Dai Phan

My Feedback: (2)

Hello felloe RCers and MERRY CHRISTMAS TO ALL ...

I have a thought that I would like to ask for your opinion. I have been in RC since 1980 and I have noticed a change in our wonderful hobby over the years. They are the advancement in the ARF market, the bloom of computer radios and the development in electric powers. I have converted the majority of my planes in the 40 size to electric power in the past 2 years. I noticed that the initial set up is about 100 dollars ( in the 40 size planes) more than glow but the return is enormous. No more fuel soaked hands and planes to clean, no more tinkkering with needle valve and the engine ALWAYS start in all kind of temperature. But I still see many guys who fly gas just turn away their heads when they are mentioned about going electric. I certainly see that the hesistation of converting 60-90 size to electric since the cost of the batteries is still to high to justify the conversion. But in the 40 size or below, it makes sense that electric power just makes plain sense. But yet, I keep seeing guys buying 40 size glow and just won't enen think about eletric conversion. Any thoughts on why there is such a hesistation? Dai

tIANci

I am starting to go into EP. Its very affordable as long as you stick to about a 350-400 motor, brushed or brushless. With that set up you only need a 25A ESC and at the most a 3S 1P li-poly. Anything more than that its nuts, a lot of fun but nuts in terms of MULLAHS!!!

Warren

My Feedback: (72)

I don't think that many also realize that you don't have to go Lipo and you can keep the cost down.

Most systems propped at @40 amps max power, with the 3300's, can give you a solid 6-7 minute flight as long as you're not full out the whole time. When I watch and time the glow flyers, that is usually all they fly in a flight, but they seem to think 6-7 minutes is short.

I had an Ultra Stick .40, with an AXI 4120/18 on 16 3300's swinging an APC 13x10 prop: Full power for almost 5 minutes with a 1:1 power ratio; I could fly for almost 10 with throttle management, and the packs are only $100 each.

An easy and great flying conversion.

jrf

My Feedback: (551)

Depends on what kind of flying you do. Scale flight through mild aerobatics are available today in a reasonable sized airplane with affordable electric power. Anything beyond that and you're going to need state of the art electric equipment and the cost goes through the roof.

By the way, you mention an extra $100 for the initial cost. Most 40 size sport planes, with engine, cost around $200. That 50% increase will blow quite a few budgets.

An finally, most modelers already have the engine and all the support equipment. Meaning they can put a brand new airplane in the air for about $100.

When electric power can provide 10 minutes of consistant (not declining) power equal to a good 46 two stroke for a reasonable price and the cost of the necessary support equipment (chargers, test equipment and spare batteries) is not prohibitive, I'll go for it.

Jim

tIANci

Warren - my GWS Formosa with a standard motor plus a 2S lipoly of 1,800 Mah gives me 12 mins of easy flying. I think li-poly and li-ions are really cheap now. Also, I use a standard li-poly pocket charger only. Of course my Formosa is not all that fast but it can still do rolling circles. Hehehe ...

Warren

My Feedback: (72)

Yes, the smaller Lipo's are very reasonable. But to get a .40 sized and up equipped your pushing $200+ for one pack; that number is staggering to most.

tIANci

Warren - that is why I say stick to 350-400 sized motors. Most acceptable ... if you want to fly a 40-60 sized plane you are talking about running 10S3P minimum! That is nuts ... expensive batteries, expensive charger ... takes all week to charge up the batteries!

P-51B

My Feedback: (5)

I don't know who your watching, but 10 minutes minimum is the general rule at my fields. I personally like 15 minutes with a touch of extra fuel "just in case".

I am currently getting into the electric arena, and the costs are very high. In order to get similar performance to the 40-46 glow with flights of 10-15 minutes you pretty much have to go to LIPO. In the 40-46 size range that means adding an expensive charger that can handle more cells than a parkflyer uses.

Lets take a look at some basic, very rough, ballpark numbers. Let's assume that the electric motors and speed control cost the same as the glow engine (which they don't). Let's say you want to fly for about an hour after work one day. With glow, that is around 40oz +/- depending on particular engine. Thats about a third of a gallon or around $7.00 in fuel. Now, if you want to fly for the same hour with your Lipo powered electric you will need 4 packs, probably in the 5s4p-6s4p range. What will that run, about $200 each? So, that is around $800 for an hour, vs $7 for the hour.

In order to break even on those admittedely very rough numbers, would take around 114 hours @ 4 flights per hour. Granted, the glow fuel is gone, but 114 hours is a lot for most modelers. Thats two hours per week, every week.

There could be an advantage there depending on how many years the lipos can last. The flip side to that is when you wreck the Lipo powered plane it is very possible that you can destroy the pack...and are out the $200 (ballpark from above), while with the glow you are out one fuel tanks worth. Thats just the loss in battery costs, not to mention the possible motor loss, because we assumed engine/motor costs were equal.

I think there may be other advantages such as no mess etc to the electric, but cost is somewhat high comparatively.

Dai Phan

My Feedback: (2)

P-51 B,

I think you make a good point about the cost of the batteries as that IS the primary reason why I have not convert any of my 60-90 sized glow planes. I have been flying the Multiplex Magister (66 inch wing span) and the cost of a brushless motor, ESC and regular 10 NIMH cell totaled about 225.00. For that set up, it is way better than installing a 40 sized glow on that plane. One nice thing about electric is that the plane's airframe does not age as fast as with glow. As far as Lipos are concerned, I think that at this time, they are over priced and unaffordable for bigger planes and not quite reliable. A hard crash and the batt is pretty much damaged beyong repair. Not to mention exploding if overcharged. When I think of Lipo undergoes charging, the Me-163 comes to mind. At the fast pace we are going now, realiable, affordable Lipos and brushed motor is just around the corner.
Dai

Meesh

My Feedback: (135)

I for one won't go to electric because of the sound, (or lack of it). I love listening to my 4-strokes purr. I love the engines so much sometimes I just go out in the backyard with an engine on my test bench and put a tank of fuel through. It helps me get through the long , cold, snowy winter months here in New Hampshire.

My $0.02

Bob

cruzomatic

My Feedback: (17)

There you go Meesh, you tell 'em.

I like both and fly both, but have been buying more glow than electric stuff recently. I'm 100% self taught flying a Zagi and have always enjoyed the simple plug and go style of flying. I still fly GWS Tiger Moth and Kavan Parnetavia electric twin.

jzinckgra

My Feedback: (11)

My reason for not going EP is simple: i don't want to have to charge and keep track of more batteries then I already do. It's my understaning that with electrics, most guys are using Lipos, which AFAIK can't be quick charged. So when your 10-15 minute flight is over, don't you have to retire the plane for the rest of the day? Even if you have a 2nd or 3rd plane at the field, those batteries will run down too. I'd rather have the convenience of flying however long I want with nitro.

Timoteo

My Feedback: (3)

I fly glow because I like the engines. There's also something about the smell of glow exhaust in the morning.

Woody 51

I have a stable of both types. My "glow" stable was bigger, but some low life tooka liking to my collection and decided that they were better being a part of his.

I was left mainly with electrics and had to make them my primary stable while rebuilt my glow one. I have had such fun with the "sparks" that I haven't started the latter task yet.

As pointed out, currently the cost of large packs and chargers is prohibitive, so have stuck to small stuff (Speed 300 and Speed 400 size) for my electrics.(models in the 30-36 inch wingspan range)

Old 1/2A pylon racers are excellent candidates for electric conversion and can be flown as "powered slopies" at Slope Soaring sites with a Speed 300 or 400 sized brushless outrunner and a 2 or 3 cell Lipoly and 18 amp ESC. Speed is determined by prop size as well as the number of cells and Ma/H rating of an installed pack.

With a small, lightweight model, such as those made by ALFA, I can get up to 40 mintues non stop, constant powered flight from a 2s1p 2200Ma/H Lipoly pack.

I chose to make this 4 x 10 minute flights. 2 packs give me a day's flying and the total life of each pack (around 300 cycles) is far less in outlaid $$ than what I would spend on enough 5% nitro glow fuel to fly a .46 sized glow model for the same time. (200 hours)

I find that it's a good alternative to glow powered flying if one feels like a bit of a change, or, like me, was forced to change for a temporary time.

Really, both types are good and as time goes by and more development work is put into electrics (especially in Asia) causing prices to fall, it will become more popular.

One only as to look at the current trend in glow of models getting bigger (as Asian made ARF's get bigger) to see that the next untapped field for the manufacturers, is electrics.

I still intend to rebuild my glow powered model stable in time. With a 1/2 a dozen unused Glow engines (2 and 4 stroke) lying in my engine drawer, it's a waste to have them sitting there.

RVator

My Feedback: (1)

I am putting together my first EP plane a Mamba from NESailplanes. It should be 20 oz or less and will use 3S2100 ma/h pack. Its not going to be too expensive but any bigger the cost get out of hand. I am willing to try Electrics just so I can fly in smaller areas closer to my house. My instructor flys a lot of electics from micro indoor types,scale,motor gliders, to pattern planes. He recently had a construction article in Model Airplane news on his patter plane called the Projectile. I have seen him make three flights of a pattern sequence that lasted 8 mins each on a single charge. He uses the left stick more than anyone I know and can get more flight time from a pack than anyone. But he has proven to me that the perfomance is there in EP. But for bigger models glow or gas is cheaper and will continue to be my favorite. I like hearing engines run and besides I have always hated sailboats and sailplanes for that reason.

P-40LUVR

I like the whole experience of tweeking engines,smelling the castor burn and most of all the sound!
Electrics never really turned me on,it's like comparing a 1965 GTO with a 389 with headers with that nice low rumble..to a golf cart that sounds like an electric blender!
Ill take the mess of the fuel(which isn't that great) and the tinkering of the engines anyday!

Tram

My Feedback: (6)

I currently fly both..

Started out in nitro then moved to gas for a short bit.. Then, got a wild hair and sold off most of my big nitro/gas stuff and went to solid parkflyers, basically.. While it was really fun at first, I was mainly flying in my backyard so parkies were great, then I started getting more time to go to the club field and found myself wishing I had the larger stuff again.. Sooo.. one day I came home and started one of my .46 fx's I had sitting around.. Now I fly both again and boy is it nice to have both..

I can toss up a parkie and go fly for a bit.. Or I can load up the grocery getter and fly the bigger stuff..

If cost were equal, I would be probably fly only electric.. Although, I would miss the sound, a little.

yard-dart

My Feedback: (35)

I like the sound of a glow engine, especially a large four stroke. Glow engine flight lasts a lot longer too. You can fly all day long for around $15-$20.00. There's no way you could fly as often and cheap with electrics. I could just imagine how many dollars in batteries that would be. The only downfall to glow is the mess, but that's no biggie to me.

The bottom line is that electric crap is just too expensive. I've flown other peoples electrics, and they're sorta cool, but I can do without them. I'll stick with my glows. To me, they're a lot more cool.

RCJake-rcu

My Feedback: (7)

I have recently been getting into electrics and found certain advantages.

1. Quiet. Can fly small ones in the greenbelt behind my house.
2. Clean. No more paper towels and Windex needed to clean the airplane.
3. Clean. No more complaints from better half about oil dripping everywhere. Can hang planes is office with no worries.
4. No vibration. Airplanes last longer...as long as my thumbs stay smart!
5. Flight times as long as with glow airplanes, or longer. My old timer can stay airborn for 1 1/2 hours on a single charge
without using thermals!
6. Motor always starts, no tuning needed. Can restart in the air!!!

Here is a photo of my latest electric. It's a Fokker DR-I from Polk's Hobbies, has an AXI 2212/20 brushless outrunner motor, Jeti 18amp Speed Controller and uses a Kokham 11.1v 1500ma Li-Poly battery pack. 25 minute flights on one charge and flies great!
BTW, I stripped the red covering and recovered it with white Econokote and used Monokote trim sheets for the red/black markings. The red Fokker DR-I I built for a very good friend.

Woody 51

Fuel must be real cheap where you are Yard Dart.
In my part of the world its double the price you quote, (and thats for "home mix." "Pre mix" is even more expensive) which make sparkies a hell of a lot more economical in the long run.

BankYank

My Feedback: (63)

Epower is a great viable way to go for to 40 size and smaller. I have had a few and even learned to fly with them. But when you start getting in to BIG brushless motors with lipo cells for the 60/90 size your wallet needs to be loaded with cash to get the amps and duration a person would want. In a few more years i'll be switching to Epower again as technology should be safer and cheeper for my size of planes by then.

LuckyArmpit

I fly both, e-flight and glow. All my smaller aircraft, are electric powered. All my .46 size and up are glow powered.
Its all about cost for me. I believe in the "whoever dies with the most planes wins". I fly everything from a slow flyer that you fly around your house to gut busting glow power. Lets look at powering a H9 Twist. I have a .46 in mine. It will hover and do all kinds of aerobatics.
A new OS .46 AX engine is $105 at the LHS. Now, lets power it with electric. Your gonna need at bare minimum an 05 sized motor.
And, you will need a 45 amp ESC. Together, these are gonna run ya at least $175. Probably more towards $250. Lets add the battery pack. You can go with nimh packs, at around 60 bux....but if you go lipo, you can save yourself mucho weight!!!! But, these packs are gonna kill ya in # of cells....Figure $100 or more per pack, and thats just one pack. Your gonna need at least 2 packs. Then, lets not forget the lipo charger for these....Another $120 for a Great Planes Triton or whatever. So, add up your costs....So you wanna spend hundreds just so you don't have to clean the plane???? I aint buying the "e flight is easier to run and setup" theory. If you setup your engine right, you never have to fool with needle settings. There aint a brushless setup in the world for 105 dollars thats gonna match an OS .46. I'll run brushless in my flying wings and smaller planes because its cost effective but not when you get into the bigger stuff.

Dave...

SBR_RV

electric flight is great and fun for all, i just hope it dont overtake glow power too much.

SBR_RV

while thinking about it, today i was at the model field there were about 10 electrics, 1 gasser and 1 glow fuel plane out in the pit area.

P-40LUVR

"1. Quiet. Can fly small ones in the greenbelt behind my house.
2. Clean. No more paper towels and Windex needed to clean the airplane.
3. Clean. No more complaints from better half about oil dripping everywhere. Can hang planes is office with no worries.
4. No vibration. Airplanes last longer...as long as my thumbs stay smart!
5. Flight times as long as with glow airplanes, or longer. My old timer can stay airborn for 1 1/2 hours on a single charge
without using thermals!
6. Motor always starts, no tuning needed. Can restart in the air!!! "


If you want all this why not fly a good simulator?[sm=lol.gif]