Road flying and Rockets

I got it in me to try flying off the road at Joppa Hill Fields. Across from the sports fields is a huge field they just mow once or twice a year and do nothing else with. I wondered last night if I could take off and land from the road and fly over the field. Turns out yes, quite easily. I parked at the lot entrance, and would walk my plane or taxi to the main road, and take off, walk across the street to the field and fly, reversing the process on landing. Of course the traffic, normally sparse, picked up. I brought Luke along as a car spotter. It worked out pretty well, but I would need a spotter as its impossible to fly and check the road for cars, bikes and people. I meant to have him video, but forgot to ask. I found it was best if he gave me a running description of the traffic while I was flying, which was no fun for him. If I decide to do this again I will need a spotter.

I was doing this flying the new HobbyKing Edge 540 EPP, and pulled a blender into an inside loop and the right wing came clean off. It was kinda cool as it didn't just drop out of the sky. The wing fluttered down and the rest came down in a slowish roll that impressed even Luke.

Of course nothing survived of the airframe... When I get home I'll take a closer look at the electronics. The battery is toast.

With that done, Luke and I launched rockets for a couple of hours. We went through a package of dud igniters (not enough of the burny stuff to ignite the motor), but got in over a dozen awesome launches. The Bulldog likes to arc, I think by design with the weight they have you put in the nose, and the Crossfire reaches at least 1000 feet, or so it seems. All came down, with some trajectory managment, on the field.

I'm walking back from a recovery, Luke is preparing another launch.

Luke waiting for the gust to drop.

My favorite is the USAF Bulldog.

I maidened the Slipstream Extra 540 with the Stabilizer system and she flew very nicely! I had found a nice patch of dead grass without clumps to fly off and land on. It was a touch gusty, and by then we'd knocked a fin or two off, and burned out one parachute, so called it a day after a single flight. The 12x6 worked fine, will probably keep it on.

Other than the Edge committing seppuku, it was a nice day. May go out later with the Ugly Stick. I had been eyeing the Hobbyking 1200mm Sbach EPP made the same way this one is, but with how easily this one came apart I think not...

Slipstream Extra 540 EP 450 Done

Today the Emax GT2218/09 motor arrived today from HeadsUpRC today, always quick shipping. I installed it with only one issue: the mounting screws are not included and the M4's I started with were a little longer than I needed so that trapped the outrunner. I replaced them and the motor runs fine. Other than that, it went well for once.

By the way, looks like Hobbypartz is sending me a replacement servo for the D654 that arrived non-functioning! Sweet.

Its AUW was 2.2 lbs. With a 10x6 APC prop and a 3S it pulled 260W something like 24A, not what I wanted. I put a 12x6 APC on it and its pulling 363W and 32 amps. Now that's what I am talking about!

Looking forward to the maiden (realize I still haven't maidened the Mustang...)!

This is a big 450 motor... and the requisite long shaft to get past the firewall.

The motor mount is installed. This whole plane is light and fragile.

All done.

Sweet lines!

So, Gary, how long before I bend it?

Slipstream Extra 540 1000 mm 450 size

(Gary Hoffman pointed out to me this is a Extra, not an Edge).

A few weeks ago I bought a Slipstream Extra 540 450 size (you won't find a link, I think they don't make it anymore), an Eflite 450 motor and a Castle 35A ESC from my friend Gary Hoffman. It was lived in by a chipmunk, both other than that was new and unbuilt. I bought it as I was looking for a light weight plane to toss around (when I got my Hobbyking Edge). I can't program the ESC (tried using both my Castle program card, and my Hobbywing program card.

I finally ordered the servos (see my last post), and set about putting this thing together. It came with the Chinglish instructions on CD which weren't very helpful. Its a nice plane, but its very light and I think not long for this world for being so fragile.

The only annoying thing about this plane is the motor box. Its designed such that the firewall is immediately at the end of the cowl. Its not the easiest design to work with as it requires the shaft pass through the firewall so it needs to be longer, usually requiring replacing the shaft with a longer one if its not designed to fit this way. The Eflite motor isn't, so its shaft is too short. I tried changing it to a longer one, but it would not run, and on replacing the shaft I found it wound not run. I did when I first set it up to test the Castle ESC and the motor, so I have somehow bricked it. I have changed a lot of shafts from my early flying days, and with the original shaft the motor manually turns clean, but it just sits and jitters like its out of sync... I looked, the inside of the outrunner has no metal parts stuck in there, the connections are good, and it doesn't matter what ESC I use. I also tried the motor on other ESCs.

I purchased an Emax GT2218/09 1100kv motor from HeadsUpRC, my go to electric motor guys. This is a powerful 450 sized motor, generating 300W on a 3S battery with about a 10x6 prop. This plane come in under 2 lbs AUW, so this will be very nicely powered. Its designed for both through the firewall and standard shafting, so it should do nicely. If there are any issues I will build a new engine mount.

I used the stock tailwheel, the gear of which is flimsy, so its going to need to fly off very good grass or the Geo-tex. I did replace the tiny stock wheels with slightly larger ones, so won't be using the wheel pants.

The geometry on the ailerons is off. If you put it straight-ish like I did here, the control horn, which presses in on two plastic pins and is not screwed in, it lies at the edge of the hard point on the aileron. You can see the wrinkling of the cote where the right pin on the horn is just in the wood.

I installed the other one stock, and its angled funny, but the pins for the horn are both in solid wood.

I have everything on board except the motor mount and the motor, which should be here in a day or two. Pretty plane!

I took the 3-axis stabilizer from the Cornell, which I rarely fly, and put it in the Edge. I programmed it and its all set. One precess is to turn the gain up on each of the three axes one at a time to magnify its behavior so you can see that it responds opposite to the "unstable" movement. For example, if you roll the plane right the ailerons should move to roll it back left. There are small switches on the gyro that you move to change the direction, easily, then turn the gains down to barely move. If they are too high you'll get a lot of oscillation as airflow alone causes subtle changes in pitch, yaw and roll, most notable during a dive.

I like these 3-axis systems from Hobbyking which incorporate a Spektrum compatible receiver. For some reason they are NIS at their warehouses, so I need to wait to buy replacements.

Bad Solar D654 Servo from Hobbypartz.com

I have bough a couple dozen of these Solar servos, liking these and the Exi ones. For low cost servos they are of great quality and I have never had problems with them. I just bought 5 for the Slipstream Edge 540, wanting an extra one in case one came in bad or went bad.

One came in bad.

Hobbypartz (which is one of several companies owned by the same group) has a link to customer service, which took me to a non-functioning Service Ticket Submission. I was signed in, and it kept saying that there were unfilled required blanks, when actually their weren't. I remembered that they used to use RCDiscuss, their forum, for customer service, and that you had to know that, and that the links were at the very bottom. I went there and signed in, made a post, and it wouldn't accept my short video, so I put a link to a shared file on my Box account (I later posted the video to my Youtube).

Its a $10 servo. I hope they don't tell me to ship it to them...

UPDATE(9/2/16): Awesome, they are sending a replacement!

GOD I LOVE THIS HOBBY!

Took the Trex 500 out today, sporting her new skids instead of the u stable but cool tripod rolling gear. Spun her up. Magnificent! Silent, no vibration, perfect blade tracking. I was stunned by the beauty. Perfect setup.

Then I hit Flight Mode and this. I must have accidently hit the self destruct switch.

Butchers bill at first glance: 4 main rotor blades, one tail blade, main shaft, autorotation gear, three servo control horns, tail boom.

HK Edge 540 480 12x6 Flight Testing

It's getting gusty as a storm is coming, but to a point I had confidence she could handle it. I was out at Joppa Hill.

I took her up with a 12x6 Xoar prop, very lightweight. She flew marvelously but the motor and packs got a little toasty. Too much prop pulling too many amps. The pic below shows the 12x6 and an APC 10x7. I have a 10x5 and 10x6 APC coming. One of these three will be the right prop. Last landing was almost backwards with a prolonged gust, so I called it a day.

I'll start with the 10x7.

Hobby King Edge 540T 480 Foamie Maiden

Whoo-hoo-yippee-kai-ay!  My new favorite flier!

Maidened the Edge between storms today in a light breeze. I am not sure she liked the Zoar 10x5, and on her first landing in thicker grass she broke it. I replace it with an APC 9x7.5 and she hauled booty. I am not sure what prop she will need if I am ever to learn harriers from one of you bright lights, but acrobatically I pulled all the stops and she kept up. She doesn't seem to stall, but instead rapidly loses altitude wings level. A little power and she immediately comes out. No aileron differential needed, tight rolls. Snaps and stops on a dime. On edge not so stable, but a lot of that is me not being very good at them, and I think needing more rudder throw. Her tiny wheels did okay, but the wheel pants didn't make it through the first take off. I still put slightly bigger wheels on when I got home. Put her through 5 packs.

Great stable flier. Never thought I'd get another foamie but these full fuse EPP Edge 540 planes from Hobby King are a blast!  I do love gas, but there is a lot to be said about tossing a plane in the car and up and flying within minutes of arriving.

Headsuprc 480 motor, 3S 2200 mAh, APC 9x7.5, 380 Watts, 32 Amps, 5 min flight.

UPDATE(8/13/16): After some advice from The Boys, I ordered a 10x5 and 10x6 APC prop from Tower Hobbies. We'll see how those fair.