Kmot

My Feedback: (24)

Thanks again, guys!

AMB

Have inverted mag 52 4 strk in mine, throttle was fun made up with a bellcrank arrangement bending a U in the throttle rod would have been quicker. I mounted a ply plate inside
the fus aft of the landing gear and have an aluminium brace going to it it forms about a
45 degree angle between the gear and fus no wheel pants larger wheels for grass strip
Just for hoots I put in an FMA co pilot it sits on a pylon just back of the wing sort of looks
like a little radar dome it is aligned with all flight surfaces . the whole thing bolts on for
easy removal and no wires hanging on the wing. Fred marks at FMA thought it was a pretty
neat installation When removed a little ply plate overs it
Also tail feathers attached to a ply plate and are removable

Kmot

My Feedback: (24)

Hey guys, after a month of doing another project I finally took the Rascal out of the box and laid the parts on my table. The covering had some wrinkles (expected) and so I spent some quality time massaging the covering with my iron and heat gun. Covering came out perfect! I only screwed up one itty bitty spot on the vertical fin where the trim pulled away slightly (the white over blue part) but I will be able to touch it up.

I was thinking about the landing gear reinforcement that has been talked about. I looked at the existing setup and it has some triangulation pieces already glued in place. Is this something that is an update over the earlier models or is this still the weak spot that needs to be beefed up even more?

Kmot

My Feedback: (24)

bump ttt

wrcflyer

My Feedback: (24)

KMOT - reinforcing is your option . if you do a hard landing the gear may pop out . if this happins then you glue it back in with reinfoecment . do it now or doit later . to do it now just push out the blind nuts and install a 3/16" ply over what is in there . drill holes for blind nuts . don't install blind nuts yet . this is what i did . on the bottom outside i added a 1/8" ply 5 1/2" X 3 1/4" with one side covered . ( care is needed to get the courve on the bottom you will need to adj. clamps .to hold in place for the epoxie tp o set . after the glue is set from the top drill down throu 1/8 ply . then reinstall blind nuts . GOOD LUCK BILL WRC-FLYER

C150M

Not to keep this dragging on but what a great job on the engine. My concern is what is the heat resistance of Krylon canpaint. Is that why you bake it for an hour...?

Best Regards,

C150M

Kmot

My Feedback: (24)

wrcflyer: thanks for the reply! I have an understanding of how to reinforce it if needed. I was just wondering if the picture of mine shows any difference in the factory assembly compared to the guys whos gear ripped out.

C150: I have used Krylon paint for a couple decades at least and on many small metal parts I always baked them at a low temp which seems to make the paint very hard. I painted my first engine, an Irvine .20 buggy engine with yellow Krylon and baked it. That engines paint never lost its color, shine, or anything even though being subjected to nitro, heat, and dirt and rocks.

I don't know how this new formula Krylon will hold up. Time will tell. But the paint formulas today are a far cry from the formulas of 20 years ago! Environmental issues have changed all that.

wrcflyer

My Feedback: (24)

KMOT - your pic shows the standard inside mount . sig talks about there gear mount in the assembley manual' BILL WRC-FLYER

H. Wayne S

My Feedback: (18)

avngr1 is right about the wind. Was flying my 110 in 20 to 30mph gust week before last. FINALLY got it on the ground. Great landing, crabbed it in, set stationary in the air for awhile then it finally eased down on the ground. . Then while sitting on the runway, engine OFF, the wind picked it at lease 6 foot off the ground, did a couple of cartwheels, broke the stab off the fus. and busted the firewall out. Was an easy fix for my repair guru, and it was back in the air in less than a week. LOVE THAT PLANE !!!

Kmot

My Feedback: (24)

Alright, I have reinforced the landing gear block. I cut a piece of 1/4" Sig plywood and epoxied it on the floor directly behind the factory block. Could not butt it up due to the hot glue squeezed out of the original pieces so just got it as close as I could and have it fully flat on the floor. Oh, I did try cutting the hot glue first and only succeeded in cutting the balsa... I then epoxied another piece of plywood across the two floor pieces which results in tying the factory block to the secondary block and the fuselage former. Then I added 1/2" tri-stock in three places so it should be plenty solid. But wait! There's more!

When I install the gear I will use long bolts and then use a metal plate across the two bolts and locknuts to hold it down on the plywood doubler and then it will definitley not be going anywhere, lol.

wrcflyer

My Feedback: (24)

KMOT . looks good what you have there . it will help a lot . i also added a 1/8 ply 5 1/2" 3 14" to outside under the belly of the plane covering the landing aera . the ply extends 3 "ahead of the bolt holes . this gives you even more beef. put covering on one side be-for you epoxie it on .you need clamps to hold the ply . it has to bend to conform to the bottem. PS throw that sig tail wheel . replace it with a sullivan tail wheel . those springs for stearing arn't to good . with the sig wheel the plane is real squirrely on take-off un till you get the tial up off the ground. GOOD LUCK YOU WILL LIKE THIS PLANE flys fast needs a lot of runway for landing . it's a floater . BILL WRC-FLYER

rc-sport

My Feedback: (12)

I don't know, I really like the tail wheel, as a matter of fact I use that same tail wheel on all my planes. The long throw back gives it more authority and to me it makes take offs much easier.

GX Ame

I've only had a couple flights with mine (40 ARF), but the ground handling seems reasonable using the provided tailwheel setup. Mind you, I'm running off of a grass strip, and usually try to get into the air fairly quickly.
I added the wing struts, just for looks. They aren't for support, but they provide a "little" bit of strengthening.
How about floats? Any comments about which ones, handling etc? There is a pond at our field, and I'm interested in trying some float flying.

wrcflyer

My Feedback: (24)

GXAme . sig has ready made floats for the rascal 40 ARF. just bolt them on. i thing about $ 100.00 . BILL WRC-FLYER

Kmot

My Feedback: (24)

Well, I really like the scale looks of the tailwheel so I was going to use it.

GX Ame: I really like the wing struts! I wanted to do that but don't know what to use or where to attach them.

I have been doing some pin striping to mine and also made a instrument panel.

GX Ame

The pin striping and the panel look great.

Kmot

My Feedback: (24)

Thanks!

Skribnod

Well the rascal went in the other day and received a little damage. I was flying at my buddy's field and was experiencing controll problems 5 minutes into the flight. The airplane was acting radical to the inputs I was giving it. I did a lower slow fly-by out in front of my buddy when he starts yelling "your wing is coming off!!" . I then turned downwind and started my approach for landing. I made it to the runway and was about 6 feet of the runway when the ariplane winged over and went nose in. After further inspection we discovered that the rear wing bolt down block had came loose from the airplane. This would explain why he saw a 1/2-1" gap under the TE of the wing. I called SIG and was told to send a discription of the accident and problem and they would be back in touch with me. I believe the rear wing bolt plate was cut too short and this caused it to pop out of the notches in the fuse. Actually you can slide the block in and out of the fuse. without a problem. The guys at SIG are relly good people so I'm hoping to get the replacement parts for a reduced price or free since it was a manufacturer defect.

Kmot

My Feedback: (24)

Skrib: oh man, that's a shame! [] I am very sorry for your loss of your Rascal.

I had already gone over the accessible joints with medium CA but as a result of your wing plate failure I am going to go reinforce the crap out of mine with some epoxy and tri-stock.

Mine is almost finished with assembly. I just added the tailfeathers last night. All I have to do is install the radio system. I have been busy fabricating and installing an on-board glow plug system as well as some scale details for the cockpit.

I hope SIG comes through for you!

-Tom

Kmot

My Feedback: (24)

OK, I took care of business. I added tri-stock and epoxied it into place. I trimmed one edge of the tri-stock to make clearance for the top of the fuse and conveniently made mini tri-stock in the process which I used on the sides and glued in with thick CA. This support plate should not be going anywhere now. Thanks for the heads up Skribnod.

esweber

My Feedback: (3)

Was just going though this forum and was wandering could you add some weight to help in the landing tell you where a little more used to the floating of this modal.

catspaw

Put Tri-stock around the landing gear plate. I've knocked mine out twice now (cause I like to do figure 8 touch and goes within the length of our field!). Interesting that the 2nd time, the gear broke at the wood, not at the glue joints. Its unfortunate that SIG notched the fuse sides for this block instead of using a fuse doubler around the landing gear plate, then you could "pin" the block by drilling through the fuse side and using dowels/toothipicks to pin the block to the fuse side for even more strength.

Oh yes, if you go with the factory recommended engine installation, use locktite, with both the locknuts and T-nuts. Mine have been coming loose occasionaly, its part of m pre/post flight checks now.
If I knock my gear off again, I'll glass it in too.

I use a OS 52 in mine. It likes to be started upright first time of the day, then after that it starts inverted.

On the 2nd knockoff, the I yanked up on the plane and it the engine was still running so I kept flying for a minute or 2! That was the 2nd time I've done that, and with a SIG plane too.

John

Kmot

My Feedback: (24)

Talk about frustrating! [:'(]

I wanted to get my Rascal Forty ready to take to the flying field which I have not yet done. I have a brand new plane and a brand new field box. So I took it out in my backyard and finished hooking up the fuel can and fuel pump in my field box. I set my plane into the foam rubber covered cradle and went to use my new Slimline Super Fueler. First thing is the pump is running backwards so it pressurises the can and squirts raw fuel all over the place. Argh... So I clean up the mess and get it going the correct way and fill up the tank in the plane. This is where it goes down hill...

I had expected all my nice work to be just perfect, lol! Well the engine won't light off. I had run in in a test stand but now the needles were off. And I kept fiddling with them and no go. I wan't even sure about it getting fuel so I bypassed the fueler system and plumbed it direct. Still would not light off. I was using my on-board glow igniter and now I was distrusting that the battery was any good so I used a hand held glow igniter and plugged the muffler to make sure it was getting fuel. Oh yeah! It spits fuel out the exhaust pipe now but still won't start and run. It did pop a couple times and even attempted to idle for about five seconds. In the meantime I am cranking and cranking like a madman and as it turned out the foam rubber covers in the cradle were WAY too soft and allowed the cradle to dig into the soft balsawood! So now my brand new plane has severe hangar rash on the top of the cowl and on the port side.

I finally gave up. I just cleaned everything up and took it all back inside. I then removed the engine from the plane (PITA!!) and set it up on my test stand. Installed a new c-cell in my glow igniter, turned the needles to 3 turns out each and bumped it with the starter. It immediately started and idled! Argh!! [:@] Typical!!

Well, truth be told I did find a problem. The o-ring for the high speed needle was trashed and it was leaking fuel bad when pressurised with tank pressure so at least I found something! The engine is perfectly dialed in now and I can install it and sort out if there are actually problems with my fuel delivery system or not. In the meantime my airplane is permanently scarred from those cradles.

N925WB

My Feedback: (56)

Sorry to hear about all the problems you had with the motor. That sucks.

I just bought a Rascal Forty last week, and had it in the air in two days. I'm flying it with a Saito .56, and I love it. On the recommended rates, it's a real *****cat. I set up higher rates on it, and now have a very relaxing, but very capable confidence-inspiring aerobat. I can get plenty of vertical penetration out of it, and I can even snap roll on high rates (not possible with Sig's recommended rates). I've done a few spins with mine, too, and it's proven itself to be an honest airplane.

On landing, I just cut power on base, and then as I approach the last 5 feet on final, I slowly apply full up elevator (low rates), and the Rascal assumes a perfect three-point attitude. I fly off grass, so ground handling is more subdued than it would be on asphalt, but I have had no problems in this department. You should keep in mind, however, that this is a tailwheel airplane, and you will have a large left turning tendency during high-power manuevers such as takeoff and steep climbs. It's nothing a little right rudder can't counterract.

I've only had one major problem thus far, and that was that my elevator hinges pulled out in flight. This caused a major nose-down pitching moment, but I was able to make a safe landing without damaging the airplane. Just be sure to put a couple drops of thin CA on the elevator and aileron hinges before you fly! This seems to be a freak occurence, but better safe than sorry.

I, too, found engine mounting to be a real bear. It's doable, but does require some fenagling. Just take your time (measure twice, cut once), and everything should work out great!

I look forward to flying my Rascal Forty for a loooooong time. It's quickly becoming my new favorite plane.

get14me

My Feedback: (4)

Great Flying plane very fast for its style. 1st landing gear block ,build it up to displace the load.
wing joiner pockets on 40 , 1/8" wide X 1/2 " high . very little surface contact to support such large wings
a tube will give you 10X the surface contact you get with a piece of flat stok on edge
If you like pulling Gs you will ripe of your wing in no time

3/4 rotation base on 180 total movement is most efficient position for a 2s, It cant flood the fuel will exit the exhaust ,
and it will not puddle in the head snuffing the glow plug. i have pics on my site