Amazing day to fly! Took the Pulse XT60 and the Waco, first flight of the season for her.
Had to retune the low needle again, kept cutting out on run up from idle to WOT. Running great now. Clean at WOT, a bit sputtery in the mid-range. Way powerful. Flew amazing!
This engine, an RCGF 26cc with a Vulcan 18x7 CF prop, has always run perfect. The Waco is difficult on the ground, really wants to ground loop. Practiced take offs trying to get a clean roll out, flipped her a couple of times spinning around. Learned that she has a lot of P-factor so I have to bring her up slowly and let her run up and lift off. Got the hang of it.
But not before breaking the Vulcan CF prop.
She is sooo over powered, and the 18x7 likes to tip cut the grass and ground strike stall. So I took advantage of having a 17x7 APC. I think once I find she flies well with it I may keep it for a while. I will get a Master Airscrew Classic 18x6 after that unless I can find another black 17".
The three blade Master Airscrew 14x7x3 came in today for the Pulse, which was flying a 15x6. The 3 blade aluminum spinner from eBay arrived a couple of days ago. Wow. Look. At. That. LOOK AT IT! That is beautiful!
IMX-Bach update. nstalled some of the gas neccessary electronics etc. I needed a few more channels for this going gas than a 6 channel reciever provides, so I installed the fated Spektrum AR8010T with a single antenna and a dual antenna satellites. One of the antenna on the reciever itself got cut, so I trimmed back the metal jacket to expose the same length as was lost. So this baby has 5 antenna in all different directions.
!Fuel tank is just forward of the wing tube CG, plenty of room for the ignition. I installed the fuel dot, seen in the first pic, and have a fuel dit coming in the mail from China.
The reciever installed, you can see the three satelite antennae. The ones on the reciever, the short one goes straight out, the long one drops down and extends out the bottom of the fuse vertically.
Spektrum wasn't helpful about the brown out, telling me what I already knew, but I expected that. They think the issue was external to the reciever, a voltage issue. I have no reason to suspect that. It was a transmission problem. They told me that I couldn't fix this and offerred no help. I know that I can remove some of the outer metal jacket and expose the same length that was lost. At the very least it will transmit, but zi am confident it recieves as well, No way to tell.
For now I am waiting for Joe to finish his move to his new warehouse, and then send me a 32cc engine I purchased used from him. He doesn't have these laying around, I was just lucky. Once that gets here I will install her and break her in. I think I will use the 17x8x3, if I can drill it. It can take up to a 20x8. I think the one on the MXS-R 30cc is an 18x10... I have no idea why, but it works well with the DLE 30.
The Sbach and I have a long rich history of tears, pulling of hair and gnashing of teeth, mostly due to its unstable wing at low speeds and its strong tendency to severly tip stall into an unrecoverable death spin.
When I took the old 30cc Sbach wing and adapted it to the MX2 fuse creating the MX-Bach, it was necessity, not a love for the Sbach wing, despite its sexy shape, that made me do it. To address the tip stall, I sought a way to keep the lifties under the wing tips for as long as possible and to allow a more gentle stall. And voila, I discovered Vortex Generators. Here is a great presentation on the concept, a video of experiments by an RC engineer.
I didn't, and don't, have the data nor the gumption to do all that math, so I just made some using L-shaped styrene strips, and installed then where I thought they should go, about 5-8cm back from the leading edge. It's all described here. I knew they would be tall enough, just picked a length, decided a V shape was nice looking, and stuck the buggers on. It actually worked! The MX-Bach has only flown a couple of times with the VGs, but she no longer shows the stall tendencies she used to. I think flying her at 10S made her a bit underpowered, so am very excited to be converting her to 30cc gas!
So as I prepare to build yet another Sbach, I am considering putting the vortex generators on her too. I will use the same guess work and install them similarly. I still have the L styrene strips. I think she is going to be an amazing flier!
Well, I did it. There was no way, psychologically, that I was going to let an entire gas and electronic set just sit there... so today I ordered another Sbach. I love this plane, but have never managed to keep one flying...
I am done with warbirds, though I looked at the Phoenix Corsair. I wanted a Corvus, but the 60" ones are all electric... It's not like ts a compromise or anything, this is an amazing plane. There aren't a lot of 10cc or 0.6 sized planes out there.
So, do I trust the Spektum AR8010T receiver? I have an inquiry in to Spektrum about that. I may use a HK Orange Reciever with stabilization. Lord knows the plane needs stablization at low speeds. Hell I may even try reprogramming one of the Alpha 6 systems if I can find it!
I am kind excited! Need to pull the parts from the rubble of the Spitfire sooner rather than later!
A storm is coming overnight tonight, the front is moving in this afternoon. The morning is warming up and the winds are calm. I figure I can get to the field, maiden the Phoenix Spitfire, and put some more time on the Pulse XT60 with her new APC 15 x 6 prop.
I arrive to find Nick Crigo and Louis Rios flying helis. Nick pretty much only flies helis, has been for 25 yrs, so he is flying the high end stuff you only see in magazine and airshows. These are his.
Nick Crigo. Nice guy, glad to have met him.
I learned that in my haste to get out, I forgot the wings for the Pulse. I don't like to start with a maiden flight of an aircraft... this isn't good.
And it wasn't good... I did maiden the Spitty, and it ended abruptly and poorly. I posted about it.
I headed back home quickly for the wings, some lunch, and decided to bring the Stik with her new 12x8x3 prop. I downsized the prop on the Sukhoi at the 13x8x3 is a lotta prop for the RCGF 10cc, but the Sukhoi didn't perform as well, so I went back to the 13x8x3 on her. I wanted to see how the Stik would do with the smaller prop. Flew about 4 tanks!
This is my favorite plane! She flies amazing, is powerful, stable, and a joy to fly! The Duck has done well. Flew several tanks and tuned the flaperon mix.
She really likes this APC prop, and yes we cut sone grass with the low clearance. She did tip stall the engine and did not break. I squeezed the soft gear together a bit, cracked the paint, but the added distance, balanced mixing on the flaperons, and a flared landing did the trick. I am planning a 3 blade 14x7x3 Master Airscrew if I can find an inexpensive aluminum spinner. That will make the clearance better. A little paint and she is better than ever.
I won't be buying another Spitfire, no matter who makes it. Second Maiden of a Phoenix Model Spitfire brought down by an odd occurrence. It is simply fate. For me, the Spitfire is cursed. I think I expected this as it did not surprise me that it crashed, and I am kinda unaffected by its demise.
I lost my first one a few years ago in an accident at the end of the maiden flight, it clipped a tree coming out of an intended stall. A year later I bought another one, same model. It sat for another year, new in box. This spring I decided to just do it, and built another beautiful airplane, this time with an Evolution 10 cc engine. This entire saga is blogged out here in earlier posts.
So today I took her out to the field in fine conditions to maiden. Here's how it went down, literally.
Gorgeous Phoenix Models Spitfire with 10cc Evolution Gas Engine.
I had a feeling since the day I bought the ARF kit that there was a bad omen about it.
Pre-Maiden Walk around, started and running sweet! Controls surfaces fine, run up fine.
As Nick took the camera from me to video this maiden, he commented that doing so was itself a bad omen. A bit of over rotation on takeoff, recovered started to turn and the engine RPM drops...then it recovers within time enough the inertia let her restart: she had gone into fail-safe mode. The Fail-safe position is ignition killed. Fail-safe is set up when you program the transmitter for a model, and set what it will do if the signal between the transmitter in my hands and the receiver in the aircraft is lost. Usually controls neutral and engine stopped, to prevent it flying off. In this case a momentary "Brown Out" of signal loss is quickly recovered by the software, but by then the aircraft was in a stall spin and it was over.
Nick is noting that at the crash site immediately when we arrived, the satellite receiver was fast flashing, an error code usually meaning "bind" is lost, the unique connection between the aircraft's receiver and my transmitter. Given what we saw, what I experienced (no control) and this blinking receiver, we are confident that she browned out during climb out, she stalled, spun, and control was impossible.
How we found her.
From the other side, before touching her.
Moved the wing to disconnect the flight pack battery.
Goodbye, Spitfire... May you rest in pieces.
So what do I do with an entire fuel/engine and electric system for a 10 cc airplane? I am confident I will NOT be getting another Spitfire. I am thinking Corsair or Zero... For now, I am just leaving it on the floor and enjoying flying my other planes.
