I'm in the final stages of building my Twinstar and I've noticed the left engine has noticeably more downthrust than the right. The nacelles are installed properly as are the motormounts, the firewalls have different downthrust angles. Is this normal??

Rob

No. Use washers behind the engine mount to raise the excessive one to match the other.

Jim

OK, I will do that.

Thank You Jim!

Mine's the same way, Rob. It's my first twin and it gets rave reviews for ease of engine-out flying, so I figured it was designed that way. I left it as is.

Good flying,
desmobob


You can notice the left engine downthrust:

desmobob,

For some reason the picture did not come through for me.

Have you flown your twinstar like this? Does it fly OK?

Rob

I'll try a different method of inserting the photo.

No, I haven't flown it yet. I was following the TwinStar threads on these forums before I bought mine and don't remember hearing any mention of it. I figured if it was a mistake or manufacturing defect, someone would have mentioned it. Same if it created a problem in flight....

I HOPE it's OK like that!

Good flying,
desmobob

Well, I've e-mailed Hobbico with the issue, hope to have a definitive answer soon.

Rob

Rob,

After looking at the photo I posted and thinking it actually looked like the RIGHT engine had more downthrust, I went down to the shop and very carefully looked things over. My engines have identical downthrust.

Holding up the wing and looking down the LE will give you a good indication of the real deal. Your props have to be at exactly the same position or things will look out of whack....

Good flying,
desmobob

I've flown my Twinstar over 130 flights with LA 40's and all I can say is that Hobbico got this thing completely right from a handling standpoint. Its a blast to fly and lands like a trainer. I really have flown the covering off this baby. Literally! I've lost most of the trim off the tail and the side of the fusalage. Just so much oil coming off the upswept mufflers blowing back on the tail. I was going to recover, but honestly I think its faster and easier to just buy a fresh airframe for next year and sell this to some one who wants to screw around with it. It's still sound other then the cosmetics.