Hangar 9 P-51D Mustang 60cc ARF 2 Boxes HAN4770 Airplanes ARF Giant

This plane looks absolutely outstanding, flies great, it's fast, but… it needs extra attention before assembly if you want it to last the rest of time. I guess I will start with the good, this plane is gorgeous, the scale details look great, the scale lines are beautiful, the canopy is a nice touch to see extra details in the cockpit. The flight characteristics are great, it flies great at low speed, it lands like a dream with the flaps down. Bring it in with the throttle cracked and the flaps down, wait for the plane to stabilize maybe a foot over the runway and then chop the throttle, the plane will set down on the mains for a scale landing and the tail will stay I the air for a while until the speed comes down. There is very little P-Factor to contend with at takeoff and landing so don't worry about that. With a GP61 in my Mustang I hit a top speed of 131 mph in level flight, I mean to tell you that everyone at the field calls this thing is a rocket ship, but be gentle with the elevator because if you pull too hard or if you have too much throw, you will stall the wing instantly and it is a violent stall, not a mild stall, but it is recoverable. I absolutely love this plane, it's a blast to fly, it has a good roll rate for barrel rolls and the speed is absolutely addicting. It doesn't perform well inverted but I may be a bit nose heavy currently but I'm going to experiment with that. My plane took 3 pounds of nose weight to balance out and that is where some of the durability issues come from. You need to soak the nose if this plane with CA to help prevent the seams from splitting from supporting the nose weight. Hindsight I should have glassed the inside skeleton of the nose to prevent these issues but it gives me the excuse to re-cover this with a different livery because another issue which is a minor gripe, this plane disappears in the sun and becomes difficult to see if the wings are level. I'd love to have this plane with the 1500mm foamy livery. Last real grip is the landing gear and the gear doors. If you are going to use the gear doors then save your hairline and buy 180 servos for this job. If you use a standard servo you end up with a really long arm which robs all of your torque, even then you have to put the gear up at low speed or you will have an issue. Bottom line the main gear doors are a beautiful detail that is a nightmare to live with. The main gear themselves work well but the parts availability for them is a huge annoyance. My gear were backordered so long that I bought a set from a hobby shop in Germany so I could enjoy this plane during the short flying season we have in Michigan. It appears like it would have taken 4 months if I hadn't bought my gear from another country. Bottom line would I recommend this plane???? Absolutely I would recommend this plane, it's positives far outweigh it's negatives and it is fast!!!!