Hughes500E

My Feedback: (16)

Any news on the new cowl from Stans? Did he ever receive an ABS for molding?

Stickbuilder

Have not heard. I'm trying for one out of carbon fiber. It's gonna be a shame to paint that one.

Bill, AMA 4720
WACO Brotherhood #1

stifts

Hi Bill, I would like to join the Brotherhood!
If I can pick my number,I would like very much to be asigned
number 64. Steve

Stickbuilder

This thing is still growing. Let's all welcome Bill Deidrich, Brother #43. We're glad you guys have joined. Maybe we need to have a secret handshake or password or something.....

Bill, AMA 4720
WACO Brotherhood #1

khodges

My Feedback: (1)

How about a magic decoder ring?

skylarkmk1

Ken,

I tried a decoder ring, it just won't work for WACOs, the codes are just too wacky.

Stickbuilder

I tried my Captain Video Decoder ring, and my Green Lantern Decoder Ring, and even used my Red Ryder Decoder all to no avail. I did get lucky with my Sky King decoder, but it only worked on Cessna's (and then only with T-50's and early 310's). So it looks like the decoder ring idea is out. I don't have a Boston Blackie decoder, but since the Waco's were not made near Boston, it probably won't work either.

Bill, AMA 4720
WACO Brotherhood #1

damifino

Like fine wine, good things take time. The carbon fiber cowl project will be hot on the heels of those MUST HAVE WACO Brotherhood tee shirts..................

ClayH

Hello gang,

Well I flew my recently purchased 1/5 scale YMF today for the first time today and I have a few questions. I bought this plane off the internet, so I couldn't see the problems until it arrived at my home.The builder actually put about 2 degrees LEFT thrust in the motor setup. Needless to say it was not only interesting on takeoff, but also turned much better to the left than to the right. How would you guys suggest correcting this problem? The plane was built per Pica specs, so it uses the hardwood rails. Should I elongate the holes in the rails to allow for the 4 degrees correction or is there another way to make the correction?

2nd, I guess this is a common problem with the Pica Waco - on the top wing where the first open bay meets the center section sheeting, there is a flex point in the wing in the sheeting. It is the same on both sides. From looking at the plans it appears that some of the spars are butt joined at this point. Any special fix recommended for this issue? If I have to remove the covering I guess I'd fill it and glass the joint. I've seen this on nearly every used Waco I've ever seen, so I'm sure you guys have dealt with it.

3rd - what CG range do you recommend?

Lastly, a few questions about the motor- The plane is powered by a Saito 120. Good scale power and that's about it. There was lots of fuel inside the cowling after the 2 flights. I run a long exhaust diverter out the bottom of the cowl. The motor is upright. Any idea why so much mess in the cowl. Granted, I've been out of Nitro planes for about 10 years, but this seemed measier than normal. Lots of fuel on the engine as well. I was running a 16-6 prop and the flight were done at mostly full throttle(the plane seemed to need it fly with scale authority)

Thanks for your input guys. I've waited 25 years to fly this plane and I want to get the details squared away.

Clay
Waco Brotherhood #18

Stickbuilder

Clay,

I would reccomend that you fill the existing holes in the engine bearers with something like epoxy, and re-drill the holes for 0 degrees offset.

The wing problem will need to be addressed by removing the covering (at least on the top surfaces) and removing the center sheeting adjacent the spars. Make a spar doubler from 1/8" ply, and remember that the dihedral is 2 degrees. Install the doubler from the center of the center section, and extend it out to the 3rd rib in each wing bay. Install it using 30 minute epoxy, and re-cover/re-sheet the wing.

The reccomended balance point is: 5-3/8" back of the top wing leading edge.

I don't have much experience with the Saito line, but it sounds as if you need to run a crankcase vent tube from the vent outside the cowl, or you have a very bad leak in the fuel system. The OS 120 that I used on one plane flew the model with good authority. What prop are you using? I would suggest something in the range of a 16X6 wooden prop, or if using an APC, maybe an 18X6. The idea here is to have the largest diameter, with a very low pitch. Thrust is what you want with a large bipe, and not speed. Using a large diameter prop with a small pitch is like driving your car in 3rd gear. great pulling powwer and great acceleration, but not a lot of speed. Remember, the WACO is not a fast airplane. If you are having to fly at full throttle, you may have issues with balance, and prop selection. With the OS 120, I flew most of the time at about 1/2 throttle, only using full throttle for big old loops. Take-offs were a lot less than full throttle as well.

What does your model weigh? It almost sounds as though you have a lead sled. I see where you are running a 16X6 prop, so I'm back to square one. As I said, I have little experience with the entire line of Saito engines. I do, understand that they are considered very powerful. Maybe someone else in here has experience with them.

Bill, AMA 4720
WACO Brotherhood #1

ag4ever

Assuming you have the crankcase vent line installed, your engine could be spitting fuel from the carb. There are velocity stacks that can be purchased (not sure if they still sell them for the big blocks though) which helps to reduce this.

There is a long post in the engine forums regarding saitos where they discuss this.

My Saito 1.00 spits a bunch of fuel thru the carb, but I don't have the carb fine tuned yet. I have not started messing with the low speed needle, and that is what is causing my fuel spitting problem, but I only have 1/2 a gallon thru the engine so i don't want to run it too lean yet.

skylarkmk1

Clay and all,

Check this site about Saito's http://saito-engines.info/index.html . Then look under "Special Tricks" #3. Also the "Throttle Setup" section, it may help lessen the amount of fuel being spit out the carb.

ClayH

Thanks guys for the tips. That Saito page was very helpful - just have to try to find a stack/filter that will fit a 120 carb.

Now I see that someone is planning to make cowls for this model as well. How's that coming? The cowl on mine is made of fiberglass,with the blisters being part of the mold. I also got an ABS cowl with the plane that has no blisters on it. Which one is the stock cowl?

Clay

ClayH

Double post

mobyal

John --
Thanks a lot for this. I'm about to put a new 120 and 150 on the stand tomorrow, and the info here looks like it'll really be helpful. (Particularly since I inadvertantly [sm=confused.gif] changed the low-speed needle setting on the 120.)

Stickbuilder

Clay,

The original cowl is made from ABS plastic, and the blisters glue on. If you use the template that came with the plan in the kit, you will wind up with the paired blisters, which would make this one a UMF, and not a YMF.

Bill, AMA 4720
WACO Brotherhood #1

skylarkmk1

Just to add to stickbuilder's reply, even spaced blisters are for a YMF (Jacobs engine) you have to make your own template with 14 equal divisions (blister locations) and spaces between the blisters. A cowl with paired blisters are for a UMF (Continental engine) and the template supplied is supplied on the plans.

Cowls are available from;

AeroFiberTech (Stan's) http://www.aerofibertech.com/products.html (1/6th & 1/5th scales)
Fiberglass Specialties http://www.fiberglassspecialtiesinc.com/ (1/6th & 1/5th scales)
Vintage R/C Plans http://www.vintagercplans.com/main.htm (plastic 1/6th for the Novack/Morgan Plans)
Kit Cutters http://www.kitcutters.com/ same as Vintage R/C Plans.

Stickbuilder, I believe is working with Stan's to get a Carbon Fiber YMF Cowl available.

Stickbuilder

Actually, the carbon fiber cowl is being done by an associate of damifino. This guy makes Nascar automobile parts, and the carbon fiber stuff is cured in an autoclave. Stan's will be from epoxyglass, and I would expect the normal outstanding workmanship for which Stan's is well known.

Bill, AMA 4720
WACO Brotherhood #1

kestrel0222

My Feedback: (1)

I have just started work on my new YMF in 1/6 scale (from plans) and will soon need to purchase a cowl for this model. I have heard of Fiberglass Specialties, but not AeroFiberTech. I have been away from the hobby for a few years and am just now returning. My question is, what is the quality of these products? Do they have alot of pin holes? I must also say that I have not purchased any proucts from either of these (2) companies in the past. Is one companies product better then the other?

Thanks,

Stickbuilder

Not to cast any disparaging remarks on any company, but Fiberglass specialists parts often have pin holes and other voids in the glass parts, while Stan's normally do not. I have 2 sets of wheel pants fot the WACO, and one of them required a total recoating with Bondo to be useable. The set from Stan's required only a light sanding. The cost was comparable, but sadly, the quality was not. You makes your choices, and live with them.

Bill, AMA 4720
WACO Brotherhood #1

skylarkmk1

Bill,

Thanks for getting the cowl thing straight, I must have miss-read posts 2101 & 2102 at the top of the page and thought you were doing the CF Cowl. Correct me if I am wrong, it is my understanding that Stan's currently has the UMF cowls and you have sent him a kit plastic cowl made as a YMF cowl to make a mold from.

Stickbuilder

Stan will receive the YMF cowl as soon as damifino has it glued together and sanded.

Bill, AMa 4720
WACO Brotherhood #1

S. Christensen

Stickbuilder, khodges and all Waco Brotherhood members,
This is my first post in your long running and very interesting Waco YMF thread. I'm posting at the request of Stickbuilder and because I am a lifelong Waco addict. There is no cure for this addiction, other than to build, fly and love every Waco possible.

The photo in the khodges Post #2097 (page 84) is of Claude McCullough's spectacular Cuban Waco. That's Claude on the left, at the tail and myself at the nose. Stooped over and unseen is Mike Gretz, probably picking up one of the seemingly thousands of bolts, nuts, etc., used in the assembly of this model for flight. The scene is the parking lot of the Worthen Center Arena in Muncie, Indiana, the site of the static judging portion of the AMA Nationals Scale competition. The photo must have been taken last year in August. Claude's Cuban Waco is a real testament to the man's abilities! It's powered by a Saito 300 and tips the scales at around 30 lbs or so. It flies beautifully and Claude entered it in last year's Team Scale event. His documentation is likewise a work of art. This was a fairly obsure airplane and Waco built just three of them (I believe) for the then very small Cuban Air Force.

I'm writing this just after returning from a wonderful morning of flying my own Waco SRE model at SIG Field. Got to the field at 7:30am and was greeted by a freshly mown grass field (50 yards wide and 3000 feet long) and a sky so blue that it almost hurt the eyes. This condition is referred to as "severe clear" by us locals. My "mission" this morning was 3-fold (2 of these Waco-oriented and the other was transmitter related). Because I love details and cannot stop messing with my models in this regard, I had obtained and built a very nice little scale Wasp Jr. dummy 9-cyl. engine from Wing Mfg. Using the documentation for my NC1252W aircraft, I used Mother's Aluminum polish to polish the 1/8" dia. aluminum pushrod tubes to a high shine and installed them in the dummy engine, along with the aluminum sparkplug stalks and the sparkplug wires and caps for each cylinder. Of course this thing looks drop-dead beautiful in the cowl of my SRE but its installation did raise a red flag. My concern had to do with the amount of cooling air coming into the cowl between each of the 9 cylinders - in short, would it be sufficent to keep my Saito 1.00 from over-heating? Long story short, I flew four picture perfect flights with nary an issue from the engine! Needless to say, I'm delighted at this turn of events! You can't imagine how pretty this bright yellow airplane is with that dummy engine in the cowl, trundling over bright green Spring grass, toward the take off position on the field. Mission #1 - accomplished.

The second mission was to test the new flap-to-elevator programming mix that I prepared for this morning's flights. My Hitec Eclipse allows up to 5 different "flight condition" mixes so I used one of these to slave down elevator input to down flap input, using an emperical 10% number. In flight, the airplane responded beautifully to this mix, keeping nicely level as flap input was introduced. I may "play" with this percentage in the future but for now, it's working nicely. Mission #2 - accomplished.

Finally, my third mission was to see how my Hitec Eclipse transmitter was working (after four 12-15 minute flights) using my newly installed 3S LiPo transmitter pack that I bought from 2dogrc during this last Toledo Show. Like everyone else, I've fought the 600maH NiCad transmitter packs used in commercial transmitters for years. The problem has always been that even after a fresh charge, the NiCad transmitter pack immediately begins losing its charge, making it necessary to constantly charge the unit any time you want to fly. I've hated this characteristic for a long time and during the Toledo Show I saw a possible answer - the 2dogrc LiPo transmitter packs. This pack is sized to fit easily into the NiCad recess in the back of the transmitter and is rated at 2500maH! After getting back from Toledo, I wired this pack with a Hitec connector and charged the pack in a little less than 50 minutes. After installing it into my transmitter, the voltage readout was 12.5 volts - a full volt higher than I'd ever seen in my fully charged NiCad pack! After charging, I let transmitter just sit until today when I went out to the field to fly. This morning when I turned on my transmitter for the first time in almost 2 weeks, the voltage readout was 12.4 volts! I am now officially a firm believer in LiPo cell packs for my many different transmitters.

Sorry for the length of this post but when a guy has as good a day at the field as I've just had, well, you like to share. Thank you Stickbuilder for my induction into the Waco Brotherhood. Trust that I'll do my best to keep the Waco name at the forefront of model aviation, just as it should be.

Bill Diedrich

Hi Bill AKA Stickbuilder,
I have been reading through this post for the past week, Whew 85 pages takes a lot of concentration to read, I would like to become one of the Waco Brotherhood if I may, sure wished I stll had that 1/5th scale kit I had to unload several years back, but have no fear I love to build so I will be on the lookout for the plans availablility through the AMA. Thanks for the return PM.

Bill Diedrich
Ventress, LA

Stickbuilder

Bill,

It has become my policy to go to the last roster on a given page, and amend that post to reflect new memberships. Otherwise, the thread jumps pages very quickly. I have entered your number (43) in the above roster. Welcome to the Brotherhood, and may all your WACO Flights be perfect ones.

Bill, AMA 4720
WACO Brotherhood #1