Skywing 48" Slick__Receiver Ready Goodness

Note: This report is in progress. I'll be adding photos and artwork as we tidy things up a bit.

The news just keeps getting better for fans of the 48" class. In addition to the three Extreme Flight 48" V2s, now we have the new receiver ready 48" Skywing Slick 360. This is a groundbreaking plane on many levels, starting with it's available 6s power system, and it's quick connect wing and aileron servo leads. Most startling is the plane is receiver ready, with power system and servos installed. A few guys are reporting going from box to air in less than 30 minutes, which is a first in super high performance planes in this size.

There are a lot of important things to cover here, but for me the best part is how easy this makes things for the new guys. The only stressful part of the entire thing is getting the stab straight, but that's nearly a no brainer because the self-aligning feature takes care of that You slide the stab all the way forward and glue it. Hinge the rudder and all that's left is bolting on the landing gear and hinging the rudder. By the time you get to 3D, you really should be able to hinge a rudder, and even at that the hinges are already glued into the rudder itself, so half of that work is already done.

Pushrods are finished and bolted to the control horns, and the servo arms bolted to the other end. They are preadjusted to center the control when the arm is centered, so all that is left is bolting the servo arm to the servo and centering the arms with sub trim. The wings are already finished. There was so little to do it was almost a little disappointing the assembly took so little effort.

Click to enlarge any photo

Of special note are Skywing's wing and fuse mounted aileron servo lead connectors. No more messing around with wires when you put the plane together. Just slide the wing on and forget about it. Another nice feature is the wing quick latch mechanism. Slide the wing on, flip the switch and go fly. Further, the Slick features quick mount SFGs. Slide them on, tighten the provided thumbscrew and you're done. We timed it, and it took me about a minute and a half to go from car to ready to fly. Without the SFGs it took 30 seconds!

Finally, if that's not enough, the plane comes with nice wing bags. Skywing went all out of this one.

For experienced 3D pilots, all of this is good news from the standpoint that you can get a fire breathing plane in the air so quickly with so little effort invested. While we never figure crashing into our plans, at least now when you wreck one it's just money instead of money and a lot of work.

For the new guys entering balsa, it's less to mess up and it's less to have to learn how to do. The set up is already figured out, so you invest a half hour in assembly and start learning 3D. We have needed this for as long as I can remember, and for those helping new guys, it cuts out a ton of work getting them going.

So this plane hits the bullseye for those who want to get going quickly, and also is the perfect for the guys who don't yet know how to do things like hinging, cowl mounting and getting the linkages right. Just about everything is done, and whatever isn't done is pretty effortless.

Here's the specs:  48"Slick360-V2 30e 1.2m - RC SKYWING MODEL (skywing-rc.com)

The Kit

I took it out of the box and started fitting things together and it was done before I remembered to take pictures. Thankfully our friend Skywing Jinwei has already posted a lot of great photos of the ARF and you'll find those here: 48"slick360 V2 - Google Photos

At first I went into a mad panic because I could not find the hardware pack. Then I realized there is no hardware pack because everything is already installed! The wings were completely finished. The pushrods were already connected to the control surfaces, and the servo arms are connected to the other end.

The cowling is mounted and even the prop and spinner are installed. It comes with a nice wood prop painted silver, and it sat dead level on the balancer without doing a thing to it. Also included in a separate pack is an APC-like "Eolo" brand composite prop molded in black The composite prop is a 13/7, and the spec sheet says the same about the wood prop. The Eolo is still in the pack, but it's a good sign Skywing is paying attention to detail by providing a balanced prop.

Astonishingly, the ailerons and elevator are sealed. I insist on sealing all my planes, but it's a job I hate. It's nice to have it already done for me.

The entire build was putting the stab in, bolting on the completely finished landing gear/wheel/pant assembly, and putting the servo arms on the rudder and elevator servos. The pushrods for all four surfaces are pre adjusted, so you center the arms with the sub trim and that's it.

The only problem I ran into was one of the servo arm bolts flew off into never-never land, but there was a little bag taped to the stab package that had a few spares, and that was actually the worst moment I had aside of waiting for the thing to get here!

I think most guys who have put a T28 together will have zero issues assembling one of these. Everything fit perfectly and nothing needed to be tinkered with. I kind of enjoy building planes, so it was a little disappointing it was so easy, but the finished product more than made up for it.

Power System

Plenty of power is supplied by the 6s Sunnysky X3120-KV585. I've seen and flown a few Sunnysky motors in friend's planes and they run really, really well. I've also seen Skywing's video of this plane and it looks like performance is not going to be an issue.

 The ESC really caught my eye. This thing is super small and weighs next to nothing. Here you can see the wires are the right length, so there's no mess of wires to bundle up. Like everything else on this plane, its already figured out for you and already done. 

Batteries

As always, it's Thunder Power, only this time it's 6s 1800 70C. According to the Thunder Power web site, these weigh 291 grams, which is only 7 grams more than the 4s 2700 packs I usually fly in my 48s. The tsunami of 6s power and bigger prop will more than offset the tiny bit of extra weight.

With the battery where you see it now, the CG is absolute dead on the center of the wing tube. I've got plenty of room to move the pack either way, but my guess is this will be pretty close to where it ends up.

Radio Installation

I still have a few things to check, and I usually tidying up the wiring and such last, but here's how I have everything layed out.

Set Up

There's not a lot to say here because it's already done. There is only one hole on the arm and one hole on the control horn, so there's no guesswork, and it's all assembled anyway.

On the ailerons I set my end points at 100%, and it's going to be more than enough

On the elevator I got a perfect 45 up and down with my end points at 100, so I left it alone.

We're kind of in limbo right now because I am waiting for some new Thunder Power 6s 1800 70C packs. After that we will post a full flight report with video.