Thunderbolt President s Message

Transcription

1 Ribcrackers Model Airplane Club We re on the web! Club 2067 February 2011 Thunderbolt President s Message We have been right in the middle of a deep freeze for weeks now. One of my good flying friends reports that he s had a few good sessions of flying even though my thermometer showed degrees and windy. That is more than I could take, however he flew and I just spent quality time in front of RC Universe. I am jealous for missing the flying but common sense prevailed. I have had good luck in the past shopping the internet for dreams but with the great expectations of the new season approaching, I haven t found that smoking deal that could be had last year. Is it just me or do you all see the rise in the asking price? One of my flying buddies picked up a new airframe a few weeks ago for a negotiated price and than was successful on bidding for a new gas motor. I haven t been that lucky yet but I still keep trying. I really don t think I m considered a low ball bidder but think about what I believe the item to be worth and bid accordingly. Lately my bid rarely gets sent to the seller and a message displays the out of the sellers range and is not willing to sell or something to that regard. I read a piece in a magazine that there was a time when the Asian manufactures kept their pricing so low and within a short period, the US manufactures were forced to import from the same region or close up shop. Could this be happening again? I know that in my allocation of time this winter, I could not build a kit and be airborne by April. That commits me to buying an ARF. I believe that they all come from a few suppliers in China or Vietnam. They might be private labeled and advertised that they are built to manufactures specifications however they still come from the same place. Just think, Gus Dabringhaus if they demanded a 20 to 30% price increase what would you do? Most would complain, cut back elsewhere and ante up. Or like me shop the internet. If the sellers list their items high, my choice is pay the price or keep shopping. You all know me by now and I will do my best to find the 2011 plane of the year. (In my humble opinion) Some of the guys are scheduling the swap meet events but in the past year I have not found good items as in the past. Items there, appear to be shop cleaning more than a thinning of the herd and selling new planes or lightly used in great condition. When you think of it, I do not have an airframe that I would sell at a meet. I might know the guy, and/or he might know me! You all know my planes. What am I saying? Remember what Warren taught me years ago. Don t buy anything with a wire on it at a swap meet. So far that advice has worked out well for me. Not to sound like your Dad, but buyer beware. Look for that warranty 30 feet or 30 seconds, which ever comes first! See you all at the meeting. Gus From Rudder. Thank you for flying Delta Business Express. We hope you enjoyed giving us the business as much as we enjoyed taking you for a ride. February Club Meeting Monday, February 7, 7:30 pm Livonia Senior Center 5 Mile & Farmington Livonia

2 MODEL OF THE MONTH WOW... a great project!. And the winner is Greg Gordon and his scratch built BF 109 Messerschmitt. It is powered by a Magnum 91 with retracts. The cord was lengthened for stability. See page 3. It is covered with Monokote. The cockpit canopy was custom made with brass sheet and soldered. A few attempts were made to achieve the correct proportion. Pilot had some plastic surgery provided by micro beads! Runner up is Dennis Robbins Balsa USA Taube it was displayed at the January 2010 meeting in the bones and at the April 2010 meeting with it s Kovertex covering. Here it is finished with a Tempura paint and sealed with Rust-oleum flat clear spray. Good job! When does it fly? Gunner facing to the rear.

3 Ribcrackers January Meeting Minutes - January 3, 2010 Meeting started at 7:30 Previous meeting minutes were accepted as presented. Treasurer Need about 70 members to meet budget Budget for 2011 will be the same as last year with a few reductions. New Budget has been approved. VP Lions won!!! Field looks great. It is shaping up to be a great year. Secretary It is time to renew. Remember that there is a late fee if you renew after the end of the March meeting. Model of the Month Dennis Robbins brought n his Balsa USA Taube on Elder Floats. Neat looking plane Greg Gordon wowed us all with his scratch built BF109. Greg started with 3-view plans that he downloaded from the internet and went from there. He had to redo the canopy because the first one wasn t quite to scale. It is powered by a Magnum 91 and has retracts. Congratulations Greg. That was a lot of work. Obediently submitted Gerald Klose Editor Still sending out 19 hardcopies of the newsletter. The rest are sent via . Received pictures of two more work shops. Please don t wait till the last minute to send your contributions for the newsletter. Jan 31 st is the next newsletter mail date. Cutoff for submissions will be Jan 26. Alex Found the same person flying by himself at Ray field for the second time. Alex made sure that he left no doubt as to the seriousness of the offenders actions in the offender s mind. ( he told him off) Old/New Business Roger Wilfong PMAC is holding indoor flying sessions at Waterford Mott High School 2011 Ribcracker schedule will be finalized by the February meeting Don Unsworth Flyers are done. See Don if you have any??s or would like a copy. Constitution rewrite has not yet been completed Gus Dabringhaus Possible new hobby shop in the Brighton area. (an was sent out later that gave additional information No one flew on New Year s Day. There was about 2 hours of decent weather during the day. The rest was either too windy or too rainy. Video Library has been mostly converted to DVD. Still need to make a list to post on our website. Airplane and Wing Carrier.Another example of Greg Gordon s creativity with PVC tubing. Raffle Winners Blue Ticket Member winner: Gerald Klose Airplane 40 size Extra Beautifully built and donated by Louie Marcon.Roger Wilfong Minus engine Dubro Filling Station..Greg Kostyniuk AMA Hat.Derek Hendy Odds n Ends donated by Ralph Hegadorn

4 My First Gasser By Greg Gordon Last season I purchased my first gas powered plane. I started off with a Nitro plane knowing that it would be fairly inexpensive and my losses would be minimal if the unthinkable were to happen. Besides I m a pretty cheap guy in an expensive hobby. This wasn t my first experience with a Nitro plane; I ve purchased a couple of planes from them before with semi-good results. The model I was thinking about buying came from the same manufacture as my Super Chipmunk better known as CMP (Chinese Manufacturing Products), which proved to be a good model. The plane I purchased was a 26% 300S Extra with an American theme of red, white and blue with of course some stars that were somewhat tastefully done. It has a 73 inch wingspan and weighs in at 13lbs. A DLE 30cc gas motor powers the plane. The plane went together very well and flew flawlessly right from its maiden flight. I felt very comfortable flying the plane performing just about every stunt that I was capable of at least for my skill level. This plane would truly go in the direction I pointed it but I also knew too much confidence can get you in trouble. The motor ran great even though it sounded like a four stroke at times. I really enjoyed the power of a gas motor and the DLE30 had no problem showing off its 3.7 hors and 17 pounds of pulling force performing vertical climbs with ease. DLE 30cc with electronic ignition I did have a misfortunate incidence with the plane on a beautiful afternoon; meaning I could not blame it on the weather when I broke the number one rule with an Extra or any plane for that matter; I accidentally slowed the plane down to the point it went into a stall. The Extra was about to drop out of the sky when I raised the engine speed attempting to get some air flowing over the elevator surface thinking it would help pull the plane out of the dive as I was yelling pull up; pull up you son of a #@!?#. Well it hit the ground and fortunately for me I only had to repair a single wing panel and the landing gear. However, before repairing the plane I tried to order replacement parts through Nitro planes but they were of no help to me but after a couple of days I fixed the wing and I was up flying again. The only thing about this plane I did not like and was pretty evident when I tried to pull out of the stall was the control surfaces were a little small for an acrobatic plane. The rudder was also not large enough to perform that outstanding knife-edge I was hoping for. Even though the control surfaces were relatively scale in size they did not perform to what I wanted for the next level of flying so when the winter season came upon us I decide to do something about it. I added 15 square inches to the rudder and went from three hinges to four for safety. The elevator surface area increased 24 square inches on each side. Now that s more like it!

5 Elevator and Rudder with modifications I knew the larger surface areas would require an increase in servo torque so I spent the big bucks and purchased some HS-5625MG digital metal gear servos from Hi-Tec. I also decided to upgrade the ailerons to the HS-5625MG servos as well. The rudder already had an existing high torque metal gear servo to do the job even with the increased surface area. The plane was tail heavy and I had to add lead weight to the front engine compartment to compensate for it. This condition was partially caused by three servos that were mounted in the tail section of the fuselage, which controlled the elevator panels and the rudder. This was undesirable and did not help for balancing the plane so I removed the rudder servo from the tail section and move it forward much closer to the balance point and installed a cable pull-pull system. I used and recommend to anyone the Aircraft Proving Grounds Website for determining the amount of torque required for any given control surface. I use this servo calculator to justify manufacture suggested servo torque or when modifying any surface such as the Extra. An underpowered servo will only put you and everyone else at risk so do it right ask an expert for help or try using the Aircraft Proving Grounds in my opinion it is a good resource but use a safety factor for peace of mind especially if you plan on performing high level acrobatics or 3D maneuvers. Even though this was a relatively cheap modification (minus the servos) to an already inexpensive model it did take sometime to make all the modifications. However the cold winter months seem to make repairs or modifications a little more enjoyable. I like the way everything turned out and I can t wait to try out the modifications. Before and after modifications I am sure that knife-edge I was hoping for will perform beyond my expectations or at least in my dreams. My short-lived experience so far with a gasser has been very exciting and educational too. I love hand starting the engine just like the old days before electric starters but trying to start a stubborn motor can get old after about the 20 th crank. I am already moving on to another Nitro model a YAK 54 that is slightly larger in size and requires a 50cc engine but no sense in rushing into anything right? Pull-Pull system with plywood tray

6 Leon s Workshop As we read this, Leon is in warm, or is it cool Florida. Rumor is that he took a few planes with him. Prior to going, he cleaned up the shop and sent us some pictures. It looks so CLEAN, NEAT, and roomy! Leon claims the freezer is for storing his latest project...sure! Is that a TV and monitor in the corner? Where is the frig and stove? Great looking shop, Leon. Thanks for giving us a peek. Sorry for the jabs. How about the rest of you Ribcrackers? Send me your shop pictures. Don LOOKING FOR A GOOD HOME Compaq computer, 733 Mhz desktop with 12Gb hard drive, 384MB RAM, network ready with windows XP, complete with monitor and keyboard. It is in fine working condition if somewhat outdated. For more information contact Gerald Klose,

7 FOR SALE Dennis Kirkwood O.S. 61FX ABL Engine w/ muffler This is a slightly used engine that is in As-New Condition Price = $80 Fledgling EP Electric Trainer, by Modeltech This is a 55.5" wing span 4-channel trainer that weighs in at 2.75 pounds, including the battery. It it is fitted with 3 Hitec HS-422 servos, a 3150 brushless outrunner, a 40AMP ESC and a 10x5E prop. It is Receiver Ready. I power the model with a single "3s-2100mah lipo", which provides 10 to 12 minute of flight times. The battery is not included in the price stated below. This model is in very good, if not excellent, condition. Price - $110 Mitsubishi Zero Fighter-50 Fiberglass ARF Specs & what is included: Wing Span ", Length ", Fuselage Fiberglass, Gear Fixed, Wing Servos 2. Rudder - Pull/Pull. Engine - O.S. MAX-46AX... used, in excellent condition (less than one season). Prop - APC, 11/6... new, Muffler - Pitts... new, Servos - Hitec HS- 425BB... new. This model has one flight and is in perfect condition. It is Receiver Ready. It even includes the receiver battery..price - $200

8 LOCAL COMING EVENTS February 6, 2011 February 16, 2011 February March 6, 2011 Chesaning Area Model Skymasters Swap Meet Thunderbirds Swap Meet The Flying Aces R. C. Flying Club Swap Meet Saginaw Co. Fair Grounds Marshall Emmendorfer, CD Larson Middle School Troy Joseph Hass, CD Kalamazoo Co. Fair Grounds Luis Espinel, CD Swap Meet Lake Fenton H. S. William Gerald, CD For more details, see pages in Model Aviation February, 2011 March 7, 2011 Ribcrackers Club Meeting Livonia Senior Center Monday, 7:30 pm 895 Grace, Northville, Michigan A special Thanks To all who contributed material for this issue of the Thunderbolt. Deadline for the March issue is February 22, REMINDER Don t forget to re-up your AMA membership. Ribcrackers 2010 Board of Directors President Gus Dabringhaus fax gdabringhaus@comcast.net Vice President Hank Wojcik oaklandbolt@aol.com Secretary Matt Jerue mdjerue@mi.rr.com Treasurer Dennis Robbins drobbins421@yahoo.com Librarian Ken Hilton Thunderbolt Editor Club Positions Don Unsworth dunswrth@sbcglobal.net Field Marshall/Safety Officer Alex Alexopoulos Chief Instructor Warren Wells Minute Recorder Gerald Klose Raffle Coordinator Warren Wells