Laymans review of SK 50
07-22-2004, 11:44 AM
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Laymans review of SK 50
First of off, I must state that I am no expert when it comes to reviewing engines. I do not qualify to give any technical specs of timing, or porting etc... My only concern with engines is performance and price.
I ordered 2 SK 50 from Kangle Industrial about 3 weeks ago. I thought the $50 price tag was too good to be true for a 50 size engine. Upon placing my order they said it would be the end of the month before the engines made it to USA. According to Kangle, these engines are made by Tiger Shark speciffically for Kangle. I have never owed many 2 strokes but never a Tiger Shark
I received my engines yesterday. The box was well packed and included the engine, instruction sheet, high volume muffler, regular carb and a RNV as well but no plug. The instruction sheet came with no parts listing or diagrams. I wished they would have included this information. It did include break in instructions, prop recommendations, and safety warnings. The engine is a typical Chinese made engine with no frills, and no shine. The casting was clean with no manufacturing burs. The SK 50 is a ABC construction and the 80 and 120 are ring. These engines have Schnuerle porting and have duel ball bearings on the crankshaft. Carburetor has both high an low speed mixture adjustments. Before I run any new engine I remove the back plate and inspect for any machining debris. I found no filings, but also saw oil coating the engine. I turned over the prop shaft to inspect compression. I expected a excessive compression with a pinch on top. I was surprised to feel very little resistance. Hoping for better compression, I installed a new Fox Miracle plug(as that is just what was handy) and rechecked. This did not seem to help. If this were a ringed engine I would have had no concerns, but being a ABC I thought the piston to sleeve was a poor match and would only get worse when warmed up. Before starting to break in the engine I read the instructions. I discovered these engines are pre-lubed and spun at the factory. This is not something that I embrace. My thoughts are that this engine may have been left spinning a bit too long. But there are not any scratches on the piston as if it was run hard.
Concerned, I inspected engine #2. This engine is a different story. And while I could still turn over the engine by hand, it's compression was much better and it had a very well defined pinch at near TDC. Not a squeak like Mag or TT however. This number 2 may be a better.
Not to be discourage, and to give the SK the benefit of the doubt, I decided to fire it up and break it in. The carburetor is a standard TN version held on with a cinch bolt. I do not know how the RNV would have worked as there was no plug provided to fill in the existing needle valve on the carb body. I will confess that I did not order or request a RNV when I ordered. It just came in the box. I think this was an extra $5 or so. The recommended break-in instructions were good and recommended some caster at break-in. I used Omega 15% for break-in as that is what I fly with. I used a APC 11X5 prop. I thought a bit small, but didn't want to load the engine up too much. After priming, I could not get the engine to fire by flipping. It was easy to flip but I suspect the oil in the engine cylinder may have had something to do with not firing. I drug out the electric starter, connected the hot shot and wham, she started to run. I ran the engine at WOT slightly babbling but mosting in the 2 stroke realm. (Please no attacks on too rich will ruin an engine. I know the routine.) I wont bore you with the rest of the breakin procedure as most of us do this often enough.
The good news: Now personally, I am a 4 stroke fan. I have most brands and enjoy the low frequency sound of these beauties. But I must admit this is a very quiet engine. I am sure it is due to the large muffler design. But I was happy to not hear the high ear piercing pitch of a screaming 2 stroke. After breakin, I started to lean it out and back off 200 RPMS or so. I then when to check the low end. It was perfect. I couldn't believe this so I checked transition and back and forth. I never touched the low end needle. Idle was perfect and transition was right on. Mid stick had no hesitation and ran as it should. Very smooth runner. Sweet engine. I shut it down and flipped it and it fired up 5 out of 5 times with one flip. Nice runner I thought.
Not so good news: Time to pull out my tach. Here is where the tire meets the road. The tell all power indicator. I used only 2 props before my neighbors started looking out their windows. Using the 11X5 prop the tach peak at 12500. I really thought a 50 size should be more. I am sure your guys will tell me if I am wrong. The idle was great. It would idle all day a 2500. I lowered it to 2200 and it ran for 3 minutes straight. Now I may could have tuned it in even better with adjusting the idle screw, but that was good enough for me. I put on a APC 12.25X3.75 hoping it might prefer this prop. Wasn't much better at 12650. For grins, I install a tower high volume muffler and did get a 500 RPM boost, but noise level brought the neighbors over with pitch forks. I suspect some improvements can be had by drilling out the muffler exit exhaust as it appears to be small.
Overall this engine appears to be a reliable engine. I suspect the lack of power may be the direct result of the loose fit of the piston/sleeve. I would put it up there with any of the other 46 size engines and besides that, it is only $50. Now you cannot beat that price anywhere for a ABC, ball bearing sweet running engine as this one is. My hope, however, was that it would be comparable to other 50s and that would make it the engine of demand.
I'll let you folks know how the other engine performs when I begin running it. My hopes that it will have better compression and should perform much better.
I have considered calling Kangle and asking them if they would send me another pistion and sleeve, but want to you guys to give me your thoughts. Was I expecting too much performance on this engine? Could it be the lack of compression, or is it other issues with timing, porting?
Here are a few pics of the engine.
I ordered 2 SK 50 from Kangle Industrial about 3 weeks ago. I thought the $50 price tag was too good to be true for a 50 size engine. Upon placing my order they said it would be the end of the month before the engines made it to USA. According to Kangle, these engines are made by Tiger Shark speciffically for Kangle. I have never owed many 2 strokes but never a Tiger Shark
I received my engines yesterday. The box was well packed and included the engine, instruction sheet, high volume muffler, regular carb and a RNV as well but no plug. The instruction sheet came with no parts listing or diagrams. I wished they would have included this information. It did include break in instructions, prop recommendations, and safety warnings. The engine is a typical Chinese made engine with no frills, and no shine. The casting was clean with no manufacturing burs. The SK 50 is a ABC construction and the 80 and 120 are ring. These engines have Schnuerle porting and have duel ball bearings on the crankshaft. Carburetor has both high an low speed mixture adjustments. Before I run any new engine I remove the back plate and inspect for any machining debris. I found no filings, but also saw oil coating the engine. I turned over the prop shaft to inspect compression. I expected a excessive compression with a pinch on top. I was surprised to feel very little resistance. Hoping for better compression, I installed a new Fox Miracle plug(as that is just what was handy) and rechecked. This did not seem to help. If this were a ringed engine I would have had no concerns, but being a ABC I thought the piston to sleeve was a poor match and would only get worse when warmed up. Before starting to break in the engine I read the instructions. I discovered these engines are pre-lubed and spun at the factory. This is not something that I embrace. My thoughts are that this engine may have been left spinning a bit too long. But there are not any scratches on the piston as if it was run hard.
Concerned, I inspected engine #2. This engine is a different story. And while I could still turn over the engine by hand, it's compression was much better and it had a very well defined pinch at near TDC. Not a squeak like Mag or TT however. This number 2 may be a better.
Not to be discourage, and to give the SK the benefit of the doubt, I decided to fire it up and break it in. The carburetor is a standard TN version held on with a cinch bolt. I do not know how the RNV would have worked as there was no plug provided to fill in the existing needle valve on the carb body. I will confess that I did not order or request a RNV when I ordered. It just came in the box. I think this was an extra $5 or so. The recommended break-in instructions were good and recommended some caster at break-in. I used Omega 15% for break-in as that is what I fly with. I used a APC 11X5 prop. I thought a bit small, but didn't want to load the engine up too much. After priming, I could not get the engine to fire by flipping. It was easy to flip but I suspect the oil in the engine cylinder may have had something to do with not firing. I drug out the electric starter, connected the hot shot and wham, she started to run. I ran the engine at WOT slightly babbling but mosting in the 2 stroke realm. (Please no attacks on too rich will ruin an engine. I know the routine.) I wont bore you with the rest of the breakin procedure as most of us do this often enough.
The good news: Now personally, I am a 4 stroke fan. I have most brands and enjoy the low frequency sound of these beauties. But I must admit this is a very quiet engine. I am sure it is due to the large muffler design. But I was happy to not hear the high ear piercing pitch of a screaming 2 stroke. After breakin, I started to lean it out and back off 200 RPMS or so. I then when to check the low end. It was perfect. I couldn't believe this so I checked transition and back and forth. I never touched the low end needle. Idle was perfect and transition was right on. Mid stick had no hesitation and ran as it should. Very smooth runner. Sweet engine. I shut it down and flipped it and it fired up 5 out of 5 times with one flip. Nice runner I thought.
Not so good news: Time to pull out my tach. Here is where the tire meets the road. The tell all power indicator. I used only 2 props before my neighbors started looking out their windows. Using the 11X5 prop the tach peak at 12500. I really thought a 50 size should be more. I am sure your guys will tell me if I am wrong. The idle was great. It would idle all day a 2500. I lowered it to 2200 and it ran for 3 minutes straight. Now I may could have tuned it in even better with adjusting the idle screw, but that was good enough for me. I put on a APC 12.25X3.75 hoping it might prefer this prop. Wasn't much better at 12650. For grins, I install a tower high volume muffler and did get a 500 RPM boost, but noise level brought the neighbors over with pitch forks. I suspect some improvements can be had by drilling out the muffler exit exhaust as it appears to be small.
Overall this engine appears to be a reliable engine. I suspect the lack of power may be the direct result of the loose fit of the piston/sleeve. I would put it up there with any of the other 46 size engines and besides that, it is only $50. Now you cannot beat that price anywhere for a ABC, ball bearing sweet running engine as this one is. My hope, however, was that it would be comparable to other 50s and that would make it the engine of demand.
I'll let you folks know how the other engine performs when I begin running it. My hopes that it will have better compression and should perform much better.
I have considered calling Kangle and asking them if they would send me another pistion and sleeve, but want to you guys to give me your thoughts. Was I expecting too much performance on this engine? Could it be the lack of compression, or is it other issues with timing, porting?
Here are a few pics of the engine.
07-22-2004, 02:38 PM
#2
RE: Laymans review of SK 50
I ran and tached several .46-.52 size engines on a 12.25-3.75 using Omega 10%.
The OS AX ran 12,400 with stock muffler and 13,100 with a Tower.
Magnum .52XLS ran 12,800 with stock muffler as I recall.
From what I can see, your muffler looks exactly like the one that came with the Mag .52. I suspect all the Chinese engine manufacturers are somewhat related, despite their claims of being separate.
If you are running 15%, I think your engine is too loose and should be sent back. A buddy got a Thunder Tiger .46Pro that way, easy to turn over. It didn't run very well from the start. He did send it in and got a replacement. I would recommend not asking for a new cylinder and piston, but sending the whole thing in so they can test it.
The OS AX ran 12,400 with stock muffler and 13,100 with a Tower.
Magnum .52XLS ran 12,800 with stock muffler as I recall.
From what I can see, your muffler looks exactly like the one that came with the Mag .52. I suspect all the Chinese engine manufacturers are somewhat related, despite their claims of being separate.
If you are running 15%, I think your engine is too loose and should be sent back. A buddy got a Thunder Tiger .46Pro that way, easy to turn over. It didn't run very well from the start. He did send it in and got a replacement. I would recommend not asking for a new cylinder and piston, but sending the whole thing in so they can test it.
07-22-2004, 03:22 PM
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RE: Laymans review of SK 50
Thanks Ed. The muffler is the same as my Mag 52. But my Mag 52 puts out much more. I'll tach it tonight and post figures.
Sending it in is possible, but it would be cheaper if they sent me the sleeve and piston. But I suspect they will want me to send it in to look at it.
Sending it in is possible, but it would be cheaper if they sent me the sleeve and piston. But I suspect they will want me to send it in to look at it.
