Skymaster F18D Hornet twin build
03-01-2017, 08:21 AM
#82
03-01-2017, 07:56 PM
#85
Got both motors running tonight. No high power stuff yet because it was late but they are running well. Also got the cg done. She weighs 57 lbs with uats full and a little fuel in main tank. Took a tiny bit of lead in the nose for cg but will probably remove it all when my new light controller gets here.
No LED lights needed with tail mounted engines
No LED lights needed with tail mounted engines
03-06-2017, 07:42 AM
#88
Saturday I got the maiden done. It was a day of nonstop issues thanks to the receiver recall from spektrum. I ended up with less then a half pound lead in the nose for CG. Not bad since I have such large engines installed in the tail.
The day started with changing out the receiver from the new 20 channel to the old 12120 and Xplus. Had issues getting everything working again after pulling the nose all apart to get the wires on. After getting that all done one of the engines had a fuel leak. It was an easy fix just the festo that screws into the side needed a new Oring.
For weather we had insane wind that day it was a quartering crosswind gusting 20 to 30mph.
Test flight. Took off about half runway with ease. With these struts it leans real bad in crosswinds. Might have to add some pressure into the main struts. On the first few laps it took just a little elevator trim but the aileron trim was maxed out. I realized I needed to mix the tailerons in with the aileron trim because this plane does not use much aileron throw. Also the main gear never retracted due to the airflow holding them locked over center. Will try some things to fix that. After doing a few more circuits with it in trim I was feeling pretty good with it. I know wanted to get it all trimmed out with the flaps/slats down and gear down. So I dropped the gear first and not long after that I got a real bad roll to the right. I fought this roll through the turn and realized I had an engine out. So I never dropped the flaps due to wanting to keep her clean. Even on 1 engine the plane had plenty of power just a real bad yaw/ roll to the right. Brought her around for landing. On our feild we have a big tree line to clear before dropping into landing. I didnt want to drop the flaps until I cleared the tree line. So on final I started dropping the power and as expected she rolled back to the left. Got her lined up past the trees and started to drop the flaps and slats but felt I had to add allot of up elevator and got scared of running out so brought the flaps back up for landing just to get her down. Landing went good just ended up long in the grass. Problem was this grass is a little long and thick so the main gear ply wood former cracked. I am fixing that now so she is ready for FLjets.
All in all it could have been worse.
Things to work on
>mix roll trim into the tailerons
>Make new thicker plywood bulkhead for the main gear...... (the stock one is very thin for such a big plane)
>Might have to install a match box on the flaps to free up a channel to add another air valve just for the main gear lock release.
>The engine flame out was due to me being in a hurry and not setting up the pump limits. I had the pump limit set very low when this engine was in another airframe. Now in this airframe with this large fuel system and the pumps being 7 feet from the engines the PW limit needs to be higher. I hit the pump PW limit in flight.
>I think the engines are set at to high of an angle and need to face back a little straighter. This is why I think she flew so bad on one motor. I had the left engine out yet the plane wanted to roll right and yawed right due to the engine angle being so far out.
First impressions in flight where this plane has a super light wing loading and feels like a pretty maneuverable plane. My old big F15 flew like a big tank. This plane feels a lot more nimble.
The gear is by far the best gear I have ever seen on a ARF and works very well. Top notch for sure great work Laki !!
Instructions where horrible and very hard to figure out. Also the ordinance is a complete pain because the stuff does not fit right. Saddle fuel tanks also need to be a different shape. With the stock shape I cracked the bottom of the hatch area just to wedge them in and they still didn't sit right. Landing light on the nose gear sits way to high and sits in the wheel well. LEX fences are way to big and not scale.
Airplane is bad ass and look forward to getting more time on it.Should be a fun season !! I have a great plane to start with now its time to make it unique and detail the crap out of it
The day started with changing out the receiver from the new 20 channel to the old 12120 and Xplus. Had issues getting everything working again after pulling the nose all apart to get the wires on. After getting that all done one of the engines had a fuel leak. It was an easy fix just the festo that screws into the side needed a new Oring.
For weather we had insane wind that day it was a quartering crosswind gusting 20 to 30mph.
Test flight. Took off about half runway with ease. With these struts it leans real bad in crosswinds. Might have to add some pressure into the main struts. On the first few laps it took just a little elevator trim but the aileron trim was maxed out. I realized I needed to mix the tailerons in with the aileron trim because this plane does not use much aileron throw. Also the main gear never retracted due to the airflow holding them locked over center. Will try some things to fix that. After doing a few more circuits with it in trim I was feeling pretty good with it. I know wanted to get it all trimmed out with the flaps/slats down and gear down. So I dropped the gear first and not long after that I got a real bad roll to the right. I fought this roll through the turn and realized I had an engine out. So I never dropped the flaps due to wanting to keep her clean. Even on 1 engine the plane had plenty of power just a real bad yaw/ roll to the right. Brought her around for landing. On our feild we have a big tree line to clear before dropping into landing. I didnt want to drop the flaps until I cleared the tree line. So on final I started dropping the power and as expected she rolled back to the left. Got her lined up past the trees and started to drop the flaps and slats but felt I had to add allot of up elevator and got scared of running out so brought the flaps back up for landing just to get her down. Landing went good just ended up long in the grass. Problem was this grass is a little long and thick so the main gear ply wood former cracked. I am fixing that now so she is ready for FLjets.
All in all it could have been worse.
Things to work on
>mix roll trim into the tailerons
>Make new thicker plywood bulkhead for the main gear...... (the stock one is very thin for such a big plane)
>Might have to install a match box on the flaps to free up a channel to add another air valve just for the main gear lock release.
>The engine flame out was due to me being in a hurry and not setting up the pump limits. I had the pump limit set very low when this engine was in another airframe. Now in this airframe with this large fuel system and the pumps being 7 feet from the engines the PW limit needs to be higher. I hit the pump PW limit in flight.
>I think the engines are set at to high of an angle and need to face back a little straighter. This is why I think she flew so bad on one motor. I had the left engine out yet the plane wanted to roll right and yawed right due to the engine angle being so far out.
First impressions in flight where this plane has a super light wing loading and feels like a pretty maneuverable plane. My old big F15 flew like a big tank. This plane feels a lot more nimble.
The gear is by far the best gear I have ever seen on a ARF and works very well. Top notch for sure great work Laki !!
Instructions where horrible and very hard to figure out. Also the ordinance is a complete pain because the stuff does not fit right. Saddle fuel tanks also need to be a different shape. With the stock shape I cracked the bottom of the hatch area just to wedge them in and they still didn't sit right. Landing light on the nose gear sits way to high and sits in the wheel well. LEX fences are way to big and not scale.
Airplane is bad ass and look forward to getting more time on it.Should be a fun season !! I have a great plane to start with now its time to make it unique and detail the crap out of it
03-06-2017, 08:24 AM
#91
Saturday I got the maiden done. It was a day of nonstop issues thanks to the receiver recall from spektrum. I ended up with less then a half pound lead in the nose for CG. Not bad since I have such large engines installed in the tail.
The day started with changing out the receiver from the new 20 channel to the old 12120 and Xplus. Had issues getting everything working again after pulling the nose all apart to get the wires on. After getting that all done one of the engines had a fuel leak. It was an easy fix just the festo that screws into the side needed a new Oring.
For weather we had insane wind that day it was a quartering crosswind gusting 20 to 30mph.
Test flight. Took off about half runway with ease. With these struts it leans real bad in crosswinds. Might have to add some pressure into the main struts. On the first few laps it took just a little elevator trim but the aileron trim was maxed out. I realized I needed to mix the tailerons in with the aileron trim because this plane does not use much aileron throw. Also the main gear never retracted due to the airflow holding them locked over center. Will try some things to fix that. After doing a few more circuits with it in trim I was feeling pretty good with it. I know wanted to get it all trimmed out with the flaps/slats down and gear down. So I dropped the gear first and not long after that I got a real bad roll to the right. I fought this roll through the turn and realized I had an engine out. So I never dropped the flaps due to wanting to keep her clean. Even on 1 engine the plane had plenty of power just a real bad yaw/ roll to the right. Brought her around for landing. On our feild we have a big tree line to clear before dropping into landing. I didnt want to drop the flaps until I cleared the tree line. So on final I started dropping the power and as expected she rolled back to the left. Got her lined up past the trees and started to drop the flaps and slats but felt I had to add allot of up elevator and got scared of running out so brought the flaps back up for landing just to get her down. Landing went good just ended up long in the grass. Problem was this grass is a little long and thick so the main gear ply wood former cracked. I am fixing that now so she is ready for FLjets.
All in all it could have been worse.
Things to work on
>mix roll trim into the tailerons
>Make new thicker plywood bulkhead for the main gear...... (the stock one is very thin for such a big plane)
>Might have to install a match box on the flaps to free up a channel to add another air valve just for the main gear lock release.
>The engine flame out was due to me being in a hurry and not setting up the pump limits. I had the pump limit set very low when this engine was in another airframe. Now in this airframe with this large fuel system and the pumps being 7 feet from the engines the PW limit needs to be higher. I hit the pump PW limit in flight.
>I think the engines are set at to high of an angle and need to face back a little straighter. This is why I think she flew so bad on one motor. I had the left engine out yet the plane wanted to roll right and yawed right due to the engine angle being so far out.
First impressions in flight where this plane has a super light wing loading and feels like a pretty maneuverable plane. My old big F15 flew like a big tank. This plane feels a lot more nimble.
The gear is by far the best gear I have ever seen on a ARF and works very well. Top notch for sure great work Laki !!
Instructions where horrible and very hard to figure out. Also the ordinance is a complete pain because the stuff does not fit right. Saddle fuel tanks also need to be a different shape. With the stock shape I cracked the bottom of the hatch area just to wedge them in and they still didn't sit right. Landing light on the nose gear sits way to high and sits in the wheel well. LEX fences are way to big and not scale.
Airplane is bad ass and look forward to getting more time on it.Should be a fun season !! I have a great plane to start with now its time to make it unique and detail the crap out of it
The day started with changing out the receiver from the new 20 channel to the old 12120 and Xplus. Had issues getting everything working again after pulling the nose all apart to get the wires on. After getting that all done one of the engines had a fuel leak. It was an easy fix just the festo that screws into the side needed a new Oring.
For weather we had insane wind that day it was a quartering crosswind gusting 20 to 30mph.
Test flight. Took off about half runway with ease. With these struts it leans real bad in crosswinds. Might have to add some pressure into the main struts. On the first few laps it took just a little elevator trim but the aileron trim was maxed out. I realized I needed to mix the tailerons in with the aileron trim because this plane does not use much aileron throw. Also the main gear never retracted due to the airflow holding them locked over center. Will try some things to fix that. After doing a few more circuits with it in trim I was feeling pretty good with it. I know wanted to get it all trimmed out with the flaps/slats down and gear down. So I dropped the gear first and not long after that I got a real bad roll to the right. I fought this roll through the turn and realized I had an engine out. So I never dropped the flaps due to wanting to keep her clean. Even on 1 engine the plane had plenty of power just a real bad yaw/ roll to the right. Brought her around for landing. On our feild we have a big tree line to clear before dropping into landing. I didnt want to drop the flaps until I cleared the tree line. So on final I started dropping the power and as expected she rolled back to the left. Got her lined up past the trees and started to drop the flaps and slats but felt I had to add allot of up elevator and got scared of running out so brought the flaps back up for landing just to get her down. Landing went good just ended up long in the grass. Problem was this grass is a little long and thick so the main gear ply wood former cracked. I am fixing that now so she is ready for FLjets.
All in all it could have been worse.
Things to work on
>mix roll trim into the tailerons
>Make new thicker plywood bulkhead for the main gear...... (the stock one is very thin for such a big plane)
>Might have to install a match box on the flaps to free up a channel to add another air valve just for the main gear lock release.
>The engine flame out was due to me being in a hurry and not setting up the pump limits. I had the pump limit set very low when this engine was in another airframe. Now in this airframe with this large fuel system and the pumps being 7 feet from the engines the PW limit needs to be higher. I hit the pump PW limit in flight.
>I think the engines are set at to high of an angle and need to face back a little straighter. This is why I think she flew so bad on one motor. I had the left engine out yet the plane wanted to roll right and yawed right due to the engine angle being so far out.
First impressions in flight where this plane has a super light wing loading and feels like a pretty maneuverable plane. My old big F15 flew like a big tank. This plane feels a lot more nimble.
The gear is by far the best gear I have ever seen on a ARF and works very well. Top notch for sure great work Laki !!
Instructions where horrible and very hard to figure out. Also the ordinance is a complete pain because the stuff does not fit right. Saddle fuel tanks also need to be a different shape. With the stock shape I cracked the bottom of the hatch area just to wedge them in and they still didn't sit right. Landing light on the nose gear sits way to high and sits in the wheel well. LEX fences are way to big and not scale.
Airplane is bad ass and look forward to getting more time on it.Should be a fun season !! I have a great plane to start with now its time to make it unique and detail the crap out of it
Quick question regarding the PW limits, are you planning on setting this to the default setting?
thanks in advance.
Oh - the F18 looks great in the pic!!!
Last edited by skunkwurk; 03-06-2017 at 08:27 AM.
03-06-2017, 09:18 AM
#92
Congrats on the maiden, I am putting together my order now. Sure is a nice looking jet and from the sounds of it adding the external tanks/ordnance may be good for this jet since it flies so light.
03-06-2017, 09:31 AM
#93
Hmmm, this pump limit thing in Kingtechs are new to me.
It makes me feel like I should be at twice the pump limit so I have "plenty" of reserve. Now seeing what can happen from the pump limit being too low, what is the worst that can happen from too high a pump limit?
Congrats on what sounded like an "exciting" maiden! The jet looks great!
It makes me feel like I should be at twice the pump limit so I have "plenty" of reserve. Now seeing what can happen from the pump limit being too low, what is the worst that can happen from too high a pump limit?
Congrats on what sounded like an "exciting" maiden! The jet looks great!
03-06-2017, 10:12 AM
#94
Here is the thing with the pump limit. If you have it set to high then you loose all your throttle resolution. Kind of like using the outside servo horn hole and turning your throws down in your transmitter....
This engine did not have the stock settings. They where all custom already from another plane and I forgot to set them up for this plane. I did engine runs that morning and saw the PW was about 340. I meant to adjust it before flight but forgot with all the other stuff going on including pulling out the spektrum receiver in my sons plane and changing it also. The pump PW was set to 340 on the last plane so this plane having a much larger fuel system needs it a little higher. Its all on me I forgot.
This engine did not have the stock settings. They where all custom already from another plane and I forgot to set them up for this plane. I did engine runs that morning and saw the PW was about 340. I meant to adjust it before flight but forgot with all the other stuff going on including pulling out the spektrum receiver in my sons plane and changing it also. The pump PW was set to 340 on the last plane so this plane having a much larger fuel system needs it a little higher. Its all on me I forgot.
Hmmm, this pump limit thing in Kingtechs are new to me.
It makes me feel like I should be at twice the pump limit so I have "plenty" of reserve. Now seeing what can happen from the pump limit being too low, what is the worst that can happen from too high a pump limit?
Congrats on what sounded like an "exciting" maiden! The jet looks great!
It makes me feel like I should be at twice the pump limit so I have "plenty" of reserve. Now seeing what can happen from the pump limit being too low, what is the worst that can happen from too high a pump limit?
Congrats on what sounded like an "exciting" maiden! The jet looks great!
03-06-2017, 10:19 AM
#95
I don't use any Ys or T fittings. 2 separate vents. The only thing joined together is the fuel fill line.
03-06-2017, 11:44 AM
#97
How should you set the pump limit? This is something I never really thought of, I would want something high enough so if a filter starts to clogged you dont flame out prior to a point of actually affecting the turbine operation.
03-06-2017, 01:32 PM
#99
My Feedback: (2)
Join Date: Oct 2004
Location: Durham, NC
Posts: 334
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
Glad you got on the ground ok ..congrats on the first flight! Thanks for being the single engine test pilot 
I thought the engine angle was too much .. about half that angle and it will point at the CG.
For cross winds you want the main struts pressure to be as low as you can get away with. The higher the pressure the more it will want to tilt . You want it to squat on the ground.
You will get a big pitch change with flaps. pitch trim change with flaps is about 3/4 of all your trim if you don't have any mixing.
I thought the engine angle was too much .. about half that angle and it will point at the CG.
For cross winds you want the main struts pressure to be as low as you can get away with. The higher the pressure the more it will want to tilt . You want it to squat on the ground.
You will get a big pitch change with flaps. pitch trim change with flaps is about 3/4 of all your trim if you don't have any mixing.