I have shared pics of these before but I just put these models through their paces again last night and had a hell of a time...and frankly, I felt like showing them off and see if any of you guys are into RC!

Skywarp is an electric ducted fan jet, pumping out about 400W of power. Unlimited vertical climb-out and respectable speeds (in the neighborhood of 80mph). A really docile and fun flyer too.

Jazz is a modified Multiplex Dogfighter- 1350kv motor, 8x8 pylon racing prop, 14.8v power system, pumping out enough power to set our club field speed record at 140.1mph (confirmed via onboard GPS datalogger).  

Next up will be a Smokescreen plane... just trying to pick out a model that would look good with the Electramotive scheme.

 

You should shoot videos of this.

 

Did I read 140mph? That's crazy fast for a RC plane ! I don't even think my car goes that fast.

 

I'll give it a try...usually, RC plane videos feature a blue sky with a tiny dot bouncing around.   Tricky to record.

It sure feels fast. The plane covers SO much distance at full throttle that you're basically in a constant bank (flying in a big oval) just to keep it in visual range. This model slows down pretty well though and can be putted around the field like a civilized plane. It's easily one of the best flying models I have.

My high speed passes are started as far down-field as possible, wide open throttle all the way down the flight line to give it as much time to accelerate as possible, then a straight-up climb out to bleed off the speed. It's a total blast.

As for the 140mph speed...we use a GPS Datalogger that is relatively acurate though there certainly is a few % margin of error. Also, while the record flight was run on a calm day, a tail wind would have altered the reading since it uses ground speed rather than air speed. Everyone in the club just agreed to say that the logger was good enough to use it as a standard.

If you guys are interested in giving it a shot, start with something slow and gentle...and cheap, even if it doesn't look cool. You're sure to crash a bunch of times before you figure it out.

My usual reccomendation is to give the Hobbyzone Champ a try. It's tiny...light, will handle some crashes. They're immensly popular, even with experienced pilots because it's such a reliable, smooth flyer. $90, comes with everything. It's an insanely good flying model...just so long as you have very calm conditions. It will fly in a gymnasium too. No affiliation with Horizon Hobby...just a fan.  

http://www.horizonhobby.com/products/champ-rtf-HBZ4900

 

There were RC cars of Bumblebee and Barricade that came out around the time of the first movie. They didn't transform or anything, but the scale was nice, and they looked pretty good and worked pretty well from what I heard.

 

I have the Bumblebee Camaro. You're right on with your description but you didn't mention that they were Radioshack Xmods which means that they suffered from bad QC.  

People modified the heck out of those little cars and got some crazy performance out of them. I never got any farther than pulling the magnets and armature out of a Crest Spinbrush toothbrush motor and assembling the crazy AWD system that came out with the early kits (that setup contained one million pieces!).

They also made a toy Starscream jet that flew with thrust differential... I still have one in good condition but the radio gear has so much latency that it's wildly imprecise. There's easily a 1/2 second lag between an input and a response from the airplane...pretty unacceptable. The airframe does fly well though.

 

Stick a tiny camera on the plane itself and then you can film it attacking fleshies in first-person.

 

Has anyone else applied TF schemes to an RC model?

I'm seriously thinking of building a Powerglide out of an EDF A-10 Warthog. I'm just looking for one that's cheap enough to customize.  

 

I've never been too into RC stuff myself but my dad is a fan, so I was exposed to it growing up. It looks fun as hell, I just don't have the room (or money)! But speaking as a total amateur, those all look rad as hell - Jazz's color scheme looks awesome on a plane, which is something I never thought I'd say.

Do you take requests? You should totally do one for Skyfire/Jetfire. Maybe both.  

 

If you're going for an electramotive color scheme, G2 Windrazor is what you ought to do IMO



Plus he's an F-16, so that's alway cool, and fairly cheap

I would also say G2 space case, but I've never seen a RC model plane based on the Sukhoi Su-47 Berkut, but yeah anything with vectoring capabilities is gonna be more expensive

 

That's bloody awesome! I would love an RC Thundercracker.

But I remember my uncle, who was an Air Cadet and was training to be an aircraft mechanic, built a $300-400 model and buried it in a hill on the first flight. He had to use a shovel to recover the engine.  

 

Here's another one of The Multiplex Dogfighter/Jazz scheme that I took after landing in the snow at the New Year's Day "Frozen Finger Fun Fly." There were actually a few people who recognized the scheme from the Posche race car and a couple who noticed the significance of the Autobot logo underneath. BTW, the undercarriage is red, a reference to the red chin spoiler and to help with visibility. You can almost see it reflecting on the snow.  

I'm a very mediocre customizer...I would LOVE to see what you guys with talent could put together.


I really had fun designing the scheme and flying the crap out of this plane. It's ready to go for another season of fighting off the Seeker Jet squadron.

 

LOL...I think a lot of people have stories like that.
Fortunately, it's WAY easier/cheaper to get started and to be successful in the hobby these days.

 

Very nice!

My dad is very into RC flying but these days he sticks to quadcopters and slower planes - the farmer by their flying site threatens to shoot the fast jets down whenever they get flown...

 

LOL!
Too funny. Usually the quadcopters are what make the local yokels nervous...as if we want to hover in front of the windows and take a peep while Farmer Billybob is on the can.

 

Are these your own customs?

 

I'm sure if he knew about the direct streaming video from them he'd rant about that too - nobody's going to tell him.

 

yeah...nothing too sophisticated.

The Jazz plane is just self adhesive vinyl and some graphics grabbed from the web, printed out/laminated/glued on.

The Skywarp plane is Testor's rattle cans and some masking. I based the wing stripes on the Hasbro Matserpiece Skywarp.

Mixing two of your favorite hobbies is surprisingly enjoyable.

 

If you do, put Astoria in the cockpit!