Cuban8

Interesting stuff. Not essential to know the ins and outs, but all part of the pleasure of the hobby. Wasn't aware that Zenoah sparkies had no advance and retard - rather like my lawn mower I guess - all a compromise to keep it simple.

Not something that I've given too much thought to, but the nature of the glow ignition system precludes any seperate ignition timing system that you will find on spark ignition systems. Usually highly critical, especially on high performance two stroke motor bike engines (still have my Mitutoyo dial gauge and spark plug adapter from back in the day) a mis-set engine would blow a piston crown very quickly. Points just open at 1.8mm BTDC IIRC on my Yamahas. Auto advance weights would take care of the advance from the basic static timing point. How do our glow ignition (and I suppose compression ignition diesels) cope with the timing change requirements across the rev range? Presumably ignition has to advance as revs increase? With no mechanical or electronic advance - what's occuring?

Should never have stopped using Castor based fuels - used to bung up worn needle valve threads a treat.......😁

Exhaust diverters and not much else - a very good description. Fourstrokes, either glow or petrol just have a more acceptable note. Even with straight through headers on his OS twin cylinder, my friend's engine's 'noise' is acceptable.

It obviously depends on where the model is to be flown. A site out in the middle of nowhere and very sparsely inhabited will probably be OK, although even then, walkers and farmers worried about disturbance to stock animals or wildlife can be problematic. Even other flyers find the noise tiresome after a while!. Clubs who do have to be extra careful about upsetting their neighbours because of noise (i.e. most clubs, certainly here in the UK) often run into trouble with noisy petrol two strokes and it's caused friction in the past within my two clubs over the years when models have had to be grounded. This whole issue of noisy two stroke petrols has never been properly dealt with, either by the manufacturers or distributors.......or dare I say it, by the modelling press who IMHO, have always tiptoed around the problem. Manufacturers have supplied their products with inadequate noise reduction and we've let them get away with it. Those with many years in the hobby might remember the magazine cartoon ad of a face shouting out and saying "use an effective silencer" way back in the 1980s. Very wise words - but if there is no effective silencer provided or available, then what?

Not with any fourstroke petrols that I've heard at my club. Two strokes just have that crackle, energy and sound quality that can be a problem. I have mates who have spent hundreds of pounds on custom exhausts for two stroke petrols and I've not been at all impressed with the returns in terms of 'silencing/muffling' - better yes, but would still be a problem at noise sensitive sites IMHO. Where I fly, two stroke petrols have fallen out of favour somewhat with us- we have housing developments and recreational facilities not a huge distance away from us so we have to be mindful of how sensitive some folks are at any sort of noise that carries.

Just a few thought that might help your decision. If you're looking to have a model like the Skybolt look and sound nice, then a two stroke of any description will never fit the bill in my opinion. It'll fly OK but the sound and character that you're after might never really satisfy you and you may become disappointed. Very much a personal thing. If you're not in a hurry start saving now for a petrol 4st - don't dismiss a glow fourstroke - I run my OSs and ASPs on the lower (15%) content Laser fuel and the amount of residue is a lot less than 20% oil content fuels. Any glow fourstroke will be a lot less messy than a glow twostroke, just the nature of how they work and how the oil is used. Siting the exhaust in the best position to keep the residue away from the model is also important, so careful planning during construction is to be considered. Several Saito petrol fourstrokes in my club and they really are superb, but the bigger ones are a lot of money for ordinary mortals and even their .60ish size baby one is four hundred quid.

Signs of discolouration on a broken RX charge lead that I was about to resolder this afternoon. Black wire quite discoloured and broken although red wire still looked bright at solder connection. Stripping back insulation revealed both conductors badly blackened. Original charge lead from my first decent Futaba set (Gold) from over forty years ago so can't complain. Still throws up questions as the lead is never left connected to a battery but simply left curled up in the drawer until needed.

If you can find a good OS/Saito/Laser then that's great, but ASP and SC are very good engines in my experience. My oldest 4St is a 30+ years old Magnum 91, which is another OS clone and still flys my Goldberg Chippy around with no problem. Never needed major maintenance other than a couple of new sets of bearings over its long life - compression still excellent and runs even better now on Laser 15% oil fuel.

You've got nothing to lose by offering them to club members. I've still got a box of a dozen or so assorted engines from my late friend's estate - all thirty years or older, nothing particularly exciting and all quite well used, no real interest from folks. Quite a reasonable old Saito 80 that I'll probably get going myself as a project when I feel like it.

You might consider fitting a 'ballast tube' through the foam core, although instead of using it for its intended purpose, run your servo wiring through. Should be able to easily remove the wiring through it in the case of needing to change a dodgy servo in the future. Easy enough to do with a sharpened suitable length and size of aluminium tube that can be somewhat smaller in dia to run your wires through, over a what's usually needed for ballast slugs. Just an idea, many ways to skin a cat. Trigger warning......I've never hurt or injured any felines when I've fitted ballast tubes back in the day.😁

Hopefully remaining on topic.........the continuing availability of fuel to us will become an issue in the not too near future, I suspect. A much reduced range from the remaining domestic manufacturers that will reflect the gradual shrinking use of IC, will probably be the starting sign. Eventually, I guess not in the immediate future, we'll rely on imported fuel from the US who may be able to sustain production supporting their reduced but still very big model industry for a while longer. The humble glowplug's on-going availability or lack of, might cut the ground from our feet before everything else if we're not careful.

Yes, a combination of throttle setting and prop when I've played around with a friend's over powered vintage style model. Master Airscrew props are intrinsically less efficient than other makes so might be worth experimenting with. They are easy to cut down with care, and providing they're balanced well each time, you could try a certain amount of cut-and-try to get the performance you're looking for. Either that or a big box of props!

I think one things almost for sure and that is to not take too much stock in the performance claims V price of suppliers. Big C batteries used in EDFs do work very hard and just wont give the same service life time as a cheaper and more moderately used battery in a 'normal' sport model. I've been getting my lipos from Amazon recently - nothing special, just for my sport flyers that don't get too much of a hammering and find them to be absolutely fine. 6 X 3S 3000 mA batteries for sixty five quid in a recent Prime offer. All work fine and well balanced on receipt.

Doesn't the issue of IC engines continuing to be available to our hobby simply rest upon somebody's motivation to manufacture them? Apologies for stating the obvious. The motivation? A viable, growing market to sell the products to in quantity, and at a margin that makes the whole venture worthwhile and profitable. A mixed bunch of products from the throw away varienty (well almost) through the mid ranges and than the top of the market complex products for the aspiring types. We used to have that twenty or thirty plus years ago, but no more. Clearly, the Chinese manufacturers who really did a wonderful job of producing a wide range of affordable and perfectly good engines had their motivation drained from them. The likes of ASP, SC and a few other smaller brands, must have sold millions of engines to a world wide audience, but dropped them like a hot brick and in short order. I wonder what those firms are doing now - the tooling investment must have been vast to produce such a huge range of engines even with the much reduced cost of Asian manufacturing. OS and Saito must be facing a similar problem - their range is a shadow of its former self and the cost of their products is much increased. As far as I'm aware the Indian manufacturers don't seem to be interested in filling the void. They're not fools, they know the sales are just are no longer there in the quantities needed. The use of IC will continue without a problem in our hobby for quite a few years yet - mainly driven by older modellers recycling older engines and bringing old shed stock back into use, I suspect - but when age etc finally does catch up.....then what? Does it really matter anyway? Enjoy it while you can.

Surely that was supposed to read 'was/is Ethanol'? Any fans of the Brilliant wartime police detective series 'Foyles War' will recall the repercussions of bootleg booze being badly produced for the black market in one episode, and the resultant selling under the counter of poisonous methanol rather than the drinkable good stuff

Wasn't there a newsletter published called 'Electric Flight UK' (EFUK) way back in the mid/late 80s? I remember having a short article published in it at the time. Long time ago so memory's a bit hazy. Pioneering days as has been said - I was the first to be successful with a non-glider type electric model in my club at the time. A Jack Headley plan design Piper Cub, suitably lightened and modified for electric. ROG just about possible with a big shove forward - eventually only became airborne from a hand launch as the nicads dropped in performance. Amazingly marginal tech, so different today.

It very much depends - I don't agree that eletric needs to be prohibitively expensive when converting an IC model. Maybe a large and heavy type but most sport types of around the usual 55" to 65" size or thereabouts are usually very viable. There's enough info around to prevent mishandling and there's really no need for any confusion regarding electric setups given the advice available from sources like 4Max. IC noise is not necessary as you say - the old Irvine Q series engines proved that years ago.

IC cars and IC model engines are totally different worlds witrh totally different issues. Whereas electric is a viable alternative for most models, electric is most certainly not the panacea for cars despite all the propaganda.

Regrettably, newcomers to our great hobby will be less likely to encounter IC engines when they buy their gear and will almost certainly start off with an electric power system in the future. This has been the case for quite some time now and is a reflection on how the hobby has been changing away from the old days of the 1950s/60s/70s etc. I say regrettably because I think the pleasure in running IC engines and becoming proficient in their operation was all part of the modelling right of passage. Just to be clear, I'm not stuck in the past missing the castor gunge over models, I simply regret that the choice will become more and more restricted. Even starting out with electric power (very sensible IMHO) and then subsequently looking to explore the fascinating world of IC will become more and more difficult. Electric power is mostly a means to an end for our models, whereas a nicely running IC engine (particularly a 4St) is very much more than a power source. I enjoy taking my leccy models out - no fiddling around - no cleaning etc etc when I have only an hour to spend flying, but there's a certain something about bringing an IC model to life with the starting process, the sound and vibration running through the airframe and the wisp of exhaust. Still plenty of opportunity to enjoy all that now, but not perhaps for newer generations given the way things are expected to go for us over the next decade.

Despite have a very serious word with myself a number of years ago about unfinished projects and only one at a time from now on, I've got half a dozen to choose from yet again. Not unique at all by all accounts.

There's a surprise.😉 No drone expert myself, but a quick Google turns up a Mini 3 as a DJI product worth a few hundred quid by the looks of it, not sure if that's what it is though. Must have been lost over the bank holiday if it was found early this morning. Spoiled somebody's fun.