The Flightmodel

You may have waited eagerly about what is going on here! Well, despite the fact that there was no post, we DID advance on the flight model! Eric is to blame! ;-) He is a buff and brought our basic "prealpha" version flight model from "non moving in the water at full throttle" to "slow taxi in water with only two engines running". He has adjusted speeds, ceiling and fuel consumption according to the real thing with the help of our mentors. He has managed to get a special behaviour of The Clipper to work: gain speed until about 70-80 kts, pull the yoke sharply to get her out of the water and reduce drag, push back the yoke immediately to level off just above the waves, gain more speed, then continue to climb.

And: Yes, you can tilt the aircraft during taxi submerging the wingtip. This was called the "passenger shower" as at this occasion the water came down the wing splashing into the salon where the passengers were sitting!