My New Workshop

 

We moved a year ago, and I had not flown or worked on aircraft that entire time. Work had, and continues to do so to some degree, dominated my life. There was no time to play (isn't capitalism awesome!). Recently my wife noting my despondent mental state pushed me to just get in the garage and set up a workshop. This was complicated by its being rather full of shit, and that we had to move more shit from our storage unit into the garage so we could stop paying for it. In the process we managed to reduce the amount of shit, and I had a surprising amount of space to work with.

The floor is partly wood covered but mostly its dirt, so its going to be dusty and difficult to keep dirt out of the  instruments and aircraft. But its works, and its better than nothing.

Now I need to find an AMA club with a field I like. Of those in the area, the only one to come closest to meeting my wishes was of course, Hudson and SNHRCC. But we lost our access when the town decided (and it seems a lot of butt hurt politicians made some crap pup to disparage us) took the land back and plan to build a solar field on it. Merrimack has a nice field with a great geotex runway, but sits in a hole cut into the forest so its tight, especially out of the south end. Others are kinda far. So for now I fly out of Joppa Hill fields, but its not an AMA field, and the grass is never short enough making decent takeoffs and landings nearly impossible, esp for my park fliers.

I have had my first 3d weekend off work as a letter carrier, I was wiped out yesterday and took the day to recover. Today is rainy and stormy. Tomorrow I hope to be able to take the Waco out, and if it will fit, charge the received pack on the PulseXT60 and take her out ass well. Since I expect the grass to be too much for my park fliers, they will necessarily remain hangered.

Goals are to get a couple helis up, and I really want to start building the U10cc Ultra Stick, my all time favorite. Learned I need to keep the weight down and keep the rudder/elevator servos centered rather than the more wishful aft (looks good, more stiff and direct, but move CG aft considerably adding a ton of weight needed forward to counterbalance. This weight and a huge receiver pack as well as a generous fuel tank just added to much weight for her to fly well).

A good day!

Memorial Day.

I took the Alpha Sport 450, the Hacker MX2, and the Pulse XT60 out to my old flying field, Jopa Hill Fields in Bedford, NH. 

The grass is nice but too long, so the Alpha and Hacker has issues. Then a cheesy wiring solution converting the Alpha from EC5 connector to EC3 went wonky, so she didn't even get off the ground. Fixed that when I got back, did it proper.

The Hacker could get off the ground with max elevator and gunning the throttle. Flew wonderfully and I flew 6 batteries, just practicing basic airmanship. Landings were a bust due to the the long grass, she would just tuck in and flip.

After that I felt more or less ready to take the pulse XT60 up. She started right up and ran wonderfully. She still is a bit rich in high, manifesting as a step down when the throttle is quickly brought from full to idle, but it's quick and she reduces well to a good steady and reliable idle. Full open she rocks! As expected, the 15 inch prop doesn't provide enough clearance in grass, so the first landing she prop-stoped herself, and in the second she just broke the prop. I ordered the 14x9x3 I should have done before (am adjustment from 14x7x3). This will give me another half an inch which I hope suffices as I can't go lower on the diameter. I also went up to 9 from 7 on pitch. This should be a nice prop.

I still don't have a formal field with a proper grass or geo-tex runway. Hudson hasn't found a new home, Merrimack is a tight hole in the forest and a bit far off. There's a club in Serry, I think, but they are also in a tight niche with high power lines right there. So I will need to deal with the grass at Jopa. At least it's so much smoother and not as clumpy as several years ago when I last flew here.

Good to be back in the air!

PulseXT 60 Engine Trials 2025

I got some fresh gas and set up the PulseXT 60 with it's 25cc RCGF gasser. It took a few reasonable turns to start and then ran great! The needles may need some tubing, but I am pretty happy with it. Once I am confident I have my flying thumbs back we'll get her airborne! This plane is probably my overall favorite and I think there is enough room at Upper Wilkins to fly there.

I'm back, baby!

Today was the day. Checked my batteries, most had really high internal resistance (IR) so we're not usable, but three had cells 20 or less, so I charged those. I updated the Spektrum Airware in my iX12 without any issues. I had to rebind the Alpha 450, but other than that no issues. A small flap break in the core on the horizontal stab was quickly patched and off I went.

First to a smaller "2 baseball diamond" field ringed by high trees. Flew the first battery there, but wanted some room to fly hard, so set off to find a field in town I had seen Last year, huge, several soccer/lacrosse fields huge, called Upper Wilkins Field.

Very nice. Grass a bit high but big wheels for that reason, a little flap and she took off and landed just fine. Almost windless day. Perfect for a return to RC flight.

I bought 4 more 3S 2200mAh 35C batteries from RCbattery.com with EC3 leads. I need to change the ESC leads on the Alpha to EC3 from EC5 now that I will be replacing my batteries. Will need to do that with all my electrics. I also had to buy a new voltage meter as my previous one isn't working.

Will be working out of an unlit garage for now, though I may do this sort of work on the dinner table.

This field will be fine for my 10-20cc gas planes, but my 30-35cc days are over, I think. My flying club, Southern NH RC Club got booted from the field hlits had for over two decades, I think it was, so that a solar farm could be built on the top of the landfill. I need to find a new club in the meantime.

I will be getting rid of the 35cc MX Breitling and MXBach, as well as a NIB Seagull 30cc Ultimate. Keeping the Ultra Stick with the hope of building it someday.

Been a minute...

 

It's been almost 2 years, I think, since I last flew my RC aircraft. Been a bit overworked. I quit medicine and became a letter carrier for the USPS, sold my house and moved to Amherst in a small apartment with my family. So I lost my basement workshop and am working out of a historic unit garage. Charging outside as I don't want any risk of fire burning down the historic over-250 up house we live in. 

Lots of dead batteries will need replacing. Will need to charge and the update the software in my obsolete iX12. Hope to take the trainer up and reteach mybeain-thumb interface.

I also need to get rid of my well loved 30cc planes including the Seagull Ultimate I have still NIB. Holding on to the 10cc aultrastick also NOB as I still want that one. Have had two I could not get to fly right as I think I was using too heavy battery and fuel tank, and I found CH hard to reach with the tail servos mounted aft in the tail boom. 

Anyway, hope to have some more free time, and with some local fields to get my smaller planes up. Will need to renew my AMA license I guess (don't want to get deported to El Salvador).

We'll have to see how this goes.

My Name is Ken, and I am an RC Addict

I am not mocking addiction, I do actually have one. My addiction to RC aircraft is real.

In the past two days I have made two major purchases. 

Being an idiot, I am buying my 3rd Hangar 9 10cc Ultrastick withing the last year, having the last one take too long to come out of a hammerhead. This time I will figure out how to fit the elevator and rudder servo's near the CG as opposed to aft, and put a smaller tail wheel on it. Dare I use the stock? Hmmmm... not sure. I am pretty sure I will spend more money I don't have putting bigger wheels on it, partly to make it more amenable to our field, but also because I like big wheels and I cannot lie.

I pulled the trigger on the Seagull Ultimate from Legend Hobby. I love the Ultimate. I cried when I had a midair with my balsa Eflite Ultimate, one of the best airplanes I ever had, which they degraded to a foamie so I won't get it again. I chronicled the demise of my lovely Pitts Model 12, and pouted that I hate flying and will never build another plane. So yeah, addicted, because I made these two purchases I probably shouldn't be making. I totally felt like a kid stealing cake from the kitchen... I'll get over the guilt, and I will still have cake.

I guess this weekend I will finally get around to salvaging parts from the pile on my "death bench", from the dead Ultrastick and Pitts. As part of my pouting over the losses, I haven't been down in the shop since I dumped the Pitts there. It's time.

Not my fault, but my fault...

I am sooo tired of this crashing yip I've developed, so much so I even gave up blogging and pouted for 10 days. This one isn't my fault, but is my fault.

Lost my new 20cc Pitts Model 12 to a build failure back, on 10/7/21.  At least it wasn't pilot error. Still hurts. Took off, had a blast flying the pattern for about 10 minutes with a couple of landing-turn-around-takeoffs, then flew 10 minutes of intense aerobatics. Finally turned downwind, coming down nicely, slowing turn to base leg, and she kept descending, applied more and more up elevator without a response, wings wiggled when asked, 3 F-bombs later she hit the ground. I had no elevator control. Hit the ground with quite a thump in a smooth continous descent.

Beautiful fun plane, my RCGF-USA 20cc Nitroplanes Pitts Model 12.

Wish I had another one.

Can you see the crash site, about a quarter mile out? 

That's a wet ditch without a bridge...

Can you see it now?

How about now? The debris field was at least 30 feet long.

Initial impact site.

Bounced about 30-40 feet...

The cowl turned back into fiberglass cloth. Engine was underneath.  

The rest was back in a different  zip code.

Internals are okay.  Not sure if there is supposed to be a light on with these new recievers.

Left the transmitter for the "swim" across the ditch, so couldn't test it.

Power was good. 

Only 47 frames lost, no holds. Not the radio system.

This was the culprit. The weak elevator horn attachment that I knew was weak, built it up, still thought I should throw a Dubro on it, but didn't. That's why its my fault. I knew there was a problem, and I ignored it. Crap.

Knowing it wasn't a pilot error, I spent the next hour flying 6 packs on my Trex 600e FBL. This flawless experience gave me solace.

Lesson learned. Looking for a 20cc  biplane...