http://www.norcalrc.com/index.php?ind=reviews&op=entry_view&iden=4

Me and Monkey came along and helped him finish up the plane, take a photoshoot of it with Corrine… and then filmed Kyle Woyshnis flying it.

Here’s some pics from the shoot:

WALLPAPER SIZE:

 SLIDESHOW:

http://www.ruddermayhem.com/corinne-16.exe

KYLE WOYSHNIS VIDEO:

Going with:

• JR 8711s all around
• Fromeco batteries and switches
• Smart-Fly PowerSystem EQ-6
  (which has 8 channels, 6 are equalized. The unit also includes an ignition cutoff and either a super or turbo reg on the front)
• Kirbys Kustom Vinyl Graphics
• Truturn 4″ Ultimate Spinner
• ZAP glues
• and some DUBRO and www.microfasteners.com hardware

The plane arrived in great shape:

I started with the cowl box. First thing you notice is the plywood reinforcement to protect the precious cargo:

Plywood and double boxed:

‘Monkey’ helped me finish unpacking the cowl:

‘Monkey’ was like “OMG, it’s so nice!”:

‘Monkey’ was all, “Aeroworks and Milano Wine… it doesn’t get any better than this!”:

The wings come with the protective plywood packaging and they are also double boxed:

The wings get wrapped in bubble wrap, too:

 The aileron and elevator hinging is already done at the factory. I noticed that the surfaces fall bevel to bevel with no binding and there is no glue in the knuckles of the pre-installed (glued in) hinges. Yes, the hinges are glued in already. The hinge and bevel job looks just great! Here’s a shot of the elevators (remember, these hinges are already glued in at the factory):

 The fuse looks beautiful, like it was built by one of the very best builders out there. It is a few ounces heavier than it has to be due to the fact it is setup for a drop-in canister installation. The can tunnel is built and lined with balsa, the formers have saddles cut into them, and the can mounts just bolt on to pre-drilled holes (the can mounts are included, as well). Cans take no extra time on this QB™:

 Going Fromeco batteries, regs, switches, etc… but also with the new Fromeco D-Cup. Anyone that has followed me for years knows I’ve worried about the power our servos need, and try to provide it to them. But, what also has worried me is low voltage spikes to the receiver. Those that have paid close attention know that I’ve been running Emcotec Filter Capacitors for the last year, or so. Now I’ll be trying out these new Fromeco D-Cups which are said to have over 100x (or was it 300x ?) the capacity of the Emcotec model. Rumor has it with the D-Cup your plane will stay on a few seconds after you turn it off. This ability to carry the receiver through a low voltage spike from high G and/or high current draw manuevers is just what we’ve been needing since all these how powered servos hit the market:

This is my 5th “QB” and even though the first one was amazingly easy to put together and set a new standard for ARF quality I have to say that they keep getting better and better. More and more features and less and less things that need any improvement. From the aluminum hatch pins to the factory built can tunnels… these things are pretty sweet. So many things, like the cowl mounts… they’re not just glued on pieces of wood that will eventually fall off… then there are blindnuts everywhere u need ‘em, and they’re all SAE, American sizes… pinned motorbox and hard points… more bevel than I’ve seen on any other ARFs and now with hinges running smooth bevel to bevel… sweet covering job, etc. etc. Wonder what’s in store for next year?:

Joe was multi-slacking so I, Monkey, got started on the plane last night. I got out a wing (the thing looks perfect) and started mounting the servos. Going with 8711s all around on this one. JR arms, and the included QB™ control horns:

I see Monkey got on here and talked some smack about getting some work done, but it didn’t take us long to find him in his usual position, i.e., hammered and out cold:

Hey man, I’m the only one doing any work up in here:

‘Course I do like to do a lil’ drink’n whilst I’m work’n, you know what I’m saying, man?:

U know, dremel’n stresses my low back:

Woohoo, thanks for the back rub, Joe Nolasco. I always thought you swung both ways… I kid, I kid… lower, man, lower…

Team Joe heard a rumor this plane comes in at just over 23 lbs. So, I told them to step back and let the Monkey do some cutting. I dremel’d out the two rear trays and also the canister tunnel. Then I removed the landing gear cover and the canister cover, along with their blindnuts. All total, I removed 8oz of material… 1/2 pound, baby. I worked pretty hard, so I went partying after:

Ah, my freak’n head, I’m so wasted…:

I taped on the included DA-85 engine template to the firewall:

I drilled the engine mounting holes and then installed the www.microfasteners.com 1/4×20 blindnuts in the firewall. I used ZAP thin CA to glue the blindnuts in. Man, what would they do without me? They better at least let me fly the maiden!:

You have to chop out some of the firewall for the DA-85. The included DA-85 template shows you where and what to chop out. A jigsaw makes very quick and accurate work of it. Can’t let Monkey have all the fun, so I chopped this out myself:

I wanted to try one of the new www.smart-fly.com PowerSystem EQ-6 units on this plane. They are similar to the PowerExpander EQ-10. The unit is an 8-channel unit and channels 2-7 are programmable. Also there is an ignition cutoff, a built in regulator for the servo power, and a failsafe switch. This unit probably fits the bill for a wide range of plane sizes and power needs. These PowerSystems will be on the market very soon… so I talked Smart-Fly into sending me out a prototype to try:

 Thanks Monkey, for displaying the EQ-6 that Smart-Fly sent for me to try:

That Joe, always trying to rob me of my props. Anyone can see that www.smart-fly.com sent in the PowerSystem for me to test!:

Mounted the included aileron control horns, 8711 servos, pushrods, and the included DUBRO ball joints. There’s only the one aileron servo per aileron, so this goes real fast:

Joe Nolasco direct soldered the extension on for me and also soldered on a Dean’s 1003 connector to the end:

Put on half of the vinyl graphics from www.kirbysgraphics.com :

Found these ZAP stickers in Mark’s stuff… they are before my time… totally old school… so had to use them:

]]> http://www.ruddermayhem.com/2007/11/aeroworks-96-extra-260/feed/ 0 http://www.ruddermayhem.com/2007/08/aeroworks-122-extra-260-2/ http://www.ruddermayhem.com/2007/08/aeroworks-122-extra-260-2/#comments Sun, 05 Aug 2007 08:52:02 +0000 admin http://www.ruddermayhem.com/wp/?p=571

Doing another review of the Aeroworks 122″ Extra 260. I’m flying the first one and loving it. But, I got pretty bummed out assembling the first one. One problem I noticed was glue in and around the hinges and round bevels that created a bind about half way through the range of travel… so they were not able to close bevel to bevel. Another problem was wing tubes that took hours of sanding for a proper fit. And, the biggest problem was the shear web in the wings was too weak and the wings needed a “fix.” Here’s some shots from the work on the first plane:

Now, deal is, Aeroworks has defined a new standard in the ARF market over the last couple of years, and continues to refine that new standard. Most of the ARF market has seen the light and tries to copy Aeroworks in their “Quick Build” level of completion. Aeroworks is still the company all others are trying to keep up with, and their quality, designs, and ideas are innovative and top notch. But, sometimes getting a factory in China to do everything you ask of them can be tough… or maybe it is just always tough. So, bottom line, as much as Aeroworks knows what it wants, and as much of that as they did deliver in my first 122″ 260… some things (as seen above) weren’t done right. Aeroworks told me to do my best with the review of the plane from the first batch and that these issues would be addressed in the second batch. That batch has arrived at Aeroworks — one of the first one was shipped here. And I’m happy to report, that upon inspection, all the above problems have been addressed nicely.

• There was no glue in and around the hinges.
• The bevels were not round and the surfaces close bevel to bevel with no binding whatsoever.
• The wing tube fits easily into the wings.
• And, most importantly the “fix” to the wings related to the shear web is already done.

There are no mods, improvements, or fixes to do on this plane. And, it can go together in a few short days like the last one did after all the mods/fixes were complete. It should be a very quick assembly. The only extra work will be the installation of the tune pipes… and maybe the usual soldering of wires throughout.

Here are some pics of the new plane, which was delivered today:

Gonna try one of the new www.jerseymodeler.com fuel dots on this plane. The dot can be put below the level of the tank without spillage upon filling because the valve in the dot does not open until the fuel filling probe is inserted into it. The dot also comes with a return line for your tank overflow/vent line end… that returns the overflowing gas to the fuel can instead of having it pour out onto the ground. The dot comes with everything you need to install it, the fill adapter, the return line and its adapter up on your plane and fuel can. Looks like Deano at Jersey Modeler has this all worked out pretty slick like:

 The first plane had JR servos and Smart-Fly power distribution… this second plane will have Hitec servos and Emcotec power distribution via the Emcotec DPSI 2001 RV:

 We started on the QB™ tonight, we worked on it for a couple of hours. Before I could get the camera out Joe Nolasco and Mark had used the included engine template (there are several for DA, 3W-150, 3W-157/170, ZDZ 150-160, and the DA template fits for the EVO-150), drilled the firewall and mounted up the engine:

 We used www.microfasteners.com 1/4-20 blind nuts for the engine mounting bolts. I like to glue these on with ZAP thin CA:

 Joe mug’n for the camera… what about?… who knows with Nolasco. lol:

Mark bolted on the MTW headers:

Mark doing some measuring to get an idea of the spacing we’ll need for the tune pipe mounts:

Then I peeled back the covering so we could have an easy time setting up some mounting for the tune pipes. Man, the quality of the wood and the constuction is great:

Nolasco cut off the servo connectors and direct soldered on extensions with Dean’s connectors:

Fromeco rules and has plenty of power for these 40% planes with high current servos:

I like the Hitec heavy duty extension wires… they don’t unravel and they’re 22 gage. We got the 48″ extensions for the outboard servos cuz these wings are big! You can get great prices on these 5955s, 8711s, Hitec heavy duty, extensions, light ply, aircraft ply, H9 titanium pushrods and lots of our giant scale stuff from Awesome Hobbies ( www.awesomehobbies.com ) Their prices are good, worst case is the same price as Tower/Horizon.

Nolasco direct soldered the extensions to the aileron servos:

So nice to have someone doing all the soldering, made the wings just come down to some quick easy assembly for me. Nolasco also made up the pigtails for the Emcotec aileron ports. We used Dean’s 1003 connectors where we will connect/disconnect the aileron servos:

Quick and easy to assemble after Joe Nolasco did all the soldering. On the outboard servo I went with the high hole in the control horn and put the pushrod on top of the servo arm. I used the included control horns, but added conicals… and mounted them back away from the bevel edge about 1/8″. Also, I used www.microfasteners.com servo screws to hold down the servos. After drilling 1/16″ holes for the servo screws I dropped some ZAP thin CA in the holes to strengthen up the wood: http://www.zapglue.com/ :

On the inboard servo I used the lowest hole in the control horn and put the pushrod underneath the servo arm. Using those control horn holes actually works out perfectly for linear movement between servos. Having the inboard servo pushrod under the servo arm and the outside servo pushrod over the servo arm keeps the geometry running pretty good throughout the range of travel:

 Mark started the install of the pipes… Mark needed some hardwood with a 20 degree angle on it to square off the angled former he will be attaching the rear pipe mounts to… so I ripped him some strips with my trusty skilsaw:

 Mark used ZAP Zpoxy to glue in the wood I ripped down for him:

 We’ll bolt the rear mounting plates to it, here are the rear plates that Mark fabricated for the pipes:

 Here are the pipes and headers for the plane:

 Joe Nolasco has about finished all the soldering for the plane… having soldered on Dean’s 1003 connectors to the elevator servos, and also made 72″ extensions for those elevator servos with Dean’s 1003s on one end, and regular connectors on the other end for the Emcotec power distribution unit:

The tune pipe mounts are finished:

Here’s a shot from the engine looking into the fuse:

 One pipe has a pit of some kind in it, and it just pokes all the way through (you can see light through it)… wonder if JB weld will be fine here:

 I got an email asking “why a DA?” Well, it was here in the shop, so it got bolted on… simple as that. So this year I’m flying BME, 3W, DA, EVO… maybe we could get in a ZDZ sometime. lol That 3M Mentor stuff looks pretty also.

I got an email asking “what engine should I get?”  I’ve talked about this alot with my local friends… the 100cc class of planes/engines is a toughy for me. The 150cc class has lots of great planes, great sizes of planes for the engines, and great engines. Everybody’s 150s are solid, and have the power to weight that is pretty ideal (although they do keep making the planes bigger, which makes the motors a little down on power — but for some reason in the 100cc class they make the planes smaller ??? ). For the 100cc twins I would like some bigger planes… 106-108″ and reasonably light… 28-29 lbs tops. For the 97-104″ planes that you see mostly in this catagory I’d like a lighter motor, like the BME-115. But, it needs to be more reliable first… at least for anything low and slow… for IMAC it’s fine now. The DA-85 (on a pipe?) might be the ticket for these small 100cc planes that are common now. Also the ZDZ-80 super. The 3W-85 and EVO-80 on pipes might do the trick, too. The new lighter DA-100 should help too… I’d like to try it.

I got an email asking “are Sala mods and cans worth the price on a 100cc plane?” Well yes, a new engine, Sala Mods, headers, and pipes cost some bucks. The Sala Mods do smooth the engines out alot. I think headers and canisters are too heavy for most 100cc planes anyway. I save the cans for the 40% planes that don’t even notice their weight.

I got an email asking, “how did you guys make the pipe supports?” Mark cut out some 1/4″ light ply with the same design as the Aeroworks supports and used the Aeroworks insulators. Slick.

 Whilst waiting for the replacement Greve’s pipes from DA… we sealed off the front pipe area with balsa:

Added an extendion to the carb arm to get some resolution:

Put together the stock tank using the 3-line clunk setup like I always do. The tank is included with the ARF, and a smoke tank is also included. Fuel line and fuel tubing barbs are also included (IMPORTANT NOTE, again make sure you use DUBRO quality fuel line):

 Still waiting on the replacement Manfred Greve’s pipes from DA :

Ran the elevator extensions (that Joe Nolasco soldered up) out the back of the fuse:

 Got the rudder servo wires secured to make sure they didn’t end up on the tune pipes:

This pics shows the Emcotec DSPI 2001 RV being used for power distribution. The unit supports up to 26 servos on 10 channels, and has a regulated voltage of 5.9v out to the servos and the receiver. For our planes can’t see why this would not be a better choice than the standard DPSI RV. THE standard DPSI RV supports 32 servos on 12 channels, but is bigger and heavier. Since we tend to use 6-8 channels and 10-15 servos… seems like the 2001 RV is the ticket with its lighter size and weight.

Also shown are the rudder servos mounted in the factory rudder servo cutouts. These cutouts are double plywood to give the servo screws plenty to hold onto. The DUBRO balljoints are included with the ARF. Metal pushrods are included, as well, but opted for titanium turnbuckles, as always. Holding down the servos are www.microfasteners.com servo mounting screws:

I got an email asking, “where do you get the spiral wrap for the single servo lead? in fact where do you get all your spiral wrap from?” I said, at www.awesomehobbies.com.

Same deal, two 5955s, stock control horns, www.microfasteners.com #3 by 5/8″ servo screws, etc. Direct soldered extensions with Dean’s 1003 ends:

Then I did a re-mount of the Emcotec DPSI 2001 RV for better shock obsorbing, that Nolasco had it too hard mounted:

We also got the Fromeco Badger switch mounted for the ignition. The fuse sides are thick enough so that the stock mounting method is plenty strong:

Made alot of progress on the this plane, almost done. Will post some more pics soon. Still waiting on the replacement Greve’s pipes from DA. Ordered ‘em over a month ago… got the first set with the hole delivered to them last Thursday, but they “lost ‘em” until I called today. So, now they are getting ready to ship the replacements. When you pay $600 for a set of pipes/headers to improve the engines performance, and they’re “in stock” and you have to wait well over a month for them… that kinda makes me feel bad.

Decided it would be nice to have charge jacks on the outside of the plane to check the voltage at the field without removing the hatch. So, cut in these Futaba brand charge jacks:

Nolasco soldered the leads off of these charge jacks over to the battery leads off the EMCOTEC. That should do the trick for field voltage checking:

I also secured the included fuel tank with the included foam and included cable ties:

This plane is all but done, just waiting on DA to send the replacement Greve’s pipes. Again, there was nothing to enhance or improve on this second generation… just went together in a matter of hours as advertised… using the included hardware, no less.

 Got an email asking, “I noticed that you peeled back the covering on this plane to do the can install, and also significantly changed the covering on your Aeroworks 100cc Yak. Could you please share any tips and advice on dealing with ARF covering removal and scheme changes?”  I said… most ARF covering is not applied with high heat… so removing it is pretty easy. Just carefully pull it back. I like to remove the covering on the bottom of ARFs just to do a neat job of the elevator extensions down the turtledeck. Then, with a few minutes work I re-attach the covering I carefully peeled back. On the Aeroworks 104″ Yak54 ARF QB™… I thought I improved the appearance alot with the covering changes I made. Those changes were quick and easy. I just peeled back the checkers and swooshes and replaced them with a piece of white covering. I used the pieces I removed as a template to mark the new white covering.

UPDATE:
Not much, ready to go except no pipes. Still waiting for the replacement set from DA. Waiting and waiting. If I would have known replacement pipes were going to take a month, or more, I would have just patched the hole in the first pipes. Wish they would have looked at the first pipes before they shipped them to me to begin with. Wish they hadn’t “lost” the replacement pipes in the shop, “forgot” to ship, shipped to the “wrong address,” and so on. Oh well… anyway… did anyone notice that this model took 2nd and 7th in the Invitational Class at the TAS last weekend?

 Might as well take some pics… here’s a shot of the glued in rudder hinges, used Z-poxy like always:

And, here’s a shot of the elevator servo/linkage setup:

 Pipes showed up, plane finished, hope for a video shot at least by the weekend. Some final assembly pics to follow. Oh, and we have a new member in our crew now, he’s been helping out quite a bit…  Monkey says, “Ciao”:

 Here’s a couple of shots of the completed interior:

A few shots of the engine area:

Couple of shots of the pipes from the exterior:

Here’s a couple of shots of Monkey finishing up the wiring on the Emcotec DPSI 2001 RV, etc:

Monkey is happy to have all that done… “ssshhhwwwoooo”:

 Ready for the maiden! Monkey did a final cleanup:

 Woohoo! Monkey pulled the maiden today! Monkey let me put up a flight after that, poor monkey tried to hold the plane while I ran up the motor… not good, not good… u’ll have to check the vid. BTW, the Greve’s pipes kick ass… but no question that 8711s dominate over 5955s, imo… at least on the ailerons, two versus two… big difference!

Monkey pulled the maiden! VIDEO:

This plane is at the recommended CG and presents nicely for precision. Built stock, just like Jason Noll’s plane, which served him well in his 2nd place finish at the TAS this year. Its older brother is much more tailheavy, having its Fromeco 5200s in the turtle deck versus next to the front of the gas tank in this newer plane. Oh, and there was some concern about Monkey after that last flight… but don’t fret none, he landed okay and is fine… here he is later party’n it up with his latest squeaze:

 Oh, and Monkey says the Greve’s pipes make the DA-150 feel like an electric motor running on a first class speed controller. If it will do that for the DA-150 who knows how good they could be on a 3W-150 or EVO-150, et al. Greve’s pipes definitely improve power and transition dramatically… Monkey like!

←end→

The first thing I noticed was that it is enormous. My foot is dwarfed by the cowl:

All the Aeroworks Quick Build Series parts have been high quality… and these smartly done pre-mounted wheel pants are no different:

The fuse is clean looking… light but rigid, pre-installed x-braces throughout help with that… and as always there is a pre-installed antenna tube down each side of the fuse:

 The canister bay is cavernous to say the least! It is over 4-1/2″ tall and as deep as you could ever need. You could use lots of different headers and canisters without a problem:

 As you know these QBs come very complete. I’ve used the included foam tires on my last QBs and they held up great and are very light. On this one I pulled some DUBRO 4.5″ Treadlites off the wall, and also went with DUBRO axles and collars (Again, the QB does come with them standard.). I show DUBRO 6-32 1/4″ long machine bolts for the collars, but I tried the DUBRO 6-32 1/8″ long machine bolts on this one. I used ZAP threadlocker on the 6-32 bolts in the collars. The included tires and axles are shown in the background:

By midnight (2 hours total) I had unpacked the plane, cleaned up the crate/boxes, mounted the gear, axles, tires, and pants, and put the plane together… taking pictures throughout the process:

 Gotta new fancy pilot from Aeroworks this time.:

 Got my servos today… going with JR 8711s on this QB:

Our local DJ, announcer, web designer, and all around RC guy, ‘Joe Nolasco’, stopped by. Joe wants to see this plane fly so he started mounting the servos in the wings:

These modern day high powered servos are still being mounted the same way much lesser servos were mounted in the past. For a couple of years I’ve wondered about that, and have seen some problems recently with them on planes others have assembled. www.microfasteners.com thought about this stuff over a year ago and released a larger servo screw, a 3m screw. They get stuck in the Hitec brass sleeves but fit the JR sleeves just right. So, I was finally able to use them:

In order to synchronize the servos as accurately as possible I need a finely adjustable height control horn… so I went with the rocketcity style control horns rather than the included control horns. The included stock horns spread the load out over a much larger area than the single bolt rocketcity style horn. So, I used alot of fresh ZAP thin CA to strengthen the wood around the hole:

Also, using the www.microfasteners.com 2″ allen head set screw bolts, rather than the rocketcity style bolts, allows a very fine adjustment of the control horn height. They look cool, too:

I’ve been told that the JRs feel/fly/center much better than Hitec 5955s.  Now, JR does not have a field programmer like Hitec does. So, what I want to do here is see what happens if I really setup the geometry, linearity, synchronization, and resolution as perfectly as possible. See how much, if any, electronic equalizing needs to be done after that (this really will depend on the “out of the box” linearity of the JR servos, if they travel equal distances off center one servo to the other I’ll be in good shape).

I’ll need Unihubs and then will have to custom drill Nelson arms… to have the servo arms lined up perfectly to the “determined” center with the 8711s remaining at zero sub-trim. At that point no synchronizing will be required if the JR 8711s are linear from the factory (the 8411s were far from it).

Centers and endpoints are easy… it’s synchronization througout the range of travel that is tricky.

Okay, I got back on the wings and opted for moving the control horns from where I had already drilled them to closer to the hinge line for linearity but high resolution. I setup 56 degrees of travel in each direction (112 degrees total) to have the aileron move up and down 4-7/8″ in each direction. That was as far as I could go just before the hinges would bind. I used protractors to get each servo to move exactly 56 degrees each way for the aileron to move 4-7/8″ each way. Then I custom drilled the Nelson arms so that all three servos could be at zero sub-trim.

The moment of truth… something I have been wanting to try for years… with the arms moving equally 56 degrees each way for an equal 4-7/8″ throw each way… and with the sub-trim at zero… the first servo should have ended up with equal ATVs if the servo was linear from the factory. My tests with 8411s years ago showed them radically non-linear from the factory and these were, unfortunately, no different. The ATVs required for my 4-7/8″ throw in each direction were 115/137. A big let down, but not surprising considering my tests on the 8411s four years ago.

Futaba tested out well for linearity out of the box four years ago. Hopefully that is still the case and therefore the setup I’m trying still possible with them. Their upcoming brushless motor servos sound awesome. With the JRs it seems like forget all the custom drilling since they are totally non-linear out of the box, and just PowerExpander EQ-10 them or Equalizer 3D them. I could still use an Emcotec with Equalizers, but I’d want to separate the power leads, having them go to the Emcotec… and the signal wires, having them go to the Equalizers. But, I don’t have time to do all the custom wiring of Equalizers to Emcotec right now:

Okay… after spending lots of time trying to come up with a perfect custom drilled servo setup for JR 8711s on the ailerons… I realized that due to the 8711s lack of linearity it would work just as well to just bolt on any standard servo arms and use a synchronizer like the Smart-Fly EQ-10. Here’s what I ended up doing:

• two 8711s per aileron
• JR servos arms (using the 1-1/4″ hole)
• Nelson control horns w/ microfastener 2″ allen bolts
• 3″ H9 titanium push rods
  (under the arm on the inside servo, over the arm on the outside servo, 2-1/2″ rods should also work)
• 1/2″ ss 4-40 bolts from microfasteners — 4-40 ss nylon lock nuts
• 3m x 6m long ss socket head bolts from microfasteners
• Thin CA from ZAP
• blue medium Threadlocker from Pacer/ZAP

My final setup left each servo arm moving 52 degrees in each direction from neutral… in order to move the aileron up and down 4-3/4″. Using the Nelson control horns made this possible. Also, having done some work on my hinges for more throw and smoother operation, I did a one piece blue gap seal on the bottom of the wings:

From there I synch-ed them up with the Smart-Fly EQ-10. Very easy to use just like the Equalizer 3D always has been. I’ve always gone Emcotec DPSI units for 40% planes… but to save time I went EQ-10 on this one. I had my Fromeco regs made up to run at 6.8 volts… so I’m using an Emcotec Filter Capacitor on my receiver (might could have saved QQ’s plane if indeed he did have a power failure):

  Got my graphics from Dennis and Debby at www.kirbysgraphics.com … now we can get this party started:

Joe mounted three 8711 servos in the rudder tray:

And, made up the rudder servo linkages using the JR full arms, etc:

 Joe Nolasco made up the DUBRO fuel and smoke tanks, using barbs, etc.:

 Joe also glued in microfasteners.com 1/4-20 blind nuts in the firewall. DJ-Joe used 5-minute Zpoxy to glue in the engine blind nuts:

 Moving along to the engine. We checked to see what headers might work. In the Aeroworks manual it shows a 2-3/4″ drop. The 3W shallow drop headers are too shallow, and the 3W standard headers are too deep. The 3W standard headers are closer, though, and Sean McMurtry used them by heating them up and giving them some more bend. Another option is the KS headers… just cut to the perfect length and weld/braze them up. I’m probably going to go that route:

Okay, I dropped back to the wings at this point because I heard about some failures with the first batch of wings for this model. I ended up spending a ton of time modifying/rebuilding  per Aeroworks… then cleaning glue out of hinges, sanding away the convex bevels and recovering (I covered the bottoms in white because I thought that would make the plane more visible). These wings are now on display at Awesome Hobbies… since after further failures of the first batch of wings Aeroworks still had doubts about these even after I did their fix:

Lost interest in the plane for a few months after that. With all these hassles plus the endless BME-115 problems it has been a discouraging year for me in R/C. But, a couple of months off and I am ready to try to get this done again.

Here are the updated wings from Aeroworks, these were rebuilt by a custom builder for Aeroworks and I had him cover the bottom white instead of the factory blue. I went with the stock Aeroworks control horns on these because I didn’t want to invest any time on them after all I had invested in the first set of wings:

 Geometry/Linearity/Resolution 101:

I got started with the elevator improvements. Same problem the wings had with convex bevels. I sanded the hump out of the bevel balsa so the elevators would close bevel to bevel… and cleaning the glue out of hinges… then recovering. NOTE: This isn’t necessary if you’re satisfied with 40-45 degrees of elevator throw:

 Winding down on the stab/elevator project… just about done. Covered the bottom of these white, as well:

Couple of notes on that. 1) is to watch the length of servo mounting screws you use on the inboard servo… as 9/16″ screws will go right into the wing tube:

And, 2), the included control horn screws are still breaking pretty easily for me. Just a light finger tip turning of the screw driver can break off a screw head from time to time. It would be better to use microfasteners.com servo mounting screws. But, to make them fit right on the inside two holes, you need to grind down their built-in washer a bit:

If you take the time and trouble, like I did, to get full bevel to bevel throw on the elevators… and you use the stock control horns… you’ll want to hold the control horns back an 1/8″ from the bevel so they don’t bottom out before you get bevel to bevel:

I’m rolling with the stock control horns, but they don’t allow you to get the synchronization between servos that close. When using only two servos per aileron (like I’m doing) they are very close. On the elevators they’re not. If you’re only using one elevator servo per half this ain’t a consideration, of course:

 Would like to report on more progress on the Aeroworks, here, but me and Mark spent hours today sanding down wing tubes to get the wings to go on the plane. Very frustrating when you’re trying to get a plane done for an event this weekend. And, even more frustrating when you think about how this was done once already (hours spent sanding wing tubes by Joe Nolasco on the first set of recalled wings for this plane). Been working pretty hard on this plane everyday for more than a week (with help from Joe Nolasco and Mark Vogel along the way)… but have doubts about it being ready by Saturday. Would have loved to have spent the day today actually accomplishing some forward progress… rather than just sanding wing tubes and eating composite dust all day.

Here’s Mark, sanding, testing the fit, and sanding some more. He worked on the tubes for a couple of hours and then I worked on them a couple of more. Still could use some more sanding:

I did do a little soldering today… extensions are all direct soldered, like I do on most all of my planes:

Got the stabs finished:

Synchronized the servos using the Smart-Fly EQ-10 Power Expander:

Used Dean’s 1003′s for the servo leads, as usual:

The pilot doing some inspecting, “It’s all ball bearings theses days”:

It was at this point that I felt like we might be over the hump. We were finished with the problems with the wings, stabs, rudder, and wing tubes… and could finally just assemble the plane. That went really fast, the actual assembly is a quick and easy. The shipment of planes coming next month should just be the quick assembly part, without the other hassles. Also, at this stage I remembered how sweet looking the plane was… all first batch hassles aside… this is one strikingly gorgeous plane, IMO:

Most everything gets very positive from here on out. The replacement wings fit was impressive… perfect, in fact… (impressive because that means all the planes are being jig built to tight tolerances, any part will fit on any plane… all planes are straight as an arrow):

I could no way, no how, get the included pull/pull cable wire to go through the included copper crimp 3 times… I could barely get it to go through twice. The cable is thick and strong though, nice stuff. So, I just made up my own crimps out of aluminum and used the included copper crimp for a “keeper.” The cables haven’t loosened up a frog’s hair so far:

 My friend Mark Vogel helped me alot on this plane… he mounted these two Fromeco 5200 Lith-ion ”grunt” packs just inside the turtle deck. He beefed up the former there in a few places before mounting the packs there. They’re really a bit too far back, I think. I’m speculating the factory location shown in the manual will be more to my liking… we’ll see:

Joe Nolasco mounted up most, if not all, of the equipment. He added sealing washers to the bolts that are holding down the Fromeco regulators for a little extra cushion. Joe mounted the regulators and Smart-Fly EQ-10 on DUBRO tygon fuel tubing standoffs… into blind nuts he glued in with ZAP thin CA. Again, the Smart-Fly EQ-10 is working out great and has the servos surprising well synchronized thoughout the travel range. The servos are quiet, apparently not fighting each other much. Shown also is the Emcoted “flux” capacitor, lol, filter capacitor I’m using for current spikes. I wanted to use the new D-Cup version from Fromeco because it has a much higher capacity, but it isn’t out yet:

I used the Fromeco Wolverine and Badger switches. And, the Wolverine is doing its job as the regs are slightly missmatched, but the batteries are dropping at an equal rate. Joe mounted these with the same technique I used on the 104″ YAK review… that of grinding down the white mounts the thickness of the side of the fuse and bolting the switch plates on to those white mounts… only using the actual two end mounting screws for “looks”:

 I setup 48 degrees of throw on the rudder and with my CG location I could use more, or maybe less expo, or maybe a more forward CG… we’ll see… it’s close to enough rudder authority right now… but I might like just a touch more. Aeroworks has a poster board throw meter that is easy to use to setup the rudder throw, as well:

Got going on setting up the plane for cans. The Aeroworks addendum doesn’t apply to 3W engines with LL length cans. We blocked off the air at the original manual location. Seems the manual and plane design considers DA only. There is also a triangle area that is not blocked off in the manual… but you could take the time to block it off with some balsa… to keep hot air from getting into the fuse:

The can mounts that are included could be used with 3W engines, but the cans wouldn’t run exactly parallel… so Mark made up some new ply mounts with the can holes spaced further apart:

3W/Pefa cans mount up best on their collars… keeps the mounts from crushing the cans. Thereto Mark made up two new custom ply mounting plates and spaced them out so that each can mounted up at its collar:

 The standard 3W header is too deep for how this plane is designed and the shallow 3W header is too shallow. If the landing gear wasn’t quite as high up in the fuse it would work out better for 3W headers. Being that Mark made custom ply mounts… it might have been possible (very close) to get the can right up to the landing gear plate and have standard 3W headers work out. But, we didn’t do that. I asked Sean McMurtry (who’s been flying the plane for awhile now) what he did… and he said he just bent the stock 3W header and made it work:

 We’re going with the “cut and weld” headers. We’ll just cut the height and length where we need it… then weld on the fitting. Unfortunately AI sent one 170 fitting and one 106 fitting. Doh! Trying to get this plane ready for a large air show next weekend:

The next picture shows 1) www.microfasteners.com “full thread” 1/4-20 engine bolts. Best way to make sure you’re actually tight, not cross threaded, or loose from bottoming out in the blind nut. 2) glue joint here was gummy and gooey… scraped it out and poured in some fresh ZAP medium CA. 3) have a pretty healthy squirter here… unburned fuel spraying out onto the cowl baffling. Gonna need to fix that one. 4) used the LL canisters I had laying around with the 3W 170 CS… AI says I would get better performance out of LLX canisters, that LL are good up to the 157. May have to visit that soiree sometime:

 Again, gotta give Mark credit for doing all the canister/header work. He’s an engineer and calc’d everything perfect the first time. Mark made the KS headers the same length as the 3W headers. When I bolted on the engine, cans and headers it went together nicely. 1) I had a 3W servo mount in my hand, but Mark said he liked the stock wooden one, so I went ahead and used the Aeroworks stock mount for the throttle servo. Worked just great. 2) I have never used these smooth surface headers before. But, I know lots of guys have so it would be interesting to have them chime in with their experiences. The 3W headers are knurled nice and deep and the teflon sleeves go on tight and stay in place real well with the clamps. These KS headers slipped on like butter and wanted to slip off like butter, too. On the first start of the engine they slipped back until the canister stacks hit the cowl. I had an idea to heat them up with a torch next to the teflon sleeves and thereby having the teflon sleeve kinda melt onto the header… without the back pressure from the engine. It worked… they have not moved since then. But, I’m still not sure what method is the best way to keep them on:

My friend Gus “billy bob” Stutsman had one of the guys at his shop weld up the fitting to the header. It’s held up solid so far, thanks Gusser:

 I don’t mount up the 3W ignitions with mounting screws through the mounting plates anymore. They just end up breaking into many pieces. I velcro or cable tie them down using foam strips on the two long outside edges to lift the ignition for airflow underneath it. I like to use double sided foam tape from DUBRO and the hard foam that comes with the QBs sandwiched in the middle of the DUBRO double sided foam tape:

Flushing the ignition with the top of the motor box worked out fine until we tried to put the cowl on. We had to lower it about 5/8″. Whoops:

 Jim Orsi (video guy) cut all the slots in the cowl… and Mark cut the carb relief and stack exit holes. Good, because I hate dealing with glass dust:

Joe Nolasco snapped this shot of the TruTurn spinner… we both think it’s the coolest:

 We had the PCAM airshow on Saturday morning early… and naturally we didn’t want to maiden the plane there  … so we rushed through cable tying down anything loose and made it to the field two hours before dark on Friday night. Everything slipped together and was working beautifully and I thought we were home free. But, the engine would not “fire” at all. Not too many 3W ignition shops in Ukiah. lol But, I remembered that Mark had a busted up 3W ignition (from mounting it in the factory mounting hole locations) he had replaced from his 56 twin. Me and Joe rushed to the shop while Mark watched the plane. Joe soldered on a Dean’s end and then we rushed back to the field. We used green electrical tape to hold the ignition together in one piece… then layed it on the motorbox and tried to start the engine. It fired right up. So, we then scrambled to swap ignitions. At dark I taxi’d out for the maiden with Mark shaking his head, and Joe saying, “do it, just do it!” The maiden went great.

The next morning, Saturday morning, my pit beotch walking the plane out at PCAM:

 ”Don’t even go there! Pit beotch? I’ll show you a pit beotch! Just fly your stupid plane, cracker!”:

The PCAM flight line boss was in this golf cart. I chased him down with a high alpha knife edge and scared him out of his cart. No, no, seriously, it was all a planned part of the show:

  Some more PCAM pics:

  A few shots from the field before the first flight video:

I’ll talk more about the flight characteristics over the coming weeks as I get more tuned in to the plane. Right now, as you can see from the video, the plane is big, beautiful, stable, and easy to fly. There is no flexing or twisting and I get the impression it will be a low maintenance plane that will hold up to alot of flights. After one gallon of fuel through the engine:

The 3W-170 ran strong… but after 2 gallons it sucked up its head gaskets and flamed out… first the doa ignition, then the reed block leaking, then the head gaskets. Well, I’d been wanting to try out an EVO-150 anyway… as you may have noticed I had anticipated using one from the start and put the EVO graphics on the cowl. Well, I popped out the 3W-170 to give an EVO-150 a try.  A gaggle of EVO engines:

Before I could get the motor swap going EVO sent along new pistons/rods and said they should be changed. In these pics Smok’n Joe is changing out the pistons. The new EVO-150s have alot more power than the older version so EVO changed to stronger rods… they ended up needing to change out the pistons with the new rods:

After the engine swap we got the plane out to break in the new EVO. The first half of this video is the maiden flight on the EVO (which had not been bench run at all, even at the factory), the second half of the video comes from the fourth flight of the day (with about 1 gallon through the EVO):

 The EVO-150 continues to be a champ, I have yet to touch the needles and I’m running the 3W 3D Prop on it now. The EVO’s red parts look good on the plane and with the red TruTurn spinner, too:

 I took apart the EVO-150 to see how it was doing. Typically if I do a good job on the break-in there will be little if any blow-by. You can see here that after 9 gallons of fuel that is exactly the case… no carbon tarnish past the ring & the cylinder is clean too. I see other’s engines that have 1/2″ of dark blow-by after just a few gallons of break-in… too lean, too hot, too fast, or the oil & mix used:

  I went with 2 gallons of Pennzoil Aircooled, 2 gallons of Lawnboy Ashless, then 5 more gallons of Pennzoil Aircooled… all @ 32-1 (my latest idea, lol)… just getting ready to go to Belray H1-R. The important thing to me is the rings and cylinders lack of carbon build up… which looks great. But, I’m not sure if this is a normal amount of carbon on top of the piston… or, if all the Pennzoil made it worse? Anyway, I’ll clean it up and start in on the Belray:

I took apart the carb, too (habit after a few gallons of break-in) and everything was clean and looked good. One new thing that has never been in a carb I’ve cleaned is this weird little poured in? custom little silicone? washer thingee. It just stays in place by the narrowest of margins. It’s there for some reason I guess, to protect the diaphragm, or something… but I still kinda don’t get it. lol Seems like an accident waiting to happen and a solution without a problem, that might create one. lol :

 A few flying pics with the EVO:

←end→

As with all the Aeroworks QBs… the plane seems RTF out of the box:

The fuse doesn’t feel exceptionally light, but the wings sure do! The leading edge and wing thickness makes me think it will really float/drag/fly stable. Also, huge ailerons, tons of throw and pre-glued in hinges. The hinges swing freely, as well:

The elevators also have pre-installed hinges (glued in), as you know… and with plenty of throw like all the Aeroworks QB™ planes:

Man, I’m just jones’n to throw this thing together right now!

Here’s some shots of the canopy and side of the cowl… look at all that pre-done work… I’m spoiled on these now, if I got an ARF without the canopy pre-done I think it would just sit in the corner and never get assembled. The fit and finish on these modern day ARFs is rival’n the best builders. And, the Aeroworks ARF QBs have the best fit and finish I’ve seen:

 I was asked about the landing gear plate and I’d have to say it looks pretty stout. It’s a continuous piece of 1/4″ hardwood side to side… with two perpendicular pieces of 1/4″ hardwood glued to it. Those side pieces pick up alot of surface area and really shear the whole thing solid. The landing gear bolts go through the overlapping area which is 1/2″ thick, and again has its load spread out pretty far and wide.

 A shot from the top and also a shot showing the pre-installed and glued in blind nuts for the landing gear (again going through a double layer of 1/4″ hardwood that has alot of coverage or shear strength):

Still don’t have all the parts… holidays and all. Hope to have everything by week’s end and start the assembly next week.

Meanwhile, as with the last QB™ I had, everything is real clean, real high quality. Also, one of these days I gotta ask Rocco if I learned this wheel pant mount from him, or him from me. Whichever, I’ve always thought it was the only way to go! And, here it is, already done:

 Still waiting on parts, so thought I’d snap some more pics. Here’s a couple of wing shots:

 Here’s a pic of the the landing gear hatch, and another of the wheel pants:

 Here’s the plane, showing the cutouts for the rudder servos, receiver, batteries, tanks, et al… pre done:

Here’s a shot of the landing gear:

And also a shot of the rudder:

Here’s a shot of the lightweight foam tires, and also a shot of the tail section:

Battery/receiver/tanks foam; velcro straps, cable ties, et al (standard included items):

The cowl:

Here’s the included throw meter, nice touch:

 Going with a BME-115:

 Here are the new style Fromeco 5200 ”Grunt” packs (with Relion 4800 labels):

Here’s a new dual switch from Fromeco. 16 gage soft wire in and out, Dean’s Ultra’s in and out, dual charge/test jacks. Tried to let you see the circuit board… I think both switches are failsafe and also I think there is circuitry to keep both batteries draining instead of only one, even if the regs are not matched… I think. lol Let me get back to you on that:

 Here’s my AW QB™ coming in for a landing tonight. It’s one of the new stick planes from Aeroworks. It’s four pieces, that’s the kinda quick building I can handle. lol

The engine is really dwarfed by the cowl:

Charles Bradley says it will spin this prop, too. Ha, lol, hard to believe… but I guess this cute ‘lil motor is actually a beast in disguise:

]]> http://www.ruddermayhem.com/2007/03/aeroworks-104-yak/feed/ 0 http://www.ruddermayhem.com/2006/12/krill-2-6m-katana-arf/ http://www.ruddermayhem.com/2006/12/krill-2-6m-katana-arf/#comments Sat, 16 Dec 2006 20:56:10 +0000 admin http://www.ruddermayhem.com/?p=1093

There’s really alot to say about the picture below… first is the size of the elevator versus the stab, you can see the stab is small and the elevator huge. Check out the covering and the prep of the sheeting underneath it… it’s really much nicer than any of the wooden ARFs I’ve dealt with. That’s the covering job right out of the box… the prep on the wood and the covering job looks excellent everywhere I have looked at it. As advertised, the hinges are glued in and they are smooth, too. I thought this plane was going to be real good… but it’s actually looking real great:

Here was a big concern… with the hinges already glued in… and having a 1/64″ gap… would there be enough throw? Well? Looks like plenty of throw to me:

This pic shows, again, the quality of the sheeting itself and its preparation… and the excellent covering job. You get an idea of the large size of the ailerons, too:

We have the size, but do we have the throw? Here’s a picture of the aileron just flopped over of its own accord:

And, here it is with a little pressure being applied to hold it over “bevel to bevel.” I think this will do:

Here’s the root end of a wing… you can see the ends of the string for the aileron servo extensions there. To say these planes are manufactured cleanly is an understatement, as you can see:

I’ve had trouble with wing retention method on some brand planes in the past. But, here the anti-rotation dowels and the retention bolts are solid and there is an extra ply plate behind the already ply root rib for the retention bolt anchor:

Large size aluminum anti-rotation dowels ain’t goin’ no place:

Here’s a pic of the landing gear, showing that lightening hole I mentioned:

Here’s the pants… strong but light glass work… three colors, too:

I tell ya’… everything, and I mean everything, so far has been first rate custom builder quality:

Aeroworks does the wheel pant mounting exactly the way I’ve done in my reviews for years. Sweet!:

I feel the same way about the cowl as all the other parts of this plane, just can’t imagine how they could be any nicer:

It comes with a cowl ring installed, too… adds rigidity, nice touch:

I found this bag of foam, cable ties, and Velcro straps in the box, too. Everything but the kitchen sink:

These included engine mounting templates sure are going to make the engine mounting go fast:

Here’s some pics of the hardware that comes with it… I’m planning on using it all… building this plane stock:

Hardware that shows on the outside of the plane, like the stab attachment bolts, are stainless steel button heads:

Aeroworks really didn’t miss a trick on this one! You just gotta be impressed:

Pretty cool, again, Aeroworks thought of everything and then some:

My friend Jimmy came over to take a look at the plane. First thing he said was ”Wow, Joe, these bolts just lineup in the canopy so great!”:

Looks like the back of the hatch is removable to add a pilot:

Like Aeroworks advertises, “quick build”, the holes are drilled for the tailwheel and it just bolts on:

Rudder pull/pull wire exit holes, already cut out… and with plastic tube glued in and cut flush:

The manual is very complete, with lots of clear high resolution pictures. It comes on CD:

While Jimmy was bolting on the wings he said, “Look at that, they just screw right in! Everything fits like its suppose to! The bolts just go right IN! Joe, these bolts just went in dead nuts!” I then asked Jimmy how the wing tubes fit, he said, “Awesome, just PERFECT!”:

We got it all together to the point I had my Wild Hare R/C 35% Extra-300 when I weighed it. The WH weighed 15.5 lbs assembled to this same point. Drum roll please. This one does weigh more, 1/2 lbs more to be precise… it’s 16 pounds. The canopy on the WH was lighter, and the landing gear was, too. I might go with a CF landing gear and see if I can’t make up that 8oz or even more, probably… just with the CG landing gear alone. The wing tube seems light, so I’ll probably just stay with it. Picking it up for the weigh in, and looking at all the parts, I had thought it would be around 15 lbs, but nope. Anyway, we’ll do a final weight when we’re done (probably 12 hours actual assembly time, it looks like). And, put it in the air and see how light it flies on the wings. It sure looks and feels like it will fly light… just have to wait and see… but I’m optimistic:

When Jimmy shows up to help he knows the right things to bring with him:

Jimmy’s gonna help me get started with the assembly. He bolted on the landing gear (blind nuts came already installed, holes were pre-drilled, as well). Jimmy said the bolts all lined up perfect and bottomed out easily by finger tightening… then he just snugged them up with the wrench. Jimmy working away in his Aeroworks cap:

Jimmy said the landing gear plate is epoxy’d in solid, and I watched him put a drop of ZAP Thin CA in the wood screw holes for the landing gear hatch cover he’s about to put back on:

When Jimmy screwed on the hatch he said the fit of the hatch was “JUST PERFECT!”:

Jimmy’s got the landing gear skirts on. The skirts are pre-drilled and the landing gear is pre-drilled and tapped:

This plane is not afraid of very clear, close-up pictures:

Next Jimmy started putting the servos and linkages on the wings. Going with Hitec 5955 Digital Servos all around, on this plane:

Going with the stock pushrods and control horns. But gonna try out the new 3mm servo screws from MicroFasteners:

Mat (Dunny) came over this morning and we drove over to USPS to pick up a new fire breath’n 3W-106 engine:

There’s so many steps you normally have putting together a plane, even with an ARF, marking holes, drilling holes, putting in blind nuts, etc. But, on this model you keep discovering that many of those assembly/build steps are already done for you. Here’s just one more example… I always check for adequate wood under the servo screws and often have to add some doubled up ply or hardwood under the servo screw area. Well?… once again, went to do something I normally have to do, and low and behold it was already done. And, done the way I would do it. Gotta love it:

You don’t get to do much cut’n, dremel’n, drill’n, or gluing on this QB. One of the rare times is the rudder. I think due to its height they don’t glue the hinges in for you on that one surface:

Normally I like to leave a decent size gap on the hinges of ARFs… 3/32″ works good for me. But, with the counterbalance alignment to the vertical stab to consider… this hinge gap had to be tight:

Mat handled this for me… first thing he did was dremel down an 1/8″ or so into the pre-drilled hinge holes so as to have the hinge knuckle fit in there nicely without any binding:

Mat lubed up the knuckles and then mixed up some 30min Z-POXY from ZAP. He used a small dowel to put the 30min Z-POXY in the holes… first he glued the hinges in the rudder, then when that had hardened, he glued the rudder with hinges into the vertical stab. Wiped up any excess glue with denatured alcohol… and that was about that:

Also included is a complete cut-vinyl graphics package… just don’t know how Aeroworks includes all this for the price:

The QB comes with a nice fuel tank with plenty of tygon fuel line for getting the plumbing done. It also comes with pre-cut tubes for setting up the stopper and also for setting up a piece of tube mid carb line in the tank. Very complete:

Nothing wrong with the included tank, but I have a couple of DUBRO 32oz-ers in the shop, so I’ll go with one of these. And, might try out one of these Fromeco “Tourniquets”, I think they’re calling them?:

I generally run canisters, but thought I’d give standard mufflers a go on this QB. These are Supersonics from Aircraft International:

I taped on the template for the 3W-106. I think the manual shows to use it for marking, but I used it for a drill guide:

I ran a 1/16″ bit through then a 1/8″ bit through, verifying they stayed center in the template holes. Then I drilled the 13/64″ hole and removed the template:

Finally I drilled the holes out with a 19/64 bit to have them ready for the Micro-Fasteners 1/4-20 blind nuts. I pushed the blind nuts into place. Then got the DA template and drilled out the holes so 1/4-20 bolts would pass through easily:

Then I used some full-thread 1/4-20 bolts… with some fender washers… to pull the blind nuts in tight without messing up the firewall wood on either side. I like to use ZAP Thin CA at this point to keep the blind nuts permanently in place:

At this point it occurs to me that I never checked Aerowork’s template at all. I never even put it up to the engine. So, I grab the engine and it slips on just like butter. Meaning Aeroworks did their job right with the template:

No hassl’n coming up with some engine standoffs… the QB provides 24 aluminum standoffs for you to use as needed. I check the manual and it said one row of spacers was all I needed for the 3W-106:

The template had the right bolt pattern for a 3W-106, sure… but that doesn’t guaranty the engine is properly lined up with the cowl! I grabbed the cowl and anxiously took a look see. Dead nuts, again!:

I was cutting on the cowl with the Dremel and thought I would mention that (and you may know this already, but) DUBRO makes cut off wheels that work great:

Now I know some of you macho guys put your socks up with thumbtacks, drink a 12-pack before lunch, and this might have you pulling back from me a bit … but… but Baby Powder is real nice in the workshop. I pack it in my pores on my arms before I go dremel’n away on fiberglass or carbon fiber. If your pores are packed with Baby Powder the glass can’t get into them… and I smell nice, too. lol:

Aerowork’s spaces the motor out for a nice healthy 1/8″ gap… an 1/8″ gap is good with me and about where I usually space things. I’m checking here with a 6″ spinner, but I have a TruTurn coming:

I generally always have to glue up some of the joints on a new ARF. I had ZAP bottle in hand, but couldn’t find a bad glue joint:

Even though the motor box is glued and sealed up solid… they still pinned it for a little extra security:

Aerowork’s installs the blind nuts for the landing gear in place for you. And, they glue up everything solid down there, too:

Aeroworks has a pre-installed antenna tube down the right side of the plane:

Again, with plywood doubled up under the servo screw locations:

It’s actually one piece of ply underneath there that is cut out for both rudder servos:

Oh… and for the 2 RX guys… there are holes running down the left side of the fuse for you already:

I am embarrassed to say… but I spent the day thinking about bolts. I wanted 2″ or 2-1/2″ grade 8, fully threaded, bolts:

I got Micro-Fasteners to start carrying them in the 1/4-20 size. Part numbers will be SCA1432FT and SCA1440FT:

The fuse is designed around canisters. And, the kit includes balsa sheets for closing off different formers to provide good airflow:

Here’s the holdup! I always start with the graphics, but forgot to order these until a couple of days ago. Kirbys Kustom is the best!:

I’ve been wanting a TruTurn anodized spinner since they came out! I ordered a 4″ gold one for this plane! But, 4-1/4″ might be nice, too:

These Kirbys graphics give my plane its own unique look:

I applied some more…:

… and even more.:

]]> http://www.ruddermayhem.com/2006/08/aeroworks-104-extra-260/feed/ 0 http://www.ruddermayhem.com/2006/08/gallery122-extra/ http://www.ruddermayhem.com/2006/08/gallery122-extra/#comments Sat, 05 Aug 2006 09:18:25 +0000 jnol http://www.ruddermayhem.com/wp/?p=585