Macchi 202 speed plane
 

I began developing this airplane around 4 years back. I'm considering a small run of kits that would include a CF reinforced glass fuse, sheeted foam wings with retract mounts and a glass bagged balsa tail section. At this point I am just trying to get a read on interest. Of you would like more details please PM, if there is enough interest in the forum then I will go into farther detail about the airplane and could even post a video.

Hmm, side mounted .91 VR-DF on a 9x12 prop?

PM sent.

MJD I will pick mine up this weekend. i will flog the heck out of it and see if there if anything needs to be improved on. So far the pics I have seen I dont see anything.

Cool, I look forward to hearing about it! Looks like a nice little sport flier :cool:. Oh no, do I have to buy a Warbird 115 motor? An OPS 1.20 bimetal? Yikes..

The .91 should pull it okay I think.

nah a OS 95V will fly it just fine and move it along at around 120 on a 11x12 prop.

Jeff, it should do better then that. The .61 2 stroke version flew the Sac course during practice at 1:27. I would say 150mph with the 95. I'm betting she would do 180 with a stock 115 running 50% and a 13x14.5

I was messing with MJD as I thought he was talking a 91 FS. I will put the juice to it see what it will do.

.61 at 1:27.. I don't know how long that course is? Me not pylon racer.

But if that is a decent time then the VRDF should do okay for ****s and giggles.

I am waiting for the all carbon fiber version...

The course is two pole 700ft spacing with 10 laps. Approx 15,000 ft traveled and 20 180degree turns. By doing the math I was able to determine an average speed of around 130. my estimate would be 140-145 between turns. That airplane also had fixed gear but was 6 oz lighter.

I'm game.......

Anything to report?

I was window shopping the YS115, it's less money than I thought it might be. Nice hop up for a .61 size ARF.

I have it but haven't really started on it. looking at best option for the engine mounting. side mount to reduce drag or inverted so I can use a racing hyde mount. I will put a servo in each wing close to the aileron. Need to look and see if I want to glass the whole wing or not. If I glass the wing then I think I can skin hinge it but never done that before. If I just use a plastic film then it will be lighter.

II don't think I have a choice but to side mount the .91.

i think you could mount the 91 inverted if rear exhaust.

I think a 91 mounted sideways with an offset header and pipe along the side would work best. The nice thing about that is the tank CL will be right there with the carb CL. Got another one almost ready to go, wings and tail are in the bag so looking to ship Tuesday. Who is next in line?

Thought I was already booked..?

Yes you were, I was off the grid last week due to work travel but was able to get MJDs kit in the mail prior to leaving. I'm looking forward to getting feedback from him. The Sacramento area modelers held a warbird race last weekend. The Macchi performed very well.

I left for 2 weeks vacation on July 19, so I saw the model for the first time yesterday, and only had a brief look through as I had to fly out again today to Reading PA for the week to install a packaging line. But.. the fuse looks really nice, light layup but seems plenty tough enough for the job, tail surfaces look good, sheeted wing panels look good - I like what I see so far! That's all I can offer for detail at the moment. I did suss out the side mount versus inverted idea by holding the engine up to the fuselage and going "hmmmm.." and I think side mount is the way to go, the header would need a moderate amount of offset for inverted. Jury is out until I take a good look at the pipe length, header length needed and the resulting geometry.

Any news yet? Looking forward to some feedback.

Sure, but I am trying to finish off three other projects so I am still in the "planning phase".. meaning fondling and thinking. I do not have a reputation for building quickly on RCU..

You did a real nice job on this, I'm very happy with cost and the quality. The glass/epoxy + CF fuse is light and cleanly molded, strong where it needs to be but nothing overboard. The detail work on the molded exhausts and air intake is worth mentioning, well done. Wing panels are neat and clean with accurate (and pre-lined) retract cutouts. The tail feathers are sanded and shaped and glassed, nice work on those too.

I might have to scale up the air intake a bit, as it has to flow about 5 litres of air per second.

I am not sure how you developed the fuselage profile - did you do any templates in a CAD program? I only ask because I'm wondering about the possibility of not having to measure up the front fuselage profile and draw templates.. I like the lazy technical approach. My plan is to laminate a laser-cut ply/GF mounting plate for the engine and epoxy/glass it to the fuse and tie it all together, versus a std firewall and mount.

If I can get a short 1" - 1.5" rise header from MACS then I may yet go inverted on the .91. I don't want to cut away at those nice molded exhausts!

Nothing fancy on the design. The plug started out as a normally constructed box fuselage. I already had molds for the cowl, canopy and section forward of the canopy. After being shaped a symmetrically as I could it was painted and the molds were pulled.

The flat plate mount is the way I went too. I made an H shaped plate out of 1/4" ply that fit the inside contour of the fuse. I notched it where the mounting lugs go and replaced those pieces with 1/4" G-10. Then the plate was glassed via vacuum bagging. The plate runs from the nose ring to 2" behind the wing LE. It allows the YS115 to move around a bit but has proven it's self for 30 or so flights now.

I may also add that mine has no formers either. When bolting the wing on with a 4 screw method, the fuse gets very stiff.

With a new racing season coming up I decided to stop fooling around and have a good stock of airplanes. Here is the result so far. Just a couple more weeks and they are ready for paint. There have been a few refinements over the prototype but not much, the stab will be moved forward 1.5" for better turning ability and I will be doing skin hinges on the tail. I got tired of carving the round wing tips so they are now Carbon Fiber. Picture shows fist set being vacuum bagged.

Those look pretty. I wish I had the time I used to have for this hobby....I'd have one.

Woohoo CF wing tips!