Looping in Louisiana

by LALooper | August 22, 2013 | (0) Posted in Just Fun

Video Description has all the details: "FT Bloody Wonder Generic 2826 outrunner, 8x4 prop, 30A ESC, 1300mah 3S battery. The little plane had a pretty bad sink rate with the camera rubber banded on the bottom. Time to build a plane with more load capacity."

FT rocks. I have been flying models for 42 years (started with control line at 5) and RC for 35. I was on hiatus from it recently since my best flying buddy lost most of his vision to macular degeneration.

This summer my 15 year old asked if I could teach him to fly. My dad (who taught me) had recommended I check out Flite Test some months back.

We bought two cases of foam board and jumped right in. Several ebay purchases later my son is taking off and landing his FT flyer, and I am burning things up with a Bloody Wonder.

I have also designed two planes based on what I have learned from Flite Test; a 250 gram acrobat/3d/4 channel trainer (love those dual rates) and a long winged 4-channel slow flyer for my buddy with the bad eyes (if it's slow enough, big enough, and tough enough, he can still see it/fly it).

Last night I ordered what I need to complete a Versa Wing and an FT3D, so I should be making more videos soon. The Bloody Wonder is a bit small and hot for a GoPro plane.

Keep up the great work. The genuineness and accessibility makes me feel like I know all of you guys the way I would if you flew with me in my backyard. You're doing amazing things for the hobby. Drop a note if you want to come fly down on the bayou.

COMMENTS

Mikeycantoon on August 25, 2013
I had seen David's site and videos before I came across Flite Test. I might go total scratchbuild based off of his designs, but I love the work that Flite Test has done for the hobby that I'm thinking of buying their Batbone tri-copter kit to support their work. I'm and IT guy, so I'm really interested in learning the electronics as I go. I'll be using the KK2 board for sure and I've been keeping my eye on the APM 2.5. Once I learn the KK2 well enough I'll move up to the APM.
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Eddy Current on August 25, 2013
If you decide to build from scratch, you should take a look at Zach's design for his TITAN tricopter (FortisAirframes.com).
In a crash, ALL of his booms (including the tail boom) can "give way" in either direction, front or back. He uses rubber O-rings to hold the booms in position, rather than using friction, from a bolt right next to the boom. You might be able to copy that part of his design.

I don't have the patience needed to build from scratch, so I spent the coin to buy the TITAN body and I'm very pleased with the quality (materials and design). Search for "TITAN" on this site and you'll find Zach's 3 part design/build article. Part 3 has a great video at the bottom of that post.

I've bought all my parts except for the Flight Controller. I'm leaning toward the APM 2.5 mostly because of the Return To Launch (RTL) feature that you get when you add a GPS antenna. I would hate to watch my new tricopter fly off into the distance if it lost contact with my R/C Transmitter. When you add up the cost of the motors, ESCs, Flight Controller, receiver, and battery, it would be a significant chunk of change $$$ to wave goodbye to.
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Mikeycantoon on August 25, 2013
Yea, I almost went with the APM first espcially because I can use my laptop for telemetry, but I figured it would work up to it. Use the KK2 to get used to flying it, get my FPV gear, then go up to the APM.
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Corsair2014 on August 23, 2013
awesome guys. loook forward to seeing whats to come!
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flyingbuddha on August 23, 2013
thanks for sharing...Im new to the r/c world and also from Louisiana (NOLA area). I picked up a Bixler 2 two weeks ago and the process of building a FT Versa Wing.
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LALooper on September 13, 2013
I appreciate all the comments. I have since built a Versa Wing and shot lots of video, some of which is on my youtube channel at: http://www.youtube.com/user/djn1066
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Mikeycantoon on August 24, 2013
Hi, awesome video dude, great story too. I have done RC boats and cars in the past and I always wanted to get into rc aircraft but back in the day it was just too expensive for me. Now with lipos, that's all changed. Soon I'll be purchasing parts for a tri-copter build and I was very impressed by the versa wing. I have a 3yr old that I hope to bring up in the hobby when he gets just a wee bit older. I live in Natchitoches Parish btw.
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Eddy Current on August 24, 2013
For the original poster: Nice video, she really climbs well. Looking forward to more video.

For Mikeycantoon: What tri-copter are you building? A kit, like Matt Hall's simplecopter or are you doing a scratch build?
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Looping in Louisiana