Peter_OZ

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or more likely it is not politically correct to teach such skills any more, everything has to be some leftie arty farty subject that has no bearing on modern life.

ticketec

My Feedback: (2)

Wo ho,

My servos arrived. now it time to catch up to Ghost!

I applied the resin/microballoons slurry to the dints and damage on the wings, tail fethers and fuse. i'll have to sand that out tomorrow. hate doing that job. i musn't put enough balloons in because it's always a pain to sand. i ran out this time so i hope it's not too hard

I then made the servo mounts for the elevators out of light ply. the servos i'm using are the Hitec 5645MG digital metal geared servos. Finally a manufacture is thinking. the servos come in this handy little case that will be perfect to use as those odds and sods containers in ones flight box. my screws container was getting a little tatty... not that hard for them to design the case to be useful and they get free advertising at the field!!

Still waiting on the order from hobby city which will delay me soon, as well as the motor and adaptor kit coming out from the US.

Thanks

dave

ticketec

My Feedback: (2)

Well another package arrived today!

I was a bit annoyed that the box was so large because i was thinking of all the shipping i have been paying, then when i opened up he box i saw that it was the hacker motor. it too was in a big box. it was only when i actually opened the hacker box up and realise that this motor is massive!!! i'm used to speed 400 sized motors, this thing is big! really really nicely finished motor and accesories.

I have epoxied the servos mounts into the rear of the fuse, so i can look at installing the servos into them tomorrow.

I also have to collect another package at the post office tomorrow which was not delivered today and it's the hobby city package with the packs, ESC, and some other bits and pieces.

Thanks

dave

The Ghost

Hi Dave, good to see your still getting there. I noticed that there is no rear former or rudder support in the rear of the fuse of your F16, just something to check. I see that the wings have the drop tank mounts, do you have the drop tanks? After looking at the wings, it don't appear that there is any location dowls on them? if you want a copy of the build instructions, PM me an address and I will send a copy.

Waiting, I know all about that, still waiting for the 6mm hardened shaft and bearings to turn up[&o].

Cheers

ticketec

My Feedback: (2)

Hey Ghost,

Is the rear former part of the standard byron formers? your right, mine does not have one installed and i'm wondering if that is a mod or a stardard bit of kit?

I do have the drop tanks.... not sure i will fly with them on, but they did come with the model. what i don't really have and really want are the sidewinder missiles, well i have one of them but it's pretty damaged. i think you can get a set of skymaster ones for about $35 each.

The wings do have the location dowels in them, but they have the female fitting in the wing and the male one attached to the fuse. my problem with them is that on the L/H wing the male dowl is missing... i'm going to have to get something to replace it.

Thanks for the offer of the instructions. i have a scaned .PDF copy of them which is fine to read, but the pictures are really bad. I had a look through it just now and your right, it seems like i'm missing former F-3, F-4 and f-5! Well i don't need F-5 anymore, because i just epoxy'd in the servo tray's i made, but i'm going to have to do something about the F-3 and F-4.... you would have the leftover ply that they were cut out from? if i could get a tracing of it, then i could use it to cut my own...[&o]

Going to try and leave work early today to pick up the other bit's and pieces at the post. and then try and get a few days off to start fitting all these bit into the model.

Thanks

Dave

The Ghost

As I already have F-5 fitted that is where the rudder servo will go. I will look through the paper work and see if I still have the missile instructions as they are made up of several pieces that are adv at the LHS.

Cheers

ticketec

My Feedback: (2)

Yeah that's fine,

I was just wondering if there was another nutbag like me who keeps the former offcuts until the model flies, just in case i stuff somethng up and need to make another I think JetFX has an unstarted kit he might be able to help me would with..

The missile i have is injected foam with abs fins? and the rail is molded in too

Thanks

Dave

The Ghost

Here is some more info for you. The mount of the nose gear retract I remember you asking about, and the missile construction.

Cheers

ticketec

My Feedback: (2)

Thanks Ghost, those pics are heaps clearer, and the main gear attachment setup makes more sense now too!

Well another package arrived!! The Hobby city/united hobbies order arrived with the packs, ESC, wheels and other bits and pieces.

NO, my new pilot didn't come from the hobby shop!

The wheels are not bad for cheap aluminium wheels. they are kinda heavy at about 75grams, but for the mains i cut off the hub from a set of larger dubro wheels and fitted the hub to those wheels. made them heaps lighter and a bit bigger too which i needed. Should be nice once painted white.

The charger i bought is also quite nice and i have started charging the 5s and 6s packs.

moe pic's to come!

thanks

dave

ticketec

My Feedback: (2)

The arrivals of packages has continued today as the adaptors from EJF.com turned up. I was a little disapointed with the quality of finish considering how much they cost i ended up polishing the spinner as it arrived with a "machine" finish. looks pretty nice now, but it's a really tight fit onto the fan, almost too tight. i might have to adjust something to make it's installation a little easier.

I decided to put it onto the balancer while i waited for some spray putty to dry, and i couldn't believe how far out it was. i started grinding the heavy side internally, untill i realised that i wasn't going to balance it with grinding alone, so i had to resort to using a blob of epoxy to add some weight. I also put the rotor on the balancer and it was fine so i'll see how it all turns out in a few days when i spin it up for the first time. At the moment i'm putting the first "soft" cycle on the new packs.

I have the elevators primed and ready for panel lines. the left hand wing has also recieved it's first coat of primer to see how it looks. I have also completed the hookup for the elevator servos and am very happy with how they have turned out. my elevator tubes were hollow, so i epoxyed in another tube (brass, it was the only size that fit nicely) this gives me a little bit of redunancy and strength.

The new wheels have been fitted and i had to make some spacers up because the lading gear wire was too small for the bushes that came with the wheels. I also made a new locating pin for the L/H wing with some hardwood and carbon fibre rod. i might even replace the original one fitted on the R/H wing.

Hopefully over the next few days i will have the panel lines done on the elevators, make up the lite ply former thats missing in my model, and re-work the rudder connection so i can finish working on the rear portion of the model.

Thanks

Dave

The Ghost

Hi Dave, Looking good. Been doing some more work at the rear of mine as well. Redone the stab linkages (Du-Bro #369 ends and #2156 turnbuckle)as I said I would, adj them and checked for binding, all looking good. Will go with the golden rod conection between the rudder/steering servo in the nose, less servos less weight. Gone from 7 servos to 3. Will use retract valve thet is controlled directly from the reciver as the kero boys use.

Cheers

F-15J_JSDF

ROFLMAO .... Love the Kitty Pilot, how cute is that!

The Ghost

Fitted stab shelf's, and rechecked fitment of rudder and wings before starting on the fuse paint.

Cheers

bodyshopjustin

My Feedback: (2)

What Colors are you doing?

The Ghost

Don't know yet, will get it to white primer while I am thinking about it.

Cheers

ticketec

My Feedback: (2)

Yeah she's a little ratbag, but pretty cute.

Well i spent today getting the coversion done from the glow motor to electric. the fan is now all assembled and i also soldered all the conections on to the various bits and pieces. As you can see i decided to run up the fan in the garage and i used the exhaust to cool the ESC and packs. It ran up fine with little to no vibration. the only drama is that the spinner was not spinning not quite straight. i've now fixed that too.

On the inital runs she was making what i thought was plenty of air but it didn't sound quite "angery" enough, and from about 75% throttle on it made no increase in rpm's. i ran it like this for about 10mins to soft cycle the packs. i decided to connecte my emeter up and she was only drawing around 7-8 Amps??? It took a bit o thinking about it till i realised what i had done! I'd wired the packs up in parallel not series [:@] #$!^$@*)#@. the 5s pac would have been "recharged" from the 6s pack and now the charger did not want to discharge it because it was saying th coltage is too high for a 5s pack. I'm really hoping i haven't just stuffed a brand new pack up.

I corrected my wiring cock up, and run up the fan again to try and discharge the 5s pack some. it was working with plenty more anger this time, 48 amp's at WOT, and HEAPs more thrust. i've got the voltage down enough now that the charger will accept it and she is discharging happily now, but i really hope i haven't done my money in.....[&:] what a beginners mistake!!!

All this stuffing about took up heaps of time so my aim tomorrow is to have the wings, stabs and fin finished with panel lines. i have been talked into doing away with the ailerons so i'll be trying to engineer a way of pinning the aileron but still being able undo that so i can use them if i change my mind. If i get time i also hope to start with the rudder/ nose gear steering rework

thanks

dave

hattend

My Feedback: (20)

I just subscribed to this thread because I'm very interested in what you guys are doing.

Is it possible that either of you gentlemen will offer for sale the machined parts for the motor mounts? For those of us who would love to do this conversion but have neither the time, tools or expertise? I have 2 F-16s in the garage...one new in box, the other I bought used but would love to convert to a cleaner, less hassle, electric model.

I'd pay a fair price plus shipping and handling from Australia.

How about it? Anyone?

Failing that, do you have full size drawings I could take to a machine shop?

Thanks
Don

The Ghost

Don, The conversion that ticketec is doing, the parts are adv througt EJF.com(see post 85), The conversion that I am doing, the parts will not be done by me as I only do this for myself as I dont have the machinery to do a large run. See post 67 for drawings, I will have to look and see if I still have the drawing as I had to redo my computor after one of them people that think it is funny to send out worms in emails got past my virus protection. If not let me know an I will see about redrawing it.

Cheers

hattend

My Feedback: (20)

Thank you

I missed the part about EJF.com I will be contacting them. I can't wait to see how both your models turn out.

Don

ticketec

My Feedback: (2)

Just a word of warning regarding the spinner. mine was WAY out of balance, please check it. in fact you don't really need it, is more a piece of bing

Ghost, doh about the computer. i hate wasting time formatting and starting again with my pc's.

I'm just applying panel line tape as i type, gotta go and finish that

thanks

dave

The Ghost

Dave, yes it was a pain lost a lot of work, went out and bought an external hard drive to store every thing on now, the worm stopped the progs from working, could not resave anything or open anything, took two days to sort every thing out.

Cheers

8178

My Feedback: (17)

What keeps the white nylon piece with the ball link on it from turning on the 4 -40 bolt threads?

Countryboy

My Feedback: (25)

I would not be as concerned with the white nylon piece turning as I would the remote possibility that the ball link would pop off to the outside. As an added security measure when I use this style of ball link, I add a small washer to the outside. It limits the amount of of swivel in the ball link, but still allows plenty for slight mis-alignment of the linkage.

ticketec

My Feedback: (2)

Nyloc or captive nuts use a small ring of nylon to stop them coming loose, the white nylon piece you were asking about has next to no chance of screwing itself off as it's a massive lock nut!!

THose captive ball links have next to no chance of coming off either.... they are manufactured as a single piece, so if they do come off, you've got bigger problems that that!

thanks

dave

The Ghost

I also use a drop of thin CA once every thing is adjusted. Never had one move yet.

Cheers