Dblex

My Feedback: (81)

Had to ask!

BaldEagel

KC

You would love our club, one of the chaps turned up with a scale warbird powered by a Moki Radial and had easy connectors on the elevator, I persuaded him not to fly it until they where changed, it took some persuading and the offer of helping to change them before he was convinced.

Mike

phantom_najd

My Feedback: (2)

I used HD ball links on both ends with 4-40 threaded rods connecting them. The plan was to JB Weld CF tubes on the full length of the exposed threaded rods but found out that the rods alone are pretty sturdy. Do you guys have any advice? Should I JB Weld the CF tubes anyways for extra insurance? Never liked the idea of soldering clevis to push rods.

Azzam

KC36330

FWIW, i used Z bends on my tornado and i won't even use an ez connector on a foamy.......

JASONB2323

Hey guys can I ask a favor. I'm trying to figure out if this bird will fit into a Toyota Highlander and I need the dimension shown on the attached picture. I'd like to know if I can transport it 'as a whole' without modifying it to breakdown as that idea intimidates me for a first-time jet. (Yeah chicken I know)..

Thank you for your time!

jzuniga

My Feedback: (7)

Jason,

The measurement your looking for is 27 1/4"...
I don't know how big your Highlander is, but I can fit my Tornado in my Acura MDX. I think the MDX is about the same size as a Highlander.
I have to gingerly put the plane in and it will fit diagonally, no problems. I can get it to barely fit straight in once she's in my SUV, but I have to have the plane elevated as there would be too much stress on the wingtips resting on the passenger windows sill. Of course I have no seats available except for the two in the front;-) Good luck...

Z

JASONB2323

Thank you! Now all thats left to do is muster up the courage to join the Jet pilots ....

slamdance64

hello everybody

well after lurking here since the thread came out, I finally maidened my Tornado today. The weather was perfect and the Tornado performed as advertised! I would love to personally thank Henry for putting out a great product and letting another person acquire a turbine for a very attractive price! A very special thanks to Calvin (heat1960) for putting this together so cleanly and so fast! Calvin did an amazing job with the layout and installation of the equipment and turbine. The Kingtech K80F has been a dream to run. It has been designed to be able to break down to fit in my hatchback. There was lots of thrust to accelerate from the grass strip and once airborne, you could climb up to a safe altitude before throttling back to 1/2 throttle. A few clicks of trim had the plane flying hands off.

I had 3 VERY satisifying flights today, and everyone who saw it were very impressed. By the third flight I was more comfortable and came down lower for everyone to enjoy, followed by unlimited vertical immelman's. The Tornado flies so smoothly and the landings are a treat. The gear works great on our grass field, and although there was a problem with the nosewheel failing to lock down on the last 2 flights, there was absolutely zero damage thanks to the slow approach speed. The nosewheel stearing linkages have been loosened up and this should lock down on the next flight.

I cant wait to have fly it again and move the cg a little further aft. It is currently nose heavy but that's the way I wanted the first few flights to be (tail heavy planes only fly once- well actually less). My dream of turbine flying has come true and I cant wait to burn lots more Kero before the snow flies here in Canada. Let the flying begin!

All I can say is I will be in line for the Hurricane for next season Henry!

Brent
A very satisfied customer

KC36330

It's not gonna happen on your grass field but on concrete when you hit the sweet spot with the CG she'll ride the mains after touchdown almost to a stop before lowering the nose!!!

Dblex

My Feedback: (81)

I am currently starting mine and I can tell you that this is now day 2 that i am fighting the covering on this plane. All my seams are coming un done....and Im trying to get a million wrinkles out and I havent even hinged her up.


The seams are really bothering me on the leading edges and all control surfaces......

Brand new kit, but Ill work through it I guess.....


What seems to be the majic temp for this covering? Med-hi?

Xairflyer

My Feedback: (1)

What is the covering? on Oracover I use the 325°f setting on my iron for others like solarfilm and easycoat I use 275°f, start about mid and keeping turning it up till you are happy with it. I would then paint the seems with clearcoat or similar

Modellbau USA

My Feedback: (5)

The covering is activated around 350 degrees and the you will have to turn it down a bit. The best thing to use is a heat gun and all your problems will go away. Iron down the seems and use a heat gun on the rest of the surfaces. You might have to do this few times after you go to the field but after a few times the covering no longer wrinkles. What we do to all our planes is heat the covering and then rapidly cool it this a very cold cloth that you soaked in ice water and it will never happen again. This covering is very resistant to heat but when it gets to that make temp it shrinks like nobody's business. Hope that helps.

slamdance64

Hi Henry,

I agree the heat gun is key. I had lots of wrinkles on my plane after outside all day yesterday. It took me 10 minutes with the heat gun and the Tornado is factory fresh again! I have never heard of rapid cooling of the covering. I will have to try that out.

Thanks again for an awesome plane!

man I love the smell of kero in the morning...

Brent

phantom_najd

My Feedback: (2)

Ditto.. Though, I hate to smell it all week long in my car... gotta do something about that.

Azzam

KXH121

My Feedback: (20)

Fabreze fabric refresher (extra strength) is about the only thing I found that gets rid of Kero smell in vehicles. Fabuloso all purpose cleaner works when you spill it on the garage floor. I don't mind it so much there but I once tracked it into the house................

jzuniga

My Feedback: (7)

Congrats on the maiden Brent!

Z

KC36330

Today was our clubs fall fun-fly, we had a great turn out and a lot of spectators. being the only turbine flier in this area currently my jets draw a lot of attention. i used the tornado jet in the event and with it's awesome flying characteristics took second place!!!!!
Could have taken first place BUT


my main landing gear fell out. mind you it's never had a hard landing, and it's flown off smooth concrete so there has never been any shock at all to the gear. the main retracts are mounted to balsa rails (not exactly hard balsa IMO), these rails are 'tack' glued in, with just a drop of glue at the inner and outer rib they contact. the rails are notched (which makes a weak spot, especially for balsa) and there are no doublers at all on the ribs. it's a poor design regardless of how you look at it. Henry told me it was corrected on latter kits but they only added more glue. he said it was designed to fail...........now IMO designed to fail is what BVM did with the flex plates, they are designed to break before the wing is destroyed, and have ample space to get inside the retract area and fix the flex plate................but when you halfass glue balsa in for a main landing gear mount and then sheet over the top of it, it may well be designed to fail but it is NOT designed to be easily repaired, it rips the sheeting out with it.

Sorry Henry but i have to disagree with you on the landing gear setup. if i land hard and rip a gear out and/or even destroy a wing, i'm content with that, it's my fault, but when i have to rip a wing apart to fix a problem that should have never happened in the fist place............and wasn't designed to be able to fix the problem that was supposed to be designed to fail............it's a huge disappointment to me.

phantom_najd

My Feedback: (2)

KC36330,

How many landings have you had with your tornado before this happened? I've had 10 landings so far all are perfect except one which was a bit hard (not very hard though). You've seen the wing from inside, so, do you recommend that I hack into it and replace those rails or just add more glue and leave them until they fail?

Azzam

KC36330

12 total flights & about 6 or so touch and go's before the first one fell out........i took Henry's advice and CA'd the rails back in, next landing the opposite main fell out. so yes without a doubt I'd cut it open and fix it by adding hardwood rails and actually gluing them in. otherwise when they do let go they bust hell out of the sheeting and it fuglys up that area.

i left my Fin tool on the job Friday so i didn't have an easy way to notch the other ribs and make the rail a continuous thickness and had to notch them like the originals, but i remade all 4 rails out of Russian Birch so they won't be breaking so easily again.

megafly

I reinforced my landong gear blocks, they are crap by the factory, and gassed the wings and boom, now it's a very decent plane, but It's too fragile when it leaves the fatory.

Kenrico

megafly can you post some pics of it glassed?
Phantom if your gear blocks are not broken no need to go to all of that work, i would just get some 1/4 block and glue them on to the Landing gear block and rib, that would be four block per landing gear and I'm sure you are going to be ok, I did that after one of mine partially came lose and i fly off rough grass and they are holding up fine. if you don't get where or what I'm talking about ill try to get some pics.

bobl2

My Feedback: (14)

Please post the pics. I need to do mine.
Maybe one of these days I will learn to never buy the first version of anything!

bigplumbs

One day the factories that make these plane were made in will get the fact that retract mounts need to be made of good quality plywood. There is no excuse for this in my book. My Falcon 120 had better mounts than those in the pic but I did coat the whole area in 30 min epoxy before I carried out the build

Dennis

phantom_najd

My Feedback: (2)

Please post the pics. Thanks.

Azzam

KC36330

Got in a good 12-15 flights today, unfortunately only two of those were on the Tornado with the repaired gear, it held up great. hopefully it won't be an issue anymore.