GUEST's OPINION:
10/05 - "After nearly a dozen flights of my Ecee Thunder, I had a bizarre flight on what is my favorite motor for it, the Estes E9-4. I have flown this motor a half dozen times before, but on the last flight, the rocket re-kitted itself! It literally came apart along all the glue joints in the wings and stabilizers! My only guess is that the glue failed due to the extreme heat at Plaster Blaster 2005! It should be easy enough to reassemble. Good thing I wasn't flying the F21 that I had planned for the next flight!" (T.M.)

GUEST's OPINION:
03/02 - "I had a canard failure on the first flight, it landed safely but due to mis-alignment of the locking arm the canard was split from the center just behind the notch for the arm to one edge. the only thing holding it together was the tape hinge. Also you must try this bird on an Estes E9-4, It's my favorite motor for this bird!" (R.G.)

GUEST's OPINION:
08/00 - "The first thing you see is that it's BIG. Then when you hold it, you realize that it's really light! I would have liked to see more about balancing and motor selection. I saw a guy try to fly this on an D12-5. Big mistake, much too much delay. Perfect on a D12-3. Things I would improve: Bigger vent hole for ejection gasses. I saw three ETs blow off pieces of themselves if the ejection charge was too robust. Piston is REALLY hard to get back in hold and will quickly get crudded up. Grain on canard flap is the wrong direction and breaks too easily. Not one ET at NARAM 42 escaped broken canard syndrome. Reasons you should buy it anyway: It's a great flyer. It's a show stopper. The construction is amazingly easy. It's a marvelous, unique design. You'll fall in love with it. Try Totally Tubular to get one, they had a good supply of all the EA stuff last time I looked." (D.U.)

GUEST's OPINION:
08/00 - "I have to disagree with this. Although I would prefer offset grain this way is better. I flew mine 5 times at NARAM with RC gear onboard and otherwise unmodified. I never broke a canard even the one time I crashed it and the last flight where I crabbed it in too hard because of a boost failure. on the E15 (fifth flight) I thought the canard did shred and declared an emergency but it was the left rudder that shredded. With full left aileron I was able to barely level it out. It crabbed in and twisted in half (not designed to land like that) the canards even in this was undamaged. The reason you need the grain that direction is that the canard is one piece but looks like two and with the grain the other way it could very quickly become 2 when that piston jammed it. This would be catastrophic to say the least. At NARAM I did see a Ecee Thunder literally blow itself to pieces! It was on its way to crashing anyway but as it deployed the charge 20 feet off the ground the aircraft blew itself to literal pieces. Very spectacular. But being all balsa I bet the flier could repair it. I plan to rebuild mine with a more flexible fuselage to withstand off center landings since the heavier flight mass (radio gear) make this a problem. He could make the grain the other way and then add a second piece to offset the grain but this make the kit more complex and more to goof up. Under normal handling and performance the canard should never be in danger." (C.T.)

SPECIFIC ROCKET TIP:
07/08 - "The moving canard flap should be reinforced before flight. The torque at canard lock-down is tremendous and can cause the flap segments to snap themselves off (a common problem as evidenced by the flight logs). Reinforcement should start just behind the hinge tape and back about 1/2-inch. One way to reinforce is by gluing paper to the top and bottom of the canard flap." (D.L.S.M. )

SPECIFIC ROCKET TIP:
09/02 - "I got a nice glide circle by first balancing the glider laterally, then subtracting 3 grams from on wing tip. Going from a straight line to a circle will probably require the CG to be very slightly moved back." (B.B. from RMR )