Cessna 185 Test Flight

I installed a OS S35 RC which, as it turns out, has plenty of power. I test flew it at the weekend and it flew well. Note that I have installed fullsize servos rather than the 13g servos recommended. Also replaced the pushrods with Dubro wire pushrods for much better control (I left the tail wheel pushrod in and when the servo pushes, it hardly responds!! ). The wing tends to flex a bit in flight but I will have to avoid too many aerobatics.

Cessna 185 Assembly starts

Well I started work on the fuselage. At the risk of the questioning of what am I doing, I am going to put a .35 engine in it (yes!!). So I am beefing up the firewall and unfortunately have to cut the cowl.

Just a warning. Don't use the supplied pushrods (unless you support the routing through the fuselage. They are not up to the job. I am replacing mine with Dubro pushrods. Also use epoxy to support critical joints such as where the wings are bolted to the fuselage (see photo).

Cessna 185 foamie

Well I spied this model on Trademe (our version of EBay). For $NZ99 plus freight, it was a great buy and the wingspan is 1400mm which is quite large. It arrived today in a surprisingly small box and even included a propellor. It is made in Taiwan rather than China by Super Flying Model. There is very little information about the model on their website but as I have constructed one or two models in my time, it should be a straightforward build. It is not bad quality but I will no doubt change a few things. You can use flaps but I doubt I will use them given it will be quite light. Here are some pictures.

Spektrum 5 channel 2.4GHz radio set

I have purchased one of these due to apparent interference problems at our flying field on 40MHz. Put it in a .40 size pattern model and had a few flights but had an 'incident' where the model had a hard landing and damaged the fuselage. The model suddenly started flying erractically as though suffering from interference. I have 'learnt' a couple of things... 1. Use a 6V battery pack which gives a bigger safety margin over a 4.8V 2. Don't use 'old' Futaba servos with Spektrum sets. I didn't even give it a thought but it seems that Futaba S128 don't necessarily go with Spektrum receivers. Anyway use more modern servos.

The Spektrum is now in a .25 size model and we have flown it on a number of occasions are all is fine (6V battery pack and no S128 servos).

JBA 52A

This engine looks similar to the OS46AX but as I don't have an OS AX (46 or 55), I can't compare them. This is an ABC type piston liner and twin ballrace design. I had some initial problems setting the idle mixture but that has been sorted (I would have thought that the idle mixture would have been fairly close when the engine is sold but that was not the case). Anyway the engine is still being run in, but it is a good performer. There is also a 46 size.

Sunday Flying at WMAC

This is our flying field at Trentham Upper Hutt. We have a prison in the background (behind the trees)!!

New Era III

Thanks to a fellow club member, he sold me this model, a New Era III. It is powered by an OS 25FP so it is economic to run. Alas the other night I had control issues and she hit the ground a wee bit hard. It is now a slightly second hand Era III. It is repairable and she should be back in the air fairly soon.