Plane Model: Catalina RTF

Manufacturer: Guan Li

Supplier: Mikes Models Market (Ebay) £99.99

Specifications:
Wingspan: 1380mm (54.3")
Length: 880mm (34.6")
Flying Weight: 780g (27.5 oz)
Drive System: Twin 370 carbon brush motor with gearbox
Speed Controller: 25A speed controller
Servo: 4x10g
Battery: 8.4 V 1000mah Ni-MH
Control system: 4 CH Multifunctional Radio Transmitter and Micro Receiver

BUILD REVIEW

This is a review of the build-only of my Guan Li Catalina .

It arrived a few days ago and after around 7 hours of work Today (Wednesday 1st October 2008), I have managed to get it assembled .

Upon opening the box, the fuselage was much, much fatter than any of the other planes I'd, Also, there were a lot of loose pieces, almost all of which would have to find their place on the plane before I could call it a day.

Another thing that was pretty clear after looking at the contents was that, despite being labeled an RTF, (ready to fly) this plane was hardly going to be "Ready To Fly" any time soon.

With both the need for gluing at several stages of assembly AND the need to fill in gaps that the documentation didn't cover, this was going to take a while.

Here's a few pictures of some of the notable pieces that came with it; namely, the wings, the engines, the props, and the 7-cell 1000mah NiMH battery pack.

I started the assembly process. To be honest, this plane felt more like a kit than an RTF, or even ARtF. It was actually sort of like when you go to MFI and purchase one of those wooden Flat Pack furnature "packages", and what you get is actually a load of MDF, some hardware, and printed instructions. Except in this case, the instructions that came with the Catalina were missing steps or outright wrong.

For example, one step says that I am to insert the aileron servos into the wings and then fasten them with two screws. !!

Ok--except there's neither any way to access the screw holes in the servo when it's in the molded slot in the wing, nor would there be anything to screw into even if I could insert the screws.

Obviously, these were intended to be glued in, which is what I ended up doing. And then it doesn't even mention anything about gluing the aileron servo covers over the servos--Mind you I did not use them in the end - never even mentions them in the instructions, except to list them among the parts that should have been included in the box.

Those are just a couple of examples, and I could talk about quite a few more but I won't. . Probably the most egregious shortcoming was that there was absolutely nothing in the instructions and, yea, even in the design of the plane which accounted for the motor and servo wires needing to be pulled out of the foam engine compartment, along the bottom of the wing, and then into the fuselage. I actually ended up having to carve out some wiring channels into which I laid the motor and servo wires before covering them with Fiber tape to hold them in place.

This is a ridiculously poor oversight, as there was absolutely no way for the plane to go together without the assembler performing some kind of manual modification to the wing, as the wires would not allow the wing halves to fit snugly onto the wing mount with the wires running into the fuselage.

Another aggravation was the fact that the rudder came simply as a piece of foam (the rudder itself) and 4 tab hinges. There were no slots in either the rudder or the vertical stabilizer into which I was supposed to insert/glue the tab hinges, nor anything in the instructions detailing the process. Well I managed to get everything together with the exception of the wing pontoons (since I'm going to try flying it over a grass field first and thus have to belly land it, which I imagine could be pretty rough on the flimsy pontoons).

It's a big Bird--54" wingspan, 34" length--although it's really the bulk of the fuselage which makes this plane look so much bigger , Should I be able to get it airborne and keep it there for any amount of time, I'm confident it will look pretty impressive flying around.

Here's some pics of the finished product:

You may also be able to tell in the pictures that the dihedral of the main wing seems to be off. I need to toy around some more with the wire struts to make sure they're not keeping the wings pulled down like that, but I think it's more to do with the poor manner in which the wing halves connect to the wing mount on the fuselage. I'm definitely going to need to make some changes there prior to flight, for stability's sake.

Note that I reinforced the bottom of the fuselage with Fiber tape along with the usual treatment of the main wings (Cover the ducts I had to cut out for the wires ).

SUMMARY:

Well, I don't want to get too involved in passing judgement. but after all the grief of getting the thing assembled, speaking strictly on the build process, quality of the parts, and comprehendability of the instructions, I'd have to rank this one as NOT for beginners.

It's a whole lot of work for what, I suspect, will be a niche plane in my fleet. I very much doubt it's going to see nearly as much flight time as a lot of other aircraft due to it's fragile nature nad poor quality.

THE GOOD:
Unique plane design--big bird that will definitely get some looks when I take it to the field Really

Only RTF boat plane I've seen

Good price for a 4-channel RTF especially given the very large size for a scale plane

Modular setup; very easy to upgrade Rx and ESC.(which I did - I used my own and not what came in the kit

Fairly easy to upgrade motors, provided you can find some that are the right size with mounting screw holes correctly placed in the front.

Once the wires were in place and connected, all the electrics worked perfect the first time.

Nice, strong, responsive servos that give good, full action on all control surfaces. (Maybe even too much--a heavy thumb could well crash this thing pretty quick with over-control.) - so for this reason I have added 50% Dule Rates

Big props on gear reduced motors put out a LOT of thrust at full throttle.

THE BAD:
AM Tx and Rx -- junk pile fodder

Crowded canopy; poor access to battery compartment; difficult to keep control and power wires out of the way of the rudder and elevator servo arms.

Quality control on the parts was very bad; had to machine down one of the motor mount slots with a Dremel just to get the wood support to slide in. Several places where the foam fuselage halves weren't fully glued together and were loose.

Very fragile stock--maybe even after tape reinforcement. Very thin foam walls in the fuselage. Also, it uses push rods for wing struts--very weak; carbon fiber, balsa, or even some stiff tubing around the rods would have been acceptable. Finally, the horizontal stabilizer wing is very,

VERY fragile, even after taping almost the whole surface area. In particular, the outer edges are barely connected, and I expect they'll be snapped off at some point.
The glue that came with it is very messy and weak/rubbery; (so I did not use it) I used two-stage epoxy or something simple like Foam Safe Cyno Glue.

THE UGLY:
No on/off switch on the plane? And to connect the battery, both hands have to be between the two propellers that barely clear the fuselage canopy? To remedy this, I'll be installing my own on/off switch in the very near future.

No landing gear + thin foam wall could mean EOL (end of line) the first time I try and belly land this thing. Fortunately, the Fiber tape seems to have increased the durability of the fuselage substantially without adding too much weight.

The wings are not easily removable once the wing joint cover is glued into place. Given that this is a big plane, that's a serious problem for transport.

The velcro mechanism for holding the cockpit canopy in place is HORRIBLE. Very hard to get the canopy all the way on, and once it's all the way on, it's near impossible to get the darned thing off again without bruising/denting the foam.