Martin Harris - Moderator

A club near ours lost its longstanding flying field on what was apparently the whim of the farmer's wife. It seems that she'd contracted Lyme's disease and as a consequence, suffered long term mood swings.

Returning to the subject... As mentioned earlier, I bought mine at a swapmeet in early 2003 (looking quite elderly even then) and I've just remembered that on the included plan, it shows torque rod operated strip ailerons. I see yours has, like mine, scale position inset ailerons and split flaps. Were these detailed as an option in the build notes or were later plans/kits modified? Anyway, I've removed some lead to bring the CofG back about half an inch from the plan position and reduced the elevator movement. The grass has been cut today so, fingers crossed, I'll start putting Jon's advice to the test tomorrow... P.S. I see the Pegasus website illustrations show strip ailerons...

How strange for Paul - using a fuel with no castor! I can't say that I've noticed any sign of overheating but my version (91) sits in the front of a very vintage (re-engined several times) circa 1982 Stearman, nicely exposed to the breeze between the dummy cylinders. I hesitate to say this but I promised the old boy who "gave" me (I managed to persuade him to take some money) the model when he was downsizing, that I would use the several gallons of Duraglo 10% (6% castor/9% synthetic) that came with it which was "the one and only" fuel recommended by the distributor before Westons (oddly, one that they distributed) and have largely honoured the pledge. The old boy used to bore (and often exasperate) club members by constantly harping on about this recommendation. Strangely, once Westons took over the engines, their fuel became the only suitable one! Could he have had a point? The idle seems quite normal and I don't recall 58s having problems - perhaps they redesigned the carburettors at some time? There shouldn't be too much problem arranging good cooling in the Pup, Lindsay, as long as you don't fall into the trap of thinking the wide open spaces of a rotary's cowl will provide it. Rather counterintuitively, what actually happens is that hot air pools in the cowling around the engine and any airflow takes an easier route. A dummy engine or suitable blanking plate to encourage air to flow over the cylinder and head, coupled with a suitable exit should do the job. It looks like BEB was mounting it inverted so a good exit should be easy to arrange.

Well, as Andy Symons liked your email Leccy, perhaps my advice wasn’t too good and suggesting pre-arming the kart racers with knowledge of the ANO might well be a step too far. What I would still suggest is talking with the kart club to impress on them how seriously the club takes the matter and confirm that members have been instructed not to fly while the race meeting is taking place. Perhaps give them contact details for the committee in case anyone should turn up to fly - member or other. Surely working with them is better than reacting to a disastrous situation.

Whether or not deliberate overflight is barred, the consequences of an inadvertent transgression seem so serious in this case - the club has been told that any overflight will result in the loss of the field - that surely, any logical conclusion is that flying cannot take place on those days. The danger here is that the sensible members will be in their workshops on these days and not at the field to regulate any reckless activity by rogue members. I would suggest contacting the karting club and making it clear that should anyone attempt to fly during their meetings, it is directly contrary to club rules, the members involved will be dismissed from the club and you will support action against them for any contravention of the ANO. The karting club could easily take photos to identify any transgressors.

I'm not aware that the 58 runs any hotter than a conventional poppet valve engine. Has this been your experience Manish? The SPs certainly required careful thought as the finning was aligned at 90 degrees to the airflow.

Sadly missed - I never met him but had quite a few conversations by PM as well as interacting with him on various forum threads and felt like I knew him. Lindsay, I think you’re confusing the 58CD with the “walnut whip” RCV 60 - 120 SP engines, which drove their propellers from the rotating cylinder at half engine speed. The 58 and 91 versions had a conventional layout (although with a horizontally split crankcase) driving the propeller from the crankshaft but the cylinder rotated internally to provide the sleeve valves.

Not on a Laser - the valve gears and cam followers prevent access to the crankshaft and piston so it’s much easier to remove the head to measure bore/stroke if it can’t be identified by other means.

Are you getting fuel leakage at rest/while filling or are you diagnosing this from air bubbles in the fuel feed? If the latter, then it may be fuel frothing due to vibration. ARTFs often have quite rigid mountings to their tanks. Packing the space around the tank with scraps of foam rubber can reduce this effect dramatically. I’ve also seen advice to add a few drops of “ArmorAll” - a car vinyl cleaning product but haven’t ever tried it - and a quick squint at the Halfords site suggests they’ve diversified the range from the original product, so take this advice carefully.

I can’t say it’s ever been a problem on any of mine. I wonder if you’ve got a hidden split or other fault? One thing to watch out for is the screw loosening, particularly after a period of storage so it’s as well to make it a regular maintenance check.

Looks like a masterpiece in the making!

Welcome to the forum Bill - and/or Ted - or whoever!

Fair enough. I think we're all grateful for your continuing interest and appreciate that any help is a bonus.

Sorry, what I meant Jon, was would there be any possibility of listing identification clues for the whole range.

Something I particularly enjoy about my Saito 182 flat twin as well! Not as smooth as my ASP160 twin but that's exceptionally well balanced, being a true boxer. Of course, neither can be compared to my 200v...

I don’t suppose there’s any way some of your identification clues could be recorded here for posterity? Seems the accumulated forum knowledge was well wide of the mark this time!

Sorry, of course they were common crankpin flat twins. As to the owner wanting them, I think I recall that it was the opposite way round and Jon created his “Frankenstein” prototype out of personal interest and was inundated with support from modellers asking for them to be put into production, having to work quite hard to persuade the boss to run off the parts needed. I do hope that you’ll find a way to obtain spares should you need them in the future. It’s not for me to comment on the stockist’s policy on international sales but perhaps it might be reviewed if sufficient enquiries are received? At least it sounds like some provision has been made by Laser’s owner for a batch of spare parts to be produced and stocked. I don’t think this has happened for ASP/SC since their decision to withdraw from the market as stocks seem to be running out fast!

I think that’s a bit unfair on Jon. The “development” of the boxers was a minor exercise by all accounts and its well documented that he didn’t feel that he was getting the support he wanted from the owner of the parent business which, after Neil’s departure, was felt to be very much of a sideline. I understand that Jon had no financial interest and was purely an employee - admittedly with a keen interest in the product. Any “beef” should be with the owner of the company who made the decision to terminate not only his company, but any (remote) possibility that Laser engines could carry on in different hands.

It’s a shame that some feathers have been ruffled but I’m glad this has worked out well for you Aiden. Personal taste has a lot do do with whether others might adopt your solution but the alternatives have been aired (pun not intended) extensively so it’s time to close the thread here.

You can only hope that MSL can change its policy in the circumstances. Are you going by present advertised policy or have you approached them directly? Might be worth doing so if you haven’t.

I’ve removed some of the more inflammatory and provocative posts. Sorry if any good information has been lost but I’m not prepared to waste time editing posts selectively.

Let’s all take a step back. There is no place on this forum for personal insults.

Can we draw a line under this please. There will always be differences of opinion on forums but we don’t need to resort to sniping at each other. While I understand the frustration of seeing repeated advice seemingly ignored, a new poster will be unaware of past advice so perhaps a little more tolerance would avoid this sort of situation. Please don’t respond to this post (PM me or another mod. if anything is unclear) and let’s return to the subject of sharing information about the Galaxy/Pegasus Hurricane.

If she flies as well as she looks, you’ll have a ball. I’m getting inspired to dig mine out - I haven’t flown it for a couple of years. Jon has enthusiastically espoused his recommendations for smaller elevator movements coupled with more rearward CofGs here for quite a while and probably didn’t realise you were new here. We do like to keep things friendly on the forum and I doubt that Jon’s frustration was aimed at you in particular. I am very tempted to remove some of my lead and put the theory to the test as mine has always been a handful on the ground and I’ve limited outings to summer conditions with hard ground and short grass. I do have fairly small wheels (2”) due to physical limitations which don’t help. What size are you using?

Yes - I was reinforcing your point! Hopefully this slight diversion will have clarified how EP models can benefit from a "tickover" setting for approach control, especially if they have a high wing loading and low drag - not that a T31 of any variety needs much help in this direction!