PilotSmith

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Was today something like National Take Your Kids To The Park Day? Arrrrgggg. I went to the parks in the area that are often deserted but they were full of kids so I had to resort to a smaller park that runs along side some tall power lines. I fly my heli there now and then. I nervously launched her and was amazed that everything was perfect! Not a single trim change needed! . I didn't go over 1/2 throttle as I wanted to get used to flying her and make sure indeed everything was right. Wind was gusting about 10mph yet it flew so steady and smooth. It was flying faster than I expected at only 1/2 throttle. All was just beautiful. As I stood there self absorbed in admiration at how well it was flying I stopped paying attention to the power poll behind me. Made a turn that I knew would go past it a bit but I was well below the level of the power lines. Unfortunately, there was a cable TV or some other sort of line running down lower I didn't notice. Left wing hit it pretty hard as I was banking. [:@] Canopy flew off as did a piece of the wing. As it tumbled I gave it more power and it pulled out and started flying. Ticked off at myself but again impressed at the airplane. Able to control it and fly it back to a nice slow landing. It was acting like it was tail heavy after the impact. After landing I noticed the left aileron was hanging down as the impact severed the aileron about an inch from where it attached to the servo horn. I think about 1 hour in the shop and she will be ready to fly again. Won't use that park again for airplanes...

I'm thinking this will be a fun airplane to fly at the beach. I really enjoyed flying my heli at the beach but a couple times I got sand in it and with so many bearings and moving parts it is a real pain when that happens to dismantle to clean it out. The brushless motor in the jet is only $10 and open outrunner case design so a little bit of compressed air is all I should need to clear it up if sand gets inside! Plenty of wide open space at the beach so I think that will be the next spot I will go next time the large park is not clear. Time to go fix my foamy now...[img][/img]

vicman

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Glad the plane flew for you this time around. I told you it was a great one!

PilotSmith

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Yes, it felt very nice! I was a bit concerned with the wind and all but it flew like it was on rails. She is already repaired and only waiting on the glue to dry to fly her again this weekend! I should have listened to you a long time ago when you said something to the effect that I should stop worrying about too many details and just build the darn thing and fly it. It was kind of a liberating experience to "just do it." I often get hung up being too anal and spending way too much time on small stuff to the point I get burned out on whatever I am working on. I still do plan to get a canopy or shape one from foam and maybe put a little paint on her along the way. But this time I am going to fly and have fun with it until I get around to those details.

Something I was going to ask the folks here is whether it matters if I taper the trailing edge of the ailerons, elevator and tail? Since you have built so many of these I'll await your take on that. As part of my new "just do it" attitude I had not done that yet before I flew it today.

vicman

My Feedback: (10)

Sanding the chine leading to the wing is the main area that will benefit from additional work.
On the last few I built I added some stiffeners to the fuse under the canopy bay and some carbon tow to the elevators. Yes I did round all the edges.
Sig makes a nice canopy and Williams bros have some nifty jet pilots that can make the thing look good in an hour or so.

Nobody else listens to me either...unless I am charging them. Who knew?

stoneenforcer

My Feedback: (23)

shucks... tape + CA.. yippy

PilotSmith

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Ok, at the risk of me sounding stupid, I am not sure what the chine is. Is that the part they call the "strake" in the plans that you are only to sand the top portion of the leading edge? (The wing extensions that run along the side of the canopy.) If so, I did taper them on the top only so there is a sharp edge on the bottom of the strakes. I also rounded the leading edged of all the other wing surfaces. I just wondered if it made a difference to taper the trailing edge of the ailerons, tail and elevator? I thought if I didn't it saves time and it is stronger. But not sure if it degrades performance.

I've got the itch real bad to paint it now... Going to shape me a canopy from foam until I have something better to put on it.

vicman

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Yeah strakes, that's what I meant. I sanded all leading egdes on all of mine.

PilotSmith

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Come on Vic, shake out of it! So did I but I was wondering about the TRAILING edges.

vicman

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I sanded a subtle airfoil on the horizontal and verticals but didn't do anything to the ailerons. I also rounded the fuse alot. In some cases it even ended up into the tri stock in the corners.
I use hot melt glue to hold all the servos in place and also for the antenna.
I used a sig canopy with a williams bro pilot.

PilotSmith

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We had crazy wind here and decided bet not to try to fly it again in 40-60 mph gusts weekend after repair. The light blue color was really getting me me so I sprayed it. Quick and dirty job with the closest thing I had to gray which was silver. Should look fine in the air. Hoping to get out today for a 2nd flight without power lines nearby...

PilotSmith

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Had a great time flying it today. Man the roll rate is high on this thing! Hard to explain but it feels so smooth flying. But I was having some trouble getting a nice loop out of it. I don't know if because it is so light that the cross winds were blowing it off to the side but I was having a hard time to get a nice even loop out of it. Other than that it was fantastic despite only having a $10 brushless motor on it. Eventually I may put in one of my spare larger brushless motors but don't feel the need just yet. Next time out I will use one of my 2200 3s packs. Today I was using a lighter 1500 3s pack. Thanks Vicman for everything on this one. It is one very nice airplane that doesn't break the bank to build.

vicman

My Feedback: (10)

Try making your loop a little bigger so you don't scrub all your speed at the bottom. Throttle back on the down leg. If what I think is happening you are almost into a flat spin at exit...rigth? Ease up on elevator stick tiger.

The rolls are friggin awsome with these planes. Hands down the bestest!

you are quite welcome

PilotSmith

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I think you might be right. I may be making them too tight as it was slowing down quite a bit in the loop. I am going out flying again today and will increase the size. I also just remember that I repaired the one wing so it is going to be heavier than the other. Next time I work on it I will check and adjust the lateral balance as I am sure it is off now. You already told me flaps are not needed but I had to try for myself. I was flying very slow and wondered if with flaps I could go even slower. As soon as I hit them it went out of control. Turned them off quickly and punched the throttle and all was fine. Since then I disabled flaps on my radio. You can slow it down so much that it just gently plops to the ground at walking speed so no need to slow even more. I'm taking my radar gun out today. Want to clock it with my China Cheapy brushless. I think I will soon put in one of my regular brushless motors as the airplane seems like it can handle speed well. I have some slop in the elevator I need to take out first before I go for some real speed as not to have it flutter apart.

PilotSmith

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Hey Vicman,

Another great day today flying. I took a friend flying that I am teaching to fly so I dusted off the Slow Stick and Easy Star and a couple flying wings. Didn't let him fly the F18. . I tried larger loops today and it worked better. Next I need to balance the airplane to compensate for the heavier wing that was repaired. I think I will put the cheapy brushless that is on the F18 on the Easy Star and put a nicer larger brushless I have sitting around in the F18. Today I noticed that the F18 makes a very cool whoosh sound at higher speeds. I think it is the wind rushing through the intakes. Sounds cool. Have you ever noticed that?

440GTX

Hmmm.
My Hobby People F 16 had a bad landing .
Ran out of juice down wind . Not enough power for another circit . Had to land and
destroyed the under side and nose of my F16
So now I have the F16 Fan motor and Esc
This thread has me thinking again. That could be dangerous.
How about an Avero Arrow foamy EDF ???

Fred..

PilotSmith

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Are you still grinding down your F18's Vicman from all the landings? I just threw out my cheapy brushless motor on the Vicman F18. The shaft was a bit bent and I think I overheated it on the last run. So I put in a Rcer Warp BL4-15-4 that was in another airplane I was no longer flying. It really flew rather nice with the cheapo $10 brushless but it was a little low on power. I think the motor I just put in it has way more power. I have not flown it yet with the Warp motor but according to MotoCalc it will have double the RPM. That should take care of the extra power it was needing. As you can see, quick and dirty zip tie with double sided tape used to mount it to the stick. Love the simple care free flying with the F18. Looks a little rough on the ground but looks great in the air.

My airplanes were all in need of maintenance as I have spent most of my time flying my helicopter. But I'm missing flying my airplanes so tonight I got 3 of them ready for flight. I now have the Vicman F18 ready for flight with the improved motor, the 3D Foamy F18 ducted fan ready to fly, and an Easy Star that I just put in a brushless motor for longer and faster relaxed flying. My helicopter is also repaired and ready to go after a pretty hard crash a couple weeks ago. I am off this week so hope to get some good flying time in.

vicman

My Feedback: (10)

Looking good PS!
More power is always a good thing.
I haven't flown any of my F-18s in about a year. All my building and flying has been either for racing or practicing for racing for a while now.

The F-18 is an excellent flyer and looks great in the air like you said.

Good show!

PilotSmith

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Got a few flights in today until I had a mishap on landing. It was a bit windy and the field I was landing at was dirt with small rocks. So I was making very slow stall landings to avoid grinding the bottom down. On the last landing got a gust that rolled the airplane and it did one cartwheel. It was already so slow I thought nothing of it. Must have bumped just right as it broke the fuselage completely off a little bit behind the wing. That was all the damage. Nothing some super glue won't fix. Love how easy it is to fix foamies. Looks like that area should be reinforced so I will double up the foam in that area.

The new motor worked fine. I can go WOT the entire time and at the end the motor is still cool. Was not quite as fast as I was expecting with the new motor but appears the motor is not running at capacity. May try a faster prop next time. It was a good improvement over the first motor but I thought with the new motor I'd have unlimited vertical performance and it was not there yet. Time to run MotoCalc again and see if I miscalculated something. Didn't you say something Vicman like Skully had so much thrust that you could carry a hamster in it?

vicman

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I had a 1:1 thrust ratio with mine @ 19oz

PilotSmith

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I am up to 21oz flying weight on mine after my misc repairs. That is with a 1500MAh 3S 30C pack. Right now I have a 6x5 prop but I think it may be a slow flyer prop as it is not very stiff. I will pick up a 7x5E prop for my next flight. According to MotoCalc thrust with a 6x5 is 18.6 oz and with a 7x5 27.7 oz. If that is the case I should get quite a bit of vertical improvement with the 7x5 with a small drop in top end speed. It also shows the max amp draw at 24.9 which should be fine for my 25AMP ESC.

I think I had some flutter as my elevator in the last few flights got a bunch of slop in it. I just put some bushings on the elev rod and added another pushrod to the servo to make it a push-pull setup. Now there is no play or slop. Also added some stripes to the wing as the white and gray were hard to see in the air.

She takes a beating and keeps on going!

PilotSmith

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I added rudder control to the bird. Now I have aileron, flaps, elevator and rudder control. Not that I need that but I thought it might be fun to play around with the extra controls. Now it is up to 22oz with battery. I swapped the 6x4 prop to a 7x5 EP (electric pusher prop) and I just measured 30oz of thrust at 25amps! 1.36:1 thrust to weight ratio. Woohoo! Can't wait to take it out this weekend. I thought it was a 6x5 that I had on it before but just noticed now it was a 6x4. All I need to do is to add thrust vectoring so I can hover it in place. Just kidding. 1/2 the fun of this airplane is how simple and light it is.