How easy to fly Nijhuis FW 190

[KenC]

Is this an reasonably easy intermediate plane , or another stall king warbird ?

[Jon H]

No direct experience but many of my customers TN designed models end up lead sleds. Not sure why, they just end up very heavy and nowhere near the quoted weights. The 72 inch Spitfire for example. Plans says about 12lbs, i would be happy at 14. Customer models? 20+. Panic then ensues and out comes the chainsaw to make mods and cut some weight out. 

 

The 190 has a very short nose so every ounce of weight at the tail might need 6 or 7 oz up front to balance it. 

 

I also understand that none of the TN designs use washout. Personally, i would use 2 degrees on almost all warbirds and i dont know the reasoning behind this choice not to use it. Again, no direct experience but customers have told me they have often had to build 2 wings (or whole models) as the one without washout was a tip stalling mess. No doubt high weight was a factor too when it came to its tip stalling behaviour. 

 

If i were building it i would target 9.5lbs max and in my case a laser 80. This would give plenty of power even at that weight. I would add some washout, and do what i could to lighten the rear as much as possible. Certainly i wouldnt rule it out as a model as it looks great and if built to the right weight i cant see any reason why it wouldnt be a winner. I would just be cautious though. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[KenC]

Thanks Jon, interesting observations.   It does have split flaps to control the camber for landing.

[Jon H]

Are you looking at any warbird and this just so happened to catch you attention or are you after a 190 specifically?

[leccyflyer]

It's not the one on a Buy-It-Now on eBay at the moment is it?

[KenC]

the very one  leccy , guess that answers Jon too 

 

[eflightray]

I scratch built a TN Spitfire from the free plan given away with a RCM&E magazine Autumn 2010.

The plans said 70" span and possible 15 Lbs with a 1.20 four stroke.

I prefer electric, lightweight.

Mine came out at 7 Lbs - 2 oz with batteries (6s), built in 2012 using mostly Depron foam, and came out at72" span.

Flies beautiful, fully aerobatic, (Spitfire like), has retracts, flaps, and is still alive after 10 years, sadly I don't owing to health reasons.

So my recommendation, - build them light, no matter which warbird you choose and you will have a big grin every time you go flying. 

Edited June 26, 2023 by eflightray

[KenC]

Jon my first choice for a "warbird " would most probably be a Vaught Corsair  F4U , for the modern stuff  or an SE5A  DB  , but they are expensive to complete , especially with the price of those darn Laser Engines. 

[KenC]

6 minutes ago, eflightray said:

I scratch built a TN Spitfire from the free plan given away with a RCM&E magazine Autumn 2010.

The plans said 70" span and possible 15 Lbs with a 1.20 four stroke.

I prefer electric, lightweight.

Mine came out at 7 Lbs - 2 oz with batteries (6s), built in 2012 using mostly Depron foam, and came out at72" span.

Flies beautiful, fully aerobatic, (Spitfire like), has retracts, flaps, and is still alive after 10 years, sadly I don't owing to health reasons.

So my recommendation, - build them light, no matter which warbird you choose and you will have a big grin every time you go flying. 

Did you add washout to the wing , or is it exactly as per plan ?

[eflightray]

It was built 'sort of' to the plan, I build light enough to not normally worry about washout.

 

It's on youtube, (and others ), search under eflightray

 

Ray.

[KenC]

28 minutes ago, eflightray said:

I scratch built a TN Spitfire from the free plan given away with a RCM&E magazine Autumn 2010.

The plans said 70" span and possible 15 Lbs with a 1.20 four stroke.

I prefer electric, lightweight.

Mine came out at 7 Lbs - 2 oz with batteries (6s), built in 2012 using mostly Depron foam, and came out at72" span.

Flies beautiful, fully aerobatic, (Spitfire like), has retracts, flaps, and is still alive after 10 years, sadly I don't owing to health reasons.

So my recommendation, - build them light, no matter which warbird you choose and you will have a big grin every time you go flying. 

Did you add washout to the wing , or is it exactly as per plan ?

[KenC]

Thanks Ray , I will pop over and have a look at it . Great looking plane .

[Jon H]

2 hours ago, KenC said:

Jon my first choice for a "warbird " would most probably be a Vaught Corsair  F4U , for the modern stuff  or an SE5A  DB  , but they are expensive to complete , especially with the price of those darn Laser Engines. 

 

Corsairs tend to be tricky as models due to their twisty wheels. Generally bigger is better as the retracts are stronger built at the larger size. As for the se5a, yea its a big build but well worth it. If you keep it for 10 or more years the cost sort of fades away. 

 

2 hours ago, eflightray said:

It was built 'sort of' to the plan, I build light enough to not normally worry about washout.

 

 

If the model is very light then yes as its floating more than flying, but most wont be taking the extraordinary measures you did building your spitfire so that recommendation is not really applicable to most models. To get a 6 foot Spitfire down to 7lbs is unrealistic and unnecessary unless you have a very specific use case in mind. 

TN Spits built to 14 or so lbs fly very well so i would shoot for that. If you can get it down to 12 that would be fine, but i wouldnt want it lighter than 12 as i find they simply dont fly nicely. 

[J D 8]

    Very light models are lovely to fly in the right conditions but when the wind blows not so good. Recon if I had the Globemaster it would be in England later that day.😁

 

[Jon H]

Oh absolutely. Im not trying to fault extra light models as they are often very impressive but they are generally a pretty niche use case 

[KenC]

Strangest flight I ever had was in a very light aircraft ..... a company called Airship industries in the Cotswolds area.  Sitting there on my seat towards the rear I nearly had a messy moment when the fan on my side rotated for down thrust ...... for just a second i thought it had come adrift. 

 

I can see the day when they do to model flying what they did to tenting.... all you do is turn up at the field with a small bag and a foot pump.

Edited June 27, 2023 by KenC

[Nick Somerville]

My Fw 190 is somewhat larger than the TN offering and the plan showed for 2 degrees of washout that I made absolutely sure was built in from root to tip. First flights have shown good slow flight characteristics for a 16kg model.

[KenC]

16 KG !     Do you sit in it ?   How was the C of G with the short nose, and does it land without tipping ?

[Nick Somerville]

Its just over 90” span and 16 kg is a good weight for the model with 18 kg+ typical. The flaps are large and at 60 degrees fully deployed create substantial drag. .75 kg of lead was required to balance her.

[KenC]

Are you mixing in a lot of down elevator with the flaps ?    Be nice to see it , sounds great.

[Nick Somerville]

It’s newly finished and I haven’t fully trimmed the flaps/elevator. First impressions are that there is little pitch change at half flap but a slight nose down at full flap. Going flying tomorrow and aim to set up the elevator to flap trim on a flight mode so will report back. 

[KenC]

Looks great  Nick.  I have seen one on YT that I like the decor on .

Where did you get your detail info fro Nick ?

Edited June 28, 2023 by KenC

[eflightray]

I forgot to put this video on the system https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g8CxWBmLOW4

 

Ray

 

Edited June 28, 2023 by eflightray

[Nick Somerville]

Detailed drawings for the build were the full set of Bentley drawings. The scheme I chose was Pips Priller’s Black 13 A8. Plenty of pics on line and a replica built in the US

a few years ago

[Jon H]

13 hours ago, KenC said:

Are you mixing in a lot of down elevator with the flaps

 

This is a common mistake with warbirds as they generally require up elevator mix with the flaps and gear down. This is due to them being trimmed for a relatively high speed in normal flight, and so needing up trim at slow speed. The drag of the gear being below the c/g causes a nose down pitch, flaps may also cause a nose down pitch again to their drag and possible movement of the centre of lift. They also tend to be fairly heavy models and this has a big impact too. 

 

The amount of up needed varies but can be substantial. My La7 has none, my Sea Fury a reasonable amount. In the case of my DB Hurricane my normal flying rate offers about 7 or 8mm deflection i think. My offset for elevator flap mix is about 9mm, so my new neutral trim is more deflection than full up elevator in normal flight. I then have to go to high rate, approx 12mm, on top of this for a nice landing. It is likely the model is still a shade nose heavy despite having nearly 1lb removed after balancing to the instructions. As its performing very well i am inclined to leave it alone at the moment. The DB Spitfire i just helped set up and a H9 Spitfire both have significant up mixed for landing to the extent that the H9's owner almost did a complete loop by accident when he slammed full flap down before he had slowed the model down enough. 

 

This is different for smaller/lighter models which balloon like mad as they simply dont need the additional lift and/or are being flown too fast for that configuration.