I bought the Raptor last summer, parked the enormous box in a corner, and left it there for months. It all seemed too complicated for a seasoned fixed wing pilot, (all those funny terms), and it was one of my flying pals who finally prompted me to start the setting-up process.
The instructions are good if you read them very carefully, and installing the servos, linkages, switch, batteries, etc is relatively easy. At least the servos mounting spaces were accurate. However, that was the easy bit. The instructions dry up at this point and so did my enthusiam, until I came across an excellent article in the January, 2002, issue of RCM&E, entitled "Take the Plunge - frightened of setting up your latest heli? Don't be".
A quick look through the article by Mark Christy and my enthusiasm returned. Out came the Raptor (a bit dusty now), and out came the three incidence meters, (one I bought, one Mel made, and one Dave lent to me - why use one when you can use three). Withing a few evenings I was ready for a bench test, ie strapped to my workmate in the garage on a wet and windy Saturday - good grief, the noise, the smoke, my eyes! However, the blades seemed to track OK, and I was able to adjust the fuel mixture, so the engine would slow run.
No more excuses, it had to fly.
Several weeks later in a 15 knot wind I stood on the flying strip, opened the throttle very carefully, the Raptor became light on its ridiculously oversized training undercarriage, and the tail started to swing a little. I then adjusted the trim for the tail rotor. I eyeballed the main rotor and it seemed level, then increased the throttle a little more and the nose tipped forward and the Raptor lifted off its back two training undercarriage balls and then sat down again.
I was so nervous that I repeated this manoeuvre several times until I realised that more power was needed and throttled up a bit more and the machine lifted off completely. I was suprised how well it coped with the gusty wind, but was unable to trim it properly because of it. I had three flights that day, but only practised hovering, apart from a mad moment when I threw caution to the wind and did two pirouettes, having gained a little height first.
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The Raptor at Odiham
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One week later a beautiful day dawned, and it was then I realised just how useful the many hours of practice I had put in on the flight sim were. In a light wind the Raptor was much easier to fly than the simulator, and I was able to fly around in gentle figure of eights and circles, coming back to the hover at the end of each circuit. I had at least four flights, and went home with a very wide and silly grim on my face.
I will continue to practice, at our flying site and on the simulator. Then who knows - today the hover tomorrow some 3D, the Raptor is quite capable of any manoeuvre.
I might just get that VTOL project under way, if I can stop building freeflight models for a few moments.
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