David,

The CS pipe is 8 3/4" long, from one end to the other. The first picture is the pipe as tested on the VA .049. This was a posed shot, the coupler's somewhere in the pipe/muffler/coupler box.


The second and third pictures show the CS .049, ball bearinged engine it was made for. I got that engine from one of the guys who was thoroughly disgusted with it. While he COULD have re-built it, he was just to busy to have to mess around with a piece of slag metal, as I seem to recall him saying. Well, he wasn't far off, I did rebuild it, new bearings, head re-machined square to the cylinder etc. etc. It was STILL a piece of slag. I ran it without the pipe and WITH the pipe and my stock VA with a muffler did better,, FAR better. But that was with the glow head that came with it. Years later, someone was making new heads to take Nelson plugs and that's what you see there. But despite having a new head some three years ago, I fell in love with stinky power and have had no time for it. MAYBE this fall.

After the disappointment with the engine, I installed it on to the VA .049 MK1 that was flying my Ugly Stik, the shoulder wing version. Well, you have not had goose bumps till you hear an .049 come on the pipe and just BLAST that Stik forward. About a minute into THAT excitement, the engine slowed and got real loud. After landing, I found that the back end had parted company. I didn't find it till some 2 or 3 years later.

The fourth picture shows what happened. What I thought was a neat, cleanly machined, middle weld, was actually a thin walled NUT that held the two halves together. Not knowing this, I never ventured to make sure the assembly was tight. I've been tempted to use blue Loctite but not till I have it in an airplane, fully tested.

I've ordered a new batch of roundtoits but it's been held up at customs. When a fresh supply comes in, I hope to re-acquaint myself with piped 1/2As. Including how well a diesel conversion responds to a pipe. [8D]

Back to the CS. The VA and Norvel that responded to the pipe with a 1.5K boost, were stock. No timing changes were made to maximize the pipe's potential. I hope the picture shows it, the CS has BAGS of exhaust lead. Is this normal? Would the other engines respond better if the exhaust timing were changed?