Condor EVO Magic 3m

 - Superb looking finish on this plane at ARF stage.

 - Negative - flaps come top hinged!!?? Flaps should really be bottom hinged. It took about 5 hours to:

    - Carefully remove the flaps.

    - Remove unwanted film.

    - Replace the missing chamfer using a long triangular piece of balsa.

    - Recover and re-hinge (bottom) to achieve flush top and bottom when the flap is closed. Bottom hinge allows 90 degree downward opening.

 - The wing tips need great care to get them to fit firmly.

 - Take care to ensure the wing locating pins are accurately glued into the wing roots. During epoxy curing, the wings should be trial fitted to ensure the pins are nice and straight.

 - I purchased the glider ARF which required very careful cutting off of the nose to suite the 38mm spinner. A nicely shaped motor mount from solid wood was required.

 - Cooling holes are required below the motor and in the bottom of the fuselage behind the wing.

 - I did not employ the nominated wire pull-pull for the rudder. Some geometry issues there. I used a conventional, push-pull snake with an offset servo in the cockpit.

 - The canopy inner and outer skins should be glued together while the whole is fitted to the canopy recess on the fuselage. Mask off to avoid unwanted bonding. I used epoxy glue rather sparingly to get a nice clean finish. 

 - The ARF kit comes with rudimentary instructions. Typically, the canopy hold down is left up to the builder. I employed a pin at the front and a wing retaining thumb screw at the rear. The screw threads were tapped out of the considerable fibreglass found at the fuselage join.

 As with all planes, one becomes accustomed to the vagaries of any given plane. This one is no different. Once you are familiar with the Condor it becomes very pleasing to fly. The only surprise is an occassional tip stall while trying to turn too sharply in a thermal. Thermalling performance is very good. Aerobatic ability is quite surprising for such a large plane. Loops, slow rolls, hesitation rolls, cuban eights - all no problem and surprisingly capable even without motor. 

If the flap hinge mod (bottom hinged) is completed then very effective crow braking can be programmed into your Tx. For terrific stability, flaps should be mixed to down elevator and appropriate aeileron to keep the plane on a nice downward path without any roll tendency!

 - Purchased in April 2014. Very many flights since then - lovely.