Hi,

I am looking for feedback from owners of this plane. It looks like it could be a cheap plane to learn advanced aerobatics while I finish scratch building.

Particularly interested in:

- Quality of hardware
- Quality of finish/covering
- Quality of manufacture

and most importantly: how does it fly!

Also, does Phoenix have a website? It is almost impossible to find information on this company!

Thanks in advance.

Richard.

Bump.

I guess no news is good news? Saw a Phoenix Fun Star today at the field. They seem to be finished quite nicely.

No comments? Maybe I should expand this thread to Phoenix models in general?

You might try emailing or calling someone at Bisson Mufflers. http://bissonmufflers.com

I know they have been selling the plane you are after for a while and have probably flown it too. I have the fun star and it is very well put together for the money.

The Atlantis from Phoenix Models is an excellent pattern plane for its size, good covering, light weight and certainly it flies great ( with a 46 Thunder Tiger engine).
It performs very clean rolls, knifes, avalanches...
I am really enjoying this plane.

I ended up buying the Atlantis. I figure that I might as well post a mini review here.

First impressions were very good. The plane is made of genuine balsa and ply of a reasonable grade and is covered with proper iron on heat shrink covering. Wings and fuselge were very light for an ARF. The plane went together quite easily as per the instructions and was very square.

When I got to the radio installation things got a little hairy since the instructions are very minimal and do not truly reflect the hardware that comes with the kit.

I converted the rudder to pull-pull with a Sullivan kevlar kit and two 1/2A horns. The elevator was very fluttery so I cut a hatch towards the back of the plane and built a small frame to stop the hardwood pushrod from moving around. This made the elevator halves much nicer but still not ideal. Once I increase the elevator throws I will redo the setup with better hardware.

Final balancing as in the manual required 60g of lead on the tail.

Final weight ready to fly is 2565g with an OS 50SX and all standard sized servos.

Not a bad model for the price at all.

Richard.

I am kind of proud of the radio install so I have posted a picture here. The battery is underneath the rudder servo and the receiver is velcroed beside it. Everything is pushed as far back as possible since the plane ended up nose heavy with the 50SX on it.

Note that the rudder servo is closer to the wing than the other servos to allow clearance. The pull cables are crossed in the fuselage and there is some tubing to stop it from rubbing on the last fuselage former.

how is the engine mounted in the atlantis? to the side or inverted
TIA greg

Diagonally with the muffler straight down.

Richard.

Have you got any information about Phoenixes new TopStar 60?
It is supposed to be a normal evolution of the FunStar into the 60 size.

It is sold here in Israel for App. 220$ which seems to be a very reasonable price for such an airplane, and it seems to be a good deal.

Any comment about it will be appreciated

pictures of TopStar PLEASE

Dear GasRookie;
Please post your e-mail, or send it to me to [email protected], so I can send those pics

Yaron

Hey Richard, I've just bought the same plane. Can you help me with a couple of questions please:

1. The plans don't show how the main wing is mounted and while the bolts are solid I'm afraid the little plastic sleeves that you mount in the wing might pull right through the wing. How did you do yours?

2. How is the covering holding up? Did you need to give it a once over before you flew it?

3. There is a little bag of balsa bits in the box that doesn't seem to have a home. What did you do with this stuff?

4. How are landings, pretty quick or reasonably tame? Did you set up flaperons, if so how big was the movement you allowed?

Appreciate your help.

Simon

1. The plastic wing thingoes do seem a little weak but seem to be holding so far. I shaped the area to the shape of the captive nut as well as possible and then liberally soaked the area with thin CA to reinforce it. The wood there is very soft balsa otherwise and would definitely have problems. After the CA cured I glued in the wing nut.

2. Covering is holding up OK so far. Has needed a little tightening but should be fine. I suggest that you trim and lock down the covering in front of the wing since it can get fuel gunk under it. The covering behind the wing has buckled a little because on my plane the wing is a very tight fit with the front and back of the saddle.

3. Some of them are used to mount the servos sideways under the wing panels. I did not realise this until after I had decided to cut the covers and mount the servos more conventionally. Other bits are for reinforcing the servo mounting tray. I used these and changed the servo arrangement to suit my pull-pull arrangement for the rudder and solid CF pushrods for the elevator. The stock rudder and elevator pushrods are useless.

4. Landings are pretty fast but I am not to sure whether that is just me being paranoid. It behaves OK when flying slowly. No flaperons on my plane. My radio is an older non-computer unit that does not support them.

Glad to help.

Richard.

P.S. Where do you fly?

I have the Sea Bee from Pheonix models. It's also a sport pattern plane. Not too bad quaility wise. I was not happy with the 2pcs landing gear. But the plane flies nice and straight. Running a MDS 48 on it and loops can be quite large before it slows down to much.
It's fun to fly around like a pattern ship, even if I'm not a pattern pilot.

Hi Richard,

Thanks for the feedback, much appreciated. I didn't quite undertsand what you meant by 'cut the covers' with regards to mounting the servo conventionally - I just screwed the servos directly into the little raised panel, hope this is right!!

I will steal your ideas for reinforcing the wing nuts and locking down the covering but I'm going to stick with the existing push rods at present and reinforce with carbon fibre and just see how it goes. I will also copy your idea and put a couple of ply panels in to limit the flex of the pushrods. I reckon this arrangement will go ok given I'm only using an FX46 compared to your '50.

I fly at PRAMS and TMAC which are both great places, the latter isn't far from work so I can fly there in the mornings which is handy. You?

Again, thanks for the feedback.

Simon

My original setup on the plane had the rear of the pushrod located by a square of ply and balsa but still had too much flex.

They may have changed the design of the wing servo mounts or improved the instructions by now. Can you post a picture of your setup? I will try and get a picture of mine up sometime soon as well.

I am currently a member of Lilydale but am in the process of moving to P&DARCS near Pakenham. I live in Melbourne BTW.

Richard.

Hi Richard,

Well, flew the Atlantis for the first time this morning, really floated a long way on landing. Needed 30 gms of lead in tail to get the CG back 146mm from the leading edge, not game to push CG any further back, already scary enough on landing. The pushrods seem ok, no flutter and pretty firm - I strengthened with some support half way down the fuse. Set up flaps thorugh my radio but they didn't seem to make any difference when deployed. I will get the camera out and post some photos.

A couple of questions you might be able to help with:

1. A fair bit of vibration throught the wings, I haven't put in any wing padding between the wing and fuse as there doesn't seem to be much space. Have you put any in? Do your wheel mounts vibrate?

2. I mounted the engine without changing the thrust line set up by Phoenix. Have you changed yours at all?

Rgds,

Simon

It does indeed seem to want to fly forever. Can fly fairly slowly though so just a matter of cutting your speed early and you can get some good landings.

I have not noticed any unusual wing vibrations... will check closer when I take her out next. I did not change the thrust line from stock. I will wait until I am used to the plane and have it fully trimmed. At this point I have not been able to do any long clean downlines to check thrust angles.

Richard.

Richard,

Did you put any foam between the wing and fuse?

Simon

No, certainly felt like I should have though.

Richard.

Hi Richard & Simon,

I just picked up an Atlantis for a steal. It was the last piece in the store, and did not come with instruction. Did your ARF kit come with instruction at all?

cheers,
gordon

Yes, mine came with a fairly comprehensive manual. Of course it left a lot of stuff out so I ended up doing things my own way.

I am sure that if the local hobby shop does not have a copy that the importer or Phoenix themselves could help you out.

Richard.

Thanks!

cheers,
gordon

Hi Gordon,

Yes instructions were included, as Richard says they were comprehensive but did miss some details out. If you have put together an ARF before you will find it self evident. A think a key issue is not to have the CofG too far back, the setting in the manual is almost half the wing chord and I found it difficult to fly when set this way. Having flown the plane a fair bit not I reckon I have it right for me which is about 140mm back from the LE - but I would start at 130mm and work my way back from there if I was you. I havel also found that the light weight of the model makes it very sensitive to wind on the ground - be careful during x-wind t/o's and landings.

I flew the plane in the Coolum Classic (pattern comp, Sportsman Class) last weekend and it went really well. I have made a couple of mods to the plane since putting it together: shaved the engine mount to provide a little right thrust, realigned the elevator halves and sealed the wing mount with silicon to prevent fuel leakage. A was also using flaperons through my radio but have now switched to spoilerons as if I need a shorter landing this is more useful - it can float a long way if you come in a little fast.

Regards,

Simon

Guess I will have to live with the store not being able to include the manual (since I got it at offered price)

Anyway, I am glad I found this message thread. I am going to use all of the pointers from you guys - especially Richard's pull-pull mod; the nice picture of the servo tray; Simon's point on CofG.

Also good to know that the 3 pieces of balsa and all the other bits don't have proper home.

But alas, I won't be able to set up spoilerons as I am still using the basic Futaba 6 channel 6XA transmitter ...

A couple of questions that I hope you guys could provide me with some more guidance: -
1) Any of you happen to have the url for Phoenix Models? I could not find it in all of the search engines
2) I assume you guys joined the wing permanently into one piece? If so, any one of you reinforced the joint with fibre glass cloth or something?

Simon,
1) How much right thrust are you using? Is 2 degree right too little?
2) Not too sure what do you mean by having the wing mount sealed to prevent fuel leakage. Are you having the wing permanently fixed to the fuselage? Do you mean the hole in the firewall thro' which the fuel lines pass? Pardon my ignorance.

Many thanks in advance!

cheers,
gordon
p.s. I hope to complete this ARF ASAP so that I can move on to the next project - a Laser 200-40!