Zor

JustinCO,

My power panel has two banana female connectors to bring the voltage to the panel and plug in the electric starter.
I simply permanently wired the battery to these connectors and charge the battery using these two connectors.

Zor

Aiden88

My Feedback: (5)

Thanks Verdmonte, that's great to know... I called Sig and they are sending replacement tubes out today.

I hinged the tail feathers last night so seeing the light at the end of the tunnel. Justin, it's funny but we both have 5 year old boys, both started on the Super Cub, both started a kit and then took time off only to come back years later to finish, and both building stock 4 Stars... Que twilight zone music...

Aiden88

My Feedback: (5)

If your tail wheel spins freely then just go with what you've got. I did something similar and it works so heck with it...

I went out and bought a cheap tool box and I always take a pair of vice grips, needle nose pliers, several sizes of phillips and regular screw drivers, electrical and duct tape, spare props, socket set for prop nuts, scissors, zip ties, and a set of allen wrenches. That's off the top of my head and I'm sure I have other miscellaneous junk in there. I drive a ways to the field so I always want to be prepared to fix mishaps and be able to make adjustments when things come loose.

What are you going to build next? I want to stay with .40 or smaller size planes so really struggling to find kits in that range. I may just build another 4 Star and really customize it and perhaps finally use up the box of Koverall I have lying around. A fabric covered 4 Star with a balsa cowl, sheeted deck, and custom paint job would be cool.

JNorton

My Feedback: (2)

Look at a Bridi Vagabond 40. Nice kit but old style instructions. It's on my building board for winter.
http://www.bridiairplanes.com/hangar/vagabond40.html
John

JNorton

My Feedback: (2)

Balsa USA just re-issued some great looking 40 size kits.
https://www.balsausa.com/store/categ...id_category=19
Look at the Moonraker, Smoothie and Excaliber.
John

justinCO

Thanks. I will see if the configuration is the same on my panel where the starter banana connectors are.

The pictures look great, just like the plane on the kit box. Don't tell me you have an almost 2yr old daughter too!?!?

I have a Hot Line models Mooney Chaparral kit that I would like to build. My grandfather and father were private pilots and owned a Mooney M20F when I was a kid. We spent a lot of time flying in that plane so it has always been a goal in R/C to build a replica of it. Picture of it below after my grandpa sold it to new owners, I think in 1996.

Zor

Hi guys,

That Mooney is sure flying low over the building apparently on final approach to landing.

Had its airworthiness on 18 October 1967.

Engine Lycoming IO360 SER

Now in Franklin, New Hamshire, USA

Address of owner ___Known but not printed here.

We have not seen many Mooneys built as a model.
Would be nice to build one.

Thanks for the pictures.

Zor

Aiden88

My Feedback: (5)

No daughter yet but my wife'sdue in August. However, my Dad was a private pilot too. That's him next to his Fairchild 45 in my avatar. He came up in the golden age of aviation and owned a lot of different airplanes. His last was a BeachcraftMusketeer but I've never seen a kit for one.I rode in it quite a bit as akid but he sold it in 1979 just before he passed away.He also had several J-3 Cubs so I built one as my first kit. One of these days I'll maiden her.

justinCO

It was actually a take off, there are more pictures in the sequence. I am pretty sure it was at an airfield not in the U.S. too. You can search by the N-number (which you already know I'm sure) and you can find some pictures the new owners took, that is how I got these. The only pictures I have of the plane are not digital (from the 80's).

Here is the full sequence:

justinCO

Very cool, congrats on the new family addition! That is a good looking J-3 Cub as well.

piper28

Yeah, there's a Fokker D7 kit that's been leaning against my wall for the last year waiting for me to finish the venture. Figure that kit will only take me about 5 years to build .

I starting breaking in the engine today myself, but the wind was bad enough that I didn't get to fly. Plus, apparently my prop wasn't quite tight enough, so I managed to damage it against the spinner, and didn't have the spare with me. Haven't quite figured out the best way to get the prop tightened down properly on a Saito without really making a mess of teh hub of the engine, scars it up real bad with pliers.

Aiden88

My Feedback: (5)

What do you mean by "hub of the engine"? Also, why use pliers? Doesn't your Saito have a prop nut that a socket wrench will easily tighten down against the prop. Don't tighten too much though. So, put on the spinner backplate first, then prop, prop nut (tighten down with socket), and then bolt the spinner to the backplate. Is that not what you're using?

justinCO

T-minus 3-4 hours until first trip to the field with this plane

I have yet to balance the plane or the prop, and also need to fine tune the servo throws for throttle/control surfaces. Hope to have that done today and will see if this thing gets airborne.

Aiden88

My Feedback: (5)

Yeah, those little but critical details all need to be done.I was hoping to take mine to the field tonight for taxi runs but not looking to good. The stupid nylon tube issue set me back about a week. Have fun tonight!

justinCO

Got out to the field today, unfortunately I did not get to fly my plane. I forgot to charge the rx/tx batteries up to full and when I got there they were low on charge. I didn't realize they lost charge so quickly when not in use (I charged them full like a week or so ago).

While we waited for the batteries to charge the guys at the field let me take up a trainer plane (on buddy box of course). It was a lot of fun and had no problems flying it at all since it flew real similar to my Super Cub.

After that we had enough charge to fire up the engine and at least do some break-in. It took a bit of cranking over with the starter but eventually it fired up. Not bad considering the engine has been sitting in a box for probably 5 years The guys at the field went through the break-in process and then we went to fuel it up for a test flight. That is when the weather came in and rain started pouring down along with some nearby lightning. At that point we called it off for the day and packed up.

It was a good outing though, everyone was very helpful and answered a lot of questions I had. I learned a lot and feel I am more prepared for when I do get to fly my plane, hopefully next Thursday. I also ended up re-doing my throttle cable as we had problems getting it adjusted properly. With the suggestions from the guys at the field I changed it to a copper line with a more easily adjustable part on the servo side, can't remember what it is called.

Few pictures attached and I grabbed a couple short videos of the engine running with my phone:

Aiden88

My Feedback: (5)

What, not flying in T-Showers. C'mon man.Would have been icing on the cake to maiden her but not so good to be out flying in T-Showers,especially if you have one them long FM lightening rods, er I meanantennas.Better flying days ahead.

Looking forward to hear about your maiden Justin.

justinCO

Yep, looking forward to next Thursday now. The throttle adjustments were giving us fits anyways so it was probably best to not rush the first flight. Now it is better configured with much more ease of adjustment.

piper28

The part right behind the spinner backplate (honestly don't know exactly what it'd be called). When I go to tighten down the nut on the prop, I find that I can't hold that part still, it rotates, and that's even without the prop nut being that tight. It's nice smooth aluminum, so it's hard to get a grip on it.

Hoping for good weather tomorrow, but it's looking iffy.

Kmot

My Feedback: (24)

Hi Justin,

You sure do have a lot of faith in your horizontal stabilizer glue joint. I would lean toward the side of caution and also attach some sort of restraint rope around the tail section and those two uprights.

justinCO

Two uprights? Not sure I follow what you mean, never seen any models using any kind of restraint ropes for stability.

I assembled it just as the manual said, with epoxy. I also added the optional vertical stab' re-enforcements that the manual recommends (epoxied as well).

The trainers at the club field inspected the plane, and asked how the horizontal stab' was attached. They said it was fine the way I had done it per the manual.

Aiden88

My Feedback: (5)

Don't worry about that Justin. Your "reinforced" stab is fine the way you have it...per the instructions.

repirazz

Justin, i believe kmot is refering to the uprights on the starting bench shown in the pic. It might be best to have wing mounted, turn plane around & have the leading edge of the wing against those uprights when you run the engine.

That being said, that's a very nice looking fourstar. GL with maiden.

-Rep

justinCO

Thanks, that makes perfect sense now! I had not thought of that and since the club guys were doing all the work I didn't think twice about what they were doing. That said, I think the glue joint is indeed strong enough to handle load of the run ups, but I guess it wouldn't hurt to flip it around with the wing on.

Zor

[/quote]

I certainly agree with "that's a very nice looking fourstar. GL with maiden".

And a reminder about a "golden rule" which states ___
NEVER STAND IN FRONT OF OR IN LINE WITH THE PLANE OF ROTATION OF THE PROPELLER.

We so often see people forgetting or overlooking that safety rule.

Zor

piper28

Most of the people at our field that start smaller (or heck, even larger) planes at our field that aren't using the starter benches we have just have the rope around the tail like that, and I've never seen it to be a problem. (As long as you make sure the plane is pulled tight against the rope, don't want to start it with slack.)

My problem tightening the prop down on my plane may have been having the two nuts swapped around. I'm not absolutely positive, but when I started putting things back together, I was looking at it going that's just not right, and it went together a lot better than it did before, and I think I've got them opposite of what I had.

Maidened mine yesterday. Did find that if you have landing gear attached with metal bolts, probably a good idea to use loctite . After the second landing I was looking at the plane thinking man the one wing is a lot lower than the other, and I really didn't think I landed *that* hard. Turns out the bolts were half out of the plane, if I'd flown for a little longer I'd have been out searching for my landing gear.

Looked back at photos, and for me, I started building August 2006. So only 2 months shy of 5 years, and no real good excuse.