Nick Farrow

Thanks all, I just wanted to make sure I was not missing a trick I am nevos of using them for household devices, like you. However I do strip them down and pick the 2 best cells and use them for a tx power source (with a voltage regulator) that seems to work for me. Just as an aside, would you expect new packs to balance? I have had some 1800mah (nanotech) from hobbyking that wont balance, Do they accept them as returns in this case? Regards nick

Hi, I have a number of lipos that are showing something like 60-70% of their capacity. They 'sag' quickly when used and when put on a discharge/charge cycle confirm that the capacity is reduced. I was wondering what to do with them, they can be used for flying but with such a restricted and diminishing flight time they a a bit of a liability. On the other hand they still have some useful capacity, but I have yet to find a use for them! Time for the bin, or do you have any ideas! ?? Thanks nick

Hi, I really recommend flitetest for great flying foam scratch build designs, but this is a step or two beyond me! **LINK**

Hi, I having just got rid of a glitchy radio that sent my newly built Flitetest 3d ( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dIJUeQed7wk ) into the deck hard, twice that removed the wings. I'm trying to knife edge it. I built this to learn aeros/3D so I suspect I need some help! My current efforts to knife edge (always wanted to do this!) are not good. Sometimes it goes from the horizontal('ish' i.e. rudder parallel to ground) into the vertical. I have this down to too much rudder and power, so pilot error? The other trait, is that when KE it turns quite rapidly into a horizontal circle that flattens out. I thought this might be down to the elevator being 'up' slightly. As far as I can see the wings and stab are straight and level and line up with each other. Putting it into a steep dive shows it tracking straight as well neither pulling out or tucking in.It also flies straight and level so I'm not sure about the theory of the elevator being slightly 'up'. Any suggestions for getting it trimmed correctly appreciated Thanks nick

Hi Mark, Thanks for the heads up. The FT board has long been an issue because of the postage to UK/EU so this is really useful as its at a good price nick

Hi, Andy.G, yes i'm in the uk. I have seen something similar in a recently opened hobbycraft. I was wondering about the weight of the board compared to native depron and what you then did to paint/cover the plane? I peeled off the brown paper from the wings but it stuck stubbonly to the fuz, anyway I coved the whole lot in hobbyking cheap packing tape (attached photo). I found that I had to cover it twice to get rid of the very obvious tape overlaps (but not on the stab as can be seen) . I guess the tape is not as good as that recommend by TigerOC.

Hi, Many thanks for the advice and help, some really good tips here When I used the brown paper, if was left to dry for at least 2 days with an air gap top and bottom. It was also heavily wieghted on the edges to prevent warping, so it was definetly dry. Perhaps, it was the cheap tesco brown paper, although it seemed thick The balance seems to be to use tape (certainly cut out the long drying times and warping), but I have a few questions: 1) When applying it, do you overlap the tape runs, or if not how easy is it to carefully 'butt' the edges together? 2) Is there a method of reliably over painting the tape, or are you restricted to the colours available? 3) Do you pretreat the depron surface to ensure the tape does not lift/bubble (other than a quick wipe!)? 4) Are there any tapes that are fully opaque, most of ones I have see are translucent, which is not great if the edges were overlapped.? I think I might peel off the brown paper on the wings and tape them once I know what I'm doing! Gordon - I had found that drying the brown paper produce massive warps on a single 6mm sheet part, so be careful with the airframe! I also sealed it with ronseal 'diamond hard' varnish but I the brown paper just seemed to soak it up without giving a decent finish. This was when it bubbled, so I only gave it a single coat. nick

Hi I'm building a 3d 'starter plane' from the FliteTest crew http://www.flitetest.com/articles/ft-3d Not having access to US dollar tree board, I have used depron and covering each bit with brown paper (using PVA glue). I have spend my time on this build and the brown paper seemed soundly bonded onto the depron However, when I put a thin sealing coat of water based varnish, some sections of the brown paper covering bubbled on the wings, which have not really gone away when they have dried out. I can cut them with a razor blade and bed them down but I was determined to 'build this right' and I dont understand what has gone wrong. Any pointers for next time would be good, this seems a great plane and I was hoping to give it a decent finish! Thanks nick

Hi Simon, Correct, the 11.6v was the initial no load voltage (with the same 'crash' battery in the same charge state), when pulling the 335 watts it dipped to 10.68 and after the 30 seconds of full power recovered to 11.4 ish. nick

Hi, I have made the 'swappable' mustang out of depron as I could not source foam/dlollar board in the uk as a reasonable price. I just used the same basic techniques with uhu. I have covered it with iron on film. Its very very tough and flies a treat. I found with the depron version the folded wing is produces a smooth aerofoil section rather than the 'lumpy' one of the dollar board. I also found that the c0g was much further forward. Its currently in for a refit have had a number of big crashes due to dodgy electronics. I'm looking forward to building their 3d flier )**LINK** Have fun with the mini! nick

Hi, Just checked with the battery that was used yesterday and my wattmeter. The battery with no load (just the watt meter) showed 11.6 Running the motor flatout for 30 secs and the meter recorded: 30.6 amps, 10.68volts, 335 watts. Servos all worked fine, so I'm thinking its not a low voltage issue (assuming its set for 9v)? Thanks nick

Hi, Thanks for all of your helpful comments. I have 3 turingy 2200/3s 25c (or the like).pushing a keda 2837/? and have a 10x8 prop. the model is a 40 inch depron P51 flitetest swappables scrathc built), 4 x 9g towerpro servos. The ESC is a 40amp robotbirds unit, the manual has these features • 1.5amp BEC • Low torque ‘soft start’ • Auto shut down on signal loss • Temperature protection, shuts down at 110 ̊C • Voltage cut off selectable to: 4.8v, 5.6v, 6v, 7.2v, 8.4v, 9v, 11v, 12v I have suffered LV before (no with this speed controller or plane) and it normally just shows as a performance degrade on the motor. I usually check this by just pulsing the throttle every now and then and if there is no real response in the motor revs, I land. This normally works quite well for me! Even when this happens (as others have said) there servo response is good. On the face of it, does not 'feel' like that. On the second take off there is ample pull and no motor fade. After the first flight, the motor and ESC are warm but not hot. I'll repair the plane to the point where I can run up the motor and put my watt meter on it. I'd like to try and prove what is going on! I'm wondering if its the 'autoshut down on signal loss', given the missing last 2 inches on the tx perhaps a range check at 11.8v. I'll keep you posted! nick

Hi, Thanks, a bit of a consensus! I'm not sure I can check the low battery operation of the esc, but I'll see if I can find the manual somewhere. The behaviour is the same with different batteries and I check the voltage with a little plug in cell monitor after each flight. I had casually wondered about low voltage but assumed that as I was flying with a low throttle (after launch) this was not a likely cause.

Hi, I'm after some advice. I fly with with 35mhz and have one model that I seem to loose control on every 2nd flight., over the last 3 weeks. I fly over very long grass weeds so the crashes are not fatal! The model has a corona dsp rx and has been rock solid prior to the last 3 weeks. The symptoms are first flight rock solid, the flight battery is down from 12.6 to 11.7/11.8 for the second flight. On the second flight its all very gradual loss of control. One time it gently rolled onto its back and nosed in on take off, with about half throttle. Today, on the first battery rock solid first flight, second flight did a circuit where is just felt hyper sensitive//verge of no control so ditched in long grass. After 15 mins searching I found it in one piece, no damage, as but with the battery connected it appeared to be powered down,no response to Tx. Next flight on a new flight pack, perfect. Second flight (batt @11.8v) on launch very little up. aeleron response was perfect. I just had to land at 200m distance with no up. Smashed nose, broken tails the servos that were still intact were still responding to the tx. The only thing that has happened over this time is the loss of a couple of inches of Tx aerial. Other models flown with the tx in this state are fine (new aerial on order). I dont feel safe flying this model on a second flight with the same flight pack. Other than change everything, suggestions on proving this would be welcome Thanks nick