dasintex

My Feedback: (10)

Yup; these threads can go down the wrong road quick, and get off subject; I believe that what ever you build, you are proud of it regardless of the scale or not so scale line it is showing, my approach is that I don't have the time or all the skill to build a Kit totally to scale, I admire those that can and do, and go to the trouble of putting endless 3mm rivets on, if I had the time, I probably would as well; in the mean time, I feel fortunate that the quality and quantity of ARFs are out there, that easily enables me to put together a decent near scale plane that I can show up with and stand side by side with any Warbird and fit in, I tend to tweek my ARFs so they are a little different and unique from the herd of others that are out there; how many times have you gone to a Warbird event and saw a half dozen Big Beautiful Doll P-51's! So build them the way you want and don't worry about comparing or what others say! just saying!

MX240

My Feedback: (4)

Big Beautiful Doll....LOL...yep, I have two of them and fly one every week.
Always want to have a spare 51.
Yep, agree "dasintex" enjoy what you have and we don't need to apologize because we didn't put any rivets on our lowly ARF.

At my central Nebraska club we have a big group of War birds both ARF and what I would call museum scale good enough for any Top Gun meet and we all have fun and get-a-long great.
Thirty years ago I was one of these scale guys and missed a lot of seeing my two kids grow up and didn't go to many ball games because of building models.

Thank goodness their mom did a good job and they turned out great with the young lady being a CFI working for a corporate rateing.

dasintex

My Feedback: (10)

Opps, I didn't mean to pick on those 'Big Beautiful Doll' P-51's, great birds, just used them as an example, that when I put together my ARF, I want it to be a little different from the same ARF of someone else; I have nothing against the guys that go for the total Scale build, if any thing I am jealous and wish I had the time and skill, maybe sometime down the road in the near future I will go that route.

BJ64

My bad - I thought we were heading down one of those "it's not scale" routes again.

Sry

BJ

BJ64

It wasn't meant like that, Ram.

I think you know what I mean...

BJ

Ramstein44

My Feedback: (157)

No worries. I gotcha.. In all honestly, I kinda want to do another one of these. I wouldn't go all out but would love to do a repaint and add Sierra gear since I made a template and slap a G62 or DLE85 in her. We'll se what the winter holds..

kwik

What is nice about this ARF is that you can buy spare parts at Tower Hobbies. You know how easy it is to rip out the gear on a 190.

One tiny mistake, and it's done.

How nice then to just order a new wing, when the damages is getting too bad.

But now I discovered that we are supposed to glue the wing-halves together, so you must buy both wing halves. And they cost $399.

Oh, well, it was too good to be true, if you could buy just one wing at half that price.

It is a nice set anyway, much quicker to put together than an ESM, but the monocote is a big minus, of course. I guess it reduces production cost.

All in all, a great ARF, at least for me.

I think it is important to soak the gear "plywood" with thin ZAP; It's that chinese bisquit stuff again.

BJ64

Just starting to really get stuck into my build seriously now... and I read your comment there, Kwik.

Is it worth using a thinned epoxy (like West Systems) to do the gear plywood reinforcing - or are you just using thin/super-thin ZAP CA to soak/impregnate the (cheapo) wood in that area?

Also, do you guys "fuel-proof" your engine bay wood? Like... epoxy/ZAP etc? I believe it's a pre-requisite down here in Oz, or they won't pass your model during certification. Which kinda makes sense anyways - fuel spatter soaking into balsa/ply would weaken/rot the wood pretty quickly, I'd imagine.

Just finished mounting the aileron/flap servos onto the hatch-plates, and I must say the plates don't look all that sturdy once the mounting blocks and servos are in place - quite a bit of give in those plates, even once the servos are all secured on. Would a couple of pieces of flat CF CA'd across the inside of each plate provide a bit of lightweight added strength in that area?

Heaps more questions to come...

BJ

Ramstein44

My Feedback: (157)

Absolutely. I use thinned west systems epoxy.

BJ64

Thx Ram

What do you thin with? IsoPropyl Alcohol (IPA), or something else?

What ratio would you thin to - or do you just go for a runny consistency?

BJ

motor12

I use Isopropyl alcohol 91% and thin it so it brushes on easily. I mix it with 30 min epoxy so I have plenty of time to work with it.

Ramstein44

My Feedback: (157)

I use a 2 to 1 mix with SLX denatured alcohol from klean strip.

TUMBLER

My Feedback: (13)

I saw one fly this weekend with a DLE 55 and it was not very exciting. SO what is the biggest engine someone has put in one of these. By the way, it must be build like tank! I saw 3 bad landings with noseovers and ground loops and not even a broken prop. a few weeks prior i saw it pied drived into the runway nose first on landing and barely any damage at all.

sharam

My Feedback: (2)

Here is a video of mine in flight - bumpy landing! I think my CG is still a little too far aft.

The DLE 55 provides plenty of power for my taste. The aircraft has a lot of presence in the air and it is very responsive. I love flying it.

It slows down very quickly with flaps which surprised me. I had thought that with all that momentum it would be hard to slow this down but it really slows quickly.

The electric Robarts are looking good so far.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8y9W...Du3Ed1CJ7BZsxA

By contrast, my P47 floats forever even with full flaps!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9tVlJcsQ_r8

mikes68charger

My Feedback: (34)

All the Top Flite gaints build about the same as long as it fits it will work.

That said the biggest you probly should go are the 80cc range, Ie the DLE85 real nice, or the ZDZ80 motors.

I got a TopFlite gaint P47 with a ZDZ80 Super (more hp than the regular) with a Scale 22X10 4 blade Belia prop, looks great and pulls very hard, but is not much faster than my DLE55 powered war birds, TopFlite Gaint P51, P40

These 80cc are not much more on weight than the DLE55, so no much more work involed, ie I did not add any lead, but moved my reciver pack farther back.

motor12

Looks good Sharam, did you use full flaps on landing. Looked like half flaps. Just wondering as I am trying to get my landings sorted out. I don't want to get to slow and end up smacking the run way....

BJ64

You could whack a Moki 250 in it if you've got the $$$

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FiFZ0E12TV8

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wSd55C8UMbM

BJ

BJ64

Thx Ram.

Is 'denatured alcohol' the same thing as IsoPropyl Alcohol?

BJ

Duplicator41

My Feedback: (1)

Two different products. Denatured alcohol is also known as MSDS.

Cheers,

Andy

vertical grimmace

My Feedback: (1)

Nice flight. Your landing seems to be typical with this plane. IMO the reason why is this plane is very light. Not like a typical warbird. They need to be flown much slower, to get the wing to stall properly. If the wing stalls, it will not bounce back up. The best way to get a feel for this is to do stall tests up high. I am beginning to think that an aircraft of this type, with TOO light of a wing loading, can be a little troublesome on landing.

sharam

My Feedback: (2)

Thanks!

Half flaps on landing. My previous landing on full flaps slowed down the plane way too much! My sense is you need to come in with half flaps (moderate to light wind), with a little power. Watch the wings as they begin to rock if your speed gets too low.

The other option is to come in high with half flaps, then dive for the runway to maintain speed with throttle fully back.

sharam

My Feedback: (2)

Thanks Vertical Grimace! I need to have a few more landings to better understand this plane's sweet spot.

vertical grimmace

My Feedback: (1)

No problem. This is what I noticed with a fellow club members FW 190. It is all about finding the sweet spot. And the wind is a difficult variable to account for. On my Pica 190, I do not like to land with full flap unless it is dead calm. But it is a different beast. Way higher wing loading.

BJ64

I just Wiki'd it, and it sounds like 'Denatured Alcohol' is what we call 'Metho' (Methylated Spirits) down here - predominantly Ethanol (booze), with up to around 10% Methyl Alcohol (Methanol) or some other bittering/toxic agent/s added in to stop recreational drinking of it

The 1lt bottle of Mehtylated Spirits I've got here at home says it's 96% Ethanol, but it doesn't say what the other 4% is.

BJ

vertical grimmace

My Feedback: (1)

Or you can just get the laminating resin and it will be thin to start with. Anytime you add anything to epoxy it weakens it and you risk a solvent trap situation. You can also use heat (gun) to flow resin. If it is a small area, this might be a good way to go if regular viscosity epoxy is what you have on hand.