I've had my concerns about ARFS being a detriment to control line in the respect that they will eventually replace building your own model altogether. I still have that concern.
However I have found the perfect niche for ARFs. And that is using them to learn to fly.
Jan crashed his plane a couple days ago and for all intents and purposes would have been out of the box for several weeks (at least) if it were'nt for this BARF Clown. He has a Fancy Pants he did a nice job on building but he's way too timid flying it to expand his flight envelope. There is also a BARF Cardinal in his fleet but for some reason he hasn't really learned anything new with it.
The latest plane he doinked was a SkyLark with an OS 30. He was starting to get good with it. He was doing multiple inside loops and lazy eights as well as consecutive outside loops entered on the backside of the lazy eight. I think he was doing well with it because it was small and lite on the handle.
Also it was a plane that Big Art gave me and told me to do whatever I wanted with it. So I gave it to Jan. I guess there isn't anything like having a low time/money investment model to learn to fly with.
Anyway------Jan had the BARF Super Clown and he brought it over today and we bashed the heck out of it and tomorrow he gets to come out and fly. He ordered plans from Brodak for a 59 Ares so this ARF bisiness isn't going to keep him from building.
It's all good, guys.
Tuesday I have an appointment with Charlie Campbell (retread) who learned to fly a long time ago with Jerry Phelps. Like Jerry , Charlie flies backwards so to get him started I'm going to help him bash together an ARF Nobler. Only thing will be different is we're going to put the wing in upside down so he can fly it backwards.
