F9F Panther EPO Jet Receiver Ready ARF

What a fun little plane. Easy to hand launch (even with my bad shoulders), no bad habits (stall is gentle and predictable and even in a light cross-wind it was longitudinal). I think I even caught a thermal while testing the glide ratio! I know several people have complained about the lack of a handhold for launching, but mine was powerful enough that a gentle toss was all that was required to get her airborne.

My wife ordered the Panther Tuesday the Nov 15th for my birthday. Much to my surprise it was here that Friday and that was with free shipping. But when I opened it the nose cone wasn't there. Disappointing but not Hobby-Lobby's fault. I called them the following Monday. Talked to a nice lady named Connie. She handed it over to a fellow named Mike. He called me back within 30 minutes of speaking with Connie and said sorry and promised he would take care of it. He even called me back to verify my address. The nose cone was here that Wednesday( 2 days later). Now that is service after the sale. In the mean time my wife ordered me the P47 that had a price drop with free shipping also. It is due this Monday. I can hardly wait! The Panther kit looked good and good quality. Can't wait to fly it.My experience with Hobby-Lobby has been a real good one. I feel any order with Hobby-Lobby in the future will be the same. And I will be a customer!

A special thanks to Connie and Mike for there caring and help!! What a team. Have a good Thanksgiving.

Five stars all the way. Others mention the cg being off. It was a bit tail heavy but with the supplied battery pushed all the way to the front but I only needed three clicks of down elevator and it flew great. Easy to hand launch, just throw it pretty much straight and let the speed build before applying too much up elevator. This is my first edf and I couldn't be more pleased. The woosh of the thrust sounds so cool. Videos do not do this plane justice. It is fast and the rolls are a thing of beauty. Buy this plane.

This is my first EDF and I absolutely love flying it. It handles well and has decent speed. I recommend though flying without landing gear as the added weight seems to really create a bad stall situation under low power. Overall this jet rocks and it always gets a lot of oooohs and aaaahs at the field.
Also to complete this plane out of the box is very quick, no more than an hour or two and your ready.

Bought the Panther for my son, who is new at flying. I kept the 1600 mAh batteries, but the plane comes out tailheavy. So, I cut out the battery tray in the front so that the battery could be installed all the way into nose. I coated the inside of the nose with epoxy to make up for shortening the battery tray/stiffener. The model balances out nicely and good space for the batteris. (Note from HL, this is not necessary, the model balances perfectly with the battery all the way forward stock.)
The plane flies very nice. Slows down for a nice landing. The battery lasts for around 5 minutes. I did not install the optional landing gear. Handlaunching is a little tricky because there is no grip in the fuselage bottom. I have to grip it behind the wing, in the tail section.
Beautiful plane, good quality, good value, highly recommended.

Hello all,
This jet is cool, I found by using a 4S 2200 Lipo it's balanced perfect and awesome speeds, we clocked it at 85mph, just cut your throw down to about 35% to 40% on the ailerons at these speeds or you will loose it..

I have to agree with the previous reviewer that the CG was off from the factory, and will add that this airplane is VERY sensitive to even small changes in CG. Many planes will fly reasonably well with CG several mm in front of or behind the recommended placement, but with this airplane it MUST be at, or preferably 5 or so mm ahead of the recommended CG in order to fly. If in doubt, build it nose heavy, then slowly subtract nose weight as you get used to the airplane.

I built the plane with the optional landing gear (so heavy servo and gear in the nose) and with the battery pushed all the way forward. It came close to balancing at the recommended CG, but was nearly unflyable. I was barely able to get it back down in one piece after multiple stalls and the very unstable flight characteristic of a very tail heavy plane. I then put 2 oz of clay in the nose, and WOW! The thing tracked like it was on rails and flew BEAUTIFULLY. Very control-able and smooth with no nasty characteristics. It does slow down a good bit in tight part-throttle turns. If you run out of battery do not attempt to make any significant turns unless you are very high, you will lose TONS of altitude. It glides well even with no power. Landings are very graceful.

I will also add to be very careful in setting up the elevator throws. It is very sensitive to elevator and more than the recommended up elevator will cause immediate stalls. Just use the factory recommended throws, and no more. In fact, I rarely need to use more than the low range throws, even with aggressive maneuvers.

The build quality of the kit is beautiful, and it gets lots of compliments. I love the color scheme. It is a rugged and strong airplane. Overall I highly recommend it, just be very careful of the CG and elevator throws.

Shipping was fast less than 7 days, plane goes together easy a nice build, bypass the included glue and use foam safe Gorilla glue, the supplied epoxy is weak, plane is extremely tail heavy CG is way off with Battery pushed as far as it will go and 3-4 Oz of weight still cannot hand launch this plane, It goes straight up and stalls, will have to wait or create some landing gear as you cannot hand launch this plane, I would have given it a 4 if I could get it in the air, will keep trying to get a flight out of it.

(Edit Note from HL: The CG is correct. This customer was hand Launching the plane incorrectly. See this video to learn how to hand launch EDF jets of this type. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FTl-EjA2DUE )

I just got the F9F and am very impressed with the quality of the airframe, and the packaging. Will be building tonight and hopefully flying in a week or two. For the price of $110, I didn't expect the plane to be this nice. I hope the power system is adequate and not underpowered.

More info to come soon.

I've logged about a dozen flights on my Panther so far and have really enjoyed it. It flies much like the Skyblazers EDF (they have the same motor/ fan setup and are about the same size). I will say I had a tough time balancing the Panther though. The stock 1600 pack has to be shoved way into the nose, so far in fact that it's past the installed battery strap. Also the flight times at or near full throttle are less than 4 minutes to LVC. I've switched to 3s 2100 TP packs on it and they have worked out much better on flight time and balancing. My Panther needed to balance about 1/4" ahead of the recommended CG to get rid of the quirky stall characteristics.

Also, several people on RCG (including me) had trouble with the stock ESC overheating in flight. If this happens, the fan will "stutter". Some went ahead and replaced the ESC, but I found that cutting the zip tie that holds it and shifting the ESC back into the airstream next to the inlet gets cooling air over it and gets rid of the problem.

I also suggest cutting a hole in the underside of the nose to allow battery cooling, otherwise there's no air circulation in the nose area due to the inlets being on the wings.

Due to the above issues I'm giving it 4 stars, it's a great flyer but it does need some tweaking.