Just finished reading the article in RCM on converting a leaf blower motor. This is a 18cc Poulan engine, it looks to be a easy conversion. Has anyone tried this yet? Thanks Tom

Tom, A guy at the club just gave me the article and an 18cc poulan to take home with me this weekend. I got roped into doing the conversion for him somehow. I guess cause I have the lathe... I just read the article last night and as soon as I finish my Ryobi this week, I am gonna start his. All in all it looks like an EZ conversion. His is going into a 1/4 scale cub. I will say that the carb that comes with the leaf blower is wide open throttle. The carb has no throttle setting but wide open, so you will have to get another carb. I will keep you updated as I get to that project.

Warren

I read that article too, which is the motivation for doing a lot of searching on this forum and putting it on my favorites list to monitor.

Last week, while at a fellow modeling buddies house, I mentioned I was going to attempt converting a weed whacker into an R/C engine. As luck would have it he had Weedeater brand string trimmer that had seen better days and he let me take. This unit has the same 18cc Poulan that was converted in that article, with a few differences. I will not need to change the carb and it needs a different prop mounting system.

So far I’m about 80% done with the conversion and it’s been easy. I re-read that article just the other day and some things make more sense after tearing into it. Can’t wait to get a prop on it to fire it up!

Thanks for the info. I also had pickup a Ryobi weed wacker to convert. Let me know witch one looks to be the better unit. I will be using 4 of them in a B-17 once I have tested them.

The Ryobi makes a much more powerful airplane engine with a lot less fuss.

Enjoy,

Jim