mgnostic

Has anyone else had much experience with the BUSA N17? I've seen seveal posts on the other BUSA WWI planes but not much on the N17. I've got my both wings and most of the fuselage framed up and the white tired wheels and a Vickers Gun from Williams Brothers arrived today. I'd like to hear from others on their servo and fuel tank placement.

R8893

My Feedback: (20)

I built one for another guy about four or five years ago so don't remember a lot of details. I suspect I put the tank right behind the firewall and the servos as far forward as possible. It was built per the plans except for pull-pull on rudder and elevator. It had a Saito 150 and still needed balast in the nose. It flew fine until totalled due to pilot disorientation.

mgnostic

I'm looking at putting in a subfloor to mount the tank on. I'm planning to use a 25 cc gas engine so the tank height is as critical as with a glow engine. I would like to have a seat and at least a pilot bust. This would lead placing the servos lower in the fuselage than is shown in the photos in the manual. I'm okay with using a standard servo for each half of the elevator but is a single standard servo as shown adequate for the rudder?

mgnostic

I've made quite a bit of progress in getting it framed up down in my cluttered shop. On the whole, construction has been very straitforward. It is basically a stick fuselage and a couple of flat bottomed wings. I will probably use a 25cc homelite conversion for power. Only two complaints so far. There have been a couple of places in the instructions that I would have liked to have had a picture and the plans have some inacuracies. The rib spacing on the upper wing is not symmetrical and the parts for the rudder build into an item that is shorter from back to front than what is shown on the plans. For a sport model this probably isnt that big of an issue but if someone was looking for an entry level scale bird for competetion is could be a big deal. If I were going for scale detail I would probably just do a laminated outline for the tail surfaces. To give BUSA its due the quality of the wood is excellent. There aren't that many die cut parts (mostly wing ribs and tail surface outlines) but the die cutting is of high quality.
I also tossed in a pic of the William's Bros Wheels.

mgnostic

More Pictures of the BUSA N17 in progress. I'm thinking of going with a color scheme from Escadrille N62. There is a really cool emblem of a red and blue rooster. Does anyone know if the squadron emblem was the same on both sides? Although it is an N24 I'm leaning to replicate the markings on plate 21 in "Nieuport Aces of WWI".

feep

Matt, as far as the servo for your rudder goes,it wouldn't hurt to have a higher tourque one for it I have a 1/4 scale SR eindecker and I use a standard servo but my rudder has more in front of the hinge line and that helps.

Are you doing push rods or pull/pull?

wings2an3

My Feedback: (1)

I've currently have about 25 flights on this models and four on another one that a buddy has. I have a quadra 23 on mine and the tank is mounted right behind the fire wall lenght wise.(20 oz) Rx 1400mah, ignition 1800mah, Hi tork pull-pull for rudder and indiviual pull-pull per elevator. Balance very important, fly great and requires rudder management. Side slips great in 12mph wind.

wings2an3

My Feedback: (1)

Photo taken by a fellow flyer on one of the first flights taking off

mgnostic

Terriffic looking N17. Did you use the BUSA decals? If so what did you think of them? What sort of finish did you use on the forward fuselage. I've read that the N28's used a masonite like material to cover the front of the fuselage but I dont know about the N17's. Some of the illustrations I've seen look like aluminum but it could be silver doped composite. Did you just use fabric up to the firewall? Many of the pictures show a clear change in texture just behind the cockpit. I suspect that the front covers overlap the fabric attachment Given that this is just a sport model I would like to replicate the effect but still keep it simple.

wings2an3

My Feedback: (1)

Matt
Yes I used BSA decals and as a rr modeler used to doing decals these were among the worst I have encountered. Good print quality, but very thin film. I even pre sprayed the decal with a gloss fixative to try an hold the decal film together. Put them down correctly the first time and DO NOT MOVE. I also brushed (lightly) solve set on top of the decal which helps them settle into the contours. Covered with Koveral and nitrate the spray with luster coat aluminum(was able to do outside), any color was done with Nelson water base urathane. I Used their aluminum cowl and fabric to the firewall. If my memory is correct this plane did not have an aluminum other then the inspection plates. Used a wire brush in a dremel to give the look.
Hope this helps!
Jay

wings2an3

My Feedback: (1)

Matt,
Was able to up load another pic. Hope this helps?

mgnostic

Thanks for the info. I had concerns about the water slide decals due to the size of the decals. I may just paint my insignia. I painted the roundels on my BUSA Bristol MI and they came out good enough to pass at 10 ft. I will probably order an aluminium cowl when I order my covering. I'm planning to use the plastic cowl to establish the location of the cutouts. Right now I'm working on the installation of the upper wing. I had intended to buy an incidence guage during my last visit to my LHS but forgot to put it on my list and the shop is a 2 hour round trip away. I'll just have to check the incidence using levels and a slice of balsa cut to a known angle.

Charlie P.

Feep,

You have MUCH more confidence in EZ Connectors than I do.

mgnostic

My personal preference is for heavy duty ball links but I admire feep's layout ideas

feep

I should really rethink my use of easy links on a model this size. They make it so easy with a split full flying elevator but just this week at my field we had a mishap which was caused by a failed easy link. It seems the backer on the elevator came off and the plane went straight in. He used the metal backers and I use the nylon. My concern is not with the backers but with the set screw arraingment. By the way except for the easy connectors the arraingment is the kit manufacture's

BobH

My Feedback: (2)

Feep, a thought about easy links.. easy on.. easy off!

vertical grimmace

My Feedback: (1)

Feep, I like the arangement of your linkage. I especially took note of the swivles. I will have to try that on my BUSA DVII. I do not like the E-Z connector. It really is not difficult to accurately produce a z-bend. One note on e-z connectors- in many AMA events they ae not allowed. If you had those on a major function (aileron, elevator, rudder) in pylon racing, your airplane would not be allowed to fly. If it is not good enough for the AMA then most certainly not for your $1500-$2000 scale beauty.

mgnostic

A little more progress has been made. I 've gotten the upper wing mounted. It wasn't terribly complicated, just fiddley. A word of caution, the upper wing as drawn on my set of plans is not symmetrical. There are differences from left to right. I didn't discover this until I held the two halves up to one another. The span was about .25 inches off and the ribs were spaced differently. I don't think it will make much difference in the overall flying quality but it complicates alignment during the wing mounting process. Of course, I also have to allow for the fact that my own building errors often creep in. As upper wing incidence is an important factor in alignment of the aircraft I highly reccomend measuring four times before drilling the holes in the struts. Mine required some tweaking and every change resulted in having to recheck the overall alignment. In terms of measuring the wing I measured and marked the wing from the centerline on both the fore and aft spars so that I could square the wing to the fuselage. This is also a good time to be mindful of the upper and lower wing gap. The equidistant marks on the spars allow for measuring an equal distance between the wings on both sides. At this point I'm concerned that it could be pretty easy to twist the wing while installing the wing struts.

Taildrager-inactive

My Feedback: (11)

I'm just starting My busa Ni-17 build. It will be my winter build with a Zenoah 26 for power. Get those easy connectors out of there, you don't even want to take the chance, if you can't make a Z bend to work get someone to help you out, I'm very serious about this, as seen too many guys lose birds using them. Is not a hard build just takes some reading and time to get things correct.

feep

Well I don't want to side track this forum but I wiil be redoing my ez links on my EIndecker. Two seasons with it like this have put me on borrowed time. I will say this in my defence, It was because of a problem with ackerman that I used them. I discovered it later by accident and found out that my elevator horns were in the wrong possition. I will be using more apprpriate connectors on my current BUSA D7. BY the way what do you think of the swivels on the tillers? They were used to help adjust the elevators and after I solved the problem I left them on also. I'm not asking for praise as much as Do you guys think they are safe?

mgnostic

It would depend on what the swivels are designed for. If they are for hooking up a crappie jig to 8 pound test line they might be a little on the light side. If they are the sort intended to keep an 80 pound catfish on a trotline they are probably sufficient. More specifically can the swivel withstand the full force of a fully stalled servo plus a safety factor of 50%. Lets say that you have a large scale servo capable of generating 120 in/oz of tourqe. My math is probably a little faulty but I think my idea is valid. As I understand it, the servo should be able to withstand a 120 ounce pull at the end of a 1 inch servo arm. 120 ounces plus 50% is only 11.25 pounds. I understand that the ukie guys are required to do pull tests on their control lines. Why not test your swivels in the same way. While it might not be sufficient for pulling 3-D maneuvers in a 40 pound plane at 120 mph a set of well tested swivels is probably safe. A further consideration is given what you know now are they necessary?

vertical grimmace

My Feedback: (1)

I actually like the swivle idea as it will keep twist out of the lines. This has actually been a slight pain on my DR1. I am actually using .018 control line cable and terminations on my DR1 and DVII. I still have a ton of C\L stuff from my combat days and it is plenty strong. I am just finishing the aileron linkages on my DVII before I start putting on covering.

Warbird Man

My Feedback: (95)

I've been flying this one for the last 2 years with no problems. Very easy to fly. (If your going gas, you can put the tank where ever you want.) Mine's right behind the firewall. It balanced out perfect with a G-23. Stay away from cap and ball links, They have too much play in them and could pop off and lead to a disater. I use the swivel ball links ( no play and have a bolt (socket head cap screw) through them. They cost alittle more, but it's cheep insurance. I also added shear webbing in the lower wing to help stiff'in it up as it can twist fairly easy. Stay away from the water transfer decals from BUSA, They're ****!

jjmretired

My Feedback: (15)

Well, I also started a BUSA Nieuport 17 a few weeks ago, sorta. When completed, it will be a Nieuport Triplane. I'm using the kit fuselage but scratch building the three wings. I got the 1/4 scale plans from Cleveland Air. The top wing is finished (with funcional torque tubes and control horns). Working on the bottom wing now. All three wings had the same cord as the bottom wing on the Nieuport 17 and same fuselage as the Nieuport 17. I'll try to upload pics of a 1/72 plastic and wing pics. Jay

Charlie P.

I can't say that swivels in general are a bad idea, but there should be no spinning/twisting in the wires so they are unnecessary. If the rudder end has screw mount hardware they could be a bad thing by allowing it to back out, but I guess they might just as well prevent it by dissipating any twisting force at the servo end????

I really like the idea of a transfer bell-crank so you can set-up the pull-pull and then do servo adjustments or swap out the servo as necessary without messing up the linkages. I'm stealing that.