When I was flying back in the late 80’s one of my favorite models was the Great Planes Super Sportster. (I had a .60 size with a Super Tigre 90 and tuned pipe) It was one of those aircraft that was both aerobatic and easy to fly. Needles to say, when I ran across the electric version while cruising the Tower Hobbies website I just had to have it.

With a price tag of $109.95 that included the ARF kit, electric motor, speed controller and 2200 ma nicad battery it was just “plane” irresistable! (pardon the pun). The kit itself was everything good I remember about Great Planes models, and with a 48” wingspan big enough to be a decent flyer. With it being and ARF, there really wasn’t that much building to it. I finished the wing and mounted the ailerons in one evening after work, and attached the tail feathers to the fuselage the next. The CA hinges were quick and easy to install in all the control surfaces and everything aligned well. The hardware that came with the kit did leave a bit to be desired though. Mine had all the wheel collars, but only had two of the allen head set screws. Not a big deal, I hit a local hobby shop and bought a couple of packs of Dubro collars. The included speed control was also missing the switch plate. Luckily I was able to scrounge one of those up from a friend and fellow modeler.

When I bought the kit I purchased 3 Futaba 3114 micro servos and when it came time to radio it up found that the servos were a bit too small to fit the existing servo trays. Instead of re-engineering the servo trays I bought some Hobbico units which were the right size and even a bit stronger in the torque department. For those reading this, the servo tray openings are 1.2” in length. For a radio, I used my Spektrum 6 channel. (great radio by the way). Once built and radioed up I found that the model itself is a bit on the nose heavy side. Probably from the big 600 size brushed motor. Mine was even nose heavy without the battery pack installed. After charging and installing the pack to cycle the battery a few times before attempting to fly, I also found that the speed controller that came with my kit was defective. It would run for a couple of minutes and then cut off all by itself. Not just the motor, but power to the radio as well. A few seconds later it would resume normal operation for about 10 seconds and repeat. With patience not being one of my virtues, I just purchased another controller that works with nicad or lipo batteries. (I figured I had already voided the warranty on the original one anyway when I cut and hardwired the switch wires to see if the switch itself was the problem) With the new controller, I also elected to use a 2200 ma 11.1v lipo pack (from one of my copters) to save a bit of weight, and still had to add about 7/8 oz of lead to the tail to get the balance point right.
Flying the Sportster is just like flying a Sportster. It made it’s maiden flight on April 1st 2007 and was un-eventful. Although a bit breezy, (probably 10-15 knot winds) it flew well, tracked well and did basically what the thumbs told it to do. I chose to do the test flight myself and handled it just fine. (That’s a milestone for me since this was only airplane flight number 4 since getting started back into the hobby at Christmas.) I did leave the flight short and landed after about 3 minutes. The battery pack was warm but by no means hot, so there were still a few minutes of flight time left.

Other than the takeoff run most of the flight was done at 1/2 to 3/4 throttle since the motor is only rated for 9 volts and I didn’t want to burn it up just yet. (I still have memories of what happened to the motor in my Walkera 60 when I tried running a lipo on it’s brushed motor) It still had plenty of power for loops and rolls. After landing (not graceful, but all in one piece) I let the pack cool down, gave it a recharge and turned the controls over to another pilot so I could shoot some video of it in the air. Larry actually flies a lot of big scale models but was still taken by the little electric Sportster, and said that on a calmer day it should do anything I wanted it to do. As of this writing, I’m inclined to believe him. This little plane is a joy to fly. It will power through the top of a loop at 2/3 throttle, and rolls are acceptable although it could use a little more aileron effect for the way I like to fly. The strip ailerons are small, and with throws set at recommended angles rolls are not fast. And, my thumbs are still rusty enough for them not to be pretty either. <grin>