Since you are sending it back to Horizon, it sounds like you may have a JR Tx. If this is the case you may want to check the fuse that all JR Tx's have. Just open the back up and find the glass snap in mini fuse. Its highly likely thats your problem.

John

john,

thanks for the information and HELP it WAS the fuse now i just need to find a 3 A 250V fuse LOL.

i would think that most auto/ hardware stores would have one or radio shack ??? i hope. otherwise where would i find such a critter ?

RADIOS SHOULD HAVE A CIRCUIT BREAKER IN THEM JUST FOR THIS REASON

at any rate im glad thats all it is and i wont have to send it back for repair.

IM IN YOUR DEBT JOHN BUCKNER although i should have known/remebered this from about 4 years ago i had a JR that had a fuse and it went bad.




bassman

.........



I,ve found them at Radio Shack in the past.

Well, I finally got a full day of flying on my PTS. What a ball, took the airbrakes off after the first tank and flew like that the rest of the day. Decided to put flaps up for this flight tommorow, so I decided to epoxy the wing and install servo for flap control. Decided to go this route as you need to bring it under power as it will tip stall fairly easily and drop like a stone, no damage though, tough plane. Had a few instructors wanting to see the plane fly and afterwards they decided to pick up a couple to train on.. I want to change the prop to run on the stock motor and was wondering what I may need as I am very new to this. Do got some cool video of our last time out, my 2nd flight EVER.. Will post the link when I am sure they are ready..

I don't know if you fly low wing or warbirds but if you take all these trainer parts you must be able to bring this p51 for hot landing I have one of those and to land with the flaps down it slows fast , you just have to learn to use the throttle to keep the plane aloft till you touch down. does your 10 year old fly low wings? he may be better than me.
I have several trainers and I just got my wings this spring started last fall. That P51 sure flys different than a high wing. This is my first low wing .
Good luck

roltech

Yes please give us your report on the take off idea, I know what you mean and was thinking of the same thing,
it's hard to steer when taking off and wants to take a left to the point it got off the runway to the grass a few times.
It all happens so fast you don't have a chance to make adjustments, so far I was always able to get it off the tar mat
even if I don't like the way rotates.

roltech

Well today didn't go to good, battery dumped twice today. I know most would say after once change the bat. Charged it for 12 hours last night and the meter said it was charged when ii tested it, flew for 5 min and died when aborting a landing, went up 10 ft then nose planted, minor damage a little CA fixed. Brought it in to check it over and noticed that the servos were barely moving. So I put it on the charger for about 45 min or so on a slow charge and when it was done we went back up. Got maybe 7 min. on it when IT happened. Bringing it around to land and when I started to line up for approach it just stayed banked all the way down. Immediately starting checking radio frequencies in the pits, all was clear. After I went and gathered all the pieces and came back the battery was dead again. Put it on the meter again and it was dead , tried to charge it again and after 113 seconds it stopped cause it was full. now i'm thinking bad charger but my buddy was using it all day and it is fine, ICE charger, So i decided to cycle it and it wouldn't discharge cause it was below 1.1v cutoff already. So after checking every possibility it is a bad battery. Don't use these batteries that come with it, yours may work fine but its just not worth it. I wanted my first crash to be honorable, lol, not a bad battery.. Charged it using the supplied charger before both times out as directed. 24hrs. first charge/ 12-16 after that.

Well am going to try to repair it, it snapped in half right behind the back of the canopy. Fairly clean break though and it's mostly plywood, nice and strong. This is a weak point in this plane, hopefully you all don't crash but if you do. Check this area and see what you think, everything from both ends is very strong but where it meets right along the back of the cockpit needs more strengthening. Will put the pics and videos up soon, don't have the crash though, my wife left as we were getting ready to take off..


Shane

We have been flying the p51 trainer for a month now. My student liked the looks of the plane, saw the ads and bought it. I sure like the trainer cord supplied that adapts to a Futaba type radio with the supplied JR master. My student would be fully certified had he bought a real trainer! Take-offs require concentration and lots of rudder and elevator control through transition. Flying is good, more or less like a high wing loaded trainer. Landings again require lots of concentration with the nose down angle. Too nose low, the speed builds up, nearly level, the descent rate is too high. Thank goodness the plane is rugged. We have lots of bent landing gear and one broken wheel (spokes broke out in a rough landing). We have not taken off the trainer attachments yet!
Bob

Pit Viper. Call horizon on that battery. I bet they make it right. After this accident remember if you have a question about your battery don't try and fly it a second time. Voltage check does not tell you if your battery is charged to the ma rating of the bat. Also if the bat was way down a 45 min slow charge would have been about 7min. Do a fast charge and cycle the battery. I always cycle my new bats before I use them. Dennis

Yeah, i thought that maybe I hadn't charged it long enough the night before, but when I did it at the feild I usually charge @ .7-.9 amps. and this is usually enough even for my 1/8 offroad batts. But you are right I should've never used it again and should'nt have second guessed myself.


Shane

Should I call Horizon or Hangar9 on the deal with the battery?

Too bad I have replace the reciever battery pack with JR 700 instead of the 600. yes I did cycle the pack a few times so far no problem other than the muffler end getting loose but I took it up today and everything went not too bad, other than it don't like the wind and had to take the flapps up to get some speed.
Horizon are very good you should call them.
Good Luck

roltech

Pitt-Viper. A fast charge should be at lest the ma of the bat. 700ma bat = 700ma charge rate. By your numbers you were charging below the 10% rule this would not give you any flying time. If the battery is really bad call Horizon tech and talk too them. They will want you to send them the battery first so they can test it. At this point based on your information I question wether the battery is bad. Find someone in your club that can cycle the bat first. Your battery are the heart of a plane, Treat them right and you will get many years of use out of them. I will send you a PM with my phone #. Call me if you have more questions. Dennis

Ok here is what I have my charger settings at;

Nicd 4 cell 600mAh {usually set mAh 100 higher than the rating}
chg. curnt. 0.9A
dchrg curnt. 1.0A
peak sense 8mV/C
dChg Volt 1.1V/C {cutoff point}
max chg cap. 110%

This is the tester i used to check the bateries with http://h1070768.hobbyshopnow.com/pro...p?prod=EXRA502

Dennis, Thanks a bunch and if I can't get this figured out I will call you. The funny thing is I use the supplied charger before I go out. I don't know, LOL We'll see what hapens..


Shane

If you bought it at a LHS take the battery to him and let him call H-9 for you. That is what I would do for my customers. The unit you showed me only shows volts not total ma. If the bat cycles bad I know the guys at Horizon will do all they can for you. I've never been let bown by them. If you can't find someone in your area to help send the bat to me and i will do it for you. It takes about three days to do three complete charges and discharges. If it is bad i will call them for you. Dennis

Right on, thanks Dennis...

Well here are the photos of my plane after the crash and during repairs..








The wing wasn't too badly damaged, it did smash it a bit right at the dowels. The best thing about this repair is that I spoke with Horizon about this and they said if it doesn't fly right to box it up and send it back for an exchange. Got to love that kind of customer service..

Shane

Next time i need to repair something I'm going to send it to you. Dennis

Great looking repair! Good idea to cover the underside of the wing with checkerboard. So, what do you charge for repair work? Keep us posted on this bird.

I'd love to take the credit, actually the guy who got me into planes did most of the repairs. Like he said, it all depends on how much time you want to put into it. He did an excellent job on the missing parts, like the one in the 4th pic. The little zig-zaggy piece on the side. I lost the plane a few times when it was cloudy (thank goodness for the buddy cord) so the checker should show up better. Also on the Aileron servo's, I recomend putting a screw thru the cover into the wood that holds the servos, the wood is only held in by CA and on one rough landing it knocked it off. Here's what I mean;

Now I just need some descent weather to do my 2nd maiden. Happy flying all!!

Shane

Has anyone yet found a reliable solution to the miserable ground handling of this aircraft on takeoff?

My student(s) and I have tried the following:

1) Max out the rudder. This, of course, gives you a chance to CATCH the ground loop (if you're lucky), but doesn't prevent it.

2) Toe in on the mains. We rotated the mains inward about 3-5 degrees, and this helped a BIT, but it's still pretty bad.

3) Very careful throttle management. If one eases, very slowly and carefully, into the throttle, the plane will track a BIT better...but, typically, by the time the plane's > 50% throttle, it's all over the place. Granted, with flaps down and NACA strips on, it'll fly at that speed...barely...but it's not really a good habbit to teach a new pilot, imo, since many planes won't.

Been considering a larger, grippier tail wheel. Not sure what effect that will have.

Also considering replacing the 3 blade prop with a 2 blade, and/or removing the VERY heavy flywheel, as it FEELS like this is a torque issue.

Any thoughts/suggestions?

TIA

I found the same thing with the one at our field. We tried all the same fixes with the same result. The man that bought the plane has since sold it. As far as doing anything to the engine, the changes your talking about will only make the plane fly faster, not improve the ground handling. If anything I found that by reducing the rudder way down and being very slow on the throttle worked best. Dennis

Thanks for the idea, Dennis...I've noticed the "best" results (still bad, but better than anything else we've tried) with careful throttle management as well.

I'm curious about your take on the prop/flywheel though...do you not believe we're looking at a torque issue here? It seems to me (and I admit, i could EASILY be way off base here) that the flywheel and 3-bladed prop offer more resistance to spinning up, as a result, MORE torque placed on the aircraft when throttle is applied.

Thoughts?

We were going to try and put more Rt. thrust in the plane.but he decided to sell because he didn't want to "fight the rudder ' that much. I'll stick to the regular trainers myself unless the student is 14. Dennis

I guess that you shouldn't have to fight to just get your trainer off the ground. It should be as easy as possible to fly, let it get harder later.