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solid colored bottom is preferred unless you are doing
vertical rolls.
Sunglasses
Several years ago I flew with some expensive Serengetti
Driver sunglasses. These had a red tint to them, I guess
to cut down on the ultraviolet region. I lost visual
perception on a solid dark blue airplane during a landing
approach and crashed.
Fortunately they were stolen at a hobby store a week
later, and I got some RayBan aviator sunglasses with a
blue-gray tint. What a difference!
Red is at the low frequency part of the visual spectrum,
and blue is at the high frequency part of the spectrum.
Red or yellow-tinted sunglasses reduce all colors to high-
contrast shades of gray, making your aircraft in the air
appear completely different from the appearance of your
aircraft at home or in the pits. Gray, light blue, or light
green tinted sunglasses make the airplane in the air look
just like the airplane in the pits, and because your vision
is extended into the high frequency part of the visible
spectrum, you will have twice the visual perception range!
Final Thoughts
Evaluate color schemes for visibility first, beauty
second. Dark-colored airplanes are more difficult
to see in overcast skies and in the evening.
Scale airplanes are a special problem. Warbirds
were colored to avoid detection, just the opposite
of RC airplanes. Avoid flying scale-colored
airplanes until you a very experienced flier.
Avoid dark colors on the fuselage where your
battery and receiver are located. The heat
buildup can result in loss of battery capacity and
premature radio failure.
Don't fly when someone with a airplane identical
to yours is already flying. ARFs and yellow Cubs
are particularly susceptible to this problem.
Several years ago two fliers were flying with
identical ARFs. When one of the models landed,
both modelers went out to get the airplane. Much
to the entertainment of the folks in the pits, one
modeler discovered that his airplane had crashed
out in the field five minutes previously because
he had lost track of which airplane was his, and
he was "flying" the wrong one.
By Dr. Robert Suding
symmetrical airfoil wings, so the aircraft will be moving
through the air with a slight upward orientation. He should
offset the fuselage side color demarcation upward at the
tail of the aircraft by roughly an inch. Now he can practice
his horizontal passes by keeping the fuselage side lines
parallel with flat ground.
The vertical stabilizer and rudder should have very wide
horizontal bands of color. Make the top of the horizontal
stabilizer the same color as the wing tips. Then put a
light-colored band, and below this a dark-colored band,
usually the same color as the inner pie slice on the top of
the wing. The base color of the vertical stabilizer and
rudder should be the same light color of the wing.
Another variant for the vertical stabilizer and rudder that
works well on trainers with very big tails—such as the
Kadet series—is a starburst pattern on the top of the
wing. This aids the beginner in determining the direction
of travel when flying at a distance. The tail’s starburst
pattern becomes an arrowhead pointing out the direction
of flight.
Looping
Consider what the usual looping problem always is for
the beginning aerobatic pilot. The pilot does not begin the
loop with his wings flat. He usually corkscrews in or out.
Proper coloring of his low-wing or mid-wing airplane can
be a major help.
Make the wing tips stand out. I usually make the outer 2
inches of each wing and 1 inch of each horizontal
stabilizer the same bright red that I color the leading
edge. If you follow my advice above on the wing bottom
and the fuselage sides, the wing tip can be visually
correctly placed for a perfect loop. If the wing tip is too
high, resulting in a corkscrew out, the pilot will see the
dark wing bottom. If the wing tip is too low, resulting in a
corkscrew in, the pilot will find that the wing tip blends too
well with the bottom of fuselage side. The correct sight
picture will be the wingtip cleanly placed against the
upper lightly colored fuselage side. Look at the
International Miniature Acrobatic Club or Pattern airplane
pictures in RC magazines. They always have a dark color
on the top half of the fuselage side into which the wing tip
blends, causing looping problems.
Geometric Shapes
Humans can recognize different geometric shapes 1/10
of a second faster than colors. I use this phenomenon to
help me with the vertical rolls performed in advanced
aerobatics. Instead of a solid dark color on the bottom of
my wing and horizontal stabilizer, I put four large circles
on the bottom of the wings and two large circles on the
bottom of the horizontal stabilizer. The noticeably faster
recognition of the round shape verses the line shape aids
me in nailing the vertical rolls.
A number of people at my field have copied my bottom
circles without knowing the reason why I use them. The
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