Electric conversion setup for old Balsacraft Easy street

[PAUL HUTCHINSON 2]

Hi guys, im going to build the old balsacraft easystreet with brushless motor and lipo battery etc. Can anyone give advice on mounting the motor, do I need to extend the distance out from the firewall?

Thanks

Paul

[Simon Burch 1]

Hi Paul

The original Easy Street was designed for a 600-sized brushed motor, so you don't have to change the structure too much when you mount a smaller brushless motor. My Easy Street is 20 years old and currently running a 4-max PO-3541-1270 brushless outrunner, 2200mah 3s, 40amp ESC driving a 9x5 prop. It will take a larger prop but the 9x5 provides sufficient performance for me.

The main difficulty I found was routing the motor wires, which required some modification to the lower part of the motor mount. In doing this, I probably weakened it; following some aggressive outside loops, the motor mounting attachment to the fuselage began to crack. I'm currently rebuilding the nose area with a slight modification to the air intake/hatch, and reinforcing it with glass. I'll try to attach photos of the work-in-progress will show you the internal and external structure.

It's worth the effort; IMHO the original Easy Street is a superb design that flies really nicely, and reaches its full potential with a brushless/lipo setup.

Happy flying.

Simon

[Simon Burch 1]

Hi Paul

The original Easy Street was designed for a 600-sized brushed motor, so you don't have to change the structure too much when you mount a smaller brushless motor. My Easy Street is 20 years old and currently running a 4-max PO-3541-1270 brushless outrunner, 2200mah 3s, 40amp ESC driving a 9x5 prop. It will take a larger prop but the 9x5 provides sufficient performance for me.

The main difficulty I found was routing the motor wires, which required some modification to the lower part of the motor mount. In doing this, I probably weakened it; following some aggressive outside loops, the motor mounting attachment to the fuselage began to crack. I'm currently rebuilding the nose area with a slight modification to the air intake/hatch, and reinforcing it with glass. I'll try to attach photos of the work-in-progress will show you the internal and external structure.

It's worth the effort; IMHO the original Easy Street is a superb design that flies really nicely, and reaches its full potential with a brushless/lipo setup.

Happy flying.

Simon

[Simon Burch 1]

Hi Paul

The original Easy Street was designed for a 600-sized brushed motor, so you don't have to change the structure too much when you mount a smaller brushless motor. My Easy Street is 20 years old and currently running a 4-max PO-3541-1270 brushless outrunner, 2200mah 3s, 40amp ESC driving a 9x5 prop. It will take a larger prop but the 9x5 provides sufficient performance for me.

The main difficulty I found was routing the motor wires, which required some modification to the lower part of the motor mount. In doing this, I probably weakened it; following some aggressive outside loops, the motor mounting attachment to the fuselage began to crack. I'm currently rebuilding the nose area with a slight modification to the air intake/hatch, and reinforcing it with glass. I'll try to attach photos of the work-in-progress will show you the internal and external structure.

It's worth the effort; IMHO the original Easy Street is a superb design that flies really nicely, and reaches its full potential with a brushless/lipo setup.

Happy flying.

Simon

[Simon Burch 1]

Apologies for posting 3 times......you only need to read one! Repeated stabbing of the 'add posting' button which didn’t seem to tespond I think.

[PAUL HUTCHINSON 2]

Hi Simon

Thanks for the update, looking forward to getting the pics. I have mine to build as a Winter project but getting all the groundwork covered now so that I don’t have any difficulties when building and adding the electrics.

Many Thanks

Paul

[Simon Burch 1]

Hi Paul

First pic without the motor in place. You might be able to see the black marks from the old can motor's brushes, which shows how far back it extended. You can also see that I've modified the air intake; it's no longer part of the hatch and the central strut protects the motor's wires.

View from behind the motor mounting:

With the motor in place. You can see how much shorter it is compared with the old 600, and how much space needs to be made for the wires:

[Simon Burch 1]

With ply protection plate to prevent the motor from chafing the wires:

View from the front:

The hatch needs to be a lot thinner to accommodate the wires, so I'll need to glass that as well. Now all I need to do is finish it!

Good luck with yours.

[PAUL HUTCHINSON 2]

Hi Simon, looks good. I will post pics of mine once i get building underway, really appreciate your time and help on this one.

Stay safe

Many Thanks

Paul

[Simon Burch 1]

No problem - glad to be of help. The joy of being furloughed....plenty of time for this sort of thing!

[Simon Burch 1]

Easy Street Mk1 back in business!

[PAUL HUTCHINSON 2]

Looks great and well finished!!

[Keith Berriman]

I like the idea of the top vent holes at front as I have notice sometimes my battery is warmer than usual if I have given it long fast flight. Looks like some minor mods to the Easy Street 2 front cowling .

Edited By RC Plane Flyer on 29/06/2020 14:22:55

[Simon Burch 1]

Yes - it's certainly worth adding additional cooling intakes and outakes when converting old can motor designs to brushless....I learned that the hard way in the early days. After converting my Easy Street, I replaced the Speed 600 in my Balsacraft Spitfire IX with a Tornado inrunner. The Spifire had lots of space around the power components but no provision for cooling airflow. This was OK with the Speed 600, but I soon cooked the Tornado....not a mistake you make twice. Fortunately the model was OK and it's still flying now...albeit not quite so pretty with intake holes in the static part of the spinner.