Originally Posted by Glowgeek

Nice smooth flying with the heli, Bert. I understand they are quite hard to control near the ground. It's been described as balancing oneself with one foot on a beach ball.

Originally Posted by Glowgeek

I've run methanol with spark on four Saitos now, in preparation for gas conversions. They all ran a tiny bit richer in the midrange rpm but nothing to be concerned with if the engine ius well broke in, alliwing for leaner idle settings. Transition to wot was alarmingly fast. Almost scary. I can certainly understand the attraction to methanol/CDI.

Saito carbs are works of art. That cateye slit in the spraybar sets them apart from other forms of carb jetting, as found on many 2 strokes. It's not just a hole in the spraybar, it provides a form of progressive fuel metering that is greatly affected by the low speed needle setting. Midrange lean or rich running can be dialed in pretty close.

Then there's the wonderful airbleed carb found on the 120 Fathead that has a midrange adjustment to allow fuel enrichment aggresiveness at the "harder to dial in" rpm range. Even less compromise of idle and wot running behaviour is required with that carb. I recently acquired a 120 Fathead. My third Fathead but the first to be converted to gas. The 120 Fathead has gigantic cooling fins, almost like Saito was looking in the gasser direction early on. I may or may not run it on a plane but fully intend on experimenting with in on gas. Mostly curious how flat I can get the fuel curve.