The F-16 is about 10" long, and about 9" wide. Its bigger than the aeroace. The aeroace motors would not fly it...Its got much more powerful motors on it, and it weighs more. It has a nice rubber/foam nose cone on it, so you dont have to worry about messing up the nose if it hits something. The wings are semi-symetrical, although kinda flat on the bottom, and have very little dihedral in them. Its a sharp looking plane. Looks really good when its flying.. When you rev it up....its screaming. Give it a good flick, and it flys straight and level and fast. You have to be VERY easy on the turns. If you turn it too sharply, it will dive, and there isnt enough to gain altitude.

What would be really spectacular is to put the F-16 stuff in a aeroace. You'd have to weight the nose like crazy, but if you got it trimmed out...it would rock.

I flew my AA on to the roof of a retirement home yesterday. [&:] I will probably just wait for the wind to blow it off. No big loss i guess.

My quad found a roof today too--fortunately we were able to find a ladder!

I can't get the www.airhogs.com website to come up. Is it my computer, or do I have the wrong website?

I bought my first Aero Ace today at Walmart after a guy brought one to our club meeting last night. Can't wait to have fun with it!

Scott

Comes up for me but their site IMHO is really terrible. The design sucks out loud.

Tom

It working now. Must have been down when I tried before. You are right. Website is not on par with most these days.

got mine back it made it down the roof and into the rain gutter.[8D] Got lucky too as it is getting ready to rain here.

I've been skimming this thread and think I'll pick one of these Aero Aces up to fly in my front yard and as a trainer for friends. Having not read all the messages in this forum yet, I'd like to get a few answers to some questions...

What size lipo is in this plane and how long of flight times do you get with it? Also, I read reference to somebody planning on installing a larger MA lipo into the plane. What size did you use and how much flight time did you get with it?

The way I understand it the TX uses AA batteries and you charge the plane off that? If so, I'd rather charge the plane with my Celectra 1 to 3 cell lipo charger. I believe it goes down to 250ma or 500ma as it's lowest charge rate which should be good enough for a small lipo. What type of charge plug does the plane have on it and is anybody charging the lipo via a seperate charger?

Is this plane sold in single and bi-plane wing styles? If so, which would you suggest to get? I thought I read that people were removing the second wing?

Any other information you can provide on hop ups, batteries, charging methods, etc would be welcome. Thanks.

Not sure what size lipo it is but it will fly for about 12 mins. Don't use a bigger bat. The plane is too small for it. Just use the tx charger to charge the plane. Only takes about 20 mins. It come's as a bi-wing but to make it faster I took the bottom one off.

battery is 3.7V 130mah

Have you guys seen the micro jets people are building with AA guts

im going to hack mine up and try to build one once i find some depron.


link to AA jet thread
http://www.rcgroups.com/forums/showt...t=476593&pp=15

critterhunter,
the cell is a FullRiver 130mah. flight times can vary from 10 minutes to 15 or more (all depends on your throttle management). the 130mah works pleanty well, but some have used up to a 210mah cell, that should provide pleanty of run time, and is still light enough for the plane to haul around.

the RX has a diode in between the battery and the charging socket, so you can only use the AA TX for charging. but, if you open the plane, remove the battery and solder on your own connections, then you can use your own charger (this is what i do with all of mine, works great). if you've got steady hands and a small point soldering tip, you can unsolder the charging diode on the RX. a few have done this with no problems, but i never got that far. the AAs transmiter charges the cell at a higher rate than 1C. this is safe, but it lessens the overall lifetime of the cell i think. if your charger only goes down to 250mah, you may be doing the same as the AAs TX charger, so it might not be worth it. you can get the Apache 20/20 smart charger for 30 bucks or less, and its a really good charger, use for single cell or up to 3 cells, 110mah up to 1200mah rates. its the one i use most, and has worked flawlessly for almost a year now.

if your order from overseas, you can get the single wing (Eagle Wing) version, but here in the states they only carry the bipe. i have the eagle wing and its a decent flyer. it climbs even easier than the bipe, but turns can be more hecktic since it doesnt have much dihedral. you can order the eagle wing, and a whole host of brand new AA designs here (hope you can read german! ): http://xufo-shop.de/sess/utn;jsessio...dex.shopscript

nick

hey nick,

on that german site, I've found the eagle wing, but there are 2 models that say they are the eagle wing. One has a round wing, kind of like the preserver, and the other has a wing/tail that is much more square. Which one?


PB_2

p.s. 21,99 euros is about 26 U.S. dollars (they use commas instead of periods for some reason)


edit: this is the site: http://xufo-shop.de/sess/utn;jsessio...dex.shopscript

Thanks for the info. Pretty handy with a soldering iron so I'll probably just remove that diode so I can use the current charge jack on the plane and not add an extra with more weight. I'd rather charge off my own charger so I don't run the batteries down in the TX. Friend of mine had a Spinmaster stealth fighter (forget the exact name) that I used to the nimh for on my Piranha Digital Peak Charger. Simply made a custom jack to hook up to it. Saved him from running down his TX all the time. I'll probably get one or two aftermarket lipos for the AA with higher capacity just so I can swap'em and fly longer. Anybody worked out an easy way to swap lipos in it quickly and with what style plug did you solder in? If I go this route I won't need a charging jack on the plane anymore since I can just yank the lipo and charge it via the new plug I put on it for easy swapping.

Pretty interesting aftermarket designs floating around out there for these electronics. When you think about it, under $30 for a micro RX/ESX and lipo battery is a real good deal and just begging to be thrown into other planes. Keep posting some links to other builds as you guys see them. Also, did I read right somewhere about a mini helicopter being built out of these guts? If so, please post a link. I'm in the market for a cheap tiny helicopter with up/down left/right/forward/back control ability. Something in the less than $50 range with a lipo power source prefered. Anybody have a suggestion?

PB,
i didnt see the 2nd eaglewing, but the one i was refering to is the one in the picture i attatched. i just modified that plane a few days ago to use a single 7mm SS motor, actuator, and differant RX (2nd pic). AUW 17 grams, flys really nice, but needs more dihedral and less rudder area...turns are quite tricky.

critterhunter,
no problem. i attatched a pic of where the diode is located on the PCB, though its been removed in this picture. i also attatched a pic of how i switch batteries (theres another pic of it somewhere in this thread). its pretty easy, and a little tape holds the nose back together just fine. i use 2mm micro connectors, i should be using polarized ones, but i dont, i just have to double check the polarity before i plug the battery in. i get them from here: http://bsdmicrorc.com/products.cfm?catID=10006

as for the heli with AA electronics, it could work, but it would be tricky. since the AAs RX only has 7 throttle positions, getting a stable hover altitude might be really difficult, and since the rudder isnt proportional, turns might be hard too. i'm building a 5" Proxflyer heli (a mini version of the BladeRunner), dual rotors, counter rotating. i did try the RX in one of my test models i built, but my gearing was way off so it didnt lift. it might be possible to do a standard heli, using one motor for the main rotors, and the 2nd motor for the tail rotor, but i dont know how the thrust differential would work on that.

if you're wanting a decent (and cheap) micro heli, there are two brand new ones that are coming out, you can get them from the same place as the X-Twins (they're being produced by the same company, silverlit). they're here: http://xufo-shop.de/sess/utn;jsessio...iew.shopscript one is smaller (PiccoZ), uses IR control for up/down/left/right, forward and back is set manually by changing CG placement. the larger one (Gyrotor) is RC, not sure about forward and back on that one, but either way, i'm getting both soon! you'll be hard pressed to find a good indoor heli for 50 bucks that has all 3 functions, the BladeRunner is as close as it gets i think. all other micro indoor helis (not hobby grade) are 2 channel, up/down/left/right, with forward and back set with the CG. the BladeRunner is the only one i know of that has forward and back.

nick

This is an awsome idea, and I want to try it, but I have no clue how to start, so any info is welcome.
Do you have to shape a really small airfoil into the plane or what? thats me biggest concern.

Thanks again for the info. Went up to Walmart, Toys-R-Us, and Target in my area. All had the AA but all were priced at $29 (I think Walmart was even higher priced). Seem to remember you guys using a quopon to get $5 off at Toys R Us (Target?). Can anybody post a link to that?

Some of these designs to use the electronics in are pretty neat. See a few that strike my fancy. Anybody put them into some kind of mini glider yet to ride thermals?

Should be buying one soon.

"Anybody put them into some kind of mini glider yet to ride thermals?"

Some people have put a larger wing on the Aero Ace which makes it very floaty. One method is to remvoe the lower wings and attach them to the ends of the upper wing. It might thermal like that.

If it does, you may lose the plane in a few seconds. The range is very limited. I think there are ways to hop up both the trasnsmitter performance and receiver antenna for more range, though. But it would still be tight for thermalling.

The problem with trying to use the AA as a glider is that it weighs practically nothing. Which means that if there is any wind, even movement of air, the plane will be affected (ie, blown away). The other problem is that to turn, you have to have throttle. And since there are no control surfaces, any turning or adjustments you make will add thrust, which will not help it glide. This plane is good for many things, but I don't think glider is one of them.

I've found the best way to get out of a bind (ie, the immediate threat of being blown onto a rooftop or into a tree) is to cut power and glide down and away, applying momentary power to steer as necessary. When you get the elevator trim tabs set up for relatively stable flight (ie, not too much climbing/stalling) it seems to glide alright - best when nose into the wind.

Finished my AA Flanker. I used 3mm cellfoam88 from hobbytownusa. I got two sheets for $7. Just did my first flight and it actually flew pretty well turns are a bit sluggish but it wasnt to bad and it looks awesome in the air. [8D]

Hey , just bought the x-twin plane - aus version of aa. Awsome, awsome but 1 question. When charging it should the green light turn on if you plug it in with it already charged. Cause it only turns on when real flat i think.

I downloaded the plans for thr F15, but I really dont know where to start, my biggest worry is if I need to make an actual airfoil?

You dont have to you just leave all the parts flat.

Dont know if you guys saw it or not....but Jason Shulman flew an AeroAce for the Extreme Freestyle Championships...it was funny.