Well I finally got to maiden this little beauty, but it wasn't all plain sailing!
Once again my 15cc gas engine was not behaving itself, but I finally managed to tune it so that it kept going at full throttle when I pointed it straight up. Subsequently discovered that my pressurised vent to the muffler had split and came off.
But my greatest concern was the COG, I was WAAAAY too nose heavy at 143mm back from the LE at the fuse, my CG was like a good inch in front of this. I had moved both my ignition & receiver batts back as far as possible, and I stuck 30gms of lead near the tail wheel, still an inch out and really nose heavy.
Anyway, taxing and take-off was all good, but once in the air the plane did a pretty good impersonation of a rocket and just headed for the heavens, it took a lot, I mean a real lot, of down elevator to get it flying level, and then lots of rudder and aileron trim to get it flying straight.
Now, in all this tuning and trimming I forgot how long the engine had been running and sure enough, splutter splutter DEAD STICK!! I hadn't even had time to check out stall tendencies. Oh well here goes..... now there was a solid westerly breeze going straight down the runway, and our runway slopes west to east, unfortunately I was up the westerly side when it conked out and was headed for a down hill landing with a strong breeze behind me. The plane passed me going over 100kph and I was in the middle of our 300yard strip, I finally got it down with 25 yards left for the hottest landing ever.
Not a scratch to the airframe but one retract bent and snapped at the base, but stayed in place and the other just spun around, with the grub screws giving out. And thanks to the advice I received here the reinforced wing bay where the retracts bolt in were perfectly intact :-)
So a replacement retract and some work on the vent line, but guys what's with the CG, is anyone getting their plane to balance at 143mm back?
Cheers,