Last Update: 28.11.2019

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Let’s face it: Flying Tom is not really subject to a rigid and goal-driven fleet policy. Our hangar hosts a ragbag of accidential purchases, real and imaginary bargains, loves at first sight, rescued orphans and passing fads.

Our acquisition of the RCRCM Sunbird turned out to be completely in line with these long-standing traditions. Initially, all we needed was a carring case for our RCRCM E-Tomcat to avoid (further) transport damage. We queried the web and got caught by an offer at Hebu. They had an appropriate box at a (according to Hebu) rockbottom price of CHF 129.-. But there was even more to save: If you bought it in a set with a new RCRCM glider, you were given an additional discount of no less than CHF 50.-. With a final CHF 79.- on the price tag, this box was a steal. Much has been published in the German edition of our blog about Swiss virtues concerning money, especially about saving the latter (see Gib dem Kaiser, was des Kaisers ist! or Einkauf im “Feindlichen Ausland”). Inevitably, and no matter the cost, this bargain had to be ours. However, buying another E-Tomcat just for the sake of that box was a smidgen over the top, even to the twisted financial standards at Flying Tom’s.

While flipping through the latest RCRCM catalog we recalled one of our long-forgotten ideas: Wouldn’t it be handy to have a small but sturdy slope glider in our hangar? Small in order to take it always with us as a backup in the car, but without forfeiting to much of our sparse and valuable space. And sturdy, so that it still can be flown when the winds grow too strong for our big and expensive ones.

The decision was taken at once: A Sunbird it should be. The full carbon version – of course – for more stability.

Unfortunately, the Sunbird is merly two-thirds the size and half the price of a Tomcat. There was only a faint chance that the guys at Hebu were going to grant us the discount on the large Tomcat box for this small bird. But we dared to ask and Hebu accepted, provided we really ordered the expensive full carbon version and not the less pricy glass one. – Deal!

On a rainy Saturday morning in the summer of 2016 (all mornings were rainy in the summer of 2016, as far as i remember) we set off to pick up the box … and the plane … at Hebu’s warehouse in the beautiful Biosphäre Entlebuch. Because this was clear right from the beginning: Never would we pay the horrific freight charge for having it shipped to our home.  [Continue reading ⇒]

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