this time of year. The last couple weeks have been weird though, I have been able to fly or at least attempt to. Think of Chicago's weather and I assume we are pretty close to that. So getting some quiet enough weather with no wind to get a plane in the air is a good day.

As I said been watching Flite Test for over a year now, and started and stopped the build processes a few times, but over the last couple weeks have been able to get something out there and in the air. Learned a whole lot and know where many of my mistakes were, and hope to learn from them. I kind of chuckle when I read people saying, that they still have their first foam plane up on the wall somewhere.... Mine.. its no longer a trophy, but it looks like more of a junk yard special.

Everything I have done to this point has mostly been from Flite Test, so as Josh Says building experiences... I hope I can find people to eventually share this with... but for now has been fully self taught with the FT's team's experiences. All's I can say is my maiden, maiden's flight was not as easy or strait as it shows on youtube.

As a side not I do have a Flite Trainer that I have spent some time with, a dozen or so hours and that at least got me the feel for it.

On to my next success!

-NV
 

rfd

AMA 51668
big, slow, and stable are the flight prerequisites for a good newbie trainer.

a 3ch ol' fogey is a good start. the under-camber wing is simple and efficient, the cabin large and roomy.

and you don't need to be a newbie to enjoy the soaring flight of an old timer.

build the bird with good alignment and watch the C/G.

weight isn't a big issue, just don't go overboard.

set yer radio for dual rates and/or expo and yer good to go.

it always helps to get in lots of sim stick time, and there's an ol' fogey for the phoenix sim.


the real deal ....
 
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4U2NVME

Member
Ok, Printed out the PDF for the Old Fogey today.... just in time for 25 CM of snow over the next few days!! ;) Going to be a white XMAS.... Happy holidays everybody!

-NV
 
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4U2NVME

Member
Thanks FoamTest and RFD. I got it built, got outside with it and was able to get three full batteries in, no crashes, no destroyed props, no new wings or body, and especially no new hot glue.

I am getting about 5 - 7 minutes flight time on a 1000mah 2S Lipo. When I land it the batter is at about 35%, does that sound about right? Once I get comfortable, will it fly with a 2200 mah 2S battery if I get the COG correct, or do I loose the additional flight time because of the additional weight?

Was pretty cool just have work on trimming it out a little bit more ( I may need to index one cog on the servo as I maxed out the trim on the remote ) but other then that Its a pretty good success. I may even think of putting some paint on it, spray bomb of some sort... you all know what works best for Adams dollar store foamboard? Since it looks like it may survive a few flights, and it will make it easier picking it out of the sky.

I have a video or two and a few pics which I may post in here, or link to, both my successes and failures. Again appreciate the good direction to go on the Old Fogey, and for people in the future its a good place to start.

I am getting about 5 - 7 minutes flight time on a 1000mah 2S Lipo. When I land it the battery is at about 35%, does that sound about right? Once I get comfortable, will it fly with a 2200 mah 2S battery if I get the COG correct, or do I loose the additional flight time because of the additional weight?

-NV
 

rfd

AMA 51668
good deal, nv - you got her built AND flown quite well in just a few dayze! :applause:

for a 2s lipo i don't wanna go much below 7.5v. a pair of my radios use 2s lipos and i set the batt alarm to 7.5v max. lipo's have a happy range of voltage they like, not too much or too little.

i think most any paint will adhere to that white DSFB, it's untreated paper. you could also use opaque tape.

please post images and vids!
 

Jim G

New member
Wow, I could have written this post myself

Wow, I could have written this post! Like you everything I have built or purchased goes way to fast for this old brain and reactions to contend with. I have just built the FT flyer in hopes of a slow plane to learn on. Good luck.👍🏻 :)
 

rfd

AMA 51668
Wow, I could have written this post! Like you everything I have built or purchased goes way to fast for this old brain and reactions to contend with. I have just built the FT flyer in hopes of a slow plane to learn on. Good luck. :)

no no no - you, and "millions of others" want the FT old fogey. build it with an eye towards good geometry and c/g, get the FT recommended flight pack, too. pickup a copy of the phoenix flight sim, then load in JohnRambozo's FT old fogey sim model and virtually practice flying before heading to the field.

this is the winning fixed wing combination of aircraft and sim for any newbie. blue_thumb.gif
 

4U2NVME

Member
Ok, so guess what... its still flying!!! I have about 10 or so more battery flights into the FT Old Fogey. I would agree with you rfd, the old Fogey has been and continues to be the key.

Here are a few more things I have done and learned from this process...

When I started I wanted to do everything at once, set up everything at once and have everything at once 100% correct.... but what I soon learned was there is way too much for 1 person who is doing this by themselves with FT help to do at once so don't do it all at once. Do a few things at a time, absorb, then do more... hell its only a few dollars of foam in the air, if I crash it I know I can repair, or rebuild it.

I found when I was flying that I was having problems telling if my plane was coming or going, was it turning towards or away from me because it was all white so being X-Mas at the time I was dealing with this I decided to paint it Xmas colors. I was smart enough to paint the old wings from my crashed sparrows first and learnt that paint will cause white foam board to bubble, and will cause it to warp if put on to heavy.

I remember listening to or hearing a certain type of spray paint was pretty good to use, but i guess the stuff in my garage was not good for the foam board I ended up doing two very light coats of spray paint on it and it took some color ok and did not warp or delaminate. I painted the bottom of the wings and plane black, the top of the wings and rear stabilizer green, front of the plane red, and the back part and tail section silver. Now I can see if the wings are level, which side if dropping down towards me or away from me and if I am coming towards me or away from me.

I got out Xmas day with my Step-Son and Son in Law and flew it a bit with them, they were pretty surprised and thought it was cool. Trying to convince them to get into it but not sure if that will happen, but they may come out with me a few times. That day I learned how to crash it into a tree and the front cowling took some damage but a little pinching with the fingers straitened it out.

I also wanted to try to figure out how to set my dual rates and expo at this time and my radio. So jumped back to Youtube, and within a few hours I had 3 rates ( High/Med/Low) and expo settings put into my radio on toggle G.

• 65% Dual Rate and 15% Expo
• 80% Dual Rate and 20% Expo
• 100% Dual Rate and 30% Exp
•
I have no idea if this is a correct setting or not, but is smoothed out my flying and still allowed for the plane to work and take off in all 3 settings. If anybody wants to comment constructively and explain if what I did here is incorrect and why and what I should do properly please feel free 


A few flight after that over the next few days it went well, I am still on my first prop and the prop saver has been just that, a prop saver. It allows the prop to get out of the way when I land and if the prop is in a vertical position, and if I hit something it just bends back. I ordered a few more batteries and found a great deal on airgun Lipo's. They had slightly more storage and were 2s, reading the specs they could handle the discharge rate so I grabbed them. I also grabbed 4 - 3S 1350mah Lipo's.


What did I learn from the air gun Lipo's? They are light, slender and work well, I got more flight time out of them then my current batteries and will have to see about their longevity. What did I learn about the 3S 1350mah Lipo's? Well..... It’s always good to ground test your linkages and do a proper run up of your prop...... which I actually did do. What I found out was that the rubber O-rings on the prop saver are great for 2S batteries, but when using the 3S, the prop leaves the plane behind and tries to fly off on its own.

So I was smart enough when I ordered all my parts to order extra O-rings for the prop saver and with my big mitts, they are hard to put on, but worked just well. What else I learned was this Old-Fogey comes to life when you give it an extra 3300 rpm or so on the prop, it acts as if its found the good hooch behind the straw bales in the barn, and that drinking the good stuff, you end up with a much more exciting Old Fogey.

The Fogey leaped to life, climbed vertical and ended up with a bunch of new cool characteristics. I also learned I could fly that, do loops without a run up, go vert, dive, and just have a general good time. I also learned it was time to figure out how to use the Lipo battery alarms, as when I tested the depleted battery after I was finished my fun it had only 8% left in the tank, so this has now been set to 3.6 volts as the alarm.

• I read somewhere if I use this that at about 3.3 volts the Voltage alarm will override my speed control and shut down my prop, but allow my BEC to continue working. Is this correct, does it actually do this? If so cool, see how I react to it the first time it happens.
• Is it a hard cut off, or if it’s because I am doing full draw at max speed, will it re-engage if I use a lower throttle and let me bring it in safely. I guess a new learning is coming one way or the other.
•
So what is completed so far, what have I started to commit to memory:

• How to build a foam airplane
• Use intelligent charge controllers
• How to set the electronics up and bind with radio
• Solder XT 60 connection to batteries and RC
• How to do the initial setup and verify flight surfaces are level
• Trim aircraft…. ( still work in process )
• Launch and fly it, bring it back in one piece, repeatability
• Learn character difference between 2 and 3 s batteries
• Set up High/Low rates and expo
• Set voltage alarms for Lipo’s

Still to learn

• Lots lol, but next step is to figure out Hit Film Express so I can post some video and pics to share with you all.
• Figure out next foamy to build, any suggestions from the crowd of experienced pilots? Not big on sparrow or tiny trainer as been there, crashed them, destroyed them already…..
• Build said plane and continue my journey on learning this new craft.

Enough rambling for now, thanks all for the help and insite, thanks FT for making this possible and accessible for everybody, how about a FT South someday so I can travel north of my border and visit and see what it’s all about.

-NV
 
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4U2NVME

Member
Wow, I could have written this post! Like you everything I have built or purchased goes way to fast for this old brain and reactions to contend with. I have just built the FT flyer in hopes of a slow plane to learn on. Good luck. :)

Hey Jim, thanks for the response, the Old Fogey in my experience has been the key to some measurable and continued success, if you are doing this alone, I would suggest to try it out. Its a easy and pretty quick build, best of all its manageable.

Happy flying! :black_eyed:

-NV
 

RMDC

Member
Great video - your camerawoman has such confidence in you. :p The prop fling at the end got a laugh out of me.
 

foamtest

Toothpick glider kid
I'm glad you had a good experience with the Old fogey, I would try the Ft flyer and the nutball next. They use the same electronics, are quick to build, and you can learn to high alpha, which is a ton of fun. Plus once you're comfortable with them you can crank up the rates as high as they can go and go crazy. The nutball actually does this really cool thing where if you have a 3s on it, climb to altitude then hammer the throttle and pin the left stick in one of the top corners it does this really cool spiraling dive. To get out of it all you have to do is pull up and it's back to its normal nutty self.
 

4U2NVME

Member
I did my first FPV flight... I purchased a small setup and installed it on the Old Fogey. The Fogey is starting to get a bit heavy but it still flew well... ok most of the time... until it did not. It was pretty cool, but I am not sure if I am getting the full sensation of the FPV flight. I am not sure if my camera is not level enough ( its mounted above the wing ) or if the field of view is wide enough. I was having problems trying to tell if I was climbing or not.. if I was level in flight or not.

What I did learn was, you fly further with FPV, and if you fly further behind you, with a house also behind you... you may get great video signal, but while looking through the FPV gear you may see your prop stop and there is not a thing you can do to restart it... Well ok, after thinking about it for a day, I could of turned around and pointed my radio in the direction of the plane and it may of gotten the signal back. It was only a few hundred feet away, but I think between my body and the house that is pretty close to me, there was not enough signal. So I have my first damaged prop... not to bad, everything else seems to be working ok. I'll try it a few more times, but concentrate hard to keep the plane in front of me circling around..

Waiting on my next lesson from the school of hard knocks.

-NV
 

foamtest

Toothpick glider kid
The hardest thing to learn with FPV is determining your altitude and some times orientation, but once you fly enough with it you'll learn your set up and it gets a lot easier.
 

rockyboy

Skill Collector
Mentor
The hardest thing to learn with FPV is determining your altitude and some times orientation, but once you fly enough with it you'll learn your set up and it gets a lot easier.

I'm finding the hardest thing with indoor Tiny Whoop FPV is the stupid hula-hoops are magnetic to RC signals or something 'cause I can make a dozen runs through a course in my living room and hit every darn hoop, every darn time :black_eyed:

I still haven't tried fixed wing FPV yet but I'm itching for warmer weather to get out and see how it goes!
 

4U2NVME

Member
The hardest thing to learn with FPV is determining your altitude and some times orientation, but once you fly enough with it you'll learn your set up and it gets a lot easier.

I am thinking of making the FT Explorer as my second plane that will fly ( 4th if I include my first two failures ).... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s6nOSeoaDOM

It seems to have a nice level place and lots of area for camera up front, and I can play with a couple different motor and prop setups. I may have to do this sooner then later... the Fogey is not dead, but it does need some repairs finally. My motor was twitching and not really wanting to start. I had adjusted the timing on my ESC to high because it was doing something like that with my 3S batteries when it was really cold outside.

It started not wanting to start the motor, but twitch the prop back and forth quite a bit, then I assume it went into a safe shutdown mode and reboot the ESC or receiver. I think this may of been because I was flying in +10C weather, and not -10C or colder like I have been learning in.

So I made some bad decisions, I was going to pack it in, and started to walk towards the house, and tested it one more time and the motor started... so I launched it, but this time the tree's were in front of me, and I did not turn the plane away in time, and did not climb over or between it... ( it seems like trees have a magnetic attachment to these planes ) but right into it at full throttle and caused a little front end damage.

New learning this time, when you think your flight day is done, it really should be, don't fly unless your system is 100% or pretty close to it.

So Explorer next? Good second plane ever? Not a fan of the nutball or the other one that was suggested... want a little more.. but then again may find out a little more is to much? Also saw the simple scout in their new ep. today with the floats in the snow... that could work, but is that a third or fourth plane?

-NV
 
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