bdavison

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Well guys, I finally got the F-15 and I've started painting it. I wanted this to be my winter "scale" project. I plan on doing all the little details, including a fully detailed cockpit, all the little antenna, panel lines and rivets and lights.

After looking at quite a bit of different scale F-15's I eventually kept coming back to one plane as the one I wanted to duplicate.

The plane is NASA's Dryden Research Facility F-15B. They use this plane to test thrust vectoring technology, and I thought the color scheme would look really good on a model.
Here are some pics of the full scale plane.






Here are pictures of mine so far... Just got the basic paint on it right now....Long ways from finishing.

rbushman3

sweet man, i'll be right there with you hopefully after the holidays, ordering a kit from the same guy you got yours from. he said he would build me one like yours. i know you were happy with the quality of the plane he built. probably gonna go with the f-18 though. will be lots of fun. what motor/esc combo are you going with for your plane. i was thinking the hacker A20-22L w/ X-20 esc on mine. thats all i've had expereince with and am very pleased with its performance and power. also the setup should go well with my tp 1320 3c lipos. i beleive you got the hs-55 servos also. let me know if theres anything else you can think of before i order one. thanks.

bdavison

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Let me tell you....he can build an airplane. Mine was flawless. Really well built. It was kinda nice not having to put it together. The fit, alignment, and shaping was really well done. Everything was tight and looked great.

Im thinking seriously of going ducted fan. I've been going through all the DF posts looking for the right set-up...

Im now considering constructing a custom ducted fan unit with ALL custom interior parts. I have a small machine shop behind my house. Ill be starting construction of the fan unit this weekend. Ill be sure to post pics of it once finished. Its going to be a dual fan set-up with full ducting. . And Im crossing my fingers that it should be able to produce 40oz of thrust once finished...I HOPE.

I think I can get at a minimum 18oz of thrust per fan out of the system running it off two brushless motors on seperate lipos.

My main problem is I dont know squat about ducted fans. I've heard alot of horror stories about how it pulls too much amps, not enough rpm's to get enough thrust, etc etc etc.
The problem Im going to have is keeping the lipos,ESC, and motors cool. At 22,000 rpm per rotor, its going to be smokin hot after a flight. But Im hoping it will be a speed machine. I wanna rocket.

If I cant get it to work...Ill be going with the hottest brushless motor I can find and a short Speed prop. Probably an AXI.

bdavison

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Well, here are the pictures of "step 2"

I have started doing the panel lines and rivets.

I have also completed the cockpit interior and pilot.

SuperKaos

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Very nice! I may have to try one of those in the near future... Keep us posted

billaltman

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Looks great , doesn't look like a foamy at all. keep us informed on the progress. I've been out a while haven't done much flying, let me know when we can fly again in the gym. I could make it in on thursday.
Bill

bdavison

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Per Tony, we are going to fly thursday night WAHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

I lost my Spiderweb Revolution II sunday afternoon. The velcro came off the battery. The battery went straight into the field from about 100ft up, and exploded into flames, then the uncontrollable plane went in, nose down, and it exploded into foam pieces. The crash stripped one of my nice Futaba S3108 servos. Im more ticked about losing the lipo than the plane. That was my favorite 3cell lipo. It was impressive though. PIRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRPlop... FLAMES...Looked like the plane dropped a bomb.

So now Im building another Revolution II...Its gonna have a better paintjob anyway.

Im going to try to finish the new Taz plane, at least to the point where you can see it all done, but not flying. I have to wait until I can afford to get all the stuff for it. Im thinking Im going to run S75 servos, and the new Castle 9A ESC in it, and of course the axi.

This past weekend I went out to the fly-in at spencer field. There were alot of electric planes out there, and one guy even brought his Composite-ARF Extra 330S. I flew the Revolution II , and had a blast. It was fun seeing a electric foamy doing knife-edge passes down a 200ft long runway.

ram3500-RCU

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Hi Bill.

Wow! Your jet is the best looking depron F-15 I have seen to date! You weren't kidding about doing it up right. This is the first I have seen your progress and it has blown me away. How much did it wind up weighing? You have inspiered me for my next personal jet. I just finished up an F-5 for myself and am going to do it all out. I'll post pictures of the paint when I have time to do it. The plane is the one in the ad with the motor installed. It doesn't have the clear canopy though. I really like what you did with the cockpit. I have to work in my stuff around those I'm building for others. They come first. I have started my BD5, while waiting on parts. Keep the pictures coming, we are loving it. Remember, you break that thing, and I will have to build you another.

bdavison

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Its not completed yet. I still have to finish the panel lines, Add the tiny details like antenna's, pitot tubes, vents, etc. Do the tailpipes. I dont know if you noticed it or not, but the cannon on the right wing root is already installed. I think Ive got it set right so that when I pull vertical, Ill get a nice WHOOT whistle out of it.

So far it hasnt added much weight at all. Just a little paint, and what ever the foam weights in the cockpit. Im guessing maybe a few grams tops. The panel lines were done with a millenium .003 pen. I copied the panel lines from a scale drawing of the real F-15, so they should be exactly like the real thing. The entire interior of the cockpit is all foam...including the pilot.
I shaped him out of a chunk of depron using sandpaper and a dremel tool. Ive decided to go even more indepth in the cockpit. Im gonna tweak the ejection seat a little more, to make it more realistic. Its too blocky, and doesnt have the ejection pull handles, seatbelts or anything.

I havent even started on the guts of it yet, like installing the avionics or motors. Still trying to decide what I want to put inside it. Ive also figured out a FANTASTIC way of putting scale lights in it.
FIBER OPTIC CABLE. You can use one central light source inside the plane. Like a bright LED. Low weight and low power consumption. Then run fiber optic cable throughout the plane to the various places where you need light like the vertical fin lights, wing tip lights, dashboard lights, etc. The fiber optic cable is REALLY light weight, and you can thread it through the plane into spots that would be hard to get wires and such. You can RIT dye the ends of the cable to get different colors.

Im going to try a new technique I've been working on. Applying a light glue to the surface of some foam, and then using a thin aluminum foil as a "leafing" to reproduce exhausts, vent fins, and other non-painted metallic surfaces. You'll see it soon. Ill be using this technique for the exhausts of the engines, and the heat shielding inbetween the vertical fins. You can see it on the full scale pics above.

ram3500-RCU

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All great stuff. Hey, how about 3M spray adheasive and aluminum foil for the bare metal parts? Just thought of it. Also, you might be interested to know that I am working on a launch cradle for these so you no longer have to hand launch. I'm going to make it simple and cheap. This might get some more guys into these that can't get past that spinning prop next to you ear. Hope so anyway. I need it for my BD5 as, even though it is mostly depron, it isn't a hand launch vehical.

Like I said in the other post, you inspire us all. Please keep it coming.

bdavison

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Why not put landing gear on it?

Tell em to quit being a sissy and huck it.

GreenAce92

Aww you didn't keep the forward canards
I think that's what they are...

God I love that the "canards" and the exposed rear engine exhaust parts sweet! nice build