If like me you have troubles to align your turbine / thrust pipe, here is what I just did for my Savex F16.
I used a laser pointer I placed of the turbine on the mount.
I first designed a little mount for the laser beam, to take the place of the turbine in the fuselage.
I taped a piece of paper as a target for the beam. The goal now is to get the laser beam in the center of the taget...
I did my turbine alignment in 10mn using this tool.
I thought this trick could be usefull
The end result can be seen on pics... perfect alignment of turbine and thrust pipe.

Great trick.

I did something similar to align the external wing tanks on my BVM F-4.

For turbine duct alignment (with no mounts to use) I use thread to line it up, I will try to post some puctures myself.

Again, very good tip!

Thanks Matt,
Just stick a piece of paper to the end of it, and you can align pretty much everything...
Once you have made it, don't loose it, you can re-use it anytime you want to check your alignment, or install your turbine in a new bird.

Excellent tip!

I use thread, but I may try the laser next time.

And here another way of doing it. A woodblock turned in a lathe gives perfect alignment between my Merlin160 and Tam's pipe. Even the distance between the nozzle and exhaust is her adjusted to the correct value. It doesn´t matter if you are using a bifurcted- or a straight pipe, vertically and horizontal alignment is achieved.I´ve another block made for my P160.


My 2 cents.

Thomas

hey guys, all good stuff here .... thanks very much as i will use a bunch of these ideas in the coming weeks ..


Wojtek

How critical is the alignment on centering???? Dennis

great idea... thx for posting! I´ll going to make a wheel alignament tool with it too...




Enrique

Thomas,

First, I thought of this solution, but without a lathe to turn the wood block, my first attempt was a disaster...
It also has to be a tight fit to be accurate. Congrats, you worked it out...


Lt. Dan,

Godd idea, but how do you keep perpendicularity with your former, as you move it around to find the perfect spot ?
Also, you can only check two dimensions at a time...


Dennis,

If your turbine is missaligned with the thrust pipe you loose power. If the pipe is missaligned, you have the wrong thrust line, and the turbine won't push strait.
You might have troubles to trim the plane. It all depends of course how bad is your missalignment.


Thanks a lot for your inputs guys,

Yann

I have found turbine alignment, when using a thrust tube as we are discussing here, to be very non-critical. Sure, if you are a few degrees off you will be heating up one side of the thrust tube a bit more, but if your tube is plenty thick (0.008" ), no matter. If it is at least three diameters long, you won't notice any thrust misalignment. If you visually center the tail end and the angle with the tube, all will be just fine.

Nice creations [&:] ....all.
In my case I made a rim with carton.... Was thinking using a GPS [&:], but decided not giving my friend another reason to makes jokes on my perfectionist sickness....[sm=bananahead.gif]

Miguel, if you're so blind you need a GPS, don't bother, go strait to the white cane...

Yann, I'm not sure I understand your question fully. I have measured the centerline of the airframe and then attached a string to run along it. I then line up the engine centerline along the string, and then once the mount is bolted in, I lined up the pipe the same way.

I think he is stating that your method only lines the turbine and pipe up laterally and not vertically.

There isn't much that can be done vertically on the SM F-15. Everything fits like a glove.

My situation is a bit different. I have several elements that need to be lined up.

It starts with the inlets, then the inlet extension, then the bypass then the pipe.

I start by making a little template that will mark the centerline on the bypass and the inlet extension. This lets me put a piece of thread dead center on each element

I line the first element up with a center ruler to the outer flange references.

I can then site everything down the center. It is hard to see from this angle, as I could not get the parallax out of this shot with my little camera. But trust me you can line it up.

Verticle clearances are set a different way in this plan. I still think there might be a way to combine the laser and this technique, just have not thought of it yet.

Matt, that looks like a super bandit bypass for a pegasus?

Oops, you posted again while I was posting, I was right, it is a bypass for a peggy in a bandit :P

Well it started that way...had to do some mods.

Molded an extension, cut a slot to get the motor in, molded an extension to the cover and stiffened with with CF tow.

Thomas,

I managed to turn a plug like yours in a piece of bakelite.
It gives perfect alignment, just like my laser beam.

Yann

Does that mean you don't want your laser tool back?
And it worked so well in my new L39
Guess I'll just have to take it out of the postage box and put it back in the workshop again!

Hi James,
Sorry, I really need it back. But I have a spare plug for you if you want...
Let me know.
Yann