NIGHTMARE FLYING THE TOPGUN F18!!!

#TopGun #f18 #PickeringRC
Martin Pickering - PickeringRC MERCH!
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Martin Pickering

[@SDennis89]

That servo buzz in a video isn't annoying at all... Beautiful plane though, and nothing feels better than figuring out gremlins!

[@shannonjurgens3667]

Ei”feeling a sense of accomplishment”

[@chrisdavis3642]

Finally!! Now the world can know what tinnitus is like! Outstanding flight!! Keep this in mind . When you're gear retracts or deploys it changes the CG on the 18 more so than most other airframes!! Plus some flap on takeoff doesn't hurt. Watching your struggles on the first flight's made my guts hurt!! Then when I saw how well you ran it through its paces I understood how you were able to hang on to it!! Excellent control! I'd say beef up the gear and deal with the extra weight!!? Really want to see it snag a wire!!

[@bertarmstrong9140]

I admire you guys and your reviews for staying after an airplane that should have been History so many times seems like you’re doing all the manufacturers work that should’ve been done long before this point just shows me how truly professional you and your team really are truly inspiring to the RC Hobby and how far technology has really come along thanks again

[@scotthuerta4992]

Thanks so much for sharing your struggles with this plane. As a comparatively new flyer without a lot of support; I can tend to think that I’m the only one struggling to “tame” a plane with bad tendencies. Thanks again

[@RCINFORMER]

"ARM" & "Moment" are the technical terms your looking for! A lot of weight on a long arm from the datum, makes a huge moment. The large weight at the front & back multiplied by the large distance(ARM) make a huge "moment" force... move them inward and you reduce the force & then basically move the CG forward for stability... looks like it could come slightly farther forward as indicated by the porpoise in the flare. Definitions: CG is referenced from the Datum. Datum. A point from which moment arms are measured. Points forward of the datum have negative arms; points aft are positive. The datum can be a different places in different airplanes. Arm. The horizontal distance from the reference datum to an item’s center of gravity. Moment. A force causing something to rotate, equal to an item’s weight times its arm. Nice flight!

[@samuelsherwood298]

👉 hi Mr. Rcinformer😜my fms super hornet and eflite mustang 1.5 fly like a dream brother!

[@redalrt4]

Beautiful plane, flight and landing. Very well done!!!

[@Cristian98010]

Increible! Cuanto me alegro de ver ese cacharro volando como debe! Grandísimo trabajo que hay detrás! Y ahora si, la familia Sepulveda, a disfrutarlo!!!

[@Deno__Deno]

I was an Aircraft Maintenance Technician in Tindal RAAF Base, Northern Territory,Australia in 75Sqn and had the opportunity to see some of the most amazing flying by the squadron pilots that I have ever witnessed, including the tail walk, ballistic manoeuvre, they could do the tail walk, then hit the loud pedal and go ballistic from the tail walk, the FA18’s that were there were fresh off the assembly line, and were delivered “Clean Skins”, with no markings for Squadron or country, that was THE first job to be performed as soon as they landed.. I would really love to see you do the tail walk then go ballistic from that position if you would like to appease an old digger please mate.. You look as though you have ironed out most of the bugs looking at your last flight, so if you’re going to have a go at it, please give me a yodel so I don’t miss out.. You look like a very good pilot mate, get as much practice as possible and you can be Great.. Really appreciate your time and effort put into this project, it shows…

[@walterschmolzl3327]

Absolutely incredible - congratulation to this RC flight model and the mega cool video!

[@DadsRCHangar]

Well done Martin, I amazed that the factory got the CG and turbine placement all wrong. Nice tip about centralising the weight. Great flight 🫡

[@rctips1763]

Nice flying and very good video shooting, you have an excellent team!

[@orochigo31]

This is a great video, Thanks for sharing. Beautiful fighter! Awesome flying, great job.

[@rcplayer927]

This is absolutely stunning! Beautiful model and excellent flying skills!

[@1980VINZ]

8:13 WTFFFFFFFFF!!!!!!!!!!!!! IT SOUNDS SO GOOD!!!!!!!!!!!! I want to cry 12:40 I am speechless…………. I even didn’t know a RC fighter could be so realistic in the air……. Your way to fly it is so amazing……. You’re very talented…. What a beautiful machine, this is too good I LOVE IT Big salut 🫡 from France and thank you a lot for sharing this with us, what a wonderful moment it was, I was in… !! Nothing is more beautiful and bad ass than a jet fighter. ViNZ.

[@stevenarmer8245]

Beautiful Jet, great flying too. Glad you got the worst bugs worked out on it. Now they can enjoy flying it.

[@carlos64030]

You certainly have it flying well now! Nice job getting it dialed in!

[@DanT1975]

What an amazing pilot! Thank you for sharing! this was impressive!!

[@johannesjenkins258]

Hi, I observed two things. First, the angle of attack is wrong during take off, and second, the vertical energy at touch-down is not absorbed by the landing gear. If you look at the original (deck) landing of an F18, the main gear folds in and stays there so the plane does not bounce up again. I mounted sloppy springs in the Yellow Aircraft F18 main gear and placed O-rings on the lower bushing of this gear to make it air tight. I put a Festo nipple on the top of the gear and put a hose into a small bottle. I filled everything with anti-freeze fuid. I so created an effective schock absorber. If You wonder how I did all of this, I was one of the AMT USA guys in 2000 and Terry Nitsch flew our Yellow Aircraft F18 with the AMT Olympus engine. Yust want you to know how we solved the take-off and landing problems with a heavy F18. Regards, Han Jenniskens.

[@mantis1412]

The full size F18 is an unstable airframe. It will porpoise without the flight computers fighting to keep it straight. Amazing piloting to have kept it (mostly) in one piece. ❤

[@12345fowler]

Neutral stability more than "unstable" and the first generation of F-18 were not "unstable" you can see it while landing everytime you have to move the elevators up for landing means you have a conventional stability aircraft.

[@smooth_ops2942]

Such a good looking model and Top Class flying as usual from an Ace👍🏻

[@smokeysrc]

Never giving up led to a beautiful and amazing flight 👍💯

[@vicentesanchez4403]

Beautiful!!!, only one little mistake, the correct nose fuselage number for this tail decoration are 15-13.

[@vancelandry9369]

Beautiful plane. I love the authentic paintjob.

[@MartinPickering-PickeringRC]

It just looks so good in the sky

[@covercalls88]

Excellent job in building and getting the bugs out. Impressive flight. Hope to see more flight videos.

[@KevinMaloneysmilingthrutherain]

That is a beast of an airplane. Awesome! outstanding job. I noticed that you had to stay in full power throughout the flight. But when the aircraft got up on step in its dynamic range, it demonstrated real authentic scale authority in flight. The best flying scale aircraft I have seen.👍👍👍👍

[@jean-claudeterretaz7464]

bravo Martin , so nice to see how well you handle this beast

[@macavree9464]

Que buen piloto tío! Hermoso el avión, felicidades.

[@frankbutta9344]

Great flying and excellent presentation! 👍👍👍👍

[@hifinsword]

Fantastic model! Great flying!

[@ryant651]

Bravo! Beautiful plane and flight!

[@richardbadish6990]

This stuff absolutely blows my mind! All the ingenuity in something like this is just mind boggling! It will certainly capture the hearts and attention from all who witness it. They will be hooked and likely end up getting into RC in one shape or form. They will lose their minds at the cost of something like this. But hopefully their curiosity leads them down the right path. Because theres so many awesome affordable RC Airplanes out there! Idt people realize how difficult it is to design something like this! To make it able to hold up to the heat alone from the engines. Then to be able to withstand the g forces applied to all surfaces, as you perform all those tight fast maneuvers. Is absolutely amazing! People dont realize the forces that these recieve from such fast maneuvers. Then to balance between ridged and weight savings to allow it to be able to be light enough to fly and strong enough to not disintegrate on the very first tight turn or climb etc etc. Im a geek when it comes to things like these! I honestly think they are almost more mind boggling then the real thing. Just because of how much smaller everything needs to be. Thats what fascinated me with Nitro rc cars as a kid. Now compared to Electric, its honestly a messy waste of time. But if u are a gearhead, u will love it! One could argue that nitro buggies are every bit as competitive as their electric counterparts. But we all know, it takes less effort for the electric to do what the nitro is doing... Im going off topic, ijs this stuff is absolutely amazing, intriguing and its definitely doing its job in growing the rc community! Awesome job bro!

[@billclark5943]

Your broomstick analogy, at least how it actually relates to the plane, is called the polar moment of inertia

[@jstewart627]

11:03 the landing was excellent

[@jannicawunge4940]

Great video Martin! Thanks for sharing.

[@cappymccappy3017]

Awesome flying.

[@nicholasgladwell99]

Nice to see it flying at the field I fly at , brilliant .

[@HornetFlyer]

Top Gun F-18's are the Super Hornets, not the legacy Hornet. Strange report considering I've seen these in person.

[@sdpupsdad]

Yep, glad someone noticed this too give away are the intakes being the legacy round style..

[@sdpupsdad]

@@spyda2002 it's implied in the title of the video.

[@CabralWolverine]

estol muito contente de ver que você finalmente teve conclusão no seu projeto . o passaro fez um voo completo 🏁

[@steveottavaino3804]

I was cheering!!! Thank you for sharing😊

[@admitmohan]

fantastic flying..... great pilot..

[@SavageRc7]

hi martin love your videos amazing flying

[@rdlynes]

Boy that tires Flying Like a Bird beautiful great job

[@steveone9375]

I am glad you were flying it as most people would have crashed that on the first flight ,,well done Martin

[@mikeinspace20xx]

Great flying an troubleshooting!!

[@soliv27]

I like the way you fly it, realistic. Even taxiing you make it look like the 'real'. Some time its hard to say if it's model or 1/1. You got that secret ingredient if realism which is to sit on the pilot's seat , like. Congratulations

[@manuelbeltranmeza]

Your persistence paid off. Congratulations. Saludos desde La paz BCS Mexico.

[@rolandtheheadlessthompsong4346]

Nice job Martin…good on ya!

[@RC4ever]

¡Qué maravilla de modelo... ! Los F-18 suelen ser quisquillosos, también a menores escalas pero por lo menos este, una vez ajustado aguanta bien el high alpha. En escalas más pequeñas, en modelos sin flaps de borde de ataque, los vórtices de los LERX pierden energía antes de hora y la cola pierde autoridad, impidiendo el vuelo estable pasados los 15-20º de ángulo de ataque. Viendo el high alpha que te has marcado antes de aterrizar parece que al menos con este, eso ya no es un problema. ;)

[@cesarcastillorc]

Se me han puesto de corbata cuando las ruedas tocan el suelo y ese ángulo de inclinación tan acusado. Bravo Martin!

[@COMNAVAIRPAC1998]

Thoroughly enjoyed the video and the piloting. Love the Hornet and the way it fly's. My only slight recommendation is not to use the slats and the air brake when landing....yes. Its heavy and you can't float it in, but drive it in and let a slight head wind be your lifting buddy.

[@alher22]

Superbe finition. Bravo monsieur.

[@suprvrmedia6235]

Fun facts. Top gun uses f18 super hornets, meanwhile spain uses F18 hornets. Super hornets have rectangular air intakes and larger LEX (leading edge extension) and more. Now you know how to identificate both

[@rcplanedisplay]

Thanks to your maintenance this Super Hornet is now ready for dogfights ! Happy Landings and have a Good Day !

[@goldendredger]

She's fast and looks good! Twins sure put out some noise to.

[@TheArgpower]

Very cool! To ride as top of bucket list!

[@iflick7235]

What a beautiful model. Thank you

[@jhonkhan8153]

What an educational physics program with just a limited time ⏲ 💯👍, at it's best 👌 this is a serious jet

[@americanspirit8932]

I purchased, a, icoy system, it works fantastic for the center of gravity location, also it gives you lateral readings as well. Would strongly recommend. Today is October 19th 2022.

[@terryperrott8567]

The McDonald Douglas F18 Hornet has the LEX ( Leading Edge Extension ) wich is a lifting surface & adds more to the wing aera. It's good that you relocated the turbines farther closer to the cg in wich makes your horizontal stab - control surface more softer & more controllable. Good job of getting it fine tuned , flys very good inverted ( upsidedown ) . Good job ...

[@MartinPickering-PickeringRC]

This has the functional LEX but it still wasnt too happy! Pleased it was at least flying by the end though

[@Bill14886]

Outstanding video. OMG off the hook. 🎉. I’m so so jealous

[@atunaco]

It is one of the most sophisticated model airplanes I have ever seen! When you see and hear it in flight it looks like the real deal. Is any film going to be shot about the 15th wing of the Spanish "Ejercito del Aire" (y del Espacio)? I have had the impression of hearing voices in Spanish in the background, and in fact, I suppose that having tried to film such a sophisticated model with Spanish emblems in Spain, has to have some purpose.

[@bilizard6218]

The F/A-18 used on the Top Gun 2 were F/A-18E and F/A-18F Super Hornets, the one you are using is a EF-18 Hornet. Not saying that It is bad, but the contrary, It is awesome! Just trying to tell more about the difference between aircraft variants

[@sparrowlt]

Tecnically its a EF-18M , an upgraded version of the EF-18A wich in turn began life as a custom version of the F/A-18A+ . They have updated avionics, SuperHornet-ish 4 MFD cockpit , updates coms, ECM and datalinks and the big GE 402 engines.. Ironically legacy Hornets still perform slighty better than the Rhino in terms of turn and climb.. so a Legacy would actually be better for the mission "as portrayed" in TG2

[@bilizard6218]

@@sparrowlt Tysm for the information! It's always good to learn more, specially when you are studying aviation engineering

[@sparrowlt]

@@bilizard6218 The Hornet is a very interesting aircraft to "study" .. first it has a very long and complex origin (its the offspring of the F-5 design wich was evolved into the YF-17 wich was then evolved into the F/A-18) and then McDonnel Douglas in order to try to export the naval version made concesions to buyer countries giving them near total freedom to customize and upgrade their aircraft. So the Canadians CF-18 , Spanish EF-18 and the Swiss Hornets are all slighty different than the baseline Hornet A. The Canadians ended updating their fleet to C standard, the spanish went different way with their own updates and the swiss went directly for the C standard but with much less air to ground and the wingfold system removed so they are rated at 9Gs. Not trying to be pedantic but there is plenty of stuff from the Hornet alone

[@Craig_Ewan]

What a machine! New subscriber. Nice flying

[@jean-marcducommun8185]

I would anytime handover my precious model to you Martin as there aren’t probably many pilots that qualify in the category jet test pilot and construction engineer at the same time. Beautiful plane.

[@muzzaball]

Well done mate - you surely put in a heap of effort to iron out the most important bugs. Having CofG issues are the worst, and having the manufacturer's settings being wrong on a plane like that must have been an absolute nightmare - that is one of the areas that has to be correct out of the box. It's not like you can just invert it 30% from the leading edge to check! Cheers mate.

[@MrCyp200la]

Bad ass F-18 and great flying😳

[@ginginthing]

Wow. A lot of work to get this CG right. Good thing nothing bad happened during all that. Beautiful plane. You must have it tweaked in by now over the last 10 months since this video.

[@nighthawk0077]

Great job and nice owner. He bought it so you could fly it ;-)

[@thomaspuma434]

Congratulations, success is yours to enjoy

[@MartinPickering-PickeringRC]

Thanks!

[@sanjeever82]

lovely noise in the background

[@u171098atgmail]

that push-rod is actually called the 'planeing link', if it fails the wheel will not stay strait, like twisting an ankle. Absent the sidewinder rails (which is prohibited) on the wing tips the airplane will roll over on landing if failed. The navy killed a Captain at Lemoore after landing (should've made an arrested landing or eject) with a planeing link failure. The jet rolled upside down and killed this guy. The gear down and locked light flashes (not steady green, minor detail right!) when the link is failed. Great airplane, the best navy airplane built for the air force, that was rejected for the F16. Thanks Northrup. A sweetheart of an airplane.

[@eugenechristopher5435]

HI, All in all Nice flight. Can you share the details of all what you've done so that other soon to be owners can make some changes based off of what you've doe??

[@warbuzzard7167]

Not certain who your video videographer is... but that person deserves an award for his or her amazing skill, as does the pilot. Phenomenal.

[@Milkywayboy]

That is such a nice plane 💪🏻

[@randall1959]

I was on wheels watch at NAS Oceana when the two prototype F-18s came in from sea trials on the Nimitz and I watched as one of them did a ground loop as the landing gear folded on landing. This has never been included in any documentary on this aircraft.

[@TheCatMan777]

Nice work Martin!

[@josephkerkau2520]

The next time you go to balance a plane like this.. try the Vanessa balancing system. Look it up, you make it yourself.. It is a very accurate way to balance any aircraft.. But what I see on the video is an example of fine flying and engineering problem solving.... In a word. COOL!!!

[@VIDEOLA1]

Excellent job! 👌🏽

[@kernoelprinz]

very impressing bird! and what a huge mount of work on this whole process, amazing. Just a little note: your modell is a legacy Hornet, an earlier modell of the super hornet wich is used in Topgun. the simplest way to check out are the diffrent air intakes for the turbines. (on the Superhornet the are sqared) But as i mentioned, huge respect for such an amazig work. cheers

[@john.norris]

good work, awesome

[@nacho7512]

This is amazing!!!😮😍👏👏👏👏👏👏

[@teamfutabaspeedfresh8339]

Yyyeeeeeesssss. Let’s fly and dance baby. Let’s Race

[@kam1583]

Liked the high alpha slow flight! Very realistic

[@jameskratzer4538]

I saw a "Bug" do the high Alpha dirty-bird pass at an Airshow, back in the late 1990's, and was amazed then. To see a turbine R/C model do it now, well, WOW! As a non-degreed Aeronautical Engineering kind of guy (non-degreed by @3.5 years of classes) who has "very informally" studied aviation for around 65 years, I know how hard the Cobra Maneuver is on airframe, engines, and pilot. Throw in RPV to the mix, and all I can say is, congratulations on the major-league cojones!

[@BrianPhillipsRC]

Amazing!

[@josericardonovais8768]

Muito bacana.....que perfeição 👏👏👏👏

[@topguncg47]

Nicely done!👍👏😤

[@MasboyRC]

Wow.. impressive 👌

[@Imugi007]

That thing has a gorgeous paint job.

[@avipatable]

Very interesting. Not many people make these kind of videos and I think everyone would learn a huge amount if there were more of them. I have no idea how you summon the nerve to keep flying a dog of a plane when it is that expensive, that beautifully finished AND belongs to someone else, but congratulations on your perseverance!

[@cabramacho5940]

Is there a camera on the remote to see where your going ? Or is this just all skill ?

[@avipatable]

@@cabramacho5940 I this case it is just skill - line of sight flying. You can get head tracking cameras that you can mount in the cockpit.

[@Stafernisy]

@@cabramacho5940 its just an rc plane lol I had one my grandpa had one.

[@terryperrott8567]

The Hornet is no dog by any means, you want to call the Hornet a dog , The Phantom was a heavy a$$ lead sled.

[@avipatable]

@@terryperrott8567 I didn't meant the F18 - I meant that model is particular... and I looking at the work that had to be done to keep it in the air and get it back on the ground in 1 piece, I stand by my description!

[@janneroz-photographyonabudget]

I love your channel and your videos. I especially love the care and attention in all of your aircraft. But with regards to the Top Gun movie and your model, if I can refer to it as that. Is yours actually a legacy Hornet rather than a Super Hornet? Similar looking but effectively different aircraft?

[@michaelgood3508]

Nice!!! Well done curious what jetcats did you use in the Skymaster..I currently have three of these models I’m building at the moment two C models and a Super hornet. But if would let me know on the turbines. Thanks

[@Foxfried]

This is a skymaster POS F-18, every single one of these planes has crashed and so will this one, throw away and get a BVM/Jet Legen F-18

[@Minnesota.Highlander]

CG+ ailerons. That is a huge bite out of the air in a turn! To scale, pilot mush

[@757phillycat]

F18 when I was deployed had the same landing gear issues. I saw a few of landing gears break on carrier recoveries…

[@rivazza68]

Nice landing

[@user-pm3th4km6l]

Nice jet i love it 👍

[@drakepirate]

Amazing Aircraft 🤯

[@aussiedigger1441]

Awesome work! Huge undertaking ironing out the kinks of such awesome scratch build

[@akenedy]

Not a scratch build. Hear him talk about getting advice from others who have built and flown this particular kit, and about ignoring the manufacturer's instructions and suggestions about where to place the C.G. Historically speaking, a scratch-built model is built without the aid of a commercially manufactured kit.

[@aaj771]

Maravilloso!!!!.

[@remicallant8756]

Nice video Martin and good flight but I should check once the elevators for play, only my opinion , regards from Remi