Coming Together
I’m about 3/4 finished putting it together. I’ve had two problems…. first, nesail.com sent me 14″ servo extensions when I only needed 4″ extensions. The extra 10″ is a pain to stow away on such a small plane so I went to Kenvil Hobbies and bought 6″ extensions. They fit great. Second thing: I couldn’t figure out how to use the (very pretty) colleted prop adapter. In the process of trying to figure it out, I broke it. So I bought a new Master Airscrew prop adapter at Kenvil Hobbies. It works great except I needed an extra washer as a spacer; 15 minutes of swearing to myself in the nuts and bolts aisle and I found what I was looking for, a single 6mm washer.Most of the decals are on. I wasn’t going to put the decals on because I want to do it de’art for Burning Man, but I realized that they are an important structural element of the plane. They offer protection for the underbelly and most especially, the decal is 3/4 of the hinge for the elevons. Before I cut out the decals, I traced them on a sheet of clear plastic, so I might make another set of decals out of a material and appearance more of my choosing.
I ran the motor. Wooeee, it’s windy! I had trouble holding it in my hand, it pushed so hard! I think it might offer more thrust than the weight of the plane! Woo hoo, hangin’ on the prop is a possibility…. well, except that it’s a pusher plane, but I’m sure you still share my enthusiasm.
While putting the Deans Ultra connectors on the LiPoly battery, I accidentally shorted it for about 2 seconds! Yipe! It didn’t just spark, it fully arced, slightly pitting my Radio Shack holder thingie. Now, all I can think about is how HForo69 (an AIM flying buddy) told me how damaged LiPolys can burn out cars and burn down homes! Before I went to bed, I put the battery on the cement floor of the garage and put a big ceramic jar on top of it. (Thanks for the jar, Melis ;-)
I did some math on http://brantuas.com/ezcalc/dma1.asp and ass-u-ming that my batteries can do 10C… this isn’t for sure, the previous generation could do 6C and the new ones are supposed to do 10C… but I don’t even know for sure that I have a “new” one. It says “6/4/04” on it which I suppose is the manufacture date, but that could be the assembly date or….
So, assuming the battery can do 10C, this plane will totally rock:
- 3S TP2100 battery
- Mega AC 16/15/4 motor
- 6×4 APC prop
- 20.2 amp draw
- 19,400 RPM prop
- 196 watts in
- 167 watts out
- 85% efficiency
- prop static thrust: 32 oz
- prop pitchspeed 74 mph
- full throttle duration: 6:14 minutes
The plane has a flying weight of about 20 oz :-)