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Skorpion


Dave Elam

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Through my wanted advert on here I was kindly offered a Skorpion by Brett Larrett and it didn't take me long to accept it. I had a Skorpion many years ago but it unfortunately had too short a life coming to grief at the Bwlch.  I really felt bad about losing that model and I always thought it was a case of unfinished business and always fancied another at some point.

This Skorp originally belonged to Mike Shellim and I remember him competing at various F3F comps many years ago. Never did I think that one day it would be mine!

While in pretty good condition age has inevitably had an effect on its appearance and there were a couple of areas of tip damage which I decided to spend a bit of time on and finish to a good standard.

Those tips needed some filling, rubbing down and then painting and I then added the stripes (which help to disguise some of the imperfections) with Solartrim. Finishing touches were my old F3F logo and a Skorpion which was incredibly fiddly to cut out and stick down!

Next stage is to sort out the radio. My trusty old DSX11 is sadly no longer 'trusty' so I'm seriously considering going down the Frsky route with an X10S. Once I get that I can then set up the model and get it up in the air. Hopefully next year I'll get to a comp or two and have a race.

Thanks again to Brett for letting me have the model.

Skorpion a.JPG

Skorpion b.JPG

Skorpion c.JPG

Skorpion d.JPG

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Looks really good mate and no need to thank me, I needed to offset the cost of the Jedi SL. LOL.

It looks fantastic, that's a really nice job you have done on it.

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18 minutes ago, pete beadle said:

Hi Brett

Don't forget to update your list of models on your footer!:):thumbsup::yes:

Onwards and upwards!

Pete

BARCS1702

Still got one Skorpion, just need to add the Jedi SL. Thanks Pete, had forgotten about that.

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  • 8 months later...
1 hour ago, Zim said:

Whatever happened to the beautiful Scorpion that I was fortunate enough to once own - it was built for Kevin Newton...

Not seen that one on a slope before.

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1 hour ago, satinet said:

Zim i sold it to someone from tup nerth who said he was going to repaint it....

Oh Tom! He wanted to repaint THAT? You should have refused and then recommended that he be banned from touching anything made from carbon ever again!

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1 hour ago, Zim said:

Oh Tom! He wanted to repaint THAT? You should have refused and then recommended that he be banned from touching anything made from carbon ever again!

Yeah mate. This only came to light when he was already in my kitchen so it was a bit late to back out.  To be honest having reacquired it from yourself I did come to the realisation that it wasn't actually as good as other models I had at the time.  The handling of them was really pretty pants.  Fast and fun model on the right day though.  Pretty bad in weak conditions though. Still an iconic design that has its place in history.

Pete this particular model was very bad from a visibility point of view as it was black with a smattering of dark green. I.e basically black and more black when more than a few metres away. It was terrible below the horizon in a dark green back ground. Looked cool though.

What happened was I bought it from Kev Knewton, then I sold it you, then I bought it back (with broken tail - fixed by tony fu ;) ), then I sold it to this guy who was from Middlesbrough or somewhere like that.  As I recall it had sanwa servos on the flaps and tail and volz on the ailerons. Side by side servos in the fuselage which just shows the size of the fuse compared to newer stuff. 

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49 minutes ago, pete beadle said:

Hi Zim

Most people that change the colour scheme(s) of performance aircraft don't do so because they don't LIKE the colour(s) of the planes they buy, especially  pre-owned racers:no:

Natural colour (ie bare carbon) is great for the undersides of F3J and F5J  soarers because it helps to define the plane's silhouette  at altitude from below

F3F flyers usually don't like black because it becomes camouflage when you're racing an F3F'er below the horizon and particularly at high speed........IMHO you also need clear differentiation between your plane's top and bottom wing surfaces.....also possibly a bright colour on the wingtips to let you assess the plane's attitude at a glance and NOT subtle colours like green and black........each to his own though:yes:...... If you're not going to race that Skorp I'd tend to agree with you, although I understand it wasn't KevN's choice either, it was how it came from Thuro:)....I may be wrong.....I often am:(

Regards

Pete

BARCS1702

Hey Pete

You're absolutely right, and completely wrong 🙂 I have raced F3F a fair bit in the past (badly and often slowly) and indeed this particular model. Often I pretended I could see it by looking at the bases when the beeps came. However, when it's as pretty as this on the ground, it doesn't matter if you can't see it in the air!

Anyway, Tom, yes, you're probably right. This one was so special though, wasn't it? As you say, absolutely iconic in that it promised a lot at the time, but had a reputation for being about as friendly as, well, a scorpion! And in this scheme and layup - what a model. Glad we both had the chance to fly it and own it - I remember one non-contest day in Wales on a snowy Crest where I was lucky enough to really enjoy what the model had to offer. So much fun!

Z

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  • 10 months later...

Well it's only taken around a year and a half but this morning the Skorpion took to the skies again. The reason it's taken so long is that the last few years have been horrendous from a personal point of view but life is now getting back to some form of normality and I'm getting more flying done.

The conditions were perfect and the Skorp just flew straight out with very little trim adjustments needed. Took my time to get used to it and then started some runs up and down the ridge. It's a quick model but we all knew that anyway.

The flight lasted around 40 minutes and the landing was fortunately non eventful. On a maiden I always like to then get the model home and give it a good check before the next outing.

Definitely one to keep and enjoy though and hopefully at some point I'll give it an outing in a competition.

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  • 1 month later...

The Skorpion never fails to put a smile on my face. Even better when my local slope is less than a mile away (as the crow flies).

Superb conditions with thermal after thermal coming through to speed the old girl up. Pleased to be the latest custodian of this absolute classic.

IMG_20200802_173258.jpg

IMG_20200802_173434.jpg

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  • 3 years later...

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