THSS REVIEWDave's Aircraft Works "TG-3"by Steve Kimball
Specifications:
Wingspan: 71"
Weight: 35 to 41 oz.
Wing Area: 609 sq. in.
Wing Loading: approx. 9.5 oz/sq. ft.
Airfoil: Modified Clark-Y
Radio: standard size gear, 2 or 4 servos
Skill Level: Beginner
Why the TG-3. I built my first real (kit) plane about 13 years ago, an Olympic 650. At the time I couldn't afford a radio. Also I think I knew that if I DID put in a radio, I had a really good chance of destroying my beautiful creation! When I finally did get a radio in it, I did manage to bust it up a few times. Fortunately, technology had come to my rescue and a friend told me about these "new" EPP foam planes. Since I was spending more time rebuilding than flying, I figured foam was just the thing to learn on! I looked up DAW on the internet and ordered a TG-3 immediately. I was sold mainly on the advertised ruggedness, but also on the fact that it could be thermaled and flown from a Hi-Start, slope, or even a winch! I've also always liked "warbirds", and this plane has a cool scale warbird-like look to it.
Building the TG-3. Other than being a bit messy, I found the building process to be fairly easy and straightforward. The instructions were somewhat lacking in the photo department, but were fairly complete as long as you read everything several times! I found the foamy building tips on the DAW web site to be very helpful. In fact, I would not have wanted to build it without this additional information which should probably be included in the kit for those computer impaired types! The only thing I couldn't quite figure out was how to install the charging jack and switch. Since I couldn't tell just what they were trying to say, I "winged" it and it came out just fine. The instructions allow for building either a polyhedral wing with rudder and elevator only, or an aileron wing. I opted for the simpler poly ship. There were two areas where the instructions were definitely lacking though. The explanation on how to set up washout could have been better. Having built a plane before I knew about washout and had no problems, but I've met other TG-3 owners whom had a hard time with this. The other area is the decalage, or incidence angle of the horizontal stabilizer. There is no mention of this at all in the instructions, so I guess the builder is to assume that the cutout on the fuselage has the correct angle. However, you can easily throw off the angle when "gooping" the stab to the fuse, or when shrinking the fuse covering. This happened to me and I ended up with a plane that didn't fly too well until I cut off the tail and re-did it. I would definitely recommend first-time builders get some help in these areas! One last thing: follow Dave's recommendation and paint the coroplast (plastic) tail assembly. Do NOT cover it with Ultracoat. No mater how nice it looks at first, it will soon (with temperature changes) be full of bubbles and look pretty nasty. All in all though, I was very pleased at how nice the plane looked when finished. Not bad for a foamy plane!
Flying the TG-3. I took my TG-3 to the local schoolyard for the initial trim flights. I soon found that even a light tailwind was too much for me to hand toss in, resulting in a quick stall and a hard bump on the ground. But no damage other than a couple of creases in the nose covering (love that foam!!). I soon graduated to a short Hi-Start and, after fixing my decalage problems, found the plane to fly quite well. After a few weeks of practice, I got up the nerve to try the local slope. WHAT A BLAST! I still fly off a Hi-Start a couple of lunch-hours a week, but really look forward to flying the slope on the weekend! This has been a great plane to learn on. Its fairly docile for the beginner, but can keep you interested for a long time doing loops, hammerhead stalls, and other simple aerobatics. It can fly in light lift that grounds most foamy warbirds, and it can even mix it up with the big-boys (sort-of) when the wind kicks up! I'm now ready to move up to a more maneuverable combat plane, but I'll probably still bring the TG-3 up the hill for a long time. I would highly recommend this as a first plane for someone wanting to get into flying. Get a little help putting it together then go have a blast!
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