I just received my 3SeaBees Willow. I was wondering if anyone else received one and if you would like to discuss the engine and equipment installation? So far I am very impressed with the quality and value of this model.

Thank you

I just received mine. Have you flown yours yet?

Mine had a broken tail wheel bracket when I got it. I've been waiting for another one and haven't done anything to it. Does yours have many wrinkles?

No, no wrinkles but its Solartex you can hit it with the heat gun and they will go away.

Here is mine assembled

It looks really good! Is it ready to fly? My flying wires were not marked. I know where they go, but I don't know how the wing angles should be set.

My Wilow is a land version, but I had it painted with the float plane colors.

I just got it so it hasn't been flown. It is WAY tail heavy and I am trying to find out if you are supposed to add a pound of weight in the nose. No luck so far. As to the flying wires mine are a b**** to install and you can't get them tight, I really don't see how they can be safely used. I am going to rig regular wires with turnbuckles to tighten. They won't look as scale, but neither does a pile of sticks, if you try to fly with the supplied ones. When you rig the wires tighten them for support....don't change any of the incidence in the wings. Also how did you hook up your aileron control wires?

The aileron wires are very hard to connect. You have to get the clevis to hook on the small piece of metal with the small hole in it that's tucked inside the upper aileron. After I connected them I noticed that the inboard side of both top ailerons rubbed the wing. I'm going to sand a little of the paint off between the aileron the the wing. Have you installed the engine yet? What engine will you be using? I'm going to use a Saito 150.

I have a saito 150 already installed. I was referring to hooking the bottom wing ail rods to the servos inside the fus. With the 150 it is still tail heavy. If you haven't already purchased the engine you might want to look at the 180

I haven't opened up the fuselage yet. I was planning on using two servos.

Was the engine hard to install?

how complete are their ARFs?

They seem to be pretty big planes. They call for a max 1.2 4 stroke. Is this a little small?

Jim!

They are very complete. All control cables are hooked up. They come with a scale engine and scale prop. Just add engine, tank, and radio.

The planes are 1/5th scale and they are big. The Willow that we are discussing has a 87" wing span.

What is the cost of the model that you guys are building?

Mine was around $900, but I had a custom camo paint job done to it that coat an extra $50.00

I had to cut a hatch underneath the fusalage to access the ail servos

No, the engine is not hard to install. I was able to route the muffler inside so nothing protrudes.

When you say you routed the muffler inside does that mean the exhaust comes out of the cockpit? One of the guys at 3seabees told me that people where doing that.

No the exhaust comes out at the bottom of the compartment behind the firewall

How's your Willow coming? I had to fabricate new flying wires so I could tension them. I also built a jig to hold the wings together for assembly/disassembly. This means now I can have the wings on in under 5 min!!

Still waiting for the tail wheel bracket. Can you send me the picture of the jig that you made to get the model to the field?

THANKS

Sure, I will take pics tonight.

here are pics of wing jig.

Another

one more

This is installation on Saito 150