Hawkflyer

Hi Maverick
I bought one on ebay a couple of months ago for $220.00 AUS and about $40.00 postage from an online shop in Sydney . They are on there all the time I think an importer has bought a heap and is selling them of one by one .
Its still in the box as a backup for my Boomerang with the Rabbit when I get it.
Where in sydney do you fly?
Hawkflyer

Mavrik!

[8D]Hey Hawkflyer,

Do you have the ebay link???

I live on the Northern beaches so Doonside and Pitt town are closest spot. My F 16 will be a sealed strip only bug, too nice for grass!!!

So I am looking at a grass machine!

Mav

Aussie1

Hi all, finally finished my Falcon this week and it came in at 15lbs with a full UAT, so I should have good performance with my PST600. It turned out quite nose heavy with standard install with only my small turbine down the back, so I have positioned the 2 1500MA LIPO RX packs and the 3000MA ECU LIPO pack as far to the rear as I could get them. The CG now measures 12.9 inches back from wing root leading edge, so will try first flight like this and assess it from there. For the canopy base I used thin ply and balsa laminated together wet and then sanded to shape and two carbon dowels in front and a Trim hatch latch at rear. It's turned out very strong and light, so should withstand normal flight forces. I will be using my JR DSX9 2.4 gig radio, and with most of the electronics towards the rear, I will put the sattelite RX right up in the nose in a clear area. One question I have is what sort of trim change are pilot's getting when full flap is selected, and what settings would you use for the landing switch? I have included a couple more pics and was pleasantly surprized to find that it fits fully assembled into my GMH station wagon as it is a fairly major operation to completely derig it for say, transport by air in a travel box. To Mavrik!, I bought mine from Powergunt Hobbies in Bendigo, and Peter the owner actually flys one with a PST600, so he has been very helpfull (as has this forum) in offering advice about this model. As long as the weather stays good, I expect to have the first flight and certification completed by end of next week. hooker, I am using Springair retracts and Robostruts fitted to Trim wheels and brakes, so only time will tell if this will be strong enough for regular use.

Hawkflyer

Hi Maverick
Sent you a PM
Hawkflyer

Hawkflyer

Hi Aussie1
Couldnt help but notice in your second photo it looks like a jacket with 4 gold bars hanging over the back of the seat of you car. Your not an airline pilot as well are you.
Hawkflyer

Aussie1

G'day Hawkflyer, I am a airline pilot, and have been for about 24 years, except for for a while after 2001 when the company I was working for went broke after 911! Fornuately, RC aircraft kept me sane, but it took me some time to recover financally and finally buy a turbine. After many years using ducted fans, I cannot believe how much cleaner and easier it is to operate a turbine model. PS Are you going to the Temora jet event?

Hawkflyer

Hi Aussie 1
Yeah hoping to get to Temora if I get my engine in time. Waiting for delivery of my Jet Central Rabbit for my boomerang, there is a bit of a wait at the moment due to the fact it is a new engine and is very popular. Being my first turbine it may take me a while to fit it and for me to get use to it.
I fly dash 8"s for qantaslink in Sydney.
Cheers Hawkflyer

Aussie1

Hawkflyer, I have sent you a PM.

Cheers, Aussie1

hooker53

My Feedback: (106)

Aussie, Looks like you are ready to go. The pst looks like a good install setting on there. Let us know how it does. Could I also get the springair and robart numbers from ya. I think I will try to machine my wheels and brakes but might need to buy one to get the measurements. Sure would speed things up. Later Hooker53

tim777jet

Since my last post, have had 11 flights and all has worked well. Weather has been terrible here , even last night had wooley hat and two jumpers on, nearly got the gloves out, wind quite strong but amazingly down the runway. Flew 3 nights ago, wind was evil and full 90 degs across runway, thought would give it a go and had 2 flights and was really lucky to have 2 landings, wind was so violent, called it a day in end, credit goes to model, last landing was with power on full flap, 90 degrees across the runway at no more than walking pace.

The ball bearing restrictor in the up line works great, gear looks scale like and softly enters the wheel bays.

The nose gear extension system has worked well and the trick with the 3 in1 spray oil with PTFE content seems to have cured all my air leaks on nose retract cylinder. (o ring rolling over)

The smoke system is working slightly better now, i am using a piece of brass tube one size bigger than my original setup ( I think it was 3mm RS tube), but have crimped the tube vertically this time, not hoizontally at the end, and not quite at the end. I left the end round and the crimp starts about 8 to 10 mm from the end and crimped down to .015 thou. I am using the last of my MT smoke fluid ( about 3/4 liter) mixed with regular diesiel and I am getting good results. Found some food colouring in the kitchen and tried a test tank with some red mixed in, but it doesnt mix properly and made no difference. I tried a powered dye that you use for dying clothes, but the powder dosnt want to mix with diesel and when you pump it into the tank, the felt filter extracts the dye and powder and you just get clean diesel in the tank. I tried without a filter, but it just cloggs the fuel pump. I know that dyes are normally injected directly into the jet exhaust and not mixed. Anyone with any experience of this.

A dozen or so flights ago I noticed that i was pulling more noticeably in the turns. I checked the C G of the model and found i was quite nose heavy. I repositioned the batteries and set the CG correctly. What a difference this has made.

To improve the CG even further, for take off, I wanted to fit the smoke tank in the rear section, instead of under the canopy area, just below the engine starter motor. I found that the hand wash , Cussons Carex from Sainsburys 99p, refill bottles, hold 250 mls, which is about 30 secs of smoke, would just about fit in here. I had to repair my engine mount area when it cracked recently, and fitted a balsa block in the rear of this bay, so the bottle was just too long and hindered the rear spar tube. Iam sure that your fuselarges will accept the bottle. I did a water pressure test and found these bottles fail at around 60 psi, so it is no good for my forced air smoke pressure system, so abandoned the idea for the moment, but would be good for anyone looking for additional fuel behind the CG or a conventional smoke system with electric pump.

I tried my flycamone2 inflight video recorder again and had nothing but problems with it. You might recall a spent a lot of time experimenting with this camera and got so good results, but now it has deteriorated the same as most other peoples. I spent a few hours investigating the problems, i think i have cracked it. My last 4 flights recorded perfectly and camera hasnt missed a beat. I cant make it fail, so if you have one, belive me, a lot of people have spent a lot of time to come up with a fix, so read here for more info. Not saying that my fix is the 100% answer, but from being an expensive mantel piece ornament, it is now a fully working piece of equipment in the field box.

http://www.rcuniverse.com/forum/m_68...tm.htm#7876612

Happy flying, cheers Tim

Aussie1

Hooker53, my retracts are Springair 300 series and the struts are Robart 440 series. The wheels and brakes are Trim 70mm. If you want to keep it real simple, use 3/16 wire struts, Du-bro wheels and a Du-bro nose wheel brake. This setup will cost about $50 compared to $400 for my setup. If flying off grass you will need a system that has good shock obsorbing design.
Here are a couple of links for you, and there is some good stuff earlier in this thread as well.
Cheers, Aussie1

http://www.retracts.com/Stuts.htm

http://www.trimair.com.au/index2.html

http://www.retracts.com/Retrax_300.htm

Mavrik!

[8D]Hi guys,

I have decided to get a second jet for grass. The Falcon is it. So retracts if I want to keep it cheap and simple and still have retractable gear what is best option? I note there are a few Aussies chimming in here which is great.

Good links Aussie!1,but what do I need to get me going?

PS My FE F16 will get certified and have its maiden on Friday at Temora. It it the tiger scheme if you want to say hello!

Cheers,

Mav

Boomerang1

Aussie1, what's the Dubro nose wheel brake? Is it the discontinued old unit with the spring wound round the drum? - John.

hooker53

My Feedback: (106)

Aussie1, thanks for the links. The springair look good. The Oleo's and wheel/brake combo i will make here in the shop. I will more then likely go with a retreact that is oleo ready. 7/16 or 1/2. Keep the good stuff coming and good luck to all. Hooker53

NightFlyer1

7/16" and 1/2" strut are way to big and you don't need them for the falcon. I have robart 3/8" strut. I had 1/2" struts on my Comp Arf Rookie and they were just right. I think my Rookie was 22lbs dry. I have Spring Air 700 with robart 3/8" and a wire nose strut for my falcon. I also had this on my boomer and it was fine.

tim777jet

Bit of inflight footage with the newly repaired flycamone2, just to show the retraction/extension with the ball bearing installed in the up line as described earlier. You can just see the nose gear jolt up and shorten at the end, when full flap is selected. I had to reduce the travel by 1/2, as when the linkage drops the leading edge of the apex link, is really close to the ground when the suspension bottoms out, so dosent look quite so dramatic, but it does make the suspension softer ( it would have been fine for tarmac landings but not rough grass). Notice how the nose of the plane does not bounce up in the air now, with the oil filled damper in the nose strut
Instead of another boring video i had try with the windows movie maker on the computer, really cool bit of software and quite easy to use when you fathem out the basics, so heres my first movie,
cheers Tim

www.youtube.com/watch?v=2X8J3AFWwmk

SJN

Cool video Tim [sm=thumbs_up.gif]

Mavrik!

Awesome vid Tim! So waht is your retract set made up of?

I need to decide what retract set up to put in my Falcon.

I know this was asked before, but would a P 80 work with the Falcon?

Mav

Grumman

Excellent Tim!!! Cheers for that Buddy... I really enjoyed that footage especially the landings.
Your right about the camera it's not bad at all, I wonder if the manufacturer is going to come out with an upgraded
version... or did they already, I believe I have seen Flycam 2
Thanks Again for the Video
Happy Flying!!!
Mojo

tim777jet

Hi Mav,
the nose leg is a Jet 1A leg and the mains are AT trailing link legs which I cut down. ( bought from Motors and Rotors in Uk)
The retract units are the Eurokit Large type cheap units in Fiber not ally, purely to keep weight down. My first set up had the cheapest Graupner retract units that were sold with the model and they lasted longer than I could have dreamed.
Nose wheel is cheapy plastic, which just lasts and lasts and mains ally hub rubber tyred, but 1/2 the weight of normal ally whells, got them in a bargin bucket in a model shop in Paris, make is in one of my earlier posts. No ball bearings anywhere, just plain bushes.

Ref engine, my engine will be heavier being home made, so as long as you treat the model with respect, it should be ok, but if you want to do flat out snap rolls and mega high G manouvers, then i would buy an appropriate model that can take that abuse.

Just in passing weighed my model last week, with full fuel and smoke fluid, plus some repairs, my model is approaching 20 lbs and flys well with my conservatively powered home built motor. Will reweigh when i return from work as think my scales might be wrong, seems a bit heavy to me. cheers Tim

Aussie1

Mav, any heavy duty retract will work fine with this jet, just keep it light! There are lot's of online stores here in Australia, or you could ring some of the larger hobby shops. Great vid Tim, it makes you realize the sort of abuse that a U/C takes, especially on grass. I'm about to find out whether mine will be strong enough. It should be as it survived almost 100 flights on my F86 Sabre. boomerang, that nose wheel brake is no longer sold (since found out) . This one is still avaliable from Hobby Lobby.
It would have to be adapted to fit a 70mm nose wheel.

http://www.hobby-lobby.com/wheels.htm

http://www.kavanrc.com/cgi-bin/dpsma...FV2.html?E+Kav

Electric Brake

Strong electric brake for Kavan’s BIG Scale Airwheels

HLFK263 Kavan Magnetic Brake ..... $ 59.90
ESTIMATED ARRIVAL 08/29/08 - Please Preorder Now
About 1.5" diameter. Use a 9v transistor radio battery and a micro switch that’s hit by "down" elevator servo movement. Braking is strong a single brake on nose wheel gives good stopping. Two on main wheels are even stronger. 6mm axle hole can be drilled to 1/4" or shimmed with 7/32" brass tubing (KSN130) to 3/16" axle.

Aussie1

Our regulations over here require a functioning fire extinguisher to be avaliable during the start sequence of a model turbine. Most extinguishers avaliable from auto or hardware shops use dry powder which is very corrosive to metals such as what your typical turbine is made of. The solution is to use carbon dioxide, but my research has found that they are only avaliable commercially here and are quite expensive. I came across this small extinguisher that uses carbon dioxide as the extinguishing agent and for the rare time that it may be needed, may be ideal for our purpose.

http://www.kangarootentcity.com.au/welcome/page48.php

NightFlyer1

Finally had time to work on the P-80 install...

Ed

Nice find Aussie. I wish that we had the equivalent here states side. Did a search, and couldn't find it here. []

... zak

Boomerang1

Thanks Aussie1, yep I have one of those Kavan brakes already. I thought Dubro may have their mechanical brake back in production. I have one of those as well but have not used it on a jet. - John.