Flying between the raindrops.

The rain stops for a while each day, I just have to be ready to take advantage of the respite. After flying with 10% nitro and making the tanks hold enough fuel I figured that I could spin the engines a bit higher using my 2% fuel mix. I've done that for two outings now and it's working. The planes seem to like it.
  I finally got tired of looking at the plane I got in the raffle last November. It's ugly to say the least. I had cut holes in it to get at the controls and some smaller holes didn't get covered. Yesterday I started to remove all the covering and take off as many pieces as I could. If I change enough things I can legally claim to be the builder of the model. That entitles me to get appearance points which are added to the flight score. I cut off both wing tips and hollowed them a lot. That saved about an ounce and a quarter. I knew the tips were full of balsa just waiting to be dug out. I cut off the stabilizer and removed the hinges from the stab and elevator. I removed the flaps and hinges also. I cut off the top turtle deck from the front of the canopy to the tail end. Then I made a turtle deck that is an inch higher out of a block of balsa I had left over from the kit version of the same plane I built a few years ago. I'm planning on installing aluminum landing gear as the original wire gear is quite heavy. The fin and rudder will get re made to change the look a bit. As I've had good luck with lowering stabilizers I've lowered it 3/4 inch.With it out I can put it back together in perfect alignment with the wing which is very important. The plane was built in China and they used tab and slot construction where the kit is not making it a bit harder to assemble properly. That may be the best way to have non modelers do the building. Most of the beginner type kits are tab and slot design.