ParkZone Slo-V

[Ellis]

I flew my Slo-V - that I bought for my wife to fly, ha ha - for the first time last evening and had a blast.
I flew at my house where there's an empty lot - solid 6' high blackberries though. It glided nicely when I cut the throttle and it turned better than I was expecting. Other than having to retrieve it out of the blackberries a couple of times, it was a great success.

Next I'll try to fly it from my 2nd level deck. It might be cool perspective. Then we''ll see if it can hold a cam.

Maybe my wife will even get to fly it.

[mrmugen]

Haha.....my wife still hasn't used her mill or lathe! Not sure why? I mean I spent foolishly on those for her to enjoy! Maybe someday when I get out of her way she will get a chance to use them...hehe.

Glad to hear the maiden went well. I still haven't flown mine successfully. I got it when on vacation in Mississippi and flew it 3 times straight into the ground and cracked the CF fuse stick.
I since then added a bl motor and good servo's and never tried it again. If anyone wants one (or 2 for that matter) I have them like new here and not getting used.

I do however like it's slo flying ability....just to into gas to go back now.

Maybe you could video it for us to see? I like blackberries....

Kevin

[Ellis]

May 23, 2008 15:12:53 GMT 1 mrmugen said:

I got it when on vacation in Mississippi and flew it 3 times straight into the ground and cracked the CF fuse stick.
I since then added a bl motor and good servo's and never tried it again. If anyone wants one (or 2 for that matter) I have them like new here and not getting used.

Sorry to hear that. Also sorry to hear that the CF fuse isn't indestructible - I was counting on at least that...haha.

My son is visiting from UofO this weekend, he may be interested in your Slo-V after seeing mine. PM me with details.

Blackberries...Yum... But if I don't do better before they're ripe, I'll have to dedicate a set of clothes just for plane retrieval - stains and snags on my Sunday best just wouldn't do.

I was also thinking of making a little runway on my deck rail, sort of aircraft carrier style-should make a good vid success or failure.

[flydiver]

The fuse is actually pretty thin and fragile. I have one one a WASP (aileron plane with R/E and brushless). You can stiffen it up by gluing a small birch stick inside. Don't hammer the size that barely fits in there-it splits. Ask me how I know.
Makes it more crash resistant and prevents twist somewhat too. With more power or aggressive maneuvers, something the Stock Slo-V can barely do you really notice the stick twisting. Really shows up with ailerons. If you up the power (necessary for aerial photo) I think you'll notice this.

Not to dis your thread but if people are reading this and considering a Slo-V I strongly suggest the Slow Stick instead. In overall quality of ALL components there is hardly even a comparison. You can also get so much info it makes your head swim-either a good or bad thing but not neutral. Modification up the wazoo. Minimal info on a Slo-V.

The main advantage the SV has over the SS is being RTF-no building, no stand alone components necessary. In general, in stock trim they fly in a similar fashion.

And what's with that POS proprietary battery connection??!! That's REALLY annoying. Tamiya is bad enough without that crap.

fly

[Ellis]

I want my money baaack...

But seriously the reason I got it was that it is RTF, and for that it seems to fit the bill. I can't imagine wanting to make mods to it - I'll probably be doing that to the SC this winter and then I'll have a TX.

Your points are valid, and for most forum members the Stick would make more sense.

And I am going to stick a camera on that ...plane.

Thanks,
Ellis

I'm happy it flew at all!

[flydiver]

Thought that was probably the case for you. Since this is often a forum for new fliers I thought it good to let people know there were other options.
My experience came from a local new flier I've been helping. He got a SC and of course beat the crap out of it. I let him fly my SS and he just LOVED the nice slow flight. It was within his speed capability then.
But, he's not a builder so he got a SV. He has me check everything out, put them up the first time and trim them out so I've gotten to compare the 2 up close.

Funny but typical story:
After he got the Cub and had gotten some BASIC flying ability he lost it flying in too much wind and smashed it into a brick building at full speed. Broke the bejeezus out of it. Glued it back together (new motor/gears/etc.). d**ned if it didn't fly OK. I got it up and trimmed and gave him the TX. He was all excited, did a loop, wing folded and this time it really busted up. Wing was weakened from the crash and he did not replace the struts. That's why I put the carbon rod in the wing in mine.
He got a whole new fuse and motor. Put it together. Bought a Slo-V, a cheaper, RTF SS because he really liked the way the SS flies. It's very underpowered but is OK, a lot like the SS on 6-cells, which is what powers it.
Wind blew all last week. Not wanting to risk the fixed Cub he took the Slo-V out-bad mistake. Very poor plane in wind. It blew away (of course-I wouldn't have risked my SS in that wind) and he smashed the hell out of it-lawn dart under full power. Had to get a whole new fuse and motor.

If you are going to do AP with it check out the motor upgrades (maybe), wing reinforcements (for sure), and definitely put at LEAST 7-cells/2S lipo on it. You can find that stuff in the SS threads in the other forums like Wattflyer and RCGroups.

fly

[Ellis]

;D Hey Guy's,
Here's the vid I took this AM. It was a little breezy but not too bad. With the cam I had trouble getting enough altitude, but still had a great time. I think I finally found my SC spot - But only at low tide and low winds. We'll have to see how often that happens this summer.
It was under powered with the cam for sure, but also one of the bullet connectors was completely loose and was cutting out a bit.
I also think one of the batteries is NG.

Re: the horiz. lines on the video. I've seen that on other vids, so whats up with that? It didn't happen with the SC.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=5er88S6nzyw

[flydiver]

"Wagon Wheel" effect? The camera has a certain frames/sec. The prop has rotations/sec. Getting a visual harmonic? The field below where the prop would be seemed clear.

Nice spot. Where are you flying?
Is sand and salthingyer an issue with equipment?

Arghh, I could see that stupid battery connector. At least it looks better than the Tamiya but certainly is not standard with anything else I have ever seen.

fly

[Ellis]

[quote author=flydiver board=general thread=1399 post=9245 time=1211668677
Nice spot. Where are you flying?
Is sand and salthingyer an issue with equipment?[/quote]

I'm in Yachats "ya-hots" Oregon (central coast). Population 750.
Maybe I should hose her down when I get home .

I wonder what the stock SC batteries would do on it.?
With new connectors of course ,

[mrmugen]

The sc batts will be too heavy. Do you have a lipo compatable charger? If so there are a bunch of cheap little 3s lipos out there that would provide lots of power and runtime.

[flydiver]

May 25, 2008 15:28:37 GMT 1 mrmugen said:

The sc batts will be too heavy. Do you have a lipo compatable charger? If so there are a bunch of cheap little 3s lipos out there that would provide lots of power and runtime.

Power-wise 7-cells would be fine. You have limited range of wing movement unless you start modifying the position of the battery pack. so you would need to pay attention to the CG.

3S would NOT be good on it-for long. The 300 brushed motor will die pretty rapidly. Tiny brushes. If that is of no concern, prop down and go for it.

BTW, standard 10mm stick mounts don't fit if you burn it up and want replacement with something else. Popsicle sticks x2 make nice shims-fit perfectly.

fly

[mikejbb]

I use my stock sc 7-cells in my slo-v and it works great. You do have to move the battery back off the battery holder but in front of the landing gear. I usually fiberglass straping tape the battery to the fuse. Then you get reasonable power and way longer flight times. I think I also moved the servos so they are up just ever so slightly in the neutral trim position. I move the trim while I'm flying depending on battery power.

Re fuse, I'm on my 4th. I needed to learn how to fly at all before trying the slo-v. At least with the sc I could keep her up and not kill her every time. But then I learned to fly with fms and now do ok with both planes. I put cf on each side of the fues after the 3rd one twisted. That's what always happenned to me. I used black cf glue and it's been fine for a long time now. The landing gear just broke off yesterday so I taped it on for now, but I'll epoxy it soon.

So a 2 cell lipo would work on the slo-v? Sounds very interesting! Of course I already deans ultra'd the slo-v.

Mike

[Ellis]

Thanks for the reply on the battery Mike. When I get everything Deaned over I'll give it a try.

I spent so much time with FMS and a usb Playstation type controller, that I had no trouble with the SC on the second outing and the Slo-V went well from the start - all I needed was space and lots of it. I'm still going to try to fly it off my deck, but alas there's those blackberries.

[cvrcmember]

The Slo-V is a really cool plane, I want one a lot!

[Ellis]

Yeah it's a fun plane to fly.
I like to use my 7-cell SC battery in it. At half throttle it still has more power and much longer flight time. Of course full throttle is pretty cool, but I don't push it - it'll probably fry the motor at some point.