A Maiden Flights short life.....E Starter
08-26-2007, 08:55 PM
#1
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A Maiden Flights short life.....E Starter
Heres a few pics of my GWS E Starter after about 30 seconds of flight. I lost orientation and nosed it in from about 40' up.......wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!
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Of all the things I ever lost....................................... I miss my mind the most!
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Of all the things I ever lost....................................... I miss my mind the most!
08-26-2007, 08:59 PM
#2
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RE: A Maiden Flights short life.....E Starter
And a few more.............
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Of all the things I ever lost....................................... I miss my mind the most!
__________________________________________________ ___________________________________
Of all the things I ever lost....................................... I miss my mind the most!
08-26-2007, 09:09 PM
#4
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RE: A Maiden Flights short life.....E Starter
LOL......... that paint job is hiding some of the worse dimples I had in it from spraying foam with non foam friendly paint. That was 3 coats of spackle and lots of sanding to get it even semi smooth..... I quit because I didn't want to add much more weight! The spare parts were ordered friday so should be here by tuesday at the latest....... Then the fuse will get resanded and repainted with a better foam frindly paint!
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Of all the things I ever lost....................................... I miss my mind the most!
__________________________________________________ ___________________________________
Of all the things I ever lost....................................... I miss my mind the most!
08-27-2007, 06:55 AM
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RE: A Maiden Flights short life.....E Starter
Ouch! That really looks like it hurt. I pray to the plank gods that my maiden goes a wee bit better!
I'm sure your second kick at the can will last much longer than 30 seconds! Afterall, if we can keep those flying rocks in the air...
I'm sure your second kick at the can will last much longer than 30 seconds! Afterall, if we can keep those flying rocks in the air...
08-27-2007, 09:42 PM
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RE: A Maiden Flights short life.....E Starter
Hang in there I am in the same boat.I have about 10 flights in now and getting better.I found a plastic coke bottle top makes for a good nose cowl.Not sure of the size, but it's not the small bottle the next size up.
The fire wall on mine is about gone,Making it harder to mount the motor stick.I wonder if I can use some expanding foam to fill in the gaps inside the fire wall.
The fire wall on mine is about gone,Making it harder to mount the motor stick.I wonder if I can use some expanding foam to fill in the gaps inside the fire wall.
08-27-2007, 09:55 PM
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RE: A Maiden Flights short life.....E Starter
ORIGINAL: onelugnut
Hang in there I am in the same boat.I have about 10 flights in now and getting better.I found a plastic coke bottle top makes for a good nose cowl.Not sure of the size, but it's not the small bottle the next size up.
The fire wall on mine is about gone,Making it harder to mount the motor stick.I wonder if I can use some expanding foam to fill in the gaps inside the fire wall.
Hang in there I am in the same boat.I have about 10 flights in now and getting better.I found a plastic coke bottle top makes for a good nose cowl.Not sure of the size, but it's not the small bottle the next size up.
The fire wall on mine is about gone,Making it harder to mount the motor stick.I wonder if I can use some expanding foam to fill in the gaps inside the fire wall.
Get a piece of foam...cut out the bad area and use 5 minuet epoxy to install the new, and re-mount the stick using 5 minuet epoxy....easy job, flyable in 30 minuets.
08-28-2007, 10:01 AM
#8
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RE: A Maiden Flights short life.....E Starter
My foam held up......I broke the mounting stick on mine.......... I will be glueing and epoxying that back together until the new one ordered shows up. I also bent both push rods to the ele and rud on mine......I have to go to the LHS and am getting threaded rod and clevis's to replace those. Hopefully all my parts show up today...... wing, tail set and fuse halves......... Its a total rebuild...wheeeeeeeeeeee!!
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Of all the things I ever lost....................................... I miss my mind the most!
__________________________________________________ ___________________________________
Of all the things I ever lost....................................... I miss my mind the most!
08-28-2007, 10:17 AM
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RE: A Maiden Flights short life.....E Starter
ORIGINAL: ArrowNaughtic
My foam held up......I broke the mounting stick on mine.......... I will be glueing and epoxying that back together until the new one ordered shows up. I also bent both push rods to the ele and rud on mine......I have to go to the LHS and am getting threaded rod and clevis's to replace those. Hopefully all my parts show up today...... wing, tail set and fuse halves......... Its a total rebuild...wheeeeeeeeeeee!!
__________________________________________________ ___________________________________
Of all the things I ever lost....................................... I miss my mind the most!
My foam held up......I broke the mounting stick on mine.......... I will be glueing and epoxying that back together until the new one ordered shows up. I also bent both push rods to the ele and rud on mine......I have to go to the LHS and am getting threaded rod and clevis's to replace those. Hopefully all my parts show up today...... wing, tail set and fuse halves......... Its a total rebuild...wheeeeeeeeeeee!!
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Of all the things I ever lost....................................... I miss my mind the most!
LOL......yep, rebuilt my aerostar .40 a couple times too.
08-29-2007, 04:40 PM
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RE: A Maiden Flights short life.....E Starter
Guys,
When I was first learning to fly 4 channel, I crashed my E-Starter so many times that I wasn't sure I got all the pieces back together straight. However after a while, I was actually flying it. I decided to give it a cosmetic make over and did the same paint thing on the fuse. As I was watching the foam melt I decided I was going to save as much as I could. I immediatly grabbed a knife and started scraping away as much of the melted foam as I could and then actually cut into the nose, until I found solid foam. As you can imagine, a lot of foam was missing. I was actually going to try a carve up a new piece of foam and glue it in, but I guy turned me on to the Gorilla GLue/ Elmers technique. Since I had nothing to lose, I secured the stick mount where I thought it should be. them formed a sortta cup affair from packing tape. I poured in the mixture into the cup and waited. It started foaming within minutes. I left it sit over night and when I came back in the morning, found a huge ball of newly formed foam where the nose used to be. a little carving with a Dremel Tool, knife, and sandpaper and I had the profile looking as good as new. I little light weight filler to fill the air holes and a dab of white latex paint, and it was hard to tell it had ever been crashed.
I have since experimented with the Gorilla Glue/Elmers mixture and found it to be exellent for repairing all sorts of things on foam planes. I broke about an inch off the wing tips of my E-Flight P-47 and just put some wide masking tape on the bottom of the wing, spread some of the misture on the edge of the wing, and like magic, there was foam there, in the morning where there was none the night before. Shape it and sand it down, a little paint, and it's a good as new. I also broke 1 1/2 inches of the top ot the tail, and just "grew " a new one, using the same method.
I have since stopped using epoxy on any of my foamies. The reason being that epoxy adds so much weight, and unless you pour it on, doesn't fill in the voids where foam was lost. The mixture is super strong and adds no weight, and fills in all the voids where there was lost foam.....
It does take some experimenting to know how much to use as the amount it expands is quite substantial. But it works great..........JMHO...Pat
When I was first learning to fly 4 channel, I crashed my E-Starter so many times that I wasn't sure I got all the pieces back together straight. However after a while, I was actually flying it. I decided to give it a cosmetic make over and did the same paint thing on the fuse. As I was watching the foam melt I decided I was going to save as much as I could. I immediatly grabbed a knife and started scraping away as much of the melted foam as I could and then actually cut into the nose, until I found solid foam. As you can imagine, a lot of foam was missing. I was actually going to try a carve up a new piece of foam and glue it in, but I guy turned me on to the Gorilla GLue/ Elmers technique. Since I had nothing to lose, I secured the stick mount where I thought it should be. them formed a sortta cup affair from packing tape. I poured in the mixture into the cup and waited. It started foaming within minutes. I left it sit over night and when I came back in the morning, found a huge ball of newly formed foam where the nose used to be. a little carving with a Dremel Tool, knife, and sandpaper and I had the profile looking as good as new. I little light weight filler to fill the air holes and a dab of white latex paint, and it was hard to tell it had ever been crashed.
I have since experimented with the Gorilla Glue/Elmers mixture and found it to be exellent for repairing all sorts of things on foam planes. I broke about an inch off the wing tips of my E-Flight P-47 and just put some wide masking tape on the bottom of the wing, spread some of the misture on the edge of the wing, and like magic, there was foam there, in the morning where there was none the night before. Shape it and sand it down, a little paint, and it's a good as new. I also broke 1 1/2 inches of the top ot the tail, and just "grew " a new one, using the same method.
I have since stopped using epoxy on any of my foamies. The reason being that epoxy adds so much weight, and unless you pour it on, doesn't fill in the voids where foam was lost. The mixture is super strong and adds no weight, and fills in all the voids where there was lost foam.....
It does take some experimenting to know how much to use as the amount it expands is quite substantial. But it works great..........JMHO...Pat
08-29-2007, 04:51 PM
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RE: A Maiden Flights short life.....E Starter
ORIGINAL: patnchris
Guys,
When I was first learning to fly 4 channel, I crashed my E-Starter so many times that I wasn't sure I got all the pieces back together straight. However after a while, I was actually flying it. I decided to give it a cosmetic make over and did the same paint thing on the fuse. As I was watching the foam melt I decided I was going to save as much as I could. I immediatly grabbed a knife and started scraping away as much of the melted foam as I could and then actually cut into the nose, until I found solid foam. As you can imagine, a lot of foam was missing. I was actually going to try a carve up a new piece of foam and glue it in, but I guy turned me on to the Gorilla GLue/ Elmers technique. Since I had nothing to lose, I secured the stick mount where I thought it should be. them formed a sortta cup affair from packing tape. I poured in the mixture into the cup and waited. It started foaming within minutes. I left it sit over night and when I came back in the morning, found a huge ball of newly formed foam where the nose used to be. a little carving with a Dremel Tool, knife, and sandpaper and I had the profile looking as good as new. I little light weight filler to fill the air holes and a dab of white latex paint, and it was hard to tell it had ever been crashed.
I have since experimented with the Gorilla Glue/Elmers mixture and found it to be exellent for repairing all sorts of things on foam planes. I broke about an inch off the wing tips of my E-Flight P-47 and just put some wide masking tape on the bottom of the wing, spread some of the misture on the edge of the wing, and like magic, there was foam there, in the morning where there was none the night before. Shape it and sand it down, a little paint, and it's a good as new. I also broke 1 1/2 inches of the top ot the tail, and just "grew " a new one, using the same method.
I have since stopped using epoxy on any of my foamies. The reason being that epoxy adds so much weight, and unless you pour it on, doesn't fill in the voids where foam was lost. The mixture is super strong and adds no weight, and fills in all the voids where there was lost foam.....
It does take some experimenting to know how much to use as the amount it expands is quite substantial. But it works great..........JMHO...Pat
Guys,
When I was first learning to fly 4 channel, I crashed my E-Starter so many times that I wasn't sure I got all the pieces back together straight. However after a while, I was actually flying it. I decided to give it a cosmetic make over and did the same paint thing on the fuse. As I was watching the foam melt I decided I was going to save as much as I could. I immediatly grabbed a knife and started scraping away as much of the melted foam as I could and then actually cut into the nose, until I found solid foam. As you can imagine, a lot of foam was missing. I was actually going to try a carve up a new piece of foam and glue it in, but I guy turned me on to the Gorilla GLue/ Elmers technique. Since I had nothing to lose, I secured the stick mount where I thought it should be. them formed a sortta cup affair from packing tape. I poured in the mixture into the cup and waited. It started foaming within minutes. I left it sit over night and when I came back in the morning, found a huge ball of newly formed foam where the nose used to be. a little carving with a Dremel Tool, knife, and sandpaper and I had the profile looking as good as new. I little light weight filler to fill the air holes and a dab of white latex paint, and it was hard to tell it had ever been crashed.
I have since experimented with the Gorilla Glue/Elmers mixture and found it to be exellent for repairing all sorts of things on foam planes. I broke about an inch off the wing tips of my E-Flight P-47 and just put some wide masking tape on the bottom of the wing, spread some of the misture on the edge of the wing, and like magic, there was foam there, in the morning where there was none the night before. Shape it and sand it down, a little paint, and it's a good as new. I also broke 1 1/2 inches of the top ot the tail, and just "grew " a new one, using the same method.
I have since stopped using epoxy on any of my foamies. The reason being that epoxy adds so much weight, and unless you pour it on, doesn't fill in the voids where foam was lost. The mixture is super strong and adds no weight, and fills in all the voids where there was lost foam.....
It does take some experimenting to know how much to use as the amount it expands is quite substantial. But it works great..........JMHO...Pat
LOL....good info!!!! ARROW....pay attention, this guy is all over it.
08-29-2007, 05:51 PM
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RE: A Maiden Flights short life.....E Starter
It also works really well when you have catastrophic crashes where the foam turns into popcorn or becomes compressed to the point where the original shape is lost. I just cut away the deformed area. then using toothpicks I stick the pieces back together in the orientation that looks about right. If there's nothing left to hold the glue from running out, I just use some blue painter's tape to plug some of the holes, so the mixture stays in the area I want. Then I mix up some and pour it in the holes. Once cured, I pull the tape off, sand and finish. I have successfully used this method to repair sections of fuselage where there were gaps of greater than an inch, with great results.
Taking this a step further, should you ever want to scratch build or make mods to an existing foamie, this process can be used to make some pretty custom stuff. I even messed around making a foam fuse by "growing foam" on the stick, from a Slo-V....It actually worked out quite well, but did take several applications, until I got the shape I wanted....LOL....Pat
Taking this a step further, should you ever want to scratch build or make mods to an existing foamie, this process can be used to make some pretty custom stuff. I even messed around making a foam fuse by "growing foam" on the stick, from a Slo-V....It actually worked out quite well, but did take several applications, until I got the shape I wanted....LOL....Pat
08-29-2007, 08:32 PM
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RE: A Maiden Flights short life.....E Starter
Gorilla Glue is a polyurethane glue. It actually requies moisture to cure. Foam does not retain moisture, therefore it would rely on the moisture in the air, to cure. After the surface started to cure it would shut off the air to the inside. Like this it would take forever to cure. If you mixed water with it, in would become weak. By adding the Elmers to the mix, it cures without compromising the strength. It doesn't seem to matter whether you use white or yellow....I have yellow, so that's what I use......I started out 60/40 the 60 being Gorilla Glue.....This worked but made very large air bubbles in the cured product. The second attempt I mixed it about 70/30....It was better.....I finally settled on about 80/20......This doesn't have to be exact....But go easy on the Elmer's....It's the Polyurethane Gorilla Glue that' s thew magic...The Elmer's is more of an accelerator, than anything else. Mix only as much as you can use in about 5 or 10 minutes. After that if starts foaming and it gets really hard to work with, and get the desired results. The other thing is temperature. You will find it sets up much faster when warm......Resist the urge to try and force cure by heating it with a hair dryer as it fast cures the outside, and slows down the inside cure. ....Good Luck.....Play with it a bit....I think, if your creative, you'll find all sorts of uses for "The Mixture".....Pat
08-29-2007, 09:01 PM
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RE: A Maiden Flights short life.....E Starter
ORIGINAL: patnchris
Gorilla Glue is a polyurethane glue. It actually requies moisture to cure. Foam does not retain moisture, therefore it would rely on the moisture in the air, to cure. After the surface started to cure it would shut off the air to the inside. Like this it would take forever to cure. If you mixed water with it, in would become weak. By adding the Elmers to the mix, it cures without compromising the strength. It doesn't seem to matter whether you use white or yellow....I have yellow, so that's what I use......I started out 60/40 the 60 being Gorilla Glue.....This worked but made very large air bubbles in the cured product. The second attempt I mixed it about 70/30....It was better.....I finally settled on about 80/20......This doesn't have to be exact....But go easy on the Elmer's....It's the Polyurethane Gorilla Glue that' s thew magic...The Elmer's is more of an accelerator, than anything else. Mix only as much as you can use in about 5 or 10 minutes. After that if starts foaming and it gets really hard to work with, and get the desired results. The other thing is temperature. You will find it sets up much faster when warm......Resist the urge to try and force cure by heating it with a hair dryer as it fast cures the outside, and slows down the inside cure. ....Good Luck.....Play with it a bit....I think, if your creative, you'll find all sorts of uses for "The Mixture".....Pat
Gorilla Glue is a polyurethane glue. It actually requies moisture to cure. Foam does not retain moisture, therefore it would rely on the moisture in the air, to cure. After the surface started to cure it would shut off the air to the inside. Like this it would take forever to cure. If you mixed water with it, in would become weak. By adding the Elmers to the mix, it cures without compromising the strength. It doesn't seem to matter whether you use white or yellow....I have yellow, so that's what I use......I started out 60/40 the 60 being Gorilla Glue.....This worked but made very large air bubbles in the cured product. The second attempt I mixed it about 70/30....It was better.....I finally settled on about 80/20......This doesn't have to be exact....But go easy on the Elmer's....It's the Polyurethane Gorilla Glue that' s thew magic...The Elmer's is more of an accelerator, than anything else. Mix only as much as you can use in about 5 or 10 minutes. After that if starts foaming and it gets really hard to work with, and get the desired results. The other thing is temperature. You will find it sets up much faster when warm......Resist the urge to try and force cure by heating it with a hair dryer as it fast cures the outside, and slows down the inside cure. ....Good Luck.....Play with it a bit....I think, if your creative, you'll find all sorts of uses for "The Mixture".....Pat
Man....your info is riviting.....seriously. I've enjoyed it tremendously.
08-30-2007, 08:51 PM
#16
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RE: A Maiden Flights short life.....E Starter
Sweet.....I am going to Lowes tomorrow and picking up a GALLON of Gorilla Glue and a quart of Elmers.......wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!
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Of all the things I ever lost....................................... I miss my mind the most!
__________________________________________________ ___________________________________
Of all the things I ever lost....................................... I miss my mind the most!
08-30-2007, 10:10 PM
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RE: A Maiden Flights short life.....E Starter
ORIGINAL: ArrowNaughtic
Sweet.....I am going to Lowes tomorrow and picking up a GALLON of Gorilla Glue and a quart of Elmers.......wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!
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Of all the things I ever lost....................................... I miss my mind the most!
Sweet.....I am going to Lowes tomorrow and picking up a GALLON of Gorilla Glue and a quart of Elmers.......wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!
__________________________________________________ ___________________________________
Of all the things I ever lost....................................... I miss my mind the most!
Are we sure that's enough? LOL.....
08-31-2007, 10:23 AM
#18
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RE: A Maiden Flights short life.....E Starter
ORIGINAL: crashcrash
Are we sure that's enough? LOL.....
Are we sure that's enough? LOL.....
__________________________________________________ ___________________________________
Of all the things I ever lost....................................... I miss my mind the most!
10-05-2007, 06:09 PM
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RE: A Maiden Flights short life.....E Starter
I just revisited this post to find the mix ratio of Elmers/Gorilla Glue. I bought a new fuse and wing set and wanted to try and fix my old broken wing to use as a spare. Seems GWS doesn't ship anything out until they are good and ready. No wings to be had anywhere so I am stuck with what i have. This is such excellent info it needs to be bumped once in awhile just to make it easier to find. patnchris........ thanks for the insiders tip on this mixture!
Hopefully my 2 new Estarter kits will arive by the end of this month, the scheduled arrival datre is Oct. 18th. I just couldn't wait so went online and found some parts at BPHobbies but they are running out too.
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Of all the things I ever lost....................................... I miss my mind the most!
Hopefully my 2 new Estarter kits will arive by the end of this month, the scheduled arrival datre is Oct. 18th. I just couldn't wait so went online and found some parts at BPHobbies but they are running out too.
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Of all the things I ever lost....................................... I miss my mind the most!
10-09-2007, 05:35 PM
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RE: A Maiden Flights short life.....E Starter
I'm glad it worked out for you. If you're doing it, you've probably come across another problem. sanding and shaping "the misture" leaves a porous surface that is really hard to finish and get looking good. Go to your local hardware store and get lite spackle.....Yup...The stuff for patchng holes in drywall. thin it slightly until it is the consistency of peanut butter. Then spread it over the surface. Wait for it to dry and then smooth it out with fine sandpaper. A little bit a paint and the repair can look better than the original....Regular spackle is too heavy, so make sure you get the lite stuff. Some people have used multiple coats of water based polyurethane to smooth out the surface. It is my experience that this can be extremely time consuming and the water based poly actually soaks into the foam. by the time you've built up enough to make the surface smooth, you have also added a considerable amount of weight. The lite spackle drys relatively fast, if you don't gob it on, and adds very little to the overall weight....Pat
