Geoff S

When I was forced to give up sailing and racing dinghies because of injury back in 1990. sailing club subs for my wife and I were about £150/year but for that we got a very well appointed club house with showers and changing rooms plus a bar and kitchen etc. Then we got almost exclusive use of quite a big reservoir. On top of that was the cost of our Scorpion dinghy (about £1800 second hand) plus sails from time time and other expensive bits of chandlery. However we made a lot of use of our investment and sailed at every opportunity including championships etc. It was pretty good value and we loved it. Makes the level aeromodelling I do quite inexpensive but then, I'm not into either giant scale or gas turbines. There are one or two members whose expenditure must be astronomical but generally most of us have relatively modest outlays. Geoff

This all reminds me of the problems I had with the parts/drawing/DVD pack I bought from Traplet in spring to build my scale Thames sailing barge. All was fine until I turned the hull over to fit the chines (I'd built it right way up in my fuselage jig ). The hull frames were miles out and the chine was wavy rather than straight. I ended up bodging the hull frames and got the hull completed eventually. Traplet admitted their error and refunded the whole £90 for the drawings (6 large sheets) and DVD as well as the faulty woodpack (the hull frame drawing is wrong too or I would have noticed). That made me happy. Perhaps RCME should make a corrected drawing available and replace the CNC cut woodpacks FoC? A wrongly placed hole on F2 coupled with misplacement of the wing dowel is one thing, fuselage formers in error by 4.5mm is another entirely! That is a huge error on a relatively small model. All the more annoying for me as, after sending off for the Dec issue specially, I find I threw it away inadvertently last week when clearing out genuinely old mags I've just ordered a second copy! Is the drawing sold separately the same as the one in the magazine or is it a copy of Peter's original? Geoff

It is a problem. We don't really want the motor to commit suicide by cutting through its own wires I've always been able to tape or stick the wires to the fuselage without going to lengths Pat suggests. Fortunately, on electric conversions etc it's more usual to mount the motor the other way round and then it's not a problem at all. Geoff

There is an enormous amount of down thrust on the Sonata 'E' electric glider to counteract zooming when the motor is started. I was a bit casual when I sawed off the front to convert it to brushless and didn't allow for enough down thrust - after all it's a very easy plane to fly. Big mistake! It was almost unflyable and I ended up having to put it down (undamaged) several fields away downwind. Every time I started the motor to push it upwind it just looped no matter how much down elevator. So down thrust can be essential in certain circumstances but my Sonata experience was probably an exception. Geoff

Posted by Steve J on 18/12/2015 21:19:32: Posted by Robin Colbourne on 18/12/2015 19:12:43: I would like to know the thinking behind the comment. If your address is on a lost model and the finder decides to keep or sell it rather than return it, you have told them where they can get more such items. Steve Exactly and that is the reason I would never put my address on a model ... or a bunch of keys fro that matter! I suppose a mobile (or BMFA) number is best because I think it may be possible to trace an address from a fixed line number. Geoff

IIRC, where I worked, the people who formalised the design draftsmen/women's drawings were called tracers. It seems the tracing paper must have slipped a few times when your design was drawn for publication. Fortunately all my design work was electronics or software so I never got involved in mechanical design. Anyone flying in aeroplanes with Rolls-Royce engines should be grateful for that Geoff

Posted by Chris Barlow on 18/12/2015 16:56:29: Will be following along. It'll be interesting to see if people come up with different ideas for an electric conversion or follow a generally accepted solution. Where abouts in Norway are you? Well I've gone for an SK3 4240 740rpm/v and a Plush 60 amp esc and I'll probably use a 3600 maH 4S LiPo. Unfortunately the motors I had in stock were either too big or too small and the highest current esc is a Black Mantis 50 amp. I have several Black Mantis esc and would have bought another except Giant Cod, who sold them, no longer exist. My first ever trip abroad back in 1966 was to Norway. We went in my then girl friend's mini and it had to be craned on and off the ferry on the way from Newcastle to Bergen. We did it on a the then £50/person travel allowance but it proved a very expensive trip - I proposed a week after we got back Beautiful country. Geoff

I was born and brought in an area surrounded by pits on the Notts/Derby border back in 1940 so mining was a part of my life. Just about the whole community relied on mining, even our family electrical etc shop whose customers were drawn from the industry. The other big employers were textiles and that's just about disappeared, too. It seems now that people survive somehow by taking in each other's washing. I did once read that it was criminal to burn coal because it's rich in other resources that can be used for manufacture. What I don't miss is the air pollution caused by domestic coal fires. I'm old enough to remember fog (smog) so thick that bus conductors had to walk in front of the buses and pedestrians had to be careful not to walk into lamp posts. I can also remember seeing miners with black faces (before pithead baths were introduced) squatting at the bus stop across from the shop. Strangers wouldn't know that there were ever pits except for the odd winding wheel memorial. Even the spoil heaps are grassed over. There were a lot of Polish immigrants then, too,- leftovers from the war who had names so oddly spelt they needed careful copying on the Hire Purchase receipts. Geoff Lots of memories and now finally completely ended.

I already had a 2 channel Futaba 27Mhz radio I used for model yacht racing so I built a Precedent Electrafly electric glider. On a whim I'd done a week's full-size gliding course at Camp Hill in Derbyshire and that inspired me to have a go at aeromodelling in my mid 50s in the 1990s The Electrafly had a weird arrangement to switch the motor on and off with the elevator control so you could get away with a cheap 2 channel radio. The trouble was you could never be sure if the motor was on or off! The result was that my second model was another Electrafly to replace the first After that I built myself a trainer and made my second aeromodelling serious mistake - I fitted an MDS 40 engine which lived up to its name - More Dead Sticks which probably cost me a year in my learning to fly. Having spent years working on my motor cycle engines I thought glow 2 strokes were so simple it didn't matter which one you fitted. Wrong!! Geoff

Posted by Mowerman on 17/12/2015 22:36:30: Do not try to add all your modelling expenses you may get a real bad shock. About thirty years ago I built a kit car and kept all bills and reciepts , when the car was finally on the road I added it all up and was shocked to see that I could have bought a new Lada and had plenty of change! Yes, but could you have bought a car? Geoff

Just as when I built myself a new bicycle I will never, ever, add up what I spend on toy aeroplanes and associated expenditure. Our bank accounts aren't rapidly draining and as long as that happy state of affairs continues that's my story and I'm sticking to it. btw my wife could easily work out how much I spend because she's the company treasurer She just wouldn't bother. Geoff

How are they going to identify the models, especially if they're own designed/built/modified etc etc? What's to stop you just having one registered and moving the registration from model to model? Way back in the 60s and 70s when I was very heavily into motor cycles I had friends who had numerous Triumphs dating from the 1920s to the 1960s who would simply move number plates from bike to bike to bike to save the VED (we all had Norwich Union insurance which insured us to ride any bike we owned). Another friend who built and competed with Ariel trials sidecars had two very similar set ups with the same number plate! The same sort of thing would be far, far easier with models. It's all nonsense and achieves nothing. Geoff

Posted by Fun Flyer on 17/12/2015 13:26:41: We've just been hit over here and it includes all Model Aircraft over 1kg. Irish Aviation Authority. A totally useless and unenforceable piece of legislation. That's a very brief report but the way it's written it implies each 'drone' would need to be registered unlike the US where it's each operator. Imagine having to register every model you own! I suspect every member of this forum has several flyable models and more that are potentially flyable where 'several' is a large positive integer (or, in my case not necessarily an integer ). If every one had to be registered individually it would overwhelm any government department. Geoff

How about a DB Sport and Scale Mascot trainer? I've no personal experience of this particular model but DB is a very reputable kit supplier and I doubt they'd market anything other than a quality model. Geoff

I agree with Matt. The positive and negative power connections are commoned in the receiver anyway. Might be a good idea to use the heaviest gauge wire you can fit in though. That's quite a small scale. How big is the loco? Geoff

If you can't get a 40 fs Surpass then either a 48 or a 52 would be alternatives. They are a bit heavier but not hugely so and you don't have to use the extra power. I have a 52 Surpass in a Flair SE5a which doesn't overpower it very much but gives a little extra security if you need it and the extra weight just means a bit less lead. Geoff

Even though I'm going electric I have a Super Tiger 34 I've had for years in various airframes (Precedent Funfly, big Lazy Bee and my Limbo Dancer until I converted it to electric) which would be ideal I would think. However Peter's preference for an OS40 fs Surpass would be the best choice IMO for the sound alone. Geoff

Posted by McG 6969 on 16/12/2015 08:31:31: Hi Dave, Hi Geoff, Concerning the Depron: white > 2, 3, 6 & 9mm / density: 40gr/m³ grey > 3 & 6mm / density: also 40gr/m³ aero > 3 & 6mm / density: 33 & 28gr/m³ respectively (so about 20% lighter) The 'normal' white comes in a 0,7 x 1,0m format (0,7m2) while the 'grey' & 'aero' comes in 0,8 x 1,25m (1m2). So, that's helpful to make a visual difference between the white ones. As I couldn't find it in Belgium, I got my aero from Ebay/UK > Kudos Trading in Nottingham. @ Geoff > Are you going to build a Depron Ballerina as well? Hope this helps Happy Deproning Chris Brussels, Belgium Edited By McG 6969 on 16/12/2015 08:34:21 Well, you learn something most days. I live fairly near Nottingham so I wonder if Kudos is open for visitors to save the hassle of big parcel postage. However, I'm not intending to build a Depron Ballerina. Converting it for electric flight is quite enough for me to attempt but I may have a go later. Unlikely this year (or 2016) as I have the Ballerina, a 2 metre electric glider (Thermal Magic designed by Trevor Wain, a club mate) and a Dennis Bryant SE5a. I will certainly be watching this buil;d with considerable interest. Whilst waiting for the bus to come back from picking up a parcel with the motor and esc for the Ballerina (I with Parcel Force would train thir staff to press the door bell!) I was tempted into the newsagent. I bought a copy of Quiet Flight which has an article about covering Depron in brown paper and PVA. Not read it yet but it seems it may overcome my objection to Depron - its fragility. Geoff

First I knew there were several types of Depron - aero, white and grey! I thought it was all the same in different thicknesses. Geoff

Posted by Electric God on 15/12/2015 10:27:12: People forget that Futaba were the first to patent and perfect 2.4 , way before the others got going. I suspect that in real terms, the revenue from selling the patent far exceeds any profits from manufacturing the goods.   Did Futaba patent the use of 2.4gHz as a carrier frequency? I doubt if there's anything to patent in that. In any case it's not the carrier frequency that's important but the channel hopping protocols that allow safe use by multiple users and each manufacturer uses its own which may be patented. I doubt if Futaba's protocol is patented because Frsky sell both transmitter modules and Futaba compatible receivers and AFAIK haven't been sued for copyright breech. I'm not sure how much FrSky 6 channel receivers cost but the last X8R (8 channel, telemetry enabled) receiver cost about £25 and 4 channels ones are less than £20. Geoff Edited By Geoff Sleath on 15/12/2015 13:08:20

There is a build article but it's not as useful as Peter's build thread here which is far more detailed. Though it doesn't mention Peter's trousers falling down as the magazine article does It shows that you not only need trouser clips for test flights but a pair of braces too. Geoff

Indeed. I very rarely watch live TV on my PC (I do have a licence, just no TV) but I just watched the lift off on BBC2. It was reminiscent of the time I borrowed a TV from my dad's shop back in 1969 and stayed up until about 4am to watch the first steps on the moon. I was a dead man walking at work later that day My nephew is a helicopter instructor at Shawbury. I wonder if he'll ever do anything like this. Geoff

Posted by Adrian Smith 1 on 14/12/2015 21:51:48: Anything is possible Martin, I am not infallible. The only thing I would say that I have used the same batch on my other two OS gassers recently and they seem fine. I have sent Ripmax an e-mail with photos asking for their thoughts and the stipulation that I haven't done any investigations myself. That must take a lot of will power. If it was me I'd be itching to grab the spanners and allen keys and stripping down to see what it's like inside. Your approach is absolutely the right one, of course. Just not the most interesting. I may be an electric flyer but I've stripped my fair share of engines (motor cycle, car and model) over the years and I'm as curious as the next man. I hope you get a satisfactory outcome. They aren't cheap engines. Geoff

Posted by Phil Green on 13/12/2015 09:42:34: Drone delivery plans, new roads, widening motorways, shipbuilding, electric vehicle research - is all a complete waste of time. Tomorrow they will invent the Start-Trek transporter and thereafter matter-transfer beams will make all the old ways completely redundant. Tomorrow, you'll see. Actually I've predicted for many years that eventually virtual reality will become so good that it'll be impossible to tell the difference between that and real life. That will largely negate the need to travel. You'll be able to experience the holiday of your dreams IN your dreams and as whoever or whatever (eagle? ) you wish. There'll be grass growing through the cracks in the motorways. The main problem will be that virtual food isn't very nourishing I'm half serious btw. When I started getting involved with computers (1961) I had to go to the library to find out exactly what they were and it wasn't much help. The ICT1301s I was involved with testing at GEC were enormous and not a silicon transistor or chip in sight - all germanium GET103s mostly and hyper fast 1Mhz clock speed. When I think of what's changed in my working life I just wish I'd be alive to see what happens in the next 50 years. Geoff

I think the 400' limit is only advisory or there goes thermal soaring and probably F3a aerobatics? I fly my Phoenix 2k up to 200 metres according to my altimeter. Looks like the quads are making hard for us all as some predicted. It seems odd that regulating model aircraft in the USA is a lot easier than regulating firearms even though there seems to be a mass shooting every month. Geoff