Nicholas Booth

Hi Ken    Thanks for the video, I wish I had mine on film as I think I would have seen a lot more information. In your flight you can see the right wing lift off before the left and would have point me more towards the thrust angles. Did he use any flaps do you know. I will check my angles out as a matter of priority first I think.     Nick

Trust angles were a long story. When build the kit it called for 6.5Degrees down thrust and 4 degree outward thrust for each motor. I had a long email exchange with Top Flite re the angles and they stated that the down thrust was required, but the side thrust was there to stabilize the plane in case of a motor loss. As it was built electric, and the chances of a normal styl engine out were not there, I removed the side thrust (had seen it done on other forums and flown without issues).   Again, not sure what to expect with the side thrust and what 4degrees outward on each motor may give.

I know I checked the wing both before and after the crash so don't expect the wing to have any issues. as for the motors, I couldn't get a positive read on the rpm's so used the rough speed which seemed to show within 150rpm of each other and also their voltage pull was less than 0.1 of an amp, but thinking now there may still be a difference in actual pull of the motor which will be worth checking. I will create some sort of harness to check each motors actual pull. Hopefully I will get some freetime this week to start checking the bits out. I went to spray the nose back up to green today but found I had not sealed my air canister properly.......off to the shops again tomorrow.

Whilst I wouldn't class myself an expert, I have flown a large number of planes over the last 7-8 years including a few really tail heavy and some nose heavy kits. The problem is that I have never had an issue keeping the plane on the ground before, which I attempted to do the second flight. I expected the tail to lift but not for the right wing to drop both times. I am pretty sure that whilst in the right circumstance it might have been saveable the second flight, it dropped its wing so fast I couldn't catch it. What I didn't state in my first post, was that I did a stall test on the first flight to see what it would do after the bad take off but it came to an almost stop and just droppped its nose. not what I expected nor the other flyers at the field. I think that moving the CoG is a first attempt and may also remove some of the pitch on the blades to increase the speed before take off......

it did on the second flight, but you know what it is like when flying a plane for the first time, I had thought about moving the CoG forward a tad as part of the rebuild. I just wanted to make sure there was nothing else I could be missing

Hi all    I have had abreak from flying for a while but am about to ressurect my Top Flite DC3 that I crashed ealry last year. It only had 2 flights, I will try to list both flights for an idea of what happened.   The kit was built from a Top Flite standard kit and converted to electric whilst doing so. The power supplied from the motors is far greater than the plane would ever need to fly. I have put 3 bladed, variable pitch props due to ground clearance.   First flight: It taxis fine without issue, no ground looping an felt nice and stable, due to our field layout their was a fairly strong side wind from right to left, but nothing extreme. I accelerated fairly quickly getting her to 3/4 power at which point she pretty much jumped into the air (45-55degrees) at about 15 feet she dropped the right wing to an almost knife edge position, I managed to use full rudder (I had left lots of rudder in just in case) and brought her back to the straight and level. after which she flew ok but placed a lot of down in the elevator to keep her level. I was quite nervous when flying her but could not remember much else, except on landing I pulled up elevator and had a fairly feeble response with a stronger than wanted bounce on the floor. no damage.   Second flight: Not tempting fate I didn't fly again the same day, but a few weeks later. I had put the ealrier issues down to not keeping her in the ground long enough although the speed had been really fast. This time the wind was from left to right and about the same speed. Knowing that I had since trimmed the plane, I expected a different take of and applied gentle throttle, holding up elevator until the tail rose and then tried to use down to keep her on the ground without hitting the props on thr ground. This time she took off at 1/3 throttle and there was nothing with the controls I could do to keep her on the ground. This time she dropped the same right wing, caught the ground and cartwheeled. The elevator felt a little bit twitchy.   I did not use flaps on either take off, but tested them first flight, the first setting raised the nose by about 5degrees, the second about 15 degrees.   I am just finishing the repairs and am looking for help in what could be the cause and maybe a fix or two   If you can help then please do as I would like to fly the plane soon and right now expect it to do the same thing again unless I make changes     Nick

you seemed to miss me out of the last couple of draws, maybe this one then NIck

Count me in please, this one looks nice

Hi Gary   Sorry for the dealy in replying to you but work has got in the way of a lot of things lately.  Firstly, I have built a few Top Flite kits Sea Fury and DC3, and have the Spitfire winging its way to me as we speak. I also have in the loft somewhere the mustang as part of my 'i'll buy it cos the credit card is empty and build it when I am ready ' projects All have built quite nicely with reasonable quality wood ( a Little heavy ) but fine for an avaerage plane. Also, if you muck up a section, Top Flite are excellent at sending individual sheets of pre cut parts. As for retracts, they are not too hard to fit and whilst they can add some weight they can also improve the flying ability of some planes. The manuals are very well written, but be sure you follow the correct section for either with or without retracts. I fly off of a fairly bumpy green also and for the best part they are ok, pot holes can cause instant dismantling. A good friend of mine uses an inline fuse so that if the retracts lock up then they do not drain the battery, where as I always go for a second battery pack. As for the choice, I love the look of wheels going up and down, will you ????  NIck

The kit has about 6 degrees of down thrust built in so don't want to mess with that too much. I will rebuild the front and try moving the batteries forward a tad and check the C of G again. Cheers guys

The model has only got into the air once and to be honest flew very nicely, it was set up with the recomended throws and did not overly react on elevator or ailerons. When building the plane you build in all sorts of angles and all were checked and double checked to make sure they were correct. The tail lifts off the ground very quickly and is the same in some of the videos I have seen on the internet of the plane crashing in pretty much the same way as mine. Once I have rebuilt the nose I will re-check the C of G but it was checked many times before taking it to the field. With only split flaps under neath I fear that applying them may give it a nose up attitude but try to lift it off even earlier but my knowledge of this is not too good. When I flew her thew first time she was happy at about 2/3 rd's throttle although a little fast for scale flying. I need to find a way of keeping her on the ground for longer to gain more speed before take off.

Hi all  Those of you who have seen my posts in the past know I have built and converted a Top Flite DC3 to brushless electric motors. The problem is not the electrics but the aerodynamjics of the plane. The first flight consisted of applying a large amount of throttle and the plane lifting of early down to what I believed a lot of wrong triming on the elevators. This caused a premature take off and an instant wing drop. I managed to correct this as it was about 20foot high using full rudder and a lot more power. I went on to fly the plane and trimmed it in the air so all was ok. the second flight was yesterday, not so succesful, I decided to have a smoother transition through the throttle this time but at just under half throttle and a short run it lifted off very prematurely but this time was too low when it dropped a wing and caught its wing tip and nose on the ground cart wheeling down the runway. The damage was not too bad, with the nose being destroyed and a few cracks here and there. For information, I applied up elevator at the start of the run until the tail lifted in the air and then converted this to as much down elevator as I could apply without catching the props on the grass runway. The tip stall is very vicious and quick when it happens and as it is a twin and was at low speed had lttle rudder authority. I am not sure of all the options I can use and what affect they would have. and am looking for help. I did not use flaps on take off as they seemed to have a nose up affect and I am not sure of how this would affect the take off at this time, I have seperate aileron servos joined with a Y lead but could seperate them and lose the landing lights and maybe configure them to be both in the up position on the training switch ( would take some serious manual reading I think) that could maybe be released when enough speed is gained for take off. Would flaps help or could they worsen the condition? I was hoping for plane with great landing and take off ability here so did not really want to tear away at full speed but just over 1/3 throttle is tooooo low. Any help please otherwise I may never try to fly it again and that would be a real shame. TIA Nick

No problems I have just charged the batteries and to say I am a happy man is an understatement. 1492Mah and 1455Mah. That would allow me 8 minute flights with plenty of Taxi time and some room to spare. I think that I will set my tranny up for 6.5 mins for the next flight and monitor again after the next charge. I guessed there would be a small difference between the two motors due to the variable pitch props that are very hard to set identically. I cannot wait for the next flight now Nick

Have you seen page 1 of the thread?

I think that I will check the batteries and then decide on whether or not to fit the DPM. if the batteries are too different in how much needed to recharge them then you either reduce your flight to suit or fit the DPM. I had planned only a 3 minute flight time total for the first flight but it was nearly a minute of slow taxiing followed by 4 minutes of flight. It didn't feel longer than a minute up in the air and then I was landing. I was too busy thinking about the controls rather than enjoying the flight. and had the weather been better I wold have braved another flight but taking off across wind is not desireable. I will let you know what I manage to put back in the batteries though, anything less than 2000mah will make me a very happy man but today will tell.  I did get some film of it but it was with a camera not a camcorder so most of it is out of focus and the sky was terrible also. I will try to film the next one though. Nick