Tuesday, March 11, 2008

China Model Productions CMP 50 sized P-40 Warhawk





Just to clear up some confusion, and a lot of misinformation on the internet...CMP is not Willhobby, or FlyModel, or any other company.  CMP is thier own company, and they have been around for  while. I have built a few of their planes, and found the quality to be quite exceptional, they are high-end stuff, and from a scale point of view, nobody else comes close.
The P-40, from a scale aspect, blows away the Hangar 9 and everybody else's P-40.  The paint job is dead flat and perfect, and there are a ton of factory-installed water transfer decals, a beautiful glass belly tank, strut covers, prepainted canopy frame, lots of nice stuff.  All the hardware is exceptional, too, with a fiberglass pushrod for the elevator, and a pull-pull system for the rudder.
You need to be careful flying it, though.  It has no washout, it's not light, and it will tip stall if you pull too hard or get too slow.  The big problem, though, is that the CG in the manual is actually for the much larger 71" one, and will leave you very tailheavy if you don't correct it to about 85mm from the LE.  It's really, really important.
If you fly off grass, you will have really hard time finding rotating retracts that will hold up.  Seriously consider fixed gear like I used.
I flew mine with a Saito 62, fit perfectly and was plenty of power.
Let's here some other comments, this is a beautiful plane..

5 comments:

KC said...

wish some one would help me with the build. I'm frightened of putting holes where I should'nt. Cannot seem to fix the bottom cowl.

rcpilot said...

How can I help you? Let me know. The cowl is held on with four screws, you may want to add some wooden blocks inside the nose for more meat for the screws to grip into.

KC said...

Thanks there just does not seem enough for the screws to bite into plus they seem to be pretty close to the edge and I'm frightened of the thing splitting. Although after all I have read on this model it seems as if it is going to go straight in anyway.

Anonymous said...

Sorry I did not see your response. You need to just add some plywood for the screws to bite into. It's not rocket science, you are on the right path here. Four screws, two on each side.

This plane flies well, but it's not for beginners. I have seen some of the posts and videos of people complaining, and I see people horsing the plane around, or pulling too much elevator, and spinning it in. It's a heavily loaded warbird, you need to fly it carefully, or it will bite you hard. Fly it well, and it is very rewarding. But it's not what I would call an easy flyer, no.
I had the chance to fly the larger 71 inch CMP P-40, that one is much easier to fly, for sure.

KC said...

OK thank you. I will probably finish it through the winter as I have some other projects on the go. I am mainly a Heli Man.