Fly RC

February 6, 2016February 11, 2016

Aeroworks BD-5B… Assembly

Over the past couple weeks I’ve been working on several projects in the shop as the weather in Indiana has not been especially hospitable for flying. It has been quite a bit warmer than in most years past for the time of year but still not up to my standards for comfortable flying. Sometimes the temperature tempted me but those mild temps usually came with gusty strong winds so no flying lately for me. The good side of that is it gives me some time to work on some projects in the shop!

The latest is the Aeroworks BD-5B I just finished putting together. Mine is pretty close to stock with only a couple small exceptions. On mine there is a pitot tube sticking right out of the front of the nose… which is about the only visible difference. I actually like the look of it on this air frame. Other things that are not exactly per the directions are:

E-Flite DS76 servos instead of the specified Hitec 55s… I like the 55s just fine but as speedy as this thing is likely to be I like having extra precision and torque of a digital.
In addition to the pitot for airspeed, I also have a g force sensor, variometer (altitude and altitude rate of change), temp sensor around the HiMax motor body, and voltage monitor at the pack as well as from the receiver bus.
I chose the Himax 2815-1400 per the written instructions which seems to be rated for quite a bit less power than the E-flite motor now recommended on the Aeroworks web page… I hope it will be sufficient.

I still have to setup the control surface throws and exponential settings but everything else is pretty much buttoned up at this point. Centering and direction of surfaces has been set. I need to apply the decals and any other final cosmetics I want to add and I haven’t picked up the propeller yet, but that is about all that is keeping it from graduating from static model to aircraft at this point.

There were a few minor annoyances when assembling… Belly pan fit could have been better, Canopy could extend down just a bit more or maybe have a structural frame added to help it fit better/keep its shape. Also, I am not a huge fan of the extensive use of the EZ type connectors where only set screws are keeping the control rods from slipping… Much prefer ball joints, standard pin clevises, Z-bends… really most other connection types! I may think about replacing some of those either before the first flight or shortly after if all seems to go well. Just seems a bit “under” designed for a plane that is going to (I presume) move along briskly as I expect this to.

My bird is 29 ounces with a 3 cell 2200mah on board. With the Himax 2815-1400 and an APC 7x5E or similar, I expect about 150 watts which should give me decent performance… 85mph? more? We’ll see soon. I am a little concerned if this will be enough, plus I have never flown a pusher and the lack of airflow over the surfaces at lower speeds (no propwash) has me thinking that landing this might be a bit more interesting. Only one way to know for sure!

I have had this ARF sitting on my shelf for a couple years but until we got a geo-textile runway recently, it just would have been impossible to take off or land without risking damage. Now, with a place to fly, it is finally going to get its chance to soar! Once I dot the last i and cross the last t and get a flight or two I will take some actual pictures and do another post on how it actually flew.. or didn’t!!

January 17, 2016September 7, 2018

Balsa USA 1/4 Scale Cub – Part 4 More Mods – Rudder Shape.

Another modification I recently accomplished on the Cub is to reshape the rudder. Again, I have decided to just look at the general outline of the aircraft. I realize that when covered, some of the “ribs” will not be in the right place and anyone looking closely will be able to tell this but in the air I doubt anyone will be able to tell! They will see the outline, which I hope will at least be suggestive of the real Super Cub!

So here is what I did. After careful comparison of the shape of each I decided that just a bit of a change to the trailing edge of the rudder would take care of the primary difference between the J3 and the Super. Besides… I’m always happy to have a little more control surface! In order to accomplish this I decided I would just laminate a new trailing edge.

Here’s the process. To start I used my balsa stripper to create some strips of the proper width from a sheet of 1/16″ balsa. After a quick sand to make a slight flat spot at my “start” and “stop” areas I pinned down the rudder and used some thin CA to tack down one end of the first strip.

I then bent the stick to shape and tack glued down the other end and then trimmed of the remainder with my Xacto knife.

I then added two more layers of stripping. On each one I used some wood glue between the layers and then tacked it in place with pins and some thin CA to insure it didn’t move before the wood glue set.

Once finished with the third strip, I added some additional support at the point where the existing “ribs” would have contacted the trailing edge. With just a bit of sanding to round things off a bit and to taper the new material at the ends and mate it up with the existing structure, the final shape was complete.

The structure is quite strong and once covered I think most folks will find it to be a fair match to the outline of the real Super Cub.

There is plenty more to do in order to get this bird finished so… more to come!

January 2, 2016January 2, 2016

Freeze Fly fun with the GoPro Session and the Carbon Z Cub

Ever since I picked up my Carbon Z Cub and read the part in the manual about a GoPro camera mount… well I knew that was going to cost me a bunch of money… and I’m not talking about just the cost of the GoPro mount! When I saw that the GoPro Session had dropped to under $200… well there goes my RC budget!!

You can see the mount and camera at the following links if you now suddenly “need” one like I did!
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So over the holidays, with the help of some gift money I got all the goodies and by the time our annual freeze fly came around I was ready. Here is a compilation of my first two flights of 2016. One with the camera perched on the top mount and one with it hanging from the bottom.

By the time I got a chance to go up again the wind was a bit higher and I was less worried about the camera falling off… which it showed no signs of doing in spite of the 25 degree weather and the several loops, rolls, etc…

I used a peel and stick type of mount on the bottom of the airplane (on the plastic belly pan area) and the aforementioned mount from E-Flite for the top mount. I don’t think a tape on type would adhere to this foam well enough and it would certainly come lose if applied to a painted area as the paint on this airplane just isn’t that securely adhered! One of it’s few faults.

Here are a couple pics showing the mounting process for the top mount. in case you are interested in how that was done… First I sliced the foam so that the “fin” on the bottom of the mount could easily insert into the foam at the desired mount location. Placing the mount in place I outlined the area for it with red dry erase marker so that I could easily wipe it away later.

I then used tape to peel some paint off the selected area.

Once finished I wiped away the marker with the aid of some alcohol. Then I mixed up some epoxy and slathered it on the fin and the bottom of the mount generally. I then placed the mount on the prepared area, insuring the fin had glue applied and went snugly into the sliced open slot. Be sure the glue doesn’t get in the slot areas where the camera mount snaps in or this will all be for naught! Wait 30 minutes for the epoxy to dry (actually I wouldn’t trust it until it dried overnight) and there you have it.

I have noticed that the mount is tighter/works better if you insert the GoPro latch assembly from the back. The other direction works but it is looser and I’d be concerned the camera bouncing around and wiggling a bit would affect video quality. The true GoPro stick on mounts don’t seem to have this issue so just be aware.

Hope you enjoy the videos. I’m just getting used to video editing so am hoping to get even better stuff in the future!

December 26, 2015September 7, 2018

Balsa USA 1/4 Scale Cub – Part 3 More Mods – Flaps!!

Another modification I have decided to make on my Cub is to create functional flaps. Below you can see the inboard section of the port side wing.

After extending lines from the trailing edge of the outboard section and then accounting for the thickness of the trailing edge I made some cuts. Here is the result.

I then created a gauge from plywood with the proper angle to match the ailerons and marked and cut the flaps to match. Here you can see it in use.

Once all the ribs were cut to match this angle and length I attached a plate to the back edge in order to finish out the flap structure and allow for hinge attachment.

I then used a plane to match the size and angle I needed on the top and bottom edge of the flap surface.

I will probably need to add some blocks at the hinge attachments point inside the flaps before they are covered in order to insure a strong attachment point. When finished, the flaps look very similar to the ailerons. here you can see the leading edge of the flap (left) and aileron (right)

Aside from the hinge blocks, I will need to work out servo placement in the wing to actuate the flaps before I can call these finished but the major work is done now and overall I am pleased. The only drawback I see is that the angle of the leading edge of the flap surfaces (and the ailerons) are going to limit the throw to approximately 30 degrees of down travel. I feel like that is likely to be enough for my purposes but I’ll do a little research to see what I can determine.

One thought that occurred to me after finishing these up is that I may just plane the corner off of the bottom edge where it contacts the wing surface. I calculated that I could possibly gain another 10 degrees or so of travel this way. I’d be happy with that since the real aircraft maxes out at about 50 degrees… I’ll call that close enough.

While I’m thinking that over, I may finish up reshaping the tail feathers…

December 23, 2015December 26, 2015

Balsa USA 1/4 Scale Cub – Part 2 Modifications begin

I’ve spent a fair amount of time just sitting and staring at… by which I of course mean meticulously planning modifications for… the Balsa USA Cub. I have been comparing the J-3 Cub and the PA-18 Super Cub from a visual appearance perspective and one of the first things I realized is that the Super has a slightly different shape to both vertical and horizontal components of the tail surfaces. Looking at the horizontal feathers first, there is a bit of a difference in shape, especially in that the PA-18 has what I refer to as aerodynamic load balancing. In the case of the Super there is a section of the elevator that is in front of the hinge line located at the most outer section of the elevator on each side. This design not only give you increased surface but also decreased load on the servo as the air flow on that part of the elevator will aid in moving the surface in the desired direction. I.E. When you pull elevator the rearmost part of the surface goes up relative to the hinge line and the airflow is fighting this motion which your servo must overcome. The part forward of the hinge line however is moving downward and the air pushing on it is helping to rotate the surface and therefore is assisting the desired motion! This is not only a very noticeable difference visually in the control surface shape and design but it is one that will help to keep the servo(s) on the elevator from having to work so hard! I like that so I immediately decided to incorporate this change. Another nice part of this modification is that it is simple since there is a rib at approximately the correct spot where surgery will need to be performed to make this change!

Of course the horizontal surface is also a bit different shape on the Super versus the standard cub. I haven’t decided if I will do anything to correct that as it would be purely cosmetic… adding very little surface area to the elevator… We shall see. So here is what I did for this first control surface change.

Here is the starboard horizontal surface.

That first rib looks to be in approximately the correct spot so below you can see the first cut has been made right against that rib. Plenty of TLAR involved in this project!

After making this “incision” I then needed to add a rib to the tip of the fixed surface. If I just capped them with a piece of balsa I’d end up with a fixed surface that would be to wide for my elevator to wrap around so I then had to cut off about 5/16ths worth of balsa in order allow for insertion of a new 1/4″ rib (1/4″ x 3/8″ was used as the thickness of the trailing edge is more than 1/4″).

I then installed my new end cap as seen below

And after a bit of sanding to size I ended up with this

Rinse and repeat for the other end and I am ready to glue the removed part to the moving elevator surface. The builder has done very little shaping of the leading edge surface of the elevator so I think I can glue the removed portion of the fixed surface to the front edge of the moving portion and with just a bit of filling and sanding I should be all set.

I will probably leave the tail surfaces for a bit and work on the wings next as I am in the mood to tackle that project. I’ve been getting nervous about cutting into the wing surfaces for a bit and I think I have my courage screwed up now since this task came off fairly painlessly. I’ll get back to the tail surfaces again and see what can be done to shape up the rudder a bit later.

I have yet to decide if I’m going to do anything else on the elevator before I call that part good and move on but for now I am pleased with my progress. There is at least one big “mistake” that the original builder made that will prohibit me from making this plane truly scale looking… at least it’s a big enough discrepancy that I don’t think I will tackle it. Once I decided that it made me start considering what the limits are going to be in terms of how much effort I am willing to put into this thing. I feel his pain as I have problems when building sometimes telling my left from my right as well but I’m not going to point it out yet. Maybe you can try to spot it someday when the project is finished and I get it ready to fly and take a few photos to post here. It’s nothing that will effect the flight performance of the airplane but there’s no way this thing will ever be in a scale contest! As a result, there is a fuzzy line in the sand in regards to how far I’ll go to make it scale. I want it to be recognizable as a super cub and even as a particular airplane but I’m not going to get to crazy making it perfect. I’m especially leaning toward anything that not only makes it look more Super and less J-3… especially when that affects it’s flying characteristics as well. I guess it’s just going to be Goldilocks scale. Not to much. Not to little. Just right!

December 22, 2015

Balsa USA 1/4 Scale Cub – Part 1 Acquisition and plans

Recently my club had a batch of RC gear contributed and much of it was sold off to club members over the course of a few weeks with proceeds going to the club. One of the items that got sold off was a Balsa USA 1/4 scale Cub. The kit had been almost completely framed up and even some covering done. The craftsmanship looked good and the price was right so I decided it would be my next large scale electric project. I have immensely enjoyed flying my 84″ wingspan Carbon Z Cub and I figured 108″ of Cub might mean almost 30% more fun!

It also seems like a great excuse to try something with an even larger electric motor and with it in the 90% framed up state, I figured it was ideal to do some “bashing” and make it into something a bit different than the usual “big yellow cub”.

I searched for a suitable subject and came across several attractive options. I needed to balance the desire for something a bit more unique with a practical eye toward ease of adaptation and availability of covering options etc… I didn’t want to go to the level of scale competition but I wanted something recognizable as “not” an available ARF. I looked at the NE-1, the Grasshopper (complete with Bazookas) and a couple others before I settled on a conversion to a PA-18 Super Cub.

There are a number of color schemes that are close enough to available covering colors to make it unnecessary to resort to painting… and many variations of the Super Cub exist… So many of these aircraft have been modified “in the field” that it would be difficult for anyone to point out a combination of “optional” gear like tire size, window size and shapes, cowl changes to accommodate various motors, etc… etc… that isn’t out there somewhere! The one’s that attract me most are all bush planes with the big tundra style tires! Those things not only add a nice scale touch but they are practical in that they absorb a bit of the abuse that the air frame would normally have to absorb.

Super Cub cowls are available for this kit so that part of the profile is easy to achieve. Bush wheels are also available as are light kits, interiors, articulated landing gears, etc… etc… So a bush variation PA-18 is what I will shoot for. I picked a picture off the internet of an Alaska based aircraft that I thought would be “within reach” to model and started planning, plotting and modifying.

First on the agenda was gathering info on equipment I would have to acquire. Bush tires and a nice shock absorbing landing gear are a necessity and I found PR bush wheels… These guys are out of Alaska and they created scale bush tires and rims for several sized and types of Cubs because no one else really has another really good option that I could find!! You really need to check out their video of a customer doing wheels skims across a pond! They are pricey as one would expect for such custom items but one of my flying buddies stepped up and ordered me a set in return for some RC shop work I had done for him recently. I wasn’t looking for that kind of payback but it is appreciated! Thanks Kelly!

Of course this forced me to order the appropriate Robart 1/4 Scale Cub landing gear! Can’t have those fancy wheels on some old, ugly wire gear can I?? So now I have pretty much all I will need to have an awesome landing gear setup for the PA-18.

Here’s the Robart gear with the wheels attached… These are going to look great!

I also went ahead and order a new cowl from Fiberglass Specialties Inc… They have a stock PA-18 cowl that fits the Balsa USA kit. It looks to be their standard quality workmanship (which is high) that has already survived sever drops from my workbench onto the concrete floor with nary a crack. I really need to quit dropping it!!

The project has since languished a bit as work got busy and I spent some time working on other projects. I also had to spend some time stuffing the piggy bank to purchase a suitable motor, speed controller, etc… I have finally gotten back to doing a bit of work on the Super Cub and I have found a few more things I felt “needed” modifications. There are a number of noticeable differences between the venerable J-3 and the PA-18.

I have the cowl taken care of but the tail feathers are noticeably different with aerodynamic counter balances on the elevator and a more rounded and larger rudder as well as some obvious bracing difference in the cockpit. Also, the vast majority of PA-18s have flaps while the majority of J-3s do NOT. Those items seemed to be high on the list of what makes a PA-18 look different and they all seem to be modifications that are “in reach” since they will require very little but time and effort to accomplish.

During this busy time I started stripping all of the covering off of the control surfaces and a bit of the tail which was about as much as the gentleman had gotten to. This was mostly accomplished during short windows in the shop after work was finally done and before bedtime.

I also removed the glow motor mount that I won’t be needing… The blind nuts I punched out before I realized that the top pair were trapped in an enclosed space and now make a fantastic rattle! I can see some Dremel work is coming to retrieve those!

This promises to be a fun project so I will have more updates soon as I expect to get in the shop a bit over the next 2 weeks around the holidays. I’ve already made some progress on the cockpit area, tail surface shapes and flaps so will try to post on some of that soon.

December 4, 2015December 4, 2015

Conversion of the Telemaster 40 to Electric Power – Part 2

It has been a while and my job keeps getting in the way of having fun… but I’ve finally started making progress again on the Telemaster conversion to electric power. Here’s some updated photos…

First you can see here the body with the transparent yellow Ultracoat applied to the open areas of the body. Basic white on the areas that are solid balsa/plywood or sheeting. That’s my basic theme with the addition of some white on leading edges and wingtips. Sort of a “visual airplane” so folks can see what is inside… I guess I’ll have to keep it neat inside when I go to install the servos etc…!!

Inside I installed a couple rails to mount the speed controller and a shelf in the bottom to give the battery a secure place to rest. I’ll add some velcro straps later. Here’s a view from the wing saddle area looking forward.

2015-03-14 12.57.04

Here’s some closeups of the modifications to the forward hatch. I needed some airflow over the Castle Creations Talon 90 speed controller and the expected 6S battery! If you look closely up above, you can see where I opened up a triangle on each side of the fuse for air to exit the fuse. With this forced air inlet I’m hoping to keep everything cool.

Essentially I just cut a piece out of a plastic soda bottle that looked vaguely “scoop” shaped and then traced around it on the hatch and hacked away the opening with a sharp Xacto. I added the forward brace to keep this all balsa hatch stiff and then used med/thick CA to hold it all in place. Adding some covering and a little rubber “combing” to the front edge later makes it all look pretty good!

Following the pattern already established I tackled the stabilizer area… solid vertical gets white and horizontal the transparent treatment. White adds a nice touch on the tips and leading edge plus helps seal it all up. That vertical will make a nice place for some added detail later… lettering, stripes, decals or whatever suits my fancy.

I’ve also been working on the wing to make the assembly easier. No more rubber band wing attachment!! Now 4 bolts will hold the wing in place. Less room for error perhaps but so much easier to get ready to fly and no re-trimming due to alignment of the wing variance.

Here is the wing center area.

As you see I cut into the top of the wing just behind the leading edge and installed some beefy plywood to give me a strong and flat surface to bolt to. Its epoxied to ribs on both sides and the bottom sheeting so I don’t think it’s going anywhere. In the back you can see the little wedge shaped hardwood blocks I cut and sanded to size then epoxied to the existing hardwood plate on top of the wing.

Here is the saddle area of the fuselage.

At the right you can see the plywood plate I installed in the forward fuselage area. It sits right under one of the main longerons and epoxy is again used to secure to the front bulkhead, fuselage sides and longerons. In the rear are some commercially made plastic bolt on inserts that have nice tight 1/4-20 threads cut in them. I can’t recall who made them but I had them laying around so I went that way rather than do another plywood insert. Due to the light construction of this aircraft there is no hardwood in the wing saddle area in the original design but since the aircraft is so light, I’m hoping these will hold without any more reinforcement. If I see play developing I may have to reinforce later. I’ll keep a sharp eye on it!

Some of you eagle eyed types may have noticed that my front bolt holes are not exactly “exact”! When I drilled those through the wing and down into these plates my trusty TLAR method (That Looks About Right) allowed for a bit of drill bit wander. I was concentrating on making the holes straight up and down so the bolt heads would sit nice and flat on the plywood and didn’t notice the discrepancy. I don’t think it really matters… the idea is to be secure, right! I’m pretty sure no will notice as it floats by at 20′ altitude and 20 mph.

That about covers the last few months of progress! I expect to get some more significant work done over the holidays… or maybe not as I have two other (or is it 3 or 4 or …) projects laying around I want to get back to as well. Oh, and there are 3 or 4 guys that have some winter projects they want to bring over… Which ever project or projects get some bench time, I’ll try to update here. Looking forward to any suggestions or comments you all might have. Feel free to post below.

October 29, 2015October 29, 2015

Throttle lock/Kill Switch programming on the DX8

A couple years ago I was taxiing back toward the pits with one of my smaller gas powered planes and had stopped to observer another flyer doing a nice touch and go… My plane was sitting by my feet at a sedate idle during this distraction. When I turned back, I returned my left hand to my radio and inadvertently slid the throttle stick to full!! Luckily I was pointed at the pit chain link fence 6 feet away with no other obstructions… like people… so as I grabbed the stick and returned the throttle to idle the plane made a dash for the fence and quit as a result of the impact and the prop breaking into several pieces. It did no real harm to anything except the prop and my pride… but it woke me up and from then on I have been much more attentive to my models while they are running. When I am idleing, my thumb is hooked across the top of the throttle stick so that it cannot easily be moved upward. As well, I now have a kill switch on every fuel powered airplane and it is always in the same position on the radio so I don’t have to hunt for it! With gas planes I have a mechanism hooked into the ignition circuit that kills power to the ignition. Depending on the type of engine and ignition system it may work a bit differently but each disables the ignition which kills a gas motor immediately.

With the advent of more electrics in my fleet this became even more problematic. Electrics, once the battery is connected, should be considered to be “running” in all cases and therefore treated with the respect that would be due any idling engine. Since you can forget the battery is plugged in at times, I try to be especially careful to restrain my electric powered aircraft whenever I’m not holding on to them and a battery is installed. I have also setup a throttle cut switch that limits the throttle channel output to zero or as close as possible. In some radios this is simpler than others. In my Spektrum DX-8 there are two ways to accomplish this… maybe more… but I’ll show one of them here that I use most. (I believe the 7s, 9 and 18 all do it similarly)

Note: You can do all of the following without the plane even being present and certainly don’t want to play with this with the plane powered up! I highly recommend you test after you finish however with the plane well restrained or the prop removed.

First, the DX-8 has a throttle cut option in the setup menu. If you go into that menu and change the inhibit to a switch label (I tend to use Gear0 as I’ll show below) you get a screen that looks like this.

You’ll notice that the switch is set to Gear0 (that’s a zero). I use this setting as I tend to setup my radio so that starting point for all airplanes when I fuel up or attach a battery is with all switches pushed away from me. It really doesn’t matter which way you do it. I’ve worked with computers and electronics so long and the way I was taught logic you generally consider 0 to be off and 1 to be on…. I guess position 2 is “really on” in the case of a 3 position switch!

With my radio set this way the throttle is locked so it cannot inadvertently start up without moving both the throttle stick and moving the gear switch out of its starting “safe” position. The other thing you may notice is that the position reads 30%. I played with this and came upon this setting by trial and error. I believe this has to be done because of two factors. First, the designers created this for (I believe) primarily fuel powered aircraft where the stop/kill position is significantly different from the idle/standard starting position. In an electric aircraft you generally don’t want an “idle” with the prop moving when you pull back to the lowest position on your stick. You want a full stop. Second, most speed controllers in my experience will look at the throttle setting on power up (as long as it’s at least somewhere near one end of travel or the other) to be the zero/stop point. That’s fine until you combine with point 1.

So imagine you plug in the battery with the throttle 30% lower than “idle”… which is what the throttle position would be if you left that setting at zero and had the switch pushed forward/off when you plugged it in. All seems fine… Your speed controller makes its little tunes and if you move the throttle stick nothing happens but your servos are energized (this may vary by manufacturer of the speed control). Great, you are ready to taxi and you flip the switch to the armed/on position and immediately the prop spins to a “high idle” setting!!! That’s not convenient, nor especially safe. This is because with the kill switch in the forward/off position the throttle was at a point 30% or so below the idle point and when you plugged in the controller reset that to be “zero”. By testing I have found 30% to be about the right point to avoid this issue. Now the kill switch doesn’t really change the position of the throttle at all and acts more like a throttle hold then a cut. Ideal for what we want when dealing with electrics.

There are other ways and other radios do it differently. On my DX-18 which I fly more than anything else I use the F switch instead of gear because I use the gear for other things… like retractable gears! But whichever switch you use, I suggest you keep it consistent. This way your routine on each plane is the same at least as regards to a safe “startup” and also because occasionally you may want to hit it in a hurry and not having to think about which switch it is can make a big difference in response time.

I’ll try to post on a different method in the near future. Hope this is helpful. Fly safe!

October 24, 2015October 29, 2015

Updates… Carbon Cub motor, AR9000 repair

In an earlier post I related my misfortune with my Carbon Cub motor having failed. Another covered the issue of channel cross interference in a Spektrum receiver. Well I’m happy to report that both issues are now resolved.

The Carbon Cub motor was replaced with no charge by Horizon Hobby. In fact it came back in something like 4 days which allowed me to get a test flight in at the club field before slapping the floats on and making a trip back down to Lake Lemon near Bloomington, IN for the fall float fly. Once again the Cub performed great.

I would still recommend the Carbon Cub, but I would certainly advise keeping a close eye on the BL52 motor from E-flite. I love the Power 60 on my Extra 260 but this motor is not that same quality in my opinion.

On the receiver, once again Horizon finally came through, and not only replaced but upgraded me to a new AR9020 DSMX receiver. I was a tad disappointed the tech still couldn’t recreate the issue after I sent them a video and exact transmitter settings that allowed me to recreate the issue using both my Spectrum radios! The important thing I suppose is they did right by the customer and that seems to be the way they tend to operate which is not always the case with all businesses. Kudos to Horizon on that front.

It’s getting to be late in the flying season here so expect to see some building projects, indoor/micro electrics and similar discussion soon.

October 1, 2015October 2, 2015

Carbon Cub – Motor problems!!

I bought my cub back in late 2014 and started flying it more as the weather got warmer here in Indiana. It has become my go to flyer and I probably have 100 flights or so on it by now. Unfortunately, yesterday it got put out of action by motor problems.

There have been 5 of the Carbon Cubs in the local club.

Cub #1 was sold as the pilot and the plane just didn’t get along… he could never get his to fly the way he wanted. Just not his style I suppose. I saw it flying at an event at another club this last weekend. Doing great on floats and seeming to have no issues as all.
Cub #2 is still in action but doesn’t get much flying as the pilot has other aircraft he flies more often. It had a motor issue within the first 20 flights or so and Horizon took care of it. The new motor has only a few flights on it since being replaced.
Cub #3 crashed within the first dozen flights or so with smoke issuing from it mid-flight and a burned up ESC and Motor apparent upon inspection after the crash. The airplane was heavily damaged in the crash. That motor was dragging badly and apparently drew so much current it fried the ESC. Owner of Cub #2 heard the engine grinding just before Cub #3 malfunctioned but didn’t even get time to speak up before the smoke started and it was all over.
Cub #4 had what appears to have been an ESC issue but I have not heard exactly what occurred. I just know it crashed and is out of service for the time being. It was flown pretty hard… this guy is a 3D pilot and he flew it that way. Nothing wrong with that but it may have played a part in its demise.
Cub #5 is mine. It has been flown a lot, but well treated and nothing happened recently that I would have expected to cause motor issues. I have not flown it exceptionally hard, had a nose impact or done much of anything unusual. Flew on floats a few days before, in heavy wind a day before that… Last flight was a long climb at mid-throttle using the wind to climb to near 1500′ AGL then a lazy dive punctuated with some spins down to about 100 feet. Probably not as hard on it as my glider tows to 1000′ or so that I’ve done in the past. When I pulled out to level and throttled up a bit I could hear the grinding and tried to limit throttle usage as I made a quick landing. I can see that several magnets have moved toward the rear of the motor and there is some gray residue inside the battery compartment where the airflow carried the shavings. I will clean that up and hope for the best regarding the rest of the electronics that are in the path of the airflow!

That makes 3 (maybe 4) of the 5 local Carbon Z Cubs that have had a similar issue. Horizon took excellent care of the owner of Cub 2 with a new motor sent out quickly. Cub 3 was replaced after the owner sent it back in for diagnosis. Not sure about the other one. My motor is on the way back to them now. I’m hoping this isn’t a representative sampling of the failure rates for these motors. I have read about a few folks on the discussion groups having these same issues. If Horizon takes care of me the way they have these other guys, I guess I would still recommend the plane to others but I will definitely tell folks to keep an eye on the motor. A failure at the wrong time could certainly ruin your day!

I’ll update when I hear back from Horizon. Hoping for a quick turn around… it’s less than 2 week’s ’till the next float fly!!