chevyman75

i have a d/v 5.9 electric motor out of a portable cd player and wondering what plane it would be good for and how to mount it to the plane... i would like to make a easy foam one!

Tsavah

You are thinking like I have been - recycle the motors found in cassette players, CD players, and a host of other consumer electronic devices. The first problem may be the weight to thrust issue, but ... one could build gliders that need very little thrust to maintain flight. That won't cancel the weight of the motor verses the thrust it can produce with a specific propeller, voltage, and current drain on the required battery pack, but it does open up a number of possibilities. All on can do is build a small flying wing design that is a great glider with the weight of the surplus motor, battery pack, radio gear, servos and other miscellanous hardware and see if the wing is still a good glider. There are plenty of gliders being flown with RC gear, so the motor weight may not be much of an issue, outside of were it will be placed to affect the craft center of gravity (CG). Obviously we don't want to change the CG, or the model won't glide as well. One example of where recycled electronic motors are used would be the micro sized RC indoor flyers, but others have told me the magnets in the hobby shop retain market motors are much stronger. Another option would be to recycle the parts in the surplus motors; wire, casing, bushings, and etc. This would be a challenge most of us who have no interest in, but it is an option. Another would be to find better magnets and replace the stock parts to see if the motor would then be stronger and more suited to an RC aircraft project if the stock motor is too weak. It does come down to thrust produced and being able to mount a properly sized propeller, or gear for use in a gear box. There is no practical way to get around the issue of thrust required.

Since I have collected a number of surplus CD players, one of these days I will have to collect a few, take them apart and do some motor tests. The first issue will be propellers with the correct size hub hole for the motor shaft, or a gear box the motor will fit. More likely I will be searching for a gear box and pinon gear that will fit the motor shaft. I will also be looking to power a micro RC airplane, so I might as well use an Ember 2, Vapor, or other micro plane design as a test bed. Of course one could build their own micro planetest bed, but the prior examples will be good choices to copy, but maybe a tad bigger. As far as finding others who have done this already, I am not having much luck so far and maybe you have done better by now. If you have, please share what you have found.