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ORIGINAL: planedriver_2

I HAD, a Saito FG 30 in a competition airplane and during it's break in and beyond it hasn't ever performed properly, We followed the Saito manual to the letter for break in and after break in, although this was followed this engine has never performed they way a 650.00 dollar engine should in my book. At the last competition i flew in i was scored for only a few flight manuvers due to engine failures. Everything was checked and rechecked for the last two rounds and nothing changed, every round, engine failed in flight. Oil, Gas, mixture and fuel tank plumbing were all worked over. We tried every fuel known to man, Ethonal free, Aviation fuel 100 LL.
All the things one with years of gasoline engine experience would do to make it run properly and nothing. Then was sent back to Horrizon on the recomendation of a Horrizon Rep from the contest i was at. Prognosis was Valve train out of tolorence, too much oil, and the use of Aviation fuel was the cause. Most of the blame for this engine problem was put on fuel supply, tank and lines , All that has since been replaced and still problems with running. The Walboro carb is very hard to tune, it's so sensitive it makes it nearly impossible to get right. When the engine was sent back it returned with a note from the technician, adjusted valves, reset mixture needles, test run on a the bench, Use 30:1 mixture for oil and fuel with 90 octain fuel from the pump with ethenol and along with the engine was a bottle of that EVOLUTION Oil. So after waisting several gallons of fuel mixes, we did just what they said to do. And it all didn't help a bit. I have since purchased a new good old 180 golden knight glow engine re installed a glow tank fuel system and the airplane has never flown better. All the power of the 30 cc gas and not a bit of trouble tunning, running ect. It is just going to cost a bit more to fly it but i should be able to keep it in the air for all four rounds in my next competition. Good Luck with that engine. Note also my friend has the FG36 cc in his large competition plane and it's been a long hard road with it also and two trips back to Horrizon, and now with many dollars on pumps, new lines , tanks, fuel mixes and oil mixes, his oil mix is now at 50:1, with less oil it seems to run much better and he finally can fly his but it still sputters on occasion and does make it thru about ten minutes without failure now. He is almost ready to stick in the 220 glow engine and get reliabillity back for his airplane also. These engines obviously have fuel flow issues and oil use issues but nobody is talking fix. As always it's always the modeler's fault not the engine. Sorry for the BOOK about this but it's really a shame this is going on. I wonder how many others are going thru this with this new FG Gasser series.