Peter Jenkins

Hi Charles - thank you. Yes, I removed the backplate before drilling and cleaned it of swarf before bolting it back on. I pinched the colour scheme from the Vanquish although the underside was pinched some some of the current F3A designs. Of course, against a blue sky when at the top of the box, they all look black anyway! Peter

Hi Ron - too late! The balsa bashing was initiated as soon as I found the problem! The pipe clearance issue is linked to the final curved pipe exhaust which can be rotated to any angle and locked by a grub screw. Until I have the Gangster sitting on its wheels I won't know exactly how much space there is. I like the idea of bigger wheels though but they are much bigger than on my F3A birds!

Today, was a rather frustrating day. I had a number of extension leads to make up which went fine - unusual for me! It was then time to fix the Rx in position and connect up all the servo leads and the switch harness. A quick check on the elevator and rudder movement had them in around the right area for low, medium and high rates. That left the balancing. Having bolted on the top cowl, I then bolted the wing on and attached the manifold and tuned pipe. The good news was that there was minimal bending of the exhaust joiner to get the tuned pipe correctly seated on its support bracket. The first problem was that there was insufficient clearance between the bottom cowl piece and the manifold. Manifold off and cowling piece adjusted to clear it, and then manifold on again. Fit the spinner backplate, prop and spinner. No need to carve the spinner to accept the prop as there was a large enough cut out to clear the prop - hooray! Carefully sighting from one mainwheel to the tailwheel showed that there would be very little space for the beautifully made exhaust efflux pipe. Careful adjustment of the position of the pipe support bracket gave a bit more clearance. This won't mean much to you as I forgot to take a photo of it, but it looks like I shall have to rotate the end pipe so that it doesn;t curve down but rather curves to the side. Will only make a final decision once all is in place and I can put it onto its wheels and measure the clearance between the pipe and the ground. One thing you can see in the picture below is the problem with the bottom cowl piece. How I came to make such an error in shaping the cowling to match the spinner I really don't know. Suffice to say, that I will have to decide how best to achieve the desired shaping as most of the underlying structure is going to be sanded away to get the cowling to blend smoothly onto the spinner! Despite these annoying problems, all the items to enable flight were now installed except for the battery and switch harness. I did a trial balance at the rearmost quoted CG figure of 5 inch back from the wing leading edge at the root. The aircraft was slightly tail heavy. Placing the battery pack, a 2S Life of 2500 mah capacity, as near to its most forward position with the switch just behind it gave a balance. Looks like I'll need to make a battery box before installing the Rx in the original, but now empty tank bay. Placing the battery pack, a 2S Life of 2500 mah capacity, as near to its most forward position with the switch just behind it gave a balance. Looks like I'll need to make a battery box before installing the Rx in the original, but now empty tank bay. The alternative battery, a 2 cell NiMh of 2500 mah, as well, is a good deal heavier than the LiFe cell but I could see no good reason for fitting it until I’d flown and checked how the Gangster actually flies. Back to balsa bashing tomorrow..

Posted by Nigel R on 28/01/2019 10:45:50: Looking good Peter re: the above, are you looking for a header/pipe joiner? If so, 19mm ID silicon tube is available on ebay, £3.60 for 1/2 metre here: https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Silicone-Vacuum-Vac-Hose-Pipe-Tube-3mm-4mm-5mm-6mm-7mm-8mm-9mm-10mm-Available/290742298928?hash=item43b1976930:m:mukwgwKXqWPSCPCt7EqavOw:rk:6f:0 Thank you Nigel, that's very useful. Might just get some of that.

Posted by Braddock, VC on 28/01/2019 11:52:21: I thought it may prove a substitute for the pipe insulation you used to stop your leads rattling, not everyone has that amount of space for large diameter tube. Oh! Got hold of the wrong stick there! Thanks for that.

Hi Braddock, thanks for that. I looked it up and it seems to say that there are 3 sizes namely 12 mm internal bore, 9 mm and 6 mm. I need a 20 mm bore so doesn't seem to fit the bill. Do you use it for connecting exhaust components and does it stand up to the heat? Looks quite soft for such use but it may work OK for those with the right bore requirements.

Posted by David Payne 4 on 28/01/2019 01:06:21: If you don't have an examiner in your club/ flying group and wish to take a BPC/A/B test then contact the BMFA office and they will put you in touch with your local examiners I would suggest contacting your Area Achievement Scheme Coordinator in the first instance as they will be better placed to help. If you don't know who your ASC is then you can find a list on the Achievement Scheme Website under the Contact Us tab and you can email them from there.. If you don't know in which Area your Club is then you will need to call Head Office. It is the Area that administers the Achievement Scheme not Head Office.

Posted by Handyman on 28/01/2019 00:02:50: I personally do not see any advantage of wanting to fly above 400 feet. I like to keep my models at a height where I can see what they are doing, and can get them back on the ground in the shortest possible time, if problems appear. Not fly to a height where its just a speck in the sky. Handyman, you may like to know that there are 2 types of aerobatic competition where if you were limited to 400 ft you would not be able to perform the required manoeuvres. F3A, the FAI aerobatic Schedule, requires you to fly at approx 150 mtrs out from the pilot and judges and has a vertical limit of 60 deg to the horizontal. This puts the height at 300 mtrs or 980 ft. I sometimes end up at 1200 ft if I'm late in initiating a vertical manoeuvre. These heights do relate to 2 mtr class models but they are perfectly visible to both the pilot and, more importantly, to the judges. The other type is IMAC where 3 mtr span is the norm and they also go well above 400 ft. Jets are the other type of aircraft that will need to break 400 ft for almost any vertical manoeuvre especially if they fly fast. Just thought you might like to know that there are very good reasons for flying above 400 ft.

Didn’t get much done today but did manage to fit the canopy. I hate this job as it’s so nerve wracking! I just couldn’t get the canopy to stick down in places until I tried using my covering iron to heat the canopy and the glue underneath. Not much heat and finger pressure on the bits that didn’t want to stick worked a treat! I fitted the throttle servo next and then the engine with the throttle pushrod fitted in place (it’s a z bend onto the throttle arm) and fed into the screw fitting on the servo arm making sure the grub screw had a dollop of thread lock. I could then offer up the top cowling to make sure that the throttle could move without any hindrance and connected up the pressure nipple and carb feed pipes. I made up the extension leads from the Rx position to the elevator and rudder servos and fitted the servos. I fitted the Dubro heavy duty horns and assembled the turnbuckle pushrods. After zeroing the sub trims and then fitting the control horns at the closest position to 90 degs to the servo, I fine tuned this position using the sub-trims and bolted the pushrod in place. Final adjustment of the control surface was simply a matter of twisting the turnbuckle to suit. Still need to trim the rudder horn fixing bolts but ran out of time!

Handyman, I fail to see where HASW has any impact on our hobby. I'm not quite sure who you have in mind for your comment "Then suddenly, out of the depths emerged the unelected spectre of Bureaucracy." If you mean the Government, then you and I elect them. If you mean the BMFA, again, you and I elect them - if there is more than one candidate for one of the Executive posts and your Club elects its Area representative on Council. So, to whom are you addressing this point? The BMFA has always been at pains to point out that the Achievement Scheme is just that - an achievement. It is not, and has never been a licence. That being said, Clubs, whose committees are elected by members, tend to use the competency to fly solo as the BMFA A test. Some also seek a B Certificate if members wish to fly a jet or an aircraft that weighs more that 7 Kg. Again, this is not a BMFA requirement. There is a recommendation that all pilots flying in front of the public should have a B Certificate but I suspect that most Display Directors would want to know a bit about the pilot and their competency than just "I have a B". I have seen some pilots who hold a B certificate fly and they would struggle to pass the A as they have not kept their skills current. The reason why the BMFA encourages Areas to run Achievement Scheme Workshops is to help Examiners as well as instructors and candidates to come up to date with what is standard for a pass in both the A and B tests. I have seen Examiners demand that candidates fly the Fig 8 with a 45 deg cross over when this requirement was replaced with two touching circles in 2010 for the A and has never been there for the B. If you are to have a national standard such as the BMFA Achievement Scheme surely it is only common sense for all partaking in the scheme to know what is the standard required for a pass? Otherwise, you will get overly strict and overly lenient standards between Clubs and that is not a good thing. For example, an ACE told me that his view of the B was that it was all about safety and flying skill was secondary so if the candidate did not loop directly in front of the pilot position he was OK with that. Same for the 2 rolls, he didn't think the needed to be centred. If you have that interpretation of a B how can you be sure that the holder of a B passed by such an examiner is able to put his aircraft where it needs to be and not where the aircraft and wind takes it? As an Examiner, I practise the B schedule on a number of occasions in the year. This is so that I can demonstrate the B to a candidate and know that I can fly it to the required standard - or where I don't, to tell the candidate what I did wrong. I fail to see why providing these Workshops is such a big issue for you Handyman. When you talk about extra burdens on Examiner and Instructors are, what are they? I would expect all Examiners and Instructors to be aware of the need to download and read the Guidance Notes on the various A, B and C tests. However, I know that some Examiners can't be bothered to do this simple thing (you can also ask the office to post you hard copy if you don't use the internet). If you don't read the latest guidance notes, which are updated every year now, and you don't go to any workshops how can you examine candidates fairly? The BMFA rules are not legislation. That is down to the government, or rather in the case of drones, to the European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) and the BMFA has been doing a sterling job to keep the impact as low as possible. I think that, so far, they have done marvellously well although we will need to see what legislation the government enact towards the end of 2019. I look forward to reading your response.

Would have been better if they had left then undrilled. Mind you, drilling the holes in the right place ain't a piece of cake either.

Thanks Jim. The 75 I flew really impressed me and I hope this one lives up to it.

Just to clarify, the AS Roadshows to which Duncan refers are the ones run by the ASRC and not the ones run by Areas in this first iteration. He says that he will consider extending this to Area run events next year. I think this will significantly reduce the number of Examiners reached as they will need to make one of the 2 Roadshows in 2019. Fingers crossed that Phase 2 comes along in 2020.

Good solution. I've never liked choke rods coming out of the front of the cowl - don't know why though!

Thanks Ron, so am I!

I don't think Battersby were still making RAF Officers hats in 1969. Bates, Alkit, Burton (I think) and one other, whose name escapes me, were the only suppliers then AFAIK.

Looking good!

Finding a civil pilot figure that would look about right took some searching but I eventually settled on an existing pilot figure after cutting it down to fit under the canopy. I painted the cockpit area black. When tidying up the shed, I found the round balsa plug that I had cut out for the carb intake and that fitted the need for a head pad for the pilot! Suitably painted it allowed the pilot’s head to be glued to the head rest. A search of my “Instrument Panel” folder did not produce an aerobatic instrument panel so I settled for a standard panel and just cut off the top 3 instruments It would have been nice to have included a G meter but, hey, this is a Gangster! The next job will be to trim the canopy to fit and glue that in place using Canopy Glue (aka craft glue) once all the paint is dry and the pilot glued in place. The task I’d been dreading now reared its head. I had to drill and tap the engine backplate to take the pressure nipple. As it happened, it was childs play and the whole job took less than 10 minutes to complete. Next up was to fit the tank in place. I fitted the feed and vent pipes and used some anti slip material under the tank and between the Velcro straps and tank before tightening up the Velcro straps. I fitted the Dubro filler valve and connected up the tank feed and the engine feed. That in turn was fitted to the pump input and the pump bolted into place. And that brings the build blog up to date. I’m still hoping to have this complete by the end of Jan 2019!