| I noticed a Duraplane posted on your site and said it belonged to | you. I'm considering getting one for myself as a trainer. How does | it fly? Have you crashed it yet? Does it live up to it's name?
I've got a Sturdy Birdy II, which is basically identical to a Duraplane 20 trainer.
They do fly, but faster than most other trainers because they weigh more.
I never really crashed mine, thanks to my instructor. However, it should be somewhat more resilient than a built up balsa trainer
The control surfaces are connected via the normal methods, and so are no more durable than those on any other plane. Mine have been broken once or twice just by accidents in the garage.
In a minor accident, the plane is likely to survive with little more than a broken prop. In a more serious accident, the engine is up front, so it's going to get broken if you hit something hard.
A Duraplane might be a good choice if you're trying to learn to fly a glow plane by yourself with no help. (But I don't suggest this!) If you do have an instructor, I'd suggest a built-up trainer instead. They fly better, and slower -- which helps with the learning process.
The Duraplane instructions themselves do say this --
The DuraPlane Trainer 40 is intended for intermediate to expert level pilots. Beginners can enjoy flying the Trainer 40 also, if they have had experience flying trainer models.
Cute that their trainer requires experience with a trainer ...
The group does seem to have a resident Duraplane maven, and you may be hearing from him shortly. If not, google the group for Duraplane -- there's been a lot of posts recently. (And it seems quite possible that your question was _intended_ to invoke him.)