So I love my TechOne Venus 3D Pro foamie and I can say that this plane is a great beginner to intermediate 3D trainer and sport plane which can be fun for beginner's in 3D as well as more experienced pilots looked to push the envelope a little bit. I have already written a couple of posts on the TechOne Venus and my thoughts of the build and other issues with the plane. After having the plane now for a few months I wanted to write another post about a few little things that I have changed about my plane and why I changed them.
Landing Gear
Unless you plan to solely fly this plane indoors the landing gear is completely useless. I have flown my Venus on very short grass, but the wheels on the landing gear are extremely small and don't work on anything besides a gym floor. Any type of grass or uneven yard will make the plane nose end into the ground when you make contact on a landing.
The landing gear are simply carbon spars with a covering of foam to make the structure leading down to the wheel. While no damage happens to the carbon, the foam gets torque and breaks away when you have the flexing that happens on landing. Also, the entire assembly I found breaks away from the body of the plane where it is glued on. I had to re-glue these numerous times with hot glue. After doing this several times, I just decided to do away with the landing gear as I fly my plane entirely outdoors in the yard. No CG changes were experienced, and I didn't have but just a couple of clicks difference in the trim.
Servos
You will want to replace your stock servos that come with the Venus with aftermarket higher quality servos. The stock servos simply do not hold up and have mediocre performance at best.
Carbon push/pull rods - Rudder
I described this mod in my video overview video. The included string simply didn't impress me and I wanted the longevity and stability of the carbon as opposed to the string. You can use really thin diameter carbon rods from anywhere you choose and they should work fine.
Video of Mods
