The Ultra Stick 40 has become for my Dad what my TopCap has become for me; an extremely reliable plane that he can take out at any time and fly without worry. Althought he is reluctant to admit it, this is my Dad's favorite plane to fly.

The Ultra Stick 40 is a great sport plane. Construction is easy, thanks to the low parts count and superb instructions put together by Hangar 9. The plane's flight characteristics are very forgiving, and the airframe is robust enough to stand up to the high speed, hot-dog flying it demands. There aren't many planes I own that I fly at full power much of the time, but this is one of them. And to add to the package, the sound of the wind whistling past the four control rods in the wing simply adds to the plane's impact as a high speed performer.

Hangar 9's selling point on the Ultra Stick series is the four servo wing, which allows for some interesting flap configurations, including the "crow". Familiar to glider pilots, the crow configuration droops the inboard flaps and raises the outboard ones, creating a very effective airbrake which also prevents tip stalls. With crow enabled, one can dive at the runway threshold from hundreds of feet up, level off at a few feet off the deck, and be stopped on the runway no more than 200 feet from the threshold. Add a few rolls to the downline, and it becomes even more impressive.

Control Mixing

If there's a downside to the Ultra Stick, its that it has tons of coupling. Throw the rudder over for knife edge, and the plane pitches downwards and rolls strongly towards the direction of applied rudder. It takes a few diligent setup flights to adjust the radio mixes to eliminate this condition, but after they are done, the plane will knife edge from horizon to horizon with nothing but rudder input.

Servo Choice

When using the four servo wing, 4 ounces (one-quarter pound!) can be saved by switching from standard to micro servos in the wing. However, when we did this, we initially installed the nylon geared versions, which ended up stripping out 4 times before we finally decided to install metal gears all around. Since installing metal gears, however, performance has been flawless.

Engine Modifications

The engine in this plane has transformed over time. It started out as a plain jane Thunder Tiger Pro 46, to which we first added a Macs tuned pipe. This combo was both noisy and not terribly reliable, so we decided to switch to the Performance Specialties Ultrathrust muffler. This combo gave much better reliability and power than the Macs pipe, and the plane will now easily climb out of a hover, even on an 11x6 prop at our high flying field. Eventually, though, the extra performance took its toll on the stock bearings, which became notchy after about a year. We then decided to install Boca high speed bearings to ensure that the engine would continue running as well as it had been.

Skis

The Ultra Stick makes an ideal ski plane because of the high power and flap configuration. We installed DuBro skis for fun when the weather turns sour and everyone else stays inside. The DuBro skis tend to dig into the snow, however, if they are not modified. The modification entails cutting off the rear 1/6-1/4 of the ski, and re-bending the rear lip. The stock skis have an equal area ahead and behind the axle, so there is no tendency to pivot up when the skis dig into the snow. This modification creates more area ahead of the axle than there is behind the axle, which causes the ski to pivot up when it begins to dig in.