ram3500-RCU

My Feedback: (221)

Back to the cowl flaps. The hinges are tack glues to the ring and the flaps. Epoxy will be added. The inner ring is 1/8" smaller in diameter so the pivot points of the hinge can fit between the ring and the flap. This way the hinge is flat on the plywood. You can also see that I have cut some holes in the ring for air flow.

The large holes are for the exhaust pipes.

BTW, the stand-offs for the cowl ring are 11/16" or 17.46MM. This will vary slightly from plane to plane, depending on how much epoxy is between the ply fire wall and the nose of the fuselage.

JSZ

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Looking good Professor Carfson

ram3500-RCU

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LOL.

I added some extra cooling holes to this one. I believe it will allow you to close the cowl flaps another 25% or so in flight (about where the stock cowl is).

ram3500-RCU

My Feedback: (221)

Now I can take the tape holding the flaps off. They are now attached to their ring.

Next the control cable is installed. Sections are cut from the cable housing and glued to each flap. This is all still before cutting them apart.

I'll now add the epoxy to the half of the hinge glued to the plywood ring, and then they will be ready to cut apart. I wait on adding the epoxy to the flaps till I have the webbing glued in place. Then the whole thing can be coated, cable guide, hinge, and web.

Because they are molded in a partly open position, you will need to remove some extra material until they lay flat.

ram3500-RCU

My Feedback: (221)

I have been asked about the tail gear doors I did last time. This will be where I am going next, for those interested in eliminating the tail door air cylinders and air system in the fuselage all together. The gear is electric, and the doors will again be mechanical and controlled by the gear strut. I will be making it a little lighter this time, to save some nose ballast.

You should check the length of your tail gear shock. It should be 3" (center to center of the mounting holes) or 72.2mm, not the 4" the original ones were. Sierra makes the modification to them if need be. Hopefully they have fixed this by now. At the 4", the fork for the tire is still protruding through the doors when the gear is retracted, instead of just the tire. This makes for a much larger than scale cutout in the doors. Not right for what CARF calls a "museum scale" aircraft, right?

BTW, this is one of the areas where CARF could have done better on the mold. The full scale had piano type hinges on these doors. Impossible on the CARF due to the curvature of the cutout for the doors. This cutout should have been straight, along with the fuselage in this area. For this reason, it is not possible to get the doors open as far as they should be, using the hinging that CARF supplies. A compromise I have lived with up to this point. I'll once again take a look at this problem when I get that far.

Details details details.

ram3500-RCU

My Feedback: (221)

Flaps are cut loose and sized for the closed position.

ram3500-RCU

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Webbing is installed.

ram3500-RCU

My Feedback: (221)

This is a good look at the V groove.

ram3500-RCU

My Feedback: (221)

A note on the tail gear to all you CARF owners.

I preface this with appreciation for all CARF has done well on this aircraft. But, again, in their own words, they consider this a "museum" scale aircraft.

Apparently, CARF has made no formal request to the manufacturer to make a correction to the length of the shock on the tail gear. If you have a 4" shock, it needs to be shortened to 3" for the scale look. Again, only the tire should protrude through the tail gear doors, and NOT the fork. Contact Sierra directly and he will take care of this for you.

Here is one that has been shortened by Sierra.

stivvy

Hi Gary,

I have a recent kit, Nov 2012 and the shocker is still incorrect.
Wonder why some kits have the correct 80mm version and others don't ??

I have been trying Darrell at Sierra but no response as yet - anyone has his email address in case I have the wrong one ?

Cheers

Steve D

vfrank59

Wow, this is weird. I just measured my shock and It is 3 1/4 in long. The weird thing is, my tail wheel does not stick out of the gear doors when retracted. It is at least an 1 1/2 inches below the gear doors. I checked to see if i could adjust the shock to make it longer but it does not adjust. I suppose the fix is a longer shock to make it right.
Vern
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stivvy

No - 3-1/4 inch is the correct length.
My kit has a 4 inch long shocker which is incorrect - too long and the yoke will be visible.

Steve D

vfrank59

I thought it was the correct length but the bottom of the tire is still about 2 inches below the gear door. The tire does not stick out of the gear door at all. I wonder if I should add a bracket to stop it from retracting so deep into the wheel well?

samparfitt

My Feedback: (43)

Vern,
Since the former for the gear must be glued to the fuse, possibly, you glued the former at an angle other that perfectly vertical! If so, it should be an easily fix by gluing some 1/8" thick (or so) piece of ply along the top mount of the gear.

vfrank59

Well, You called it! I just checked the tail wheel mount former and it is dead nuts vertical. I will add a piece of ply to the top mount and correct the angle.
Thanks for all the help.
Vern

ram3500-RCU

My Feedback: (221)

Glad we figured THAT out. I was about to pull my hair out.

2" below the doors!!!!!!!!

I thought maybe something had to be upside down.

ram3500-RCU

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I'm confused about the different lengths though. Darrel claims he had not sent any shorter ones out, and has only shortened the ones that I sent back to him.

??????????????????????????????????

ram3500-RCU

My Feedback: (221)

[email protected]

His phone # is 440-476-4885

vfrank59

Me Too! It looks wrong that it is hidden below deck. I will check my doc's to make sure it is not suppose to be below the surface of the gear doors.
Gary, never got a pm from you on the guns, lights and sound system. I am not sure if it got lost on the internet if you did send one.
Thanks,
vern

ram3500-RCU

My Feedback: (221)

This is a SHOCK.

Couldn't resist that.

ram3500-RCU

My Feedback: (221)

The Corsair tire is always visible through the gear doors when retracted. Hence the clearly visible cut outs in the doors.

It would be nice if CARF gave you some ledger lines on the inside to align the bulkhead with. However, if you first establish the correct location of the vertical tail spar relative to the wood insert for the vertical tail, and cut that slot, that locates the rest of the internal wood parts automatically, including the bulkhead in question. This is critical in getting the gear oriented properly. CARF does kind of show this being done this way on page 27 of the manual, if you look at the pictures on the bottom of that page. See where they show the slot being? A dimension would really help at this point, being this is not something that should vary from plane too plane.

Still owe you that email Vern. My brother works a swing shift (3 shifts) with different days off as well, and I loose track of his schedule for communicating with him. Thank you for your patience. Once this is established, it will simply be a case of option selection.

I also have decided to give a web site another try. All this will be easily accessed there as well.

vfrank59

No problem. I know how works gets in the way. I installed my D&L gear and it works great. Thanks for getting all the engineering done for us!

Thanks,
Vern

ram3500-RCU

My Feedback: (221)

Something else I would like to point out.

See that bolt in the front of the plywood frame holding that end of the air cylinder? That bolt is all but impossible to access once all this is glued in place in the fuselage. That bolt is eliminated when you go with the electric conversion. Mitch adds another bracket to the housing to hold the trunnion arm, so the whole thing bolts in with the (4) cap screws through the main bracket. The result is a removable gear unit now. You have an air cylinder go bad on rig, and you are scratching your head, or maybe learning a new language, or both.

ram3500-RCU

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Mitch is selling a lot of these conversions. He likes me too.

ram3500-RCU

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Note on that bulkhead that may also help. When it is in the correct place, it is not a tight fit in the fuselage. You would think you could just slide it back till it is snug, but this is NOT the case.

I hate to harp on this, but this is another nice advantage to the electric gear. I fit all the gear up to the bulkhead, and then remove it when installing the plywood structures. Much easier to locate and glue all this in without having to work around the gear, or dissembling it. (4) bolts bolt it back in when I have all this wood stuff glued in.