TonyS

Hi Craig, the simple answer is no but hopefully soon. I never did work out why I couldn’t get all 4 motors to function but by a process of elimination it all seemed to come back to my 4 into 1 lead from the esc’s. I remade it but with no better results. I’ve now ordered one off eBay which is making its way from China as I type. Hopefully this will sort it out, if not, I’m at a complete loss and can’t proceed to finish the plane until I’m sure what the fix is. fingers crossed and thanks for asking. Tony

Sounds like the consensus is : a gyro isn’t a replacement for flying skills why not use assistance where it helps Set the plane up properly without the gyro first gyro ordered Thanks everyone.

I guess there’s a bit of a purist in me. Gyros didn’t exist when I started flying and I’ve always thought that it’s a cop out from actually learning how to properly fly a plane but........ I’ve found myself wondering on a couple of occasions recently whether a gyro might not make sense in certain circumstances. The first situation - hand launching an edf. I had an unfortunate experience recently when hand launching a plane when I wasn’t quite quick enough back onto the controls after throwing it and a gust of wind tipped the thing sideways before it had enough speed to be able to recover. I suspect that a gyro would have quickly compensated and kept it level until I’d both thumbs back where they needed to be. The second is me being a whimp. I’be built a pretty quick balsa Gloster G40 from a kit, spent a lot of time getting it looking right and everyone that’s seen it has made a point of noting that it’s a heavy model with a thin wing profile running on 8S. Basically it’s going to be very very quick. I’m wondering whether I shouldn’t install a gyro as I feel I should take advantage of all the help I can get, if nothing else but to give me the confidence to actually maiden it! what does everyone else think? Am I just a dinosaur for thinking gyros are cheating?

That 6s version can really shift! placed an order for the Turnigy Heavy Duty 4s 2200 today but have just been refunded as they’d made a mistake with stock levels and are out of stock. Oh well, I guess it’ll be parked gathering dust a while longer.....

Awesome. Great advice as always so thanks all. I do find that the nose leg on this collapses easily - the slightest knock and so I tend to take off on my driveway which is tarmac but very narrow so little room for rudder error. The lawn is like a bowling green so I might try hitting that and see what happens. (I live on a farm in case any of you are wondering if I’ve lost my marbles). Will report back when I’ve got hold of a new battery! Thanks again.

Thanks Peter, cant see any 4s 2200’s in that brand. Back in the day I used Overlander extremes and they were good for anything. Only 30c but seemed up to most challenges. Will keep looking. T

Thanks all. more new batteries😫 What does everyone here recommend for high C rated batteries?

Thanks Mike, I’m using the highest rated batteries I can find - Turnigy Nano Tec 2200 4s 90c. If that isn’t enough I’m lost....!

Hi everyone, probably been covered before somewhere but.... I took my old Vampire foamy out today to give it an airing but only remembered why it’s been sitting unused for years... it has retracts and therefore takes off from the ground rather than being hand launched. Several times I put it down powered up then increased to full throttle only for the motor to ‘die’ as the throttle lever hit the max. Needless to say it never got off the ground. i have flown this before so not sure what’s going on. I tried a second battery but had exactly the same result so I doubt it’s the batteries (unless they;re both knackered in the same way). basically the power curve seems to increase until the throttle hits c 75-80% of travel after which it starts to drop off. could I have inadvertently messed up the settings on my DX7 TX? could it be an issue with the ESC? anything else? Answers on a postcard (or in this thread) please.......

Thanks chaps. some food for thought. First I’ll check the throttle settings then I think I’ll jury rig a cross connection to see if it’s an arming issue. I’ll tease out the live wires from three ESC connections but to be honest I can’t see that having any impact given the way it’s wired. Frustrating.

Posted by Craig Carr on 31/08/2020 08:32:01: Hello Tony, im the same as Peter, can’t think of anything offhand, if you’ve done it as described it will work. Did you remove the 3 x red wires directly from the escs rather than any servo y leads? Edited By Craig Carr on 31/08/2020 08:55:58 No Craig I excluded the ‘live’ from the 4 into 1 on three of the sockets - same effect I’d have thought.

OK. So the fans, batteries and esc's are wired as per the diagram. Things to note. Battery 1 powers the inside fans, Battery 2 the outside fans All cables from the ESCs are intact. The 4 into one only carries the positive from ESC wire 3 to the Rx Battery 1 is connected first to give Rx power It doesn't work When I power up only two fans ever work. Is this something to do with the arming sequence for the motors? Is it because having plugged the Rx in and this having 'set' the ESC's for the two motors powered by Battery 1, when I then connect Battery 2 the Rx isn't then shaking hands with the two additional ESC's?

Thanks Peter, I have a funny feeling that today is going to be one of those painstaking step-by-step testing days! still, I can think of worse things on a dull BH Monday. 😀

Thanks Peter, I have a funny feeling that today is going to be one of those painstaking step-by-step testing days! still, I can think of worse things on a dull BH Monday. 😀

Guys, I’m now completely stumped. I've created a 4 into 1 cable for my ESC leads with the red wire removed from three so the Rx only receives power from one. So, two batteries. One battery powers the middle fans and the other the outside fans. Only one ESC is powering the Rx so the battery to that motor gets connected first. (This battery powers the outside motors). All the usual bleeps and I have control of retracts, rudder (for the nose-wheel) and elevrons. I then connect the second battery. I then have power to the inside motors (from the second battery) but no power to the outside motors. no matter what I do I don’t seem to be able to get power to the outside two motors. All suggestions welcome. Thanks.

Thanks Craig, I didn't get a three way harness with the retracts sadly. The thread is really useful thanks. It's given me a few ideas. It was interesting to see that others had issues with the thrust tubes. That is what stalled the build in the first place. I did everything including building a tapered 'template' tube to wrap the acetate around. In the end I found it was as easy to stick the acetate in the fuse, the natural tendency for it to unroll and the fan in place held it together with the aid of some sellotape. I then glued using canopy glue which took several days to dry. Anyway, once I'd managed to get over that hurdle I was back into balsa gluing which is where I'm most comfortable! Can't see where you put the Rx? Was it accessible after the build? I can't find a 4 way ESC connector block anywhere. If anyone has any ideas I'd be grateful to hear them. Thanks Tony

Just a quick question for all you veterans out there..,. When wiring up tricycle landing gear do you use a 3 way harness or two Y harnesses. The way I've cobbled mine together with extensions and two Y harnesses means that there are lots of connections to go wrong. I don't want to clip them all as the weight is climbing all the time so.....?

I've built a few kits before, all have been balsa builds from pre-cut kits and plans and I'm getting comfortable with the basics. This time I feel I've bitten off a bit more than I can chew. Wiring 4 EDF motors, elevons and retractable tricycle landing gear (with a steerable nose wheel) to two batteries and a single transmitter is pretty daunting to say the least. I can see the wires multiplying before my eyes and there's not a lot of room and I can't see any instructions as to where to feed the wires from the nose wheel and steering servo through to where I think I'm going to have to squeeze in the Rx. I have got as far as ensuring the landing gear works and steers which is something I guess - video here

Thanks John, Love the Lippisch - looks a great little plane. I did see the Marlin but the u/c worries me. I don’t have anywhere smooth enough for such small wheels and I’d worry about the control horns if I belly landed it. Thoughts? Tony

Hi Trever, Great spot, thanks. I think I might just treat myself to the Freewing. The Starmax looked and flew beautifully for a (relative) cheapie. Tony

Thanks Ric. Useful to know.

But isn’t a 3s pack supposed to be delivering 11 volts or so, so it’s stretched to deliver 12.2?

I realise I've been away a while (8 years as it turns out) but when I was into flying a lot I used to be able to pick up really affordable but fun foamy like the Starmax Panther or the small Vampire (can't recall who made it) or the Multiplex Twister all of which were amazing little planes. Now there's almost nothing to pick from it seems. Even other types of plane like the Multiplex Blizzard with the tuning set which was a warm/hotliner (let's not get into that debate) is gone.   Anything that looks similar is 4 times the price. The world's changed a lot...... Edited By TonyS on 13/08/2020 18:58:31

Vecchio, quite right, all very confusing. Seems as though it's not as black and white as I'd thought however...just to add fuel to the debate which is the lifeblood of any community. First test on the Wattmeter shows 450Watts and 37 Amps drawn at WOT. The last pack I wrecked was an Overlander Extreme 1700 30C. Upon landing the charge was 12% (ouch - never usually go that low but in my defence it is a small capacity battery so the flight time went by very quickly...). As always it recovered, in this case to show 21% when it had cooled off a bit.