The thickness of the prop hub is too much for the standard motor shaft. A friend knows some one who has a metal lathe and will make me a longer shaft. He started work on it and found that a part of the lathe has been damaged by some one he loaned it to. The project is on hold until he gets a new part for the lathe. Maybe this week. By doing some measuring and comparing shafts between the 50cc and 65cc motors it looks like the 65cc shaft could be modified easily to fit the 50cc motor. It would take cutting one new snap ring groove and grinding flats for the 50cc bell on the 65cc shaft. This would save a lot of work and money (machine shop labor). I have cut grooves like this by chucking the shaft into a slow turning drill motor and using a cut off wheel on a Dremel. When my new Robart electric retracts stripped the threads in the linkage barrel (for no apparent reason) I made new linkage barrels from larger diameter mild steel rod from ACE hdwe., using the same method. The larger rod stock meant a longer length of threads in the linkage barrel and less likely to strip again. Any way, I have a lot of retract cycles on these parts now and no more problems.
Here is the new 4 blade with a TRU-TURN spinner and decals. Bill and I are itching to try out this setup as soon as possible. After the electric meet this weekend at Ocala Flying Model Club we are going to display the model at the Wildwood, Fla. Airport along side the full scale P 51 C BettyJane on February 21st. This is one of the Collings Foundation's Wings of Freedom Tour Stops. The last time we did this was five years ago at The Keystone Fla. airport. At that show I observed this plane come in fast from the west at about 1000 feet and go vertical for what looked like 4-5 thousand feet, something I didn't think a P 51 could do without a hopped up Merlin in front.
