“New bird built stock just doesn't want to fly with any authority. It sucks that I have to spend the same amount of money on parts to get better performance. The plane flies great once you get it going.”
“Don't be discouraged by the review by builders who love to hop up their planes!This EDF flies terrifically right out of the box! I use a 2200 mAH 3 cell battery and I've been getting terrific flights for years! I'm on my 2nd unit as I've worn out my 1st one!See my photos on the Motion RC site.”
“The Panther was my first EDF jet and that was three years ago. Ive had the f-16, Sabre and a couple of Stingers since then and they have all been awesome!l However, the Panther was always my favorite and here we go again. This time I have the 12 blade fan and 3300kv motor with a 4 cell 2200 and this bird comes alive! Perfomance is fantasic and so is the sound! I always hand launch and belly land my jets with no issues and this one is no exception. The color scheme is also very easy to see for orientation. I love this plane! MotionRC is still the best in the business and their commitment to their customers is second to none. Thank You”
“Good news: This plane looks great, takes off well, is steady in the role axis, and it lands OK. It looks and sounds great in the air, and I think it has lots of power. I'm getting about 4 minutes flying time out of an 1800 3 cell battery.Bad news: As mentioned by other reviewers, there is something not quite right with the balance. I've tried adding weight both fore and aft, and it still flies like a roller coaster, no matter what I do. I'm going to try using a heavier battery and see how that goes.One other not so good thing about it is the quality of the nose gear strut. It's made out of very thin and fragile metal. Just a couple of rough landings, and it bends and then eventually breaks. I've already had to order a replacement nose gear twice. Main gear is good, nose gear strut is too fragile for this plane.”
“I've had one of these that I had countless flights on using stockfan unit. Wonderful model for it's price range. Finally retired itas there was more glue than foam holding the plane together.Bought and built a new one installing a Freewing 12 bladed fanunit with a Freewing 3300kv motor and a 40 amp esc using a4S 2200mah 40c Admiral (minor mod to batt compartment).All I can say is wow ! This plane has sooo much more performancenow, especially in the vertical ! Same stable, easy to fly Panther,just MUCH faster ....If I wasn't constantly jamming the throttle forward I could do afive minute flight easily. It's pulling 36 amps wide open.The power unit is putting out 1kg of thrust on a model with a RTFweight of 730g so you do the numbers ... up up up up .... where'dit go ?????This model is probably one of the best edf's on the market in the64mm fan class in my opinion.P.S. - The 12 blade 64mm fan makes that awesome turbineWhoosh sound that we all love ;)”
“I wasn't too impressed with the performance I got with a fully charged 2200 3s 3 cell battery. That being said, I don't know how the Motion RC guys got it to fly so well on a 1600 in the demonstration video. With my 2200 all the way to the front, I was still a bit tail heavy and seemed to lack power. I attempted to loop it and I momentarily lost control.The ailerons seemed a little sensitive on low rates. So I moved the clevis to the outermost hole on the horns.The build went fine except for the canopy. It didn't fit right. I had to shave off a little foam to get the canopy magnets to engage. Now the back end of it is sitting slightly up.I'm glad I purchased the nose steering and landing gear because I think I would have stalled it on hand-launch. Taxiing around on the 2200 barely puts any weight on the nosewheel. I'm going to try a 3000 3s 30c and see how that works and update my review.”
“build - very easy everything included in kit including glue 5/5flying - my manual states CG 45mm from the leading edge I think it is not correctfirst flight - I put 2200 mah in the nose and slightly pushed forward so it was nose heavy (when checking with 45mm CG), hand launch resulted in uncontrollable climb and nose dive into grass - repair regluesecond flight - pushed 2200 mah all the way into nose; failed hand launch (too slow), belly landing, no damagethird flight - same battery location, hand launch OK, I fought strong tendency to climb whole flight, nice landing glide, belly landingfourth flight- same battery location, elevator trim adjusted a bit, hand launch OK, tendency to climb still, got bit disoriented while trying to land - crash into harder surface, total lossfor me 2 stars I should be able to trust manual”
