Crazy people... My Pulse XT in flight!

What a bunch of whack jobs... But we're fun!

My Eflite Pulse XT 25e in flight. Best plane ever! Flying a Heads Up RC Power Up 32 behind an Emax 40A ESC and a 4S 3300 mAh LiPo spinning a 13 x 6.5 prop. Can't wait to see what happens with a 12 x 8!

Punched in the nose...

It was avoidable, but being a beginner I didn't react appropriately... The Stearman had one of my older batteries in it, a 3S 3000, and we'd been hauling butt for about 4 minutes. I had power, but it wasn't hot at full throttle anymore. I flew over low, started to pull up, and she started to stall about 30-40 feet up. She tipped hard and I pulled her out, she got to about 10 feet up and stalled again. I should have pushed the nose over while I had some power, but I don't know where my head was and she stalled from 10 feet, landing right on her nose in the tall weeds... Crunched the crunched cowl, punched in the firewall and fractured the battery box, cracked a couple wing tabs and cracked the dowel I was using as a wing spar. I'm already nearly done with the repairs.

Dag-nab-it...

Taco'd the pack. Good riddance. I think this is the same one that put her in the tree the other day...

Wanted simple, strong, with good airflow. Made two bars with popsicle sticks, supported behind with a larger piece of hardwood that is sandwiched between this bar and another popsicle stick behind. The H shape grips the sides of the battery box. CA'd in place, coated with epoxy.

That's a firewall and battery box! I think if she gets punched in the nose again, the motor will give before this motor mount! My plan is to stop dropping her on her nose. She will get the new fresh cowl and a new prop (the crashed one was chipped but not broken). Pics tomorrow when she is flight ready. 

I had planned on spending this time starting the Sopwith build, but wanted to knock this project out and get everyone back up to flying speed. 

C-47 and DC-3

My C-47 and Steve Burton's DC-3 at Bob Miller Field, October 16, 2011.

Kenny's Edge

Kenny Chandler flying his Seagull Edge 540 with an OS55 engine and a 10x4 prop. Setup to landing! It was a long flight, so I edited out a lot of the long flight sections. The boy got skills!

Hobby King Mini F-86 Sabre

Quick note, ordered my first EDF jet last night. Its the Hobby King F-86 Mini Sabre 50mm EDF. This is an exciting addition to the Piratey Squadron and I look forward to sharing more abut her when she arrives and gets her first flight!

Dynam C-47 Skytrain from Nitroplanes

Wow... all I can say is, wow... Not really, there'a a whole lot to say about this amazing model! Yesterday I maidened the Dynam C-47 Skytrain from Nitroplanes whose build I outlined earlier. This model is a crowd pleaser. She looks spectacular on the ground and in the air, flies gracefully and so scale like, but can easily perform basic aerobatics. Solid construction, wicked easy build, and a completely unbelievable price for the receiver ready ARF!

I am flying her with a single 3S 2200 25C battery and a Spektrum AR6100 receiver. She gives me an easy 8 minutes of scale flying. When I set her up I wanted a touch of nose heavy CG. She, however, did not. Nor did she appreciate my lack of attention to detail in missing that the right aileron was deflecting up at mid stick. On her maiden she took off, came out of ground effect and went all psycho on me! This thing is supposed to be docile! Several times I nearly crushed her miserably until I figured out I needed to hold her nose up, power back and left aileron to keep her level, then I nearly lost her as she flew off into the distance when I was psychologically reluctant to turn her having just got her wings level and in controlled flight. I manged to turn her back inbound and I brought her in for a squeaker of a sweet landing. It was kinda nice, having everyone start yelling supportive (and good) advice as I fought to control her, and cheering me when I finally landed her. Thanks guys!

I removed the 3/4 oz nose weight, fixed the aileron and took her up again. This time it was breathtaking, smooth, sweet and just a pleasure to fly! The video below is her third flight. I included the entire, shortened flight, since I don't have any other video of me doing a complete flight. Today I flew her again and she showed the same docile habits, giving me and the crowd the same enjoyable flight. I added flaperons today which dramatically improved (slowed) her sink rate as I pulled the power back on final approach to landing.

Thanks to Steve Burton for doing the video work using my phone's camera. Enjoy!

Stearman revisits the Southern Ents

First flight of the day went wonderfully. Took the Stearman up, toodled about a bit, shot some practice approaches coming over the fence to land into the east wing. Decided it was time, came in, and realised I was a little more hot than I wanted to be, a touch higher. I should have made a missed approach, but opted to try the landing. Realized that was a mistake, powered up to go around, a good option, except I was on a lean battery and the power punch I needed wasn't there. Pulling back, pulling back, she's nearly hovering on her prop, looks like she might clear the trees, but still very high alpha (nose up), lost her behind some closer trees, and WHACK! She struck the tree nearly bottom on at slow speed, but the whack was wicked loud!

I trudged into the woods, with one of the guys (Greg or Bobby) gunning the Stearman's motor so I could locate it. I found it in the highest tree. Its in this pic. Can you see it?

Here's a closer look, can you see it now?

Greg came in with a chainsaw (he was working on clearing out some of the highest trees to open up the approach from the south, and this tree was slated to fall). He had the clever idea of cutting it down bit by bit, starting at the bottom. The tree fell, but the brush held it up a bit, so he cut again, it fell a bit more, repeating this several times.

Finally it tipped enough she fell out of the highest branches into the brush and I was able to grab her.

I set her down, and lucky me, she was essentially intact! Neither the crash or the piecemeal decent of the tree eating plane caused much more than breaking the ends off the prop (from running it in the tree), and a few poke holes in the cote!

Here she is with some packing tape over the pinpoint holes and one 1/2 inch tear, with the new (and old) prop. I took her up after checking her out, and she flew wonderfully for the rest of the day!

Thanks Greg Castellan for helping me recover the Stearman!