Ron Gray

What supports the tail?

Well I need to make a new dolly ASAP, up at the field at the moment, first flight this morning the FW fell out of the dolly breaking the prop on the tarmac. But much worse is that the ply engine former has cracked and there isn’t a lot of room to replace it so I may have to use some carbon tow and resin to repair it. Bearing in mind that it wasn’t a heavy ‘crash’ maybe a thicker former for new builds?

It is so well behaved, straight out of the box and no trimming. What I like best are the non scale Reno racer type pylon turns about 30’ off the deck! I’m going to take some nose weight out today as, whilst it flies really well as it is, all of the CG tests I’ve done indicate that it’s nose heavy. Removing some of that lead may also help with the dolly take offs.

No problem for Richard as he makes train kits! 🚂

Now, here’s a thought,the gutter type with a bungee attached to the front of the trolley. I’ve got some spare squareline gutter…………………….

My dolly was originally built to launch delta wings both EDF and pusher but mainly the latter as I have some potential bacon slicers powered by 6s and there is no way anyone, including me, will go anywhere near them for launching. Hence why I said that I think the problem is one of weight. A new one has been designed!

Thanks guys for all your responses, I was going to close the voting yesterday but decide to let it run on a bit. Anyway it is now CLOSED. The results are in and after final verification the verdict is that the Mystic will be the subject of the next Vlog and it should hopefully start tomorrow if I can finish off my gardening chores in time!

6” front, 5” rear all independent axles on mine Eric. For that last vid I had freed and oiled the axles so they were all free running, I think the dolly is too heavy! So I can make a new, lighter dolly or add some power to this one 😲 The other thing I had thought about doing was change the prop from the 12 x 8 to a 12 x 6, the x 8 gives it plenty of thrust (2x its weight) but the lower pitch should accelerate quicker?

After the fog lifted it turned into a lovely day and allowed me to have several flights with the FW, dolly needs some work though!

A bit like an Acro Wot with attitude! (75" w/s).

Now there's a thought!

I do have a soft spot for the Rascal due to how much enjoyment I get from the big 110” one I have. The design just looks so good. Having said that I do love my Laser engines and building a ‘Mad Max’ type rendition of the Mystic is also a very attractive’ proposition.

This is a different approach where viewers of my YouTube channel will get to decide which model I build next! This will then form the content for the next build VLOG.

TWIN X14 also supports ACCST D16 and ACCESS modes

It’s always easier to blame the radio gear rather than dumb thumbs.

Then stretch to the X20S or really stretch to the Pro!

Thanks Ade, mucho appreciated.

Are you near a FrSky dealer Dave? Having said that the X18 and X20 feel very similar but I haven’t tried the X14. I’ve got the X20S and love it, you will find a huge difference in quality between the QX7 and either the X18 or X20 and Ethos is certainly more intuitive than OpenTX. Whatever you do don’t hold an X20Pro, they are superb and you’ll hanker after one!

Many thanks for your kind words Gordon, I’ve said this before but getting these sort of responses make it all worthwhile especially when things have been learnt from them! There will be more build Vlogs as I have quite few to do! Regarding the FW’s speed, for the vast majority of the flights it was flown a bit faster than ‘scale’ so that I could get used to it and it was also flown way faster than scale when I was doing some full throttle fly pasts as that always brings a grin! The landings weren’t too bad as long as the approach is a long one which gives the model time to slow down, the next flights should be better as I’ve now settled on the amount of noseweight required and I now know how it flies. I will be filming it again to makeup for the poor quality of the last one!

Sorry, I meant longer not lower!

The final Chapter 30

The video is currently being uploaded to YouTube. TBH it's not the best video due to the fact that I had the GoPro angled too high and that it was a really horrible sky for photos. The video is actually the second flight as I hadn't go the camera switched on for the maiden! From the launch I didn't need to input any trim changes at all, it just flew straight and level out of the launcher's hand but I felt that it was a bit nose heavy. So for the second flight which the video shows I had removed 1/3rd of the nose weight which made it slightly more sensitive but the 45º inverted climb showed it to still be nose heavy, however the onlookers all agreed that it didn't look as good as it did in the maiden flight. So I will be putting a bit more lead back in the ballast box. The stall is non existent and it was 'planted' throughout its flights showing a good (non scale) turn of speed with WOT, flight times were circa 8 minutes which left just over 30% in the 3700mAh 4s packs. It does take a bit of time to slow down on landing so lower approaches are the order of the day but it comes in nice and flat. Hand launching was easy and there was no torque roll or nose dipping. It's a winner!

Later Eric, it’s the final chapter in the VLOG, Chapter 30.

Maiden flight day

Using my Dubro prop balancer.