mrdhud

My Feedback: (48)

Tee Shirt update

Times running out you only have until Monday to get your name on the list for the new tee shirts. I will be placeing the order this coming Monday so send me a PM with your order.
Dan

ctflyboy

My Feedback: (3)

tee shirts
to all who ordered tee shirts, those who haven't paid it's time to own up, you placed the order now lets get the $$$ out to dan,
there is no reason he should have to pay the difference for unpaid shirts.

Jim Henley

Hey Bill, good to see you on the thread. I have a full set but the first shirt is a little worse for wear.

mrdhud

My Feedback: (48)

Tee shirt update:

As of today 3/30 I have collected 780.61 out of 1317.94 this leaves 537.33 unpaid. This amount is more then I willing to pay out of my pocket so I will give it two more week to collected the balance. The price per shirt is contingent on ordering 66 shirts. At the end of two weeks (4/13) if this amount is not collected I will make a full refund to all that has paid.
If anyone needs to speak to me call me at 863 698-9706. Please send your payment to:
Dan Hudson
1050 S Oak Ave
Bartow, FL
33830

Below is a list of names that have paid.

As of Monday 3/30 I have received payments from.
Stickbuilder
Rickstubbz
Waconut
Johnboy151a
Flyrc67
Ctflyboy
Fly20
Amscat
Cdbarker
Troys007
Bill diedrih
Tmac48
Yel914
Clavino1
Clandestoy
Jacque
Froghair1
Mikedj
Rc_wings
Michaelnel
Nine o nine
Hinckley bill
George waldrop
Mrdhud
waco1

michaelnel

How 'bout it you guys? You made a commitment when you had Dan order you shirts, time to pay up!

waco1

Dan, I paid you long ago and don't see my name there.

mrdhud

My Feedback: (48)

Waco1

My apologizes your name is on my paid list sorry for not having it on the list i posted doing it now.

DIVERHERB

Okay I have a small problem that I am having a little trouble with. Hope some one here has an idea. I plan on putting a dle 30 on this plane. I bought this plane with the fuse mostly built. Mounting the engine is not much of a task, as I plan to cut off the existing engine bearers flush with the firewall and epoxying thicker firewall over the existing one. Leaving the existing bearers there it would add strength. My problem comes in concerning the fuel tank placement. The only placement I can see feasible would place the tank about 13 in. back from the firewall around the leading edge of the lower wing. Does any one think this would be a problem for the engine drawing fuel? It is a pretty long run but with a engine that pumps I think it might work. Any thoughts?

mrdhud

My Feedback: (48)

Herb I don't think that would be a problem I know some people set there fuel tank back on the CG location with good results. Lets get a few more thoughts on it and see what others think.

stevegauth30

I've had my tank pretty far back and way low on the carb with good results. also with a DLE. I think you will be fine.

Ekim

My Feedback: (1)

13" isn't bad. I think your good to go.

DIVERHERB

Thanks all for the response. I did not think it would be a problem for a gas engine. For a normal glow engine I would never place it that far back. This is going to be further back then I have placed tanks in gas planes in the past. But without cutting into the fuse I really do not have much choice. Most of the fuse has already been framed in. The next one I plan on making modifications needed. Thanks.

michaelnel

Hi Folks

I tried calling Futaba support, held forever, then took the option to have them call me back, and was told their mailbox is full so I could not leave my number for a callback. Not good.

So.. Took my GP WACO out today for what was supposed to be its maiden flight. A very very experienced pilot at our club was going to take it up for me, but after assembling the wings onto the fuse, it was obvious there was a problem. The upper wing aileron servos were hard over and humming while the stick was in the middle position. Lower wing ailerons were fine, and the upper ones even moved in the correct directions along with the lower ones, but the centering position of the arms was WAY off, with them only able to move a little on one direction.

We took the servo plates out with the linkage disconnected, found nothing wrong other than that the arms were not centered when the stick is centered. However, pulling the arms off and putting them on at 90 deg to the servo did not fix it. Something in the radio seems to be telling them the wrong place to sit at stick center.

I have the plane set up with four aileron servos. I am using Futaba S9001 servos at all four positions. I have the bottom ailerons connected via a Y harness and plugged into port #1 of my Futaba R3008SB receiver.

I have the top ailerons plugged into another Y cable, and that Y is plugged into port #6 on the R3008SB.

I am controlling the Futaba R3008SB with a Futaba 10J transmitter. I figured that to make the ailerons all work, I should slave 6 to 1, and at one point that did work. I used the 10J's P.MIX1-6 function to do this. On the P.MIX1-6 screen, under Normal I have selected "1:AIL+FLAP", which seems correct to me since 6 is FLAPs.

If I select that, on the second page it shows:

P.MIX1

RATE < +100% MIX: OFF
> +100%
OFFST: 0% TRIM: ON
( 0%)
MASTR: AIL SW: THR
SLAVE: FLP POSI: NULL

At one point I had this working correctly, the ailerons behaved as desired, ie: whatever the lower left one did, the upper left one did the same, and visa versa for the right side. I had all the ailerons centered at rest and had set the control travel and dual rates up.

However... now, the lower ailerons work as they should, but the upper ones are moved way off center position (to the point where you can hear the servo complaining). They still move in the correct directions along with the lower ones, but I can't get them to center correctly.

I have gone through all the settings that seem applicable, but have not been able to solve this. I sure hope someone here can help me get this set up right!

ctflyboy

My Feedback: (3)

Hey whats your name?
Why do you need 4 servos 2 is adequate

michaelnel

I figured the problem out and it is fixed. All four servos working correctly now.

waco1

Don't feel like sharing the fix?

michaelnel

Quote:

Originally Posted by waco1

Don't feel like sharing the fix?

I was a little put off by ctflyboy's post. For some reason he seems to have it in for me. He PMs me criticizing me for not having my profile filled out, so I filled it out. When someone asked me to post pictures, his response was "Not bad for an ARF" or something equally crappy. Then today he says "Hey, What's your name?" (it's in my profile he asked me to fill out) and tells me I don't need 4 servos (however this plane is designed by Great Planes to use 4), so I was pretty much miffed and not interested in posting again because he will come back with yet another jab.

But there are guys like that on every board, so I will simply ignore him in the future.

I finally figured out what was causing the upper wing ailerons to be hard over all the time on the WACO.

I had set the thing up so the lower ailerons are Y together and into channel 1, and the uppers were Y into channel 6. Channel six on this TX/RX combo is normally flaps, but since I am not using flaps, I figured to use 6 and slave it to 1. And that did work, until this morning.

So fiddling around this afternoon, going through all the settings in the radio, I found the aux channel settings. That is where you can assign a channel to a switch of your choosing.

Channel 6 was set to "VR". "What is VR?", I ask myself? Well it turns out that on this TX they have a knob smack in the middle of the front panel, labeled VR. More research reveals that this pot can be used so that when you have flaps, instead of being limited to 1 or 2 or 3 positions, you can twiddle the knob and have infinitely variable flap angles. Pretty neat if you have flaps, not so neat if you are using that channel for slaved ailerons.

So I twisted the knob, and lo and behold the upper wing flaps moved to where they were supposed to be centered, when the VR knob is centered, and the flaps on both wings worked correctly in concert with each other.

Further, I found that you can set the desired switch for the FLAP channel to "NULL" instead of the default "VR". I did that, and now the VR knob no longer serves as a "Screw Up The Upper Wing Flaps So We Can't Maiden This Puppy" knob.

So it's fixed, and I think we will see that yellow beauty in the air next Tuesday!

airplanegeek

Ok,

Who all has built a T&J Models Waco, and why haven't I seen them discussed here??? I think i will look at building the 1/8 size.

Anyone have any experiance with these kits? http://www.tnjmodels.rchomepage.com/tnjwaco45.php

thanks

dscaccia

I just discovered this thread! Amazing! My dad built a Pica 1/6 Waco but never covered it and it has been in storage for 15 years. My dad is a WWII vet and has built many RC aircraft over the years, and he has always wanted to fly a Waco. He is 88 now and can't build or fly any more, and he finally gave me the green light to finish it and now the fun begins. I am going to go electric with the following set-up:
AXI 4130/16 with a 16-10 prop. 70amp controller and a 5000mAh 6S (two 3S packs) battery. I haven't had a chance to read through all of the pages on this post but I am definitely interested if anyone has done this already. Any information will be gladly accepted and greatly appreciated!

rc_wings

Michael,

That nasty VR function will mess you up every time!!! What I would suggest is rather than using the mixing as you have done, set the 10J to a "Flaperon" or "Flap" as wing type. This will automatically do the mixing for you of the two aileron channels. If using "Flap" wing type, you will have Aileron 1 on channel 1 and Aileron 2 on channel 7. If using "Flaperon" wing type your aileron 1 will be ch1 and aileron 2 will be ch6 on the receiver. The only thing is in Flaperon, the VR knob will move the surfaces as well, and not ideal as you found out. So ideal setting is to use the "Flap" wing type, and plug your ailerons into ch1 and ch7 on the receiver. All the mixing will be done for you. Then you can connect your Y harnesses. If you want to get a little more granular, get rid of the Y harnesses, and then use the mixes to add in two more channels on your receiver. One for each of the two additional aileron servos. This now allows for much finer control for each individual servo. You have an eight channel receiver, plus SBUS, so plenty of room to have a port for each servo.

The guide is a little confusing on the Acro page for the wing type (page 19), but if you look at the Glider settings (page 21) it may make more sense. I do not have a 10J, but the programming is similar to the way my 14SG (and my old 8FG) are programmed. Similar methodology. By selecting the appropriate wing type, can save you a few steps in programming and avoiding to have to use mixes, and disabling switches/knobs. It also automatically sets the trim to control the appropriate channels. If you keep the setting you have...make sure you check to ensure the trim has carried over to the slave channel you have programmed.

Good luck with the maiden!

Marko

michaelnel

Thank you Marco for the great analysis and suggestions. If I were setting this up from scratch I believe I would do the ch1/ch7 thing but I am wondering, now that I have the VR turned off and have it all working with ch1/ch6 is there some benefit to switching over to 1/7? I realize it would have been easier to do that from the start had I understood you could do that, but is there a reason to change it now that it is working?

rc_wings

Michael,

Just ensure your trim function carries over to the slave side. Some mixes do not take the trim function over. If everything is working....no there is no reason to change at this point that I can think of off the top of my head. The only thing is if you wanted to have finer tuning for each servo from the radio, when mechanical adjustments are not enough, you could get rid of the Y harnesses and plug each servo to its' own channel on the receiver. That is a matter of preference, and I never use a Y harness any more if I am using a receiver with enough ports to accept all my servos being directly plugged in to the receiver. For the next bird....keep the wing type in mind, as it can really speed up your radio setup.

Marko

Jaybird

I have the same Great Planes WACO ARF with (4) aileron servos with top and bottom left and top and bottom right "Y"ed together on separate channels (Spektrum Dx7s). Mine has a Saito 125 four stroke and it pulls it around great. It's a great flying model. Easy to handle on the ground with a little right rudder on take off when the tail comes up and very smooth in the air.

For fun I made telescoping aileron connecting rods made of aluminum airstream tubing with a brass insert to hold a section of 2-56 threaded pushrod. It connects to cut down control horns and rides with them without interfering with their operation. Nice ground detail but hard to see in the air.

It's too late to mention it now, but I kept my top wing as three pieces and bolted the center section to the cabanes and made a connection system to hold the outer panels with the wing spars glued to them.

I also bolted the mounting brackets to the wing struts and use the threaded inserts in the wings to make the field connections. That way I don't have to put on nuts, washers and screws through the brackets, just screws and washers into the the wing panels top and bottom. That's a change you can still do if you want.

It still takes a while to assemble at the field, but that's what biplanes are all about.

Best wishes for a successful maiden.

Video of mine can be found here. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TK6B...ature=youtu.be

Jaybird

DIVERHERB

Michael on all of my planes I prefer to use separate servos on the ailerons. I feel more comfortable this was then running a rod from the upper to the lower ailerons its also one less thing to hook up at the field. Some prefer to use 2 servos for biplanes some prefer to use 1 w/belcrank for monoplanes. I guess it all comes down to preference. No right or wrong way.

rc_wings

Herb,

He has a servo for each aileron (4 total), and is using a Y-harness to connect two pairs. Not like the Stearman ARF from Great Planes, as it uses the rod to connect the ailerons on each wing. Kind of a PITA...especially on that plane. My Goldberg Ultimate uses a rod too, but it works well and is a snap to put together compared to other bipes like the WACO and my buddy's Stearman.

I agree...if I can avoid that rod, and the use of Y-Cables....I do.

Cheers,
Marko