RE: A Bit Of Cox Nostalgia On The Tee Dee .010
Thanks to all for the good wishes. Yeah, its been a strange year for me. But, things are improving and I've had a progressively busy fall and winter and am starting to catch up.
Quite a few years ago, some of you may recall an ad in RCM from an outfit called Little Gem products. They offered a tiny throttle for the TD .010. Not an exhaust throttle but an intake throttle and it came with an adjustable airbleed. That one was donated to me by someone as I never could get ahold of the company. It was tried and really didn't do more than take the engine down to 18K or so. A throttle it was but not all that effective.
Then I stumbled on to some neat little throttles made by VA for some of their small diesel engines. These were generously donated to me by Dave Larkin of Canadian diesel fame. Quite a bit better made and after having installed an adjustable airbleed, it was somewhat more effective at throttling but while the idle would hold, transition was mediocre at best. While I managed to get a TD .049 throttling well with a conventional throttle, much mechanical gymnastics were required to accomplish what I wanted.
Pictured on the right is the Little Gem throttle and on the left is the VA unit adapted to suit.
There's something unique to the Cox series of engines that allows them to throttle effectively at the exhaust. Today, we have three designs that do that satisfactorily, two of them commercially available. The important thing, I think, is that now we have very small radios and choices in throttles for that little marvel, the TD .010. Now we can get our creative juices steamed up and make something to take advantage of what we have available to us. Full house .010 pattern ship? Why not. Imagine Quique Somenzini putting one through its paces. Imagine his surprise at how well it flies.