Patch News – July 2020
August already and despite the Covid-19 restrictions many of us have managed lots of flying in July. The number allowed at the field is now a theoretical 30 but the booking system remains in place so if you want to fly please email John Wheeley beforehand, preferably at least 24 hours before. July saw several of the models built during lockdown flown for the first time, including Woody’s Hawker Hunter which finally got airborne. The patch is in excellent condition having been regularly mown by the FARTS (Friday Afternoon Rural Trimming Society).
The sunny weather brought out lots of insects including this little grasshopper that hitched a lift on my F-22 Raptor.
One of the Ikarus C42’s from Solent Flight based at Lower Upham airfield appeared to be practising engine out procedures when we arrived one morning, fortunately only one of them was directly over our field.
Last month I reported that Woody’s Hunter had been completed but we hadn’t managed to get it away from a launch. One of the problems was a sticky elevator snake and Woody managed to sort that. Then he did a thrust test which proved to be ok but the overall weight of the model was much more than it should be so in July we tried it with a 1500mAh battery instead of a 2200mAh. As well as saving weight it moved the centre of gravity slightly rearward to the correct position. Catapult King was seconded for launching and at last the Hunter took to the skies.
It was a bit out of trim and very twitchy on ailerons but at least it was flying. When landing I discovered that it suddenly drops the right wing if slowed up but it survived undamaged. After some adjustments to the control movements and exponential we tried again and the second flight was much better, still twitchy but much better.
I kept the speed up on the landing approach and got it down safely on the patch. Excerpts of both flights are in this month’s video. Sadly I think it will never be perfect because it’s just too heavy but it flies and looks great in the air
I also featured Norwegian Nick’s F-86 Sabre last month which was almost ready for flight. Nick flew it twice in July and it flies really well although, like the Hunter, it’s proved to be rather too twitchy on ailerons at first.
The Sabre uses 4 cells rather than 3 but still manages to weigh less than the Hunter. After the first successful flight Nick went off to finish the colour scheme and it now looks superb in it’s Royal Norwegian Air Force ‘Jokers’ colours.
He flew the Sabre again later in the month and it goes away from the launch well and flies beautifully although it did suffer a rather abrupt arrival caused by twitchy ailerons and loss of orientation I think. Fortunately there was no damage so with a little more tweaking it should be perfect. Some of the first flight can be seen in this month’s video.
Nick also brought his Sea Vixen along to fly but after setting up the launch ramp and bungee he discovered that the Vixen launching hook was broken so he couldn’t fly it. Never mind, they looked brilliant together on the ground.
In the June Patch News I admitted to being jealous of Captain Slow’s model rack so I decided to make one for myself. Over the years my model room has become a model store and every time I want to do some building or repairing I have to empty the room of the models. She who must be obeyed is very understanding but does sometimes mention it when there are models on the landing, in the second bedroom, and especially on our bed. Luckily I don’t have any oil dripping I/C models these days! The obvious solution was to store the planes in the garage but unusually we do actually put a car in it so what I needed was a bench mounted rack. I was able to fix the rack directly to my workbench, a shelf, and a rafter so I didn’t need it to be free-standing like Captain Slow’s.
This also meant it could be taller and hold more models, mine holds eight. I can stand the remaining small models on the bench around the rack and there are currently thirteen models on there. I spent just under £20 at Screwfix on some 21.5mm overflow pipe, a few 90 degree bends, and some T pieces. I already had the foam insulation.
Note that it’s overflow pipe and fittings not water pipe. The fittings are just a push fit and would normally be glued but for my purposes I didn’t need to glue them so it will be easy to reconfigure for different models later on.
Literally just as I was placing the last model in the rack and demonstrating to Doreen how brilliant it all was a courier arrived with a parcel for me, yes, another new model…how embarrassing, unsurprisingly it was mentioned!
So what could be in that thin package? It’s another foamboard jet of course and this time it’s one from Banggood.
It’s a Yak-130 that has a part-box fuselage and I think it looks rather pretty, I hope it flies as good as it looks.
I really fancied the JAS-39 Saab Gripen but, as well as being a few pounds dearer, for some reason the postage on it was £9.52 but only £1.65 for the Yak. I had some discount points to use so the Yak cost me just over £23 including delivery. I haven’t had time to build it yet but it arrived undamaged and looks good, watch for a report next month.
The Folland Gnat that Dwayne Pipe is building from scratch is coming along nicely and should be ready to test fly before too long. Early in July he sent me a couple of photos of the completed construction, ready for covering.
Then at the end of the month he sent some more of the covered model, just got to hinge the control surfaces etc.
Catapult King recently bought the foamboard Sukhoi SU-27 that Dougal Entendre had won in a club raffle a while back. Dougal says he doesn’t like them so decided to sell it on rather than build it and discover that he was wrong!
This is what Catapult said about it: It uses a 2200mAh 3s battery as the weight seems to be needed to get close to the CG, there’s a FrSky D4R-II receiver and a good old 30A HobbyKing ESC (Love em!). The motor was the hardest as I couldn’t find one for love nor money during lock down, but Gary came to the rescue and gave me a Turnigy D2826 2200Kv which he had spare, thanks Gary. Catapult soon had it all put together and asked Dougal to do the test flight for him. The test flight went well and Dougal soon handed the transmitter back to Catapult who had no problems at all with the Sukhoi. I have to confess that I forgot to photograph Catapult with his new toy but you can see some of the first flight in this month’s video, including the part when Dougal almost buried it while inverted.
Certainly the biggest new model to be flown this month was Mini-Mike’s rather lovely P.68 Partenavia Victor. The kit was made by Modell Studio in the Czech Republic and at 2m (79″) span it’s a big one and it only just fits in his car.
Mini-Mike has fitted the Victor with a pair of Tornado Thumper 3542 1250KV motors that are powered by a pair of 4 cell 3300 lipos. There’s plenty of room in there to fit whatever batteries he wants and one very cruel person was overheard saying that Mini-Mike will be useful when it comes to the lambing season! I’ve no idea what they meant…
He said the 1250KV is too high and even using 9×6 props the motors are pulling more than the stated maximum current but he decided to see if it would fly and then decide what changes to make. He needn’t have worried, the Victor shot into the air despite the motors sounding very odd. Once he’d reached cruising height and raised the flaps the model burbled around on about third throttle but even then the motors didn’t sound too happy.
It was reminiscent of Bob’s Easy Twin that had similar problems with erratic running motors which he eventually solved by replacing the Y-lead between the receiver and speed controllers. Anyway, the Victor stooged around for several minutes, looked great, and was otherwise problem free. Not wanting to push his luck Mini-Mike called landing, lowered the flaps, and discovered the Victor floats on a lot but made a nice landing just off the patch.
We were very pleased to have two prospective new members attend the field towards the end of the month and I understand Page Boy will be bringing a third one along with him soon. The first to appear was Chris Winkworth who initially came along one Sunday while we were sheltering from the rain in the barn. Chris brought along a model he’s been building on and off for a few years and it was given a thorough going over by us all, poor Chris!
It’s a tissue covered semi-vintage style low-winger but currently only has rudder and elevator controls. The general consensus was that with almost no dihedral it’ll need to to be fitted with some ailerons before anyone risks flying it.
Dougal Entendre got really excited when he spotted that Chris had a make of radio that he’d never heard of before! It’s a Detrum 2.4G GAVIN-6A 6CH. Dougal found the manual online quicker than you could say ‘Google’ and immersed himself in that for the rest of the morning. Chris was very heartened to know that even if the model doesn’t fly and gets smashed to bits he can always flog the radio gear to Dougal for a zillion pounds!
The second newbie was 11 year old Charlie who was brought along by mum Nadine. Charlie came equipped with an FMS Easy Trainer, a 1280mm spam foamie with a top mounted pusher motor powered by a 2 cell 1200mAh lipo. I think it must have come as a PNP including the radio gear as the transmitter is a small toy style one with manual trims. I haven’t seen manual trims for years, they seemed very odd having long been used to electronic ones.
Bob the Builder gave the model a thorough check over with Charlie and made sure everything was as it should be and in doing so discovered the lipo was only 31% charged. None of us had any 2 cell packs with us so the test flight would need to be a very short one. I was nominated as test pilot and can report that the model was perfect, no trims required, it handled the fairly windy conditions well, and should be an ideal trainer for Charlie.
Knowing that we had some new kids on the block Captain Slow and Woody sorted out a buddy box set-up for the newbies to learn on which consisted of Woody’s Wot Trainer and a pair of Spektrum transmitters with a buddy lead. Captain Slow and I test flew the model and trimmed it out before handing the slave transmitter over to Chris to try. It all went well so after a quick battery change Charlie had a go and again everything went well.
They both over-controlled as beginners always do but after a few minutes they were getting the feel for it and should be fine given so more practice. We had enough lipos to give them both another flight and this time Dougal was given the Chief Test Pilot’s hat. He soon handed control over to Chris and all fine for a few minutes.
But Dougal suddenly found he had no power although the radio seemed to be working ok. The model came down in the valley but fortunately the damage wasn’t bad, just the tail broken off. We initially assumed he had run out of battery but when checked it there was about 60% remaining. The motor was tested and appeared to be fine so that only left the radio. Further checks will be carried out but it would seem to be yet another case of b….dy Spektrum…
Over the winter Kryten built himself a new Swannee, a conversion of a single channel model that he had first built way back in 1966. I featured the new Swannee in June this year so I won’t bore you with the details again, suffice to say that this one has electric power, throttle, rudder, elevator, much reduced dihedral and ailerons. Kryten’s made a lovely job of the model and has been waiting quite a while for a decent day to test fly it. The Swannee is a low-wing model which was quite unusual back in the days of rudder only control and Kryten’s never flew very well.
Kryten thinks that was probably more down to his lack of building skills and a decent building board than the model design so we had high hopes for the new version. We weren’t disappointed and, after the addition of some down elevator trim (not surprising as single channel models had to climb under power) Swannee flew beautifully. Success after just 54 years! Kryten managed to take some flying shots while I did the test flight and I shot some video while he was flying it. It was too late to add the video this month but you’ll be able to see Swannee in action next month.
Apparently I missed the fun one Friday afternoon when Woody landed the wrong side of a barbed wire fence and managed to get himself totally caught up on it. He spiked his left arm and caught the right leg of his trousers on the top strand was unable to move, remaining trapped until 1066 spotted his predicament and went along to free him. The sad part of the tale was that nobody took any photos of the woeful Woody! Captain Slow promptly re-named him Major Disaster and continuing with the ranking theme Chris Winkworth will henceforth be known as WingCo.
Kryten brought his decent camera along in July so I have some of his excellent quality flying shots for you to see, Nick’s Sabre in particular looks superb. Apparently the only usable shot he got of my Stearman was as I was doing an emergency landing because the battery was hanging out. A likely story Kryten, I’ll remember that…!
A Beechcraft KingAir (a ten seat, twin engine aircraft) had just left the runway on take-off when there was an enormous bang and the starboard engine burst into flames. After stamping on the rudder to sort out the asymmetric thrust, trying to feather the propeller and going through the engine fire drills with considerable calmness and aplomb, the stress took its toll on the Captain. He transmitted to the Tower in a level friendly voice: “Ladies and gentleman. There is no problem at all but we’re just going to land for a nice cup of tea.” He then switched to Cabin Intercom and screamed at the passengers: “Mayday. Mayday. Mayday. Engine fire. Prop won’t feather. If I can’t hold this asymmetric we’re going in. Emergency landing. Get the crash crew out.”
The aircraft landed safely but with the passengers’ hair standing on end. Colin CowplainPatch News – June 2020
As I begin writing this edition the country is slowly returning to normal, or at least ‘the new normal’ and many members have managed to get some flying in. The gradual easing of the lockdown rules has also made life easier for patch maintenance and it’s been mown several times which has brought it back to almost pristine condition although the lack of rain has caused it to go rather brown. The mowing has been led mostly by 1066 and Captain Slow has managed to keep the fence going throughout lockdown with regular charging and changing of the battery.
At the end of May the bullocks returned and tended to join pilots alongside the patch but they’ve learnt not to touch the fence so haven’t caused us any serious problems. It would be nice if we could teach then not to wander across the take-off and landing areas at critical moments but overall they’ve been more of an irritation than a problem.
Dougal Entendre tells me that Woody backed into the live fence during one session and rather disturbingly he seemed to enjoy the shock! Mike Smith did the same thing next time out but apparently found it less enjoyable. This time the bullocks visit was only a brief one and at the time of writing the field is bullock free again. Oops, you can ignore that, on Friday 26th Woody reported that the bullocks would be returning and sure enough they’re back.
During lockdown there were so many new models being built that I was overwhelmed with material for Patch News so I expected to be able to report on lots of maiden flights but that just hasn’t happened. With the restrictions of the number of pilots at the patch I haven’t attended as much as usual so I expect I’ve missed a few of the new models but will catch up over the next couple of months. Please send me details and photos of any new models I’ve missed.
One I haven’t missed is Captain Slow’s now infamous Splot. It’s infamous because the build of the really basic, fast to put together model took the Captain two years to complete, and I haven’t missed it because it still hasn’t flown!
I sneaked a couple of socially distanced photos in mid-April when I dropped by Captain Slow’s place to collect the fence battery and the Splot was virtually finished then but 2½ months later it still hasn’t flown. He swears it’s all finished but doesn’t want to rush into anything. I must admit I am rather jealous of his model storage rack though.
I forgot to include one particular photo in the last Patch News and it’s one that I know you’d want to see. Bob the Builder and I were flying as soon as we were allowed and before the patch has been cut. Because the patch grass was longer than the rest of the field we left the fence up and flew from outside the circle, landing between the pits and the patch. At least that was the idea but Bob misjudged one landing and ended up here:
I bet he couldn’t do that again if he tried! Luckily there was no damage, and the plane was ok as well.
Bob has now fitted a pair of new motors to his EasyTwin. The model flew well with the original motors but one of them made some fairly horrible noises at particular throttle settings and Bob could never be sure it wouldn’t suddenly seize up, especially bad news on a twin. So he’s splashed out on a couple of Tornado Thumpers from Overlander. I asked him for some comprehensive details of the new set-up and this is what he sent me:
I just can’t get the staff… Oh, he did say “10 minute flights”. It can be seen flying with my BushMule in the video.
A couple of months ago Dougal sent me some photos of his venerable Fun 3 model. It’s now 40 years old having been originally built it in 1980 although the fuselage was rebuilt 4 years later following an ‘incident’!
It’s been successfully flown with a variety of power sources, the first being a Meteor 40 with a tuned pipe (I bet that was noisy) and now of course an electric set-up which Dougal says makes it go better than ever.
It is still using the original Skyleader servos which look rather out of place next to the tiny 2.4GHz Devention receiver, how things have changed in 40 years. But also notice the wing bolt plate that is looking very dodgy, I think that might have seen the end of the model had it not been spotted!
Last month I showed you a couple a photos of Woody’s almost completed Hunter that he’s built from the Tony Nijhuis plan. It’s now finished and I’ve had a few attempts at getting it flying but so far without success.
The model looks nice but I wonder if it’s overweight as it just won’t go away from a hand launch. After several unsuccessful but undamaged attempts Woody is going to check the weight and measure the thrust to see if they are what the plan says they should be. It has the same fan and motor as my Raptor but feels about twice the weight although to be fair the Hunter uses a 2200mAh lipo and the Raptor only a 1500. We’ll see what the scales tell us.
Norwegian Nick brought his almost completed Sabre along to the field to show us one day. Like Woody’s Hunter the Sabre was built from a Tony Nijhuis plan and is using the same FMS fan but with a 4 cell rated motor. In theory that means it should have around a third more thrust so it ought to have plenty of power.
The model is built to Nick’s usual high standard and is very nearly ready to be test flown. Personally I have to say that I have some doubts about the pilot, I’m not sure he can be relied on, he looks completely legless…
Several months ago, in the heady pre-lockdown days, I featured a Multiplex Stunt Master that Chas Butler had picked up for a good price at the LMA Much Markle show last year. The Stunt Master is made from Elapor (the Multiplex version of EPO foam) with carbon fibre reinforcements, has a wingspan of 870mm and weighs just 350g.
The ready fitted hardware consists of a Permax 2206 1050kv outrunner, a 20A esc and three 8g servos. The prop is secured by a rubber O-ring so any unscheduled arrivals won’t damage the motor shaft, not that Chas will have any unscheduled arrivals. Both ailerons are operated by one servo mounted centrally in the fuselage above the wing, an arrangement that is pretty unusual on outdoor models these days but maybe it’s more common on indoor ones.
Due to winter, windy weather, the lockdown etc Chas hadn’t got round to flying his new toy but towards the end of June the weather seemed perfect for its first flight. Despite being the hottest day of the year so far the conditions weren’t actually ideal as there was a reasonable breeze blowing from the east which always means turbulence from the trees. But the first flight went very well and even subsequent flights in the increasing wind were fine.
Chas was delighted with the model and it certainly looked good in the air. The flights I watched were with the rates in the ‘standard’ setting, wait until he tries ‘3D’ setting! You can see some of the maiden flight in this month’s video.
Towards the end of June both Captain Slow and I started flying FPV again. We both had some successful flights without any problems but then Captain Slow decided to fly his SkyHunter normally, ie. not using goggles. It was flying fine although the turbulence off the trees but getting worse as the morning wore on, especially low down. I was trying to get some flying shots of the model so asked him to do a low pass…big mistake, entirely my fault.
It’s a shame I was taking stills rather than video but you get the idea, the pass was a bit too low for the conditions. Fortunately there was no damage other than a cracked joint in the nose and a big dent in Captain Slow’s pride!
Dwayne Pipe sent through a couple of photos showing how he’s progressing with his Folland Gnat. It’s a totally scratch built model, Dwayne has drawn up his own plans, scaling everything up from an Airfix kit.
He began by producing a kit of parts and now has the wings almost done, I assume there will be a carbon joiner.
Dwayne is going to fit a 12 bladed fan from Banggood which he’s tested on an 8 cell lipo and gives around 1.5kg of thrust so in his words the performance should be ‘lively’! Dwayne is building up quite a bit of experience with EDF set-ups, his scratch built TSR2 goes very well as you can see in this month’s video.
Catapult King has now repaired his own design Yellow Tail following an early flight ‘incident’ when he discovered that models with very thin tapered wings are prone tip stalling, something that’s all part of the learning curve I’m afraid.
He based it on 1066’s Pichler HiSpeed, taking the basic sizes and then modifying them to his own requirements.
This time out Catapult kept the speed up and the Yellow Tail performed well with no problems.
Catapult also flew his Bug, a model he built from the Flite Test plan, which is constructed almost entirely from Depron so is very light. The day was rather breezy so hardly ideal Bug conditions but it just about coped.
The weather has been quite amazing for the last couple of months but it became cooler and windier at the end of June. On Sunday 28th Dougal Entendre, 1066, and Bob the Builder had booked a slot and they all flew despite the strong wind. Here is Dougal’s report on the morning: When Steve and I met up, we decided to go in the lower field as we both had hand-launchable models and didn’t fancy dealing with the cattle. I flew the Sportjet and the Blizzard, and Steve flew his Mirus. The wind was strong but not too bad. Then we saw Bob going in the gate of the upper field, so I went over to tell him where we were. Steve went back to the car to get his hotliner out as there seemed to be lift about. Bob flew his Walrus and made the most of the lift which we found over the bottom of the field.
The wind was coming up from the south-west, so some of it may have been slope lift, but there were strong and bumpy thermals coming through too. On my second Blizzard flight it started to rain quite heavily, so Steve and I landed, and Bob left at that point. The rain soon stopped though, and I still had 87% in the Blizzard battery, so we flew again. I must have spent fifteen minutes or so working bumpy thermals, and Steve did the same with his hotliner. I landed with 55% still left in the battery! So all in all a surprisingly enjoyable morning, and we were glad we made the effort! Thanks Dougal, sounds fun, sometimes the more challenging days turn out to be really good.
Video time now, and this time includes contributions from me, Captain Slow and Dougal Entendre, thanks guys. Please watch the video full-screen, it’s so much better with small models flying around.If the video won’t play for you please click HERE
Do you think invisible aeroplanes will ever be a thing?
I just can’t see them taking off…
Colin Cowplain
Patch News – May 2020
Things looked up a little for aeromodelling in May as the partial lifting of the lockdown was announced on 11th which meant two people could go to the patch and fly as long as they stayed at least two metres apart. Captain Slow came up with a system of booking slots which seems to be working well and many members have been out flying in the glorious weather. Initially there was the problem that the patch grass had grown very long and the bullocks were in the field but the bullocks were soon moved out and Iven offered to cut the grass with his self-propelled mower.
The patch is the long stuff on the right in this photo, Iven is mowing around the edge. Captain Slow accompanied him and did a battery swap but Iven preferred to just mow alone and he eventually finished several hours later with five one cubic metre bags of grass that he took away in his van. We are all very grateful Iven, it was a mammoth job that would have taken the members very much longer with the club mower.
Since then 1066 has mown it twice with Mike Smith and once with Colin Cowplain. Unfortunately the bullocks returned on 27th May which will make things a bit trickier, especially with just two flyers at a time.
Continuing from last month with some of the new models that have been built during lockdown I’ll begin with Kryten’s Swannee. For those of you who don’t know Kryten is really Graham Swan so when the Swanee plan was first published when he and I were at school together it was almost compulsory that he built one! This is what he says: When an article about Swannee appeared in Patch News in July 2018 I was quoted as saying the model was “awful”. I first built this plane in 1966 when it was first published as a free plan in the Aeromodeller magazine.
Thinking about my comment, after reading the article, I concluded that it was my building skills and lack of accuracy that were awful rather than the model, which never did fly satisfactorily. I decided later in 2018 that Swannee V2 would be my “winter build” project ready for the spring of 2019. In the event it has taken slightly longer than that to carry out and complete it.
Firstly I decided that I would add aileron control as the original model was single channel “rudder” only. The original version had a large amount of dihedral and small amount of wash out built into the tapered wing construction. I think the washout was the Achilles heel of my first model. The wings are formed from 1/16th balsa skins top and bottom with a tapering set of ribs effectively keeping the skins apart. The plan indicated 1½ deg or 1/8th inch of washout along the trailing edge. At the time I used my Father’s work bench as my “model building board” and I am sure that the surface had more twist in it than that before I even started!!
So with a nice flat building board I am hopeful that V2 will be more successful. The main changes are:-
Converted to electric power including a battery tray, extended to include space for an AS3x receiver installed directly on the CofG.
Incorporated aileron control with HXT servos built into the wings
Stiffened up the front fuselage with light ply doublers.
Reduced the dihedral, the angle of attack and omitted the washout all as suggested in an RCM&E April 2017 article.
Added elevator, an option on the original, and rudder controlled by servos rather than the “rubber band” powered escapement.
Omitted the rubber band fixing of the wings and replaced them with nylon wing bolt arrangement.
Otherwise the 36-inch wingspan Swannee V2 is constructed true to the plans and then covered in Hobby King film. Incidentally, the small cut outs in each of the formers shown in the photo, are to enable them to slide onto an aluminium box section which acts as a jig to keep the fuselage straight. This is removed before the engine mount is attached to F1.
All up weight including a Zippy 3cell 1000MaH battery is 22 ounces rather than the single channel target of 16 ounces. This equates to 15 ounces per sq ft (Please note that by way of a tribute to the age of the original model I have used imperial units)
The (dare I say it) Spektrum AS3x receiver has been set up with three flying modes:-
Mode 1 General flying – no gains
Mode 2 Launch – heading gain and rate gain
Mode 3 Landing – rate gain
Kryten sent through lots of construction photogaraphs which included the formers, fuselage, and wing halves.
Here’s the model ready for covering and then completed with some very nice water slide decals that Kryten made.
And here’s Swannee flying…but only virtually. Hopefully Swannee will be test flown for real before too long.
Page Boy has been busy building a Skywriter, a 48” span sports-scale biplane designed by Lindsay Todd.
I don’t have any information about the motor etc at the moment but it looks as if he’s making a lovely job of the airframe and as the lockdown continues I don’t suppose it will be too long before it’s ready for covering.
Last month I mentioned that Matt Takhar was building something that’s a complete departure from his usual stuff.
I can now reveal that’s it’s an Oxy4 Max helicopter! As we only fly fixed-wing models at the field a helicopter is quite a rarity for a PAM member although Captain Slow used to be heavily into choppers and some members do have small ones… but that’s another story! Matt is intending to fly his new toy with Hayling Helis in due course.
Matt says: Here’s the spec… I don’t actually know what most of this means or does, but it all sounds good!
Oxy 4 max
GDW DS595MG Tail servo
GDW DS290MG Cyclic servos x 3
Scorpion Tribunus 06-80amp Esc/SBec
Egodrift Tengu motor 3220/960KV
HRB 6S 1800mAh lipos x 3
Micro Beast flybarless unit (aka the magic box of tricks)
Fun-Key FK RT Carbon Fibre Main blades
Fun-Key FK RT Carbon Fibre Tail blades
The build has been very enjoyable, mainly down to learning something new. Although I will admit I spent the best part of three hours trying to work out how to setup the flybarless unit with the RX/TX, it uses a single SBUS lead from RX to unit.
That looks like a real feat of engineering, not what we normally think of as building. Good luck flying it Matt!
Norwegian Nick is still at it, building models that is. He sent me some info on his large Tiger Moth that looks almost ready to fly now: Bought it on eBay, cost £50. It’s a 1/5th scale Toni Clarke creation. When I got it home and gave it a good going over, I thought that’s 50 quid down the drain. It had been covered in doped on nylon cloth and painted in an awful earth colour probably dating back to the early 80s… Anyway in for a penny in for a pound. I used about 2 pints of cellulose thinners to remove all the covering which seemed to take ages. On exposing the frame work it was obvious that quite a lot of Balsa would need to be replaced. The wings thankfully were ok and needed no attention. The fuselage top and bottom longerons were spruce and in good nick however all the lattice balsa struts rudder and elevators just crumbled to dust when squeezed. So I bit the bullet acquired a set of plans and rebuilt all the affected structures. On completion I noticed that the tailplane was slightly offset to the horizontal but thought I don’t care anymore it will still fly. Covered in plain Solatex and sprayed to the Norwegian aircraft insignia.
All servos were the first Futaba 3003s, huge, and control linkages in the wings were bell-cranks and wire pushrods. Now fitted with Hitec servos throughout and conventional push pull cables for elevators and rudder control as per full size. Had to make new struts for wings because they were absent when bought. Anyway enough of the waffle, it’s just over 6ft wingspan weighs out at about 10 lbs which is normal. Reluctant to power it with electric motor which would have involved major dockyard surgery on the front end and I think would belittle the concept of a Tiggie so have fitted a Laser 70 4-stroke for power which I guess will be abhorrent to some. Just been online and the price of the same model from Toni Clarke is 499 Euros so fifty quid seems a bargain.
It looks great now Nick, well worth the effort and it will make an excellent stablemate for your 80” span Citabria Pro.
Nick’s also got a Peter Holland Archie biplane underway, well he wouldn’t want to run out of things to do would he?
So that’s a Sabre, Buccaneer, Tiger Moth, and an Archie…are there any others that I don’t about yet Nick?
I forgot to mention the March competition in last month’s Patch News. For those who didn’t read the Comments section the winner was Kryten who correctly named the three S’s as Swanage, Studland, and Sandbanks just eight hours after it was posted! I was really pleased with the photo but I didn’t expect anyone to get the answers so quickly, in fact I wasn’t sure it would be recognised at all. Well done Kryten, here’s your Gold Star ⭐
Last month I set another competition, this time to guess the number of lipos in my ammo box. This comp wasn’t as popular but several members had a go. At one point I said that there was a tie, giving what I thought was a really good clue as that meant there could only be three possible answers. Surprisingly only one person had a go after that and with a one in three chance Page Boy correctly guessed 39. Well done Page Boy here’s your Gold Star! ⭐
Another model awaiting a test flight is this rather nice Hunter that that Woody has built from the Tony Nijhuis plan.
Woody bought the laser cut kit and fitted the recommended FMS 50mm fan and motor along with a 40A Hobbywing speed controller. The colour scheme is from the Empire Test Pilots’ School as Boscombe Down, in fact this one:
I’ve recently fitted the same fan/motor combination to my F-22 Raptor and am happy to report that the performance is much better than with the previous Dr Mad Thrust unit. I also had to replace the speed controller as the original was a 25A unit and the FMS set-up pulls a good 30A. I fitted a 40A one that I had spare and it so happens it’s a Hobbywing one so my set-up is identical to Woody’s. I believe the Hunter uses 2200mAh 3 cell lipos but I can’t fit those in the Raptor, I’m using 1300mAh 3 cell or some old (ex-Cyano Steve) 1800 Gens Ace ones that will just fit.
I haven’t managed to find any new 1800’s that aren’t too big so maybe my next lipo purchase will be some 1500’s.
The FMS fan is superb, it’s whisper quiet and noticeably more powerful than the Dr Mad Thrust unit. Of course the extra power means the flights are a little shorter but only using full throttle for steep climb outs and loops etc prolongs the available time to an acceptable length. See it in this month’s video. It will be interesting to see how the performance of Woody’s Hunter compares, the Hunter has a much more modern ducting design than the Raptor. Norwegian Nick’s Sabre will use the same fan but with a 4 cell motor so should be even better. Watch this space.
Gorgeous Gary has put together a Multiplex Funjet Ultra, he might be surprised by the speed of the thing, Multiplex say it will do 125mph! Gary has got a Himax c3514-2900 motor, a 60A esc, and will be using a 3 cell 2200mAh lipo.
Gary has also been buying more I/c engines, he’s fitted a new OS55 to his existing Wot-4 and has built a new Acro-Wot that also has an OS55. He’s been flying since the partial lockdown lifting but not tried the new models yet.
Dougal Entendre took this selfie of himself and Gary at the patch. Now I’m not sure if it’s just the photo but there appears to be rather more of Gary than last time I saw him. Could that be too many lockdown pies Gary?!
Dougal also sent a photo of his prop hanging mishap, it seems he’s a bit out of practice but he said it would buff out.
He was right, it did buff out a treat, good as new now. Well apart from the cowl but that was an earlier mishap.
I explained last month the Dwayne Pipe had treated himself to a new Futaba radio and he’s been using it in earnest.
Getting everything set up can take a bit of getting used to with a change of manufacturer so the instruction manual has seen some heavy use but there have been no more unexplained crashes so it’s been a worthwhile change.
Almost last but by no means least is Bob the Builder’s new EasyTwin, an own design twin engine sports model.
I did the test flight last week and after a little trimming and dialling down of the rates the model flew beautifully. The only problem was that the motors weren’t making the right noises, well one wasn’t anyway. At low throttle and full throttle they both seemed to run together nicely but at just above half throttle there were some very strange noises, definitely not correct, although it didn’t seem to affect the flying too much.
The idea of building the twin was to use up a couple of old motors and a spare speed controller he had kicking around. I mentioned that running two motors from one controller was not advisable so Bob forked out for a matching pair of new ones. It now looks as if Bob might need to buy a pair of motors as well which rather spoils the whole idea. Never mind, it’s a nice model and flies well. You can see it in action in this month’s video.
Bob also built this during lockdown, just for something to do really. I have no details, what you see is what you get.
Well it looks ok so the all important question is how does it fly? Just watch the video, it’s hilarious!
1066 sent through some photos of the last new model of the month, Mike Smith’s Durafly Tundra V2.
It’s a standard PNF (Plug’N’Fly) model so very little work is required but Mike ordered it on a Tuesday, it arrived on the Saturday, and he flew it on the Monday. One of the unexpected joys of lockdown!
Video time now and this month your cameramen were me, Captain Slow, Dougal Entendre, and Bob the Builder, thanks chaps. Please watch the video full-screen, it’s so much better with small models flying around.If the video won’t play for you click HERE
Some of you might also want to watch a second video. A couple of weeks ago, during a lockdown clear out, I found a VHS tape of the 1987 Nationals Fun Fly that Don Eades, Graham Head, Dick Hall, and myself entered. The tape was made by the event organisers using a camcorder and copies sold to competitors. I haven’t been able to play VHS tapes for many years so I had it converted to an MP4 file. I found the original video was 1hr 12mins long so I’ve edited it and made a PAM version which is mostly of the four PAM members and is 22mins long. It will probably be of little interest to many current members but it is a bit of club history and it’s here if you’d like to watch it:If the video won’t play for you click HERE
Give a man a plane ticket, he’ll fly for a day. Push him out of an airborne plane and he’ll fly for the rest of his life.
Colin Cowplain
Patch News – April 2020
As April has been the first full month of lockdown with no flying at all this Patch News will be concentrating on how we’ve all been keeping busy. However, the patch hasn’t been totally forgotten and some members have been along and checked the fence as part of their daily exercise. The battery has been changed regularly and everything is in order which is fortunate as Woody reports that the bullocks are due to return shortly.
Dougal Entendre pointed out that the photos of the patch area have been updated on Google Maps and now show some of us at the field. It’s even possible to see the spot and now I know why I didn’t win the spot landing comp, the spot isn’t in the middle! Obviously all my spot landing attempts were dead centre of the patch… 
My request for photos and information about your projects has been answered with a deluge and I now have enough material for at least two editions. Thank you all for your contributions, Patch News wouldn’t be possible without them especially during lockdown. If your model doesn’t feature in this edition it will be in the next one.
I’ll begin with one of several of Norwegian Nick’s projects, definitely a major project, a Blackburn Buccaneer.
Nick mentioned that back in his naval days he’d worked servicing Buccaneers for three years so I asked him for some more information: I got drafted from H.M.S. Bulwark, a commando carrier with just Wessex Helios in 1975 to RAF Honington in Suffolk which had a detachment for 809 squadron Buccaneers. We had 3 of the squadron Buccs already to go in case they lost any when they were deployed on Ark Royal which was deployed over the pond to the USA. We also looked after and maintained 4 RAF Buccaneers of 208 conversion unit which trained RAF pilots and observers for front line squadrons. Prince Charles in his youth was going to visit the Ark Royal in the North Sea and we had to provide him with one of our Buccs. We were sent up to the Firth of Clyde to embark on Ark Royal, he then flew on board and stayed for 4 hours then flew off. We as the maintainers were then flown off to Lossiemouth and then back to Honington by a Sea Devon aircraft. Now I can see why Nick wanted to build one.
Nick chose a Mark Douglas designed Buccaneer S2 kitted by Belair Kits. The fuselage is 1925mm in length and it has a wingspan of 1350mm, AUW should be around 10 lb 4 oz. Nick has bought two Lander 76 mm fans at 1600W each and two 85A esc’s that will be fed by two 6 cell 6000mAh lipos. The servos are a mix of Hitec 225s and HS 125s.
The fuselage construction consists of framed bulkheads spaced by longerons and then the whole fuselage has to be planked due to the shape. Nick admits it’s a pain but says he’s winning and once finished it will be sanded to shape and then glassed. The wings were built as normal with spars and ribs and then sheet balsa covered. Wow Nick, just wow, that’s a heck of a project! I’m really looking forward to seeing the completed model.
You’ll be amazed to hear that Dougal Entendre has bought another transmitter as he was down to his last twenty or so! He sent me his excuses reasons. My reason for buying the Jumper T16 was in part because it uses the OpenTx software. I thought I really ought to get to grips with that, as Tx software used to be a major interest of mine back in the 20th century. But also the T16 is a multi-protocol Tx, so in theory I could use it for all my existing Walkera Devo receivers, plus any bind-n-fly indoor models I might choose to buy. These tend to use Spektrum or Frsky-compatible receivers, or various other makes, and all I would have to do is select the right protocol for each model.
Actually getting hold of a T16 proved to be tricky as everywhere seemed to be out of stock, or charging about £200 for it, or both. I eventually found a supplier on Amazon.com (the USA site), who said they could get it to the UK for £135 (including customs duty). I ordered it in late January, and it reached me as promised in the middle of March.
It’s a good looking Tx which seems to be styled after a current Futaba model, and has a colour screen. It’s not a touch-screen – it uses a roller and pushbuttons just like the old Spektrum DX8 I had about 7 years ago. The sticks have Hall effect sensors instead of pots, so they have a very smooth feel to them. You have to provide either a 2s LiPo battery, or a pair of 18650 Li-Ion cells. A piece of equipment I’ve been designing at work uses the latter, so you’ll never guess what I ended up with!
It all sprang into life when I powered it up, but it soon became apparent that the roller switch was working very intermittently, and some of the pushbuttons didn’t seem to work at all. On subsequent power-ups the screen displayed a message that it had a stuck key. My heart sank as I contemplated returning it, but a Google search revealed quite a few other people had had this problem, and it could be solved by re-seating a couple of ribbon cables inside the Tx. So, following the advice of a YouTube video, I undid the screws to open the Tx, then set about undoing the connector clips at each end of the first ribbon cable. This cable was only about 2.5cm long and 0.5cm wide. When I undid the second connector clip there was a “ping” and the ribbon cable disappeared. It had obviously been held in compression, and had now pinged off to God-knows-where. I spent about 20 minutes searching the floor for it to no avail. I tried shaking the Tx upside-down, but nothing fell out. Eventually I found the ribbon wedged behind one of the PCBs in the Tx, to my great relief.
I eventually completed the reseating for both cables (carefully!) and screwed the Tx back together. The message about a stuck key didn’t show on the splash screen when I powered up, and what’s more, all the pushbuttons and the roller now worked properly! A good result, but one has to question the manufacturer’s quality control.
The next thing to do was check the version number of the firmware. Sure enough there was an update on the Internet, and apparently it was an important fix for a couple of bugs. So I had to download OpenTx Companion on my PC, and connect the Tx with the USB cable to update it. I also had to remove the SD card from the Tx and copy a new load of data files to it. I think this stores most of the graphics and sound files, but I haven’t investigated its contents in detail yet.
Then to do battle with OpenTx. There are a LOT of menus, and I think I’ve barely scratched the surface of what it’ll do. It seems very capable, but it’s a big learning curve to find your way round it. For example, it seems to default to being a 4-channel system. I needed a switch allocated to a fifth channel, which entailed going into a different menu to assign one of the switches as an input to channel 5. It still didn’t work though. I then had to go into the mixer menu to assign the mixer to an output, and then it did work. I’ll probably get used to it, but it’s not for the faint-hearted. Anyway, I’m quite looking forward to exploring its capabilities, especially the audio (must get a sample of “Highway to the Danger Zone”!). That’s all very easy to do on a Multiplex Cockpit transmitter Dougal!
So far I’ve only tried it with an indoor quadrotor to keep me flying through this period of social distancing. That meant another huge learning curve to set up the quad using an app called Betaflight but that’s another story. Having read all that reminds me that Bob the Builder almost bought the same Jumper T16 transmitter before choosing the less complex but rather more expensive Multiplex Cockpit. Dougal is finding the Jumper quite taxing and he used to write transmitter software and has a D.Phil in computers systems (yes, he’s genuinely a Doctor) so I think Bob made the right decision. When I queried Dougal about his qualification he said if anyone expects him to be the other sort of Doctor he tells them to take two Aspirin and ring him in the morning! You can see Dougal flying the quadrotor in this month’s video. Rumour has it that in the winter Dougal will have to upgrade the Jumper to a Coat…
Meanwhile Bob the Builder has a new project on the bench, a twin engine camera plane that he might eventually use for FPV. I only have limited information at the moment but Bob tells me it’s going to look quite similar to this one.
The wingspan is 1300mm and it will be powered by a pair of 2836 1400Kv PropDrive motors from HobbyKing, a pair of 40A speed controllers, and a single 4000mAh lipo. Bob seems to be re-using the tailplane and fin from an old model, a good bit of upcycling. With most of the actual building done it’s looking nice, should be a good flier.
The motors will provide around 400W each which should be plenty of power. The one in the photo looks to have a pusher prop on it so expect Bob is going to correctly have both props rotating in towards the fuselage.
Another twin now, Mike Smith’s Partenavia Victor that he bought from Puffin Models about twelve years ago and has finally got round to finishing. At 79″ span it’s a big one and the kit was made by Modell Studio in the Czech Republic.
Mike has fitted the Victor with a pair of Tornado Thumper 3542 1250KV motors and will be using a pair of 4 cell 3300 lipo packs. The quoted weight is around 10lbs but Mike is hoping his will be a bit lighter as the original used heavier nicads batteries. He’s concerned about a lack of power but looking at the motor specs I think it’ll be fine.
Like the full-size the model is fitted with flaps to slow it up for landing. Space for all the gear isn’t a problem and Mike managed to squeeze everything in, I reckon he should cut a hatch and join my BushMule on a parachute drop!
1066 has sorted through his lipos and ditched thirty five duff ones! He then charged/discharged all the remaining ones to the correct storage voltage and sent me a photo of how he’s storing them, certainly much neater than mine.
I’ve also set all mine to storage voltage but I didn’t get round to sorted out the duff ones. This gave me an idea for another Gold Star Competition: How many lipos are in my ammo box? There’s a mix of 3 & 4 cell packs of capacities from 1000mAH to 4000mAH. Would you like a clue? I’m afraid I don’t have one, your guess is as good as mine.
I haven’t counted them yet but I struggled to get them all in there. Oh, and the balance board is still in the bottom. Please enter your guesses in the Comments, one guess each, nearest is the winner.
1066 also sent me some photos of what he thinks was his last scratch built model, a Pitts Special S-1S.
He cut his own foam wings and used the Avicraft Panic method to skin them. He said after all the work it was a rubbish flier and that put him off scratch building for life. He was using an OS61FSR but it really needed a 90.
The model may not have flown very well but it looks superb to me. The full-size G-BOOK was the late Brian Lecomber’s display Pitts back in the 1980’s but in 1992 it was unfortunately destroyed by a fire after landing. Apparently the fire was caused by a leak of diesel oil from the smoke system, fortunately nobody was injured.
Matt Takhar has sent me some info on two lockdown projects, one of which is a complete departure from his usual stuff but that one will have to wait until next month. This month I’ll just show you his latest 3D plane, an Extra 300-EXP. He says it wasn’t much of a build as it’s an Extreme Flight kit so there was little work to do.
Both the wingspan and length of the Extra are 48”, the wing area 500sq. in. and the weight 42-46oz. Matt has fitted it out with an Extreme Flight Torque 2814T 829kV motor coupled to a Hobbywing Platinum Pro 50A V3 esc.
He’ll be using a 12×6 APC Electric Prop and I assume it’ll be on a 4 cell lipo. The servos are all Savox SH-0257MG Micro Digitals. I love the colour scheme and no doubt it will perform as well as the other Extreme Flight models.
Many of us are familiar with the Avro Lancaster that Percy Vears has been building for a while now and barring fitting the radio gear, and final testing/adjustments, the project is more or less complete.
This is what Percy says about it: The airframe was built in balsa/ply from a Tony Nijhuis 72” Lancaster kit. This was finished with 18gm glass fibre cloth and Z-Poxy resin. Halfords High-Build primer was used to take out some of the bumps and dents (most of which is removed by sanding). This was then followed by a coat of Halfords Grey Primer.
Camouflage colours on the top surfaces were Matt Dark Earth (Humbrol 29) and Matt Dark Green (Humbrol 30), and after application of the roundels, were sprayed with Halfords matt clear lacquer. The underside and fins were painted with Halfords Satin Black Lacquer. Roundels and lettering were cut from Solar Film.
Some items required were not readily available off the shelf, so this forced me to engage in the world of 3D printing (another learning curve!). These included pilot/crew figures, Browning guns and spinners, plus other small parts.
The electronic parts (apart from Tony Nijhuis supplied retracts) came from HobbyKing and are as follows:
- Motors: 4x Turnigy D2836/8 1100kv brushless
- ESC: 4x HobbyKing 30A
- Rudder servos: 2x Turnigy TGY-D56MG (flat profile)
- Other servos: 4x Turnigy TGY-50090M
- UBEC: 5V, 5A (learnt from Vulcan – separate UBEC needed)
- Battery: 3s 5000mAh 40C
- Propellers: 4x Master Airscrew 3-blade 8×6 (2xCW & 2xCCW)
The overall weight is likely to be in the region of 3Kg (6.5lb) so performance with 700W (824W peak) is likely to allow the aircraft to lumber along at scale speed, rather than exhibit aerobatic performance.
Excellent Percy, it looks superb and I’m sure it will fly very well. At just over 100W/lb I think it will have plenty of power and should ‘lumber along’ perfectly on about half throttle.
Last month I mentioned that Dwayne Pipe was looking for some new radio gear and he replied with this: I finally lost confidence with Spektrum when on three flying occasions the aircraft just fell out of the sky for no obvious reason ( apart from my own rubbish flying). To confirm it the ailerons reversed themselves in mid-flight while I was using my Spektrum transmitter on my flight simulator at home. So I have abandoned Spektrum and bought a Futaba T6K transmitter and receivers. Nick S lent me an old Futaba transmitter and instruction manual so I got the hang of the programming, I have been transferring all my models over to Futaba which seemed to take forever.
Still haven’t tried it out in real life, so that’s something to look forward to when the grownups let us out to play.
Meanwhile Dwayne has started another project and he’s doing it the proper way, starting from scratch: With all this time on our hands I have been looking for a challenging build project. I fancied a more aerobatic edf than my TSR2 (which is good at flying fast in a straight line). A BAE Hawk would have been fine but Dan’s is so good that I couldn’t compete. For Christmas, presumably to keep me out of trouble, my wife bought me an Airfix Red Arrows Folland Gnat kit, which looks really good and being mid wing should be hand launchable. So my latest project is to design a Folland Gnat using just the Airfix kit and the three section drawing that comes on the back of the box.
Based on a 12 blade 70 mm fan and a 36″ wingspan I have drawn out the plan using only a setsquare, rule, pencil and eraser. Very old school. I’m very impressed by your plans Dwayne and I can’t wait to see this one finished.
Newbie Nick has bought a 1 metre span Strike 3 DLG from Hyperflight, I took this is from their website: The Strike 3 is superbly made using 30 g/m2 Carboline spread carbon, the model is exceptionally light, while also being strong and very rigid, allowing high launches. Still air times of 2 minutes have been reported by strong launchers, and pilots enjoy the excellent performance and sweet handling. Its full span ailerons allow camber adjustment in flight, giving it a wide speed range, allowing it to be flown in moderate winds, which is unusual for 1m gliders.
Under the Kevlar nose cone Nick has fitted four Blue Bird Nano HV digital servos to control the ailerons, elevator, and rudder. The rudder and elevator are sprung in one direction and use a Kevlar cord to pull against the tension.
The four servos are stuck together then glued to a thin ply tray then the whole assembly is glued into the fuselage.
Nick has mounted the receiver under the CG and has fitted a 2 cell 300mAH battery in the nose and the all up weight is just 130g. It’s certainly an interesting very high tech model that should perform very well.
Video time now. Yes I have managed to cobble one together with contributions by myself and Dougal. Please watch the video full-screen, it’s so much better with small models flying around.If the video won’t play for you please click HERE
A pilot walked into a bar and asked for a packet of crisps.
“What flavour would you like?” asked the barman.
The pilot replies “Have you got helicopter flavour?”
“No sorry, just plane”…
Keep safe everyone – Colin Cowplain
