Fly RC

May 9, 2015

Taft Hobby DO-27… Last Flight!

Unfortunately, Steve’s DO-27 didn’t make very many flights between it’s first and last flight. Steve was never thrilled with the flight characteristics, though it seemed to be quite capable. I think he was expecting it to fly a bit slower/lighter and it required just a bit of speed to maintain control authority. In addition the wing mounting method seemed to always need at least 3 hands to accomplish and the servo wire connection into each wing was painful to accomplish. If you get one of these, you should plan on modifying those servo wires to move those connections to a more easily accessed area. I also wonder how long the plastic/spring wing connecting clips would last? I’m not a big fan of those either. Bolts have always worked well so not sure why they decided to use something different here.

Having said all that, the DO-27 is an oddly attractive aircraft and did seem to be fairly capable of some nice rolls and similar basic aerobatic maneuvers. Unfortunately we never got a chance to fully explore its capabilities. On the first flight of our most recent day at the field the plane suddenly lost all power and dove into the ground nose first… rolling slowly while gathering more speed as it fell.

Here is what the crash scene looked like….

Ugly, I know. The impressive thing is that the wing not only didn’t break in half on impact but wouldn’t even break over Steve’s knee when he tried to do so in order to shove it in the trash bag!! When I picked through the wreckage and sorted out the good stuff, I did a little exploratory surgery and found there were a pair of CF square tubes embedded in each wing half. No wonder this thing is tough!

It also took no time to find the cause of the crash and it was NOT (unusually in my experience) pilot error. Or at least not a case of dumb thumbs. The apparent cause of the crash was a poor solder joint on the positive lead of the battery load wire which had broken off in mid flight! So Steve’s mistake was trusting his mechanic/electrician (that would be me) to make this solder connection. I hate that this happened… sorry Steve… but it does make the case that maybe a separate battery to run the receiver and servos would be a good option… especially for the larger/more expensive electrics. Will have to look into that soon for my 90 size Extra and maybe for the Carbon Cub.

The problem was a combination of several things. One, the battery has 10 gauge stranded wire which is a bit unusual for a battery this small (4c, 3700mah). Second, the supplied speed controller connectors were some smallish bullets which is a bit unusual in my experience and we had nothing to match them and even if we had it would have been tough to get these big wires into the matching bullet connectors. Third, we decided to swap these for Deans Ultra connectors. While I love the Deans for current carrying capability and the snug connection that results, this is another case of having problems connecting the wires to these blades. Easy to do for 14 gauge and smaller but for these 10 gauge I was having a lot of trouble getting things attached without melting the housing. I thought I had pulled it off but in the case of the positive lead the wire had pushed away a bit and the gap between the back of the blade and wire was filled only with solder. Unfortunately solder bends easily but also quickly fractures under a repeated bending as will often occur when installing batteries in our airplanes. Mind, I am not making excuses… I should have done a better job on this solder joint. I just want to point out that getting this right would have been a lot easier if we had picked a more appropriately sized connector considering the wire size involved. I must be slipping.

RIP DO-27… it appears all the electronics, including the servos, receiver, speed controller and motor have survived. What can we do with all of this?

April 30, 2015April 30, 2015

Conversion of the Aeroworks Extra 260 to Electric Power – P4

Took the Extra to the field last night and ran a couple of batteries through it. I had fear that it would become much heavier and not fly as well but that is definitely not the case. The weight is virtually unchanged… added a few ounces at most… and the plane flies very well. Power from the E-Flite Power 60 with a 16×8 Xoar E prop is unlimited vertical even when the battery falls to 15% of capacity! I have several batteries but one I highly recommend the current crop of 30C 3300-4000mah Glacier 6S batteries for this setup. Mounting the battery with the tail end butted right up against the wing tube seems to put the balance point right on or maybe just a smidge toward nose heavy. The motor, battery and Castle Talon 90 never even get more than warm after a nice 8 minute or so flight.

The best part is that I had to do virtually no trimming as this was based on an existing radio setup. I think I added (or took out) 1 click of elevator. If you have this or a similar size bird you want to electrify I highly reccomend this setup. Here are links to the speed controller, motor and prop I used…

The Glaciers seem to outperform many brands that are 2-3 times as expensive and testing on my bench definitely bears that out so far. I have borrowed a couple of the higher price packs from a friend (6S 4400s) and will try those as well very soon.

I am amazed how well the plane flies. For reasons I can’t put my finger on, I think the plane flies better with this configuration than it did with the DLE-20 gas engine. Maybe it’s the smooth application of power (the DLE has to have a crazy throttle curve to even come close to smooth throttle application) or the lack of noise and vibration. The other thing I can’t put my finger on is any gas or oil residue on the plane! Clean up is solely for the purpose of removing bugs and grass from the air frame!

Aside from the cost of batteries and an appropriate charger (but to be fair I will use both to provide power to 2 other airplanes) the conversion to electric I consider to be a huge success and actually less expensive than I expected.

Perhaps the only thing left to address is the need to remove the canopy to connect and disconnect the battery. With screws holding it on it’s likely going to get a bit tedious. I am thinking of adapting it to magnets or perhaps some sort of slide latch system. For now I’ll probably just try to get in a few more flights, get a battery voltage monitor hooked up so I can watch my battery voltage using the on board telemetry and experiment with some different props. Perhaps a current probe for the telemetry will be added as well to help choose that perfect prop. There’s always more to learn and experimenting while flying the “E” Aeroworks Extra 260 is going to be a lot of fun.

April 29, 2015

Taft Hobby DO-27… First Flight!

If you read the first look post on this plane you will recall that we ran into problems trying to install the first wing set due to (apparently) a misaligned tube in one wing. Once again the folks at Falcon took good care of their customer and shipped out a new wing set and tubes. The new set slid right into place but at this point we noted another issue.

As you can see one of the servo leads in the wing is so short that it is very difficult to plug in at all when you are assembling the aircraft. You don’t have a lot of wire coming out of the wing root either, though it is adequate. The problem is you can’t hold onto this servo lead and apply any pressure to assemble it… Forceps are NOT optional! This is an annoyance, but not a showstopper.

Finally, the last complaint I have about the Taft DO-27 is the hinging of the control surfaces. The folks at Taft obviously know these things are a bit fragile as they include a bag of hinge points to install in case the molded in hinging fails. We added some wound tape in the aileron hinge line on Steve’s plane and we will see how it goes but both the returned wing set and the new set are already showing signs of hinge failure so I think I would consider adding tape to all hinge lines or cutting them loose and installing the hinge pins from day 1 if it were my airplane.

The good news is, once we got the plane assembled and at the field… It looks good and flies really well. The scale details really add to the look and the lights are a nice touch as well. Taxiing on our grass field was easy and with almost no wind and a short takeoff run the DO-27 picked itself up and climbed quickly. Steve shortly had it doing loops, rolls, snaps and more. Power was good and flight times look to be 8-10 minutes of general sport flying… maybe longer with some throttle management.

I’d like to rant about how nice the plane is and in the air it really is. Flying characteristics (based on the two flights so far) seem to be excellent. Plenty of wing, good roll rates, just a generally good flying airplane. Looks too are a plus with nice lights and a distinctive shape and color scheme with a few details thrown in makes for a nice combination. Assuming the wing tube problem is unique, you have to deal with a few issues… First rearrange things to get the tail linkage setup correct. Second, you should probably get some short extensions to permanently attach to the 2 shorter servo wires and make them easier to connect and disconnect. Third, get out your hinge tape or go ahead and install the hinge points day 1. With those 3 things out of the way, the airplane should be a winner. Time will tell for sure.

April 25, 2015April 30, 2015

Conversion of the Aeroworks Extra 260 to Electric Power – P3

Well the glue dried and I got the motor mounted using 1″ spacers, 2.5″ bolts with fender washers in front and behind the firewall and nylon insert nuts on the back of the firewall. These nuts are so much better than any combination of loctite, lock washers etc… They will not vibrate loose even in big single cylinder gas applications (only heat can effect them and that takes quite a bit).

Also mounted the speed control on the bottom of the motor box where there is a natural air flow and (by adding a hole in the bottom of the motor box) kept it close enough so the motor wires can plug right in and the battery wires can reach without any extensions. Only the throttle wire may need an extension.

Added the side air scoops as you can see above with Gorilla brand expanding glue. It’s great for many things… seems to have great adhesion to so many surfaces and materials… just have to keep an eye on it to prevent problems due to expansion of the glue. Here’s a link to the stuff I used.

Also opened up the bottom of the airplane for exhaust as directed in the instructions.

Need to close off the old switch opening, decide how or if to address the fuel dot, work on the battery hold down and do some general clean up of the internal wiring and it will be time to do some measurements and a bit of radio adjustment. The last critical bit will be insuring the balance is on and it will be time to fly.

April 19, 2015

Taft Hobby DO-27… First look

During his recent trip to the Weak Signals show in Toledo, my flying buddy Steve made an “impulse buy” from the good folks at Falcon Hobby Supply and came home with the Taft Hobby DO-27 in Red and White.

The purchase started out with a bit of misstep when the folks working the booth there assured Steve that the plane would accept the 6S LiPos that he had on hand. This is not the case! The DO-27 is setup for 4S use and I very much doubt the speed controller or motor would last long if a 6S was installed! With no 4S batteries in his inventory, Steve was considering returning the aircraft but the folks at Falcon stepped up and offered to send a free battery at no charge. Shortly thereafter Steve has a 45C Pulse Ultra battery in hand and is looking forward to flying his new airplane.

Today, Steve brought the DO-27 over and we started unpacking and assembling. Visually the airplane is striking with a nice paint scheme, quite a bit of scale detail and a very distinctive look. Packaging seemed to be excellent with no damage noted and everything held tightly in place. The model is also very complete with everything needed including a nice wood prop, spinner, nice looking wheels, etc… Assembly is very simple with only a few steps to complete but during the process we did note a couple of issues. Two were especially troublesome.

First, the front wing tube in the port side was impossible to install. It went in an inch or so and then became very stubborn. After forcing it a bit further it just continued to get more difficult to slide in. Visual inspection seemed to indicate the tube was misaligned with the plastic wing root as a lip can be seen on one side. With no way to move the tube (it seems to be quite securely installed) we tried using a drill bit to open up the entry to the tube and eventually managed to get the tube in place but it is very difficult to install and I think another call to Falcon is imminent!

Secondly, when Steve attempted to connect the linkage to the tail surfaces we quickly realized one was far to short and the other far to long! It was quickly decided that the linkages were simply swapped at the factory so we traded them out and things looked a bit more promising until we realized that both were now to long… a bit more head scratching and we realized that if we physically reversed the servos, essentially moving the output shaft forward a bit, we might have something that would work. With that done, we got to a workable linkage layout and all seems well.

Another minor issue was clearance between the landing gear blocks and the foam hatch that screws on over it. Once the straps were added to hold the landing gear in place, the belly hatch was held slightly away from the body of the plane. Some simple trimming in the area took care of the problem.

We still have high hopes that solutions to all the issues will be found and Steve will get to actually fly the bird soon. With any luck it will fly as good as it looks and we can leave the issues behind. More to come….

April 19, 2015

Lots of LiPos… maybe parallel charging is one answer?

I recently picked up a higher power charger… In my case, I chose the Revolectric FMA PL-6. This is a very highly regarded charger and I did not pick it for just the power but that was a basic requirement in the decision making process. So far, I am enjoying it and I will have another post up shortly with more info on that product. The important plot point for now is that this is a single output charger that can crank over 400W of charge power at 12V and over 800W at 24V. Compared to my previous chargers that have always (at most) been limited to 50W per output this thing is a real power house… but I was thinking I had to trade off quite a bit to get the big power. For instance…

The first big trade off when looking at these higher wattage chargers is that they typically have fewer outputs. On my old trustworthy Hitec X4 I have 4 outputs, each capable of 50W of charging power. When you start looking at chargers with 400W or so you usually get 1 output or occasionally 2 outputs with 200W of power each. By the time you get to 600W or higher you are typically going to get one output.

This was an acceptable trade off for me because my main goal in purchasing this charger was to allow me to charge my 6S 3300-4000mah LiPos in a reasonable time. A 4A charge (one hour recharge for the 4000s) at 25V (approx.) requires a 100W charger. With my 50W, charge times were in the range of 1.5-2 hours. With my new charger I can charge at 2C (8A) which at 25V is 200W and charge in 30 minutes or less. Not bad! In a pinch I can even charge faster as the batteries are rated for 5C (20A) max charge rate which would bring me to a 12 minute charge provided I have at least a 24V supply! I don’t like to push the batteries that hard normally but it’s nice to have that ability.

The problem, it would seem is that I now can only charge one battery at a time so if I charge at 2C or so I could charge another battery every 30 minutes. That’s great but it sure would be nice to be able to charge multiples… Oh well, I guess I have to give up something for progress… or do I! As it turns out there is a way to get there, and it really isn’t that difficult. Enter the parallel charging board…

2015-04-16 21.03.15

With this nifty little board plugged into the 6S balance port on the included balance board as well as the main charge ports of the PL6, I can now connect up to 6 similar batteries at a time and using the high power charging capabilities of this charger I can charge all 6 at once!! There are many versions of this board with various types of charge plugs, so be sure to get the version that is right for your batteries. It’s really fairly simple to use and quite effective. Basically as long as the batteries are all similar cell counts and are starting the charge cycle at fairly similar states of charge, you can simply plug all of them into the board (main charge lead first, then the balance plug from each battery) and you’re ready to charge.

As an example, let’s say I’ve flown 6 flights on my T28 using 3S 2200 mah LiPo batteries. Assuming I’ve run them all down near exhaustion I simply plug in the main leads and then the balance plugs to the balance board, set the charger for 2200mah charge rate as normal but specifying that I am charging 6 parallel batteries. The charger will then multiply the charge rate and start charging at 13.2A. In an hour or so, all 6 will be charged. If all the batteries can handle a 2C charge rate of 4.4A then we could charge them all in about 30 minutes as the charger would be pumping out 26.4A. 26.4A at 12V (all approximations) would require a bit over 300W which is easily attainable with even a fairly modest 12V power supply or battery.

There are a couple things to keep track of when parallel charging. You should take it seriously when I say that the batteries need to start the process at near similar charge levels. Any difference in voltage between the packs will equalize by current rushing from one pack to the other through whatever connections are available (thus the advice to connect the main load connectors first since they can handle more current). This rush of current if pretty much unrestricted and could overheat another battery or smoke the balance board if the difference is to great. Also, note that all the packs need to be of equal cell count so no mixing 3S and 6S etc…

When this really gets to be impressive is when you look at what happens if I want to charge up all six of my 6S batteries. I have 2 4000mah, 3 3300mah and 1 3700mah 6S packs for use in several of my planes. Using my old 50Wx4 charger getting all 6 packs back to charged state after a full day of flying would take at least one full charge cycle of 1.5 hours (at least) for the first four and an additional 1.5 (or more) hours for the second batch of 2. This is 3-4 hours of charging. Now, I can hook up all 6 packs in parallel and even if I pick a modest 3.3A charge rate the charger will then do the match and start charging at about 20A (assuming adequate DC power). The charge cycle will likely take only a bit over an hour and all 6 packs will be race ready again!

I’m not sure I’d want to do this with packs that were hugely different in capacity… have to think about what will happen and whether this might cause issues but I’m not concerned with this particular scenario. Of course parallel charging is possible with other chargers… this is not something only this charger can do… but to be useful the charger needs power to spare. Your average 50W charger need not apply… Here are links to both the charger and the balance board in case you are interested in purchasing one or both for yourself.

April 16, 2015May 10, 2015

Conversion of the Aeroworks Extra 260 to Electric Power – P2

Some small progress has been made. I stripped all the gas related equipment out the other day. This includes the fuel tank, fuel dot and associated plumbing, gas motor (DLE-20) with ignition, both throttle and choke servos, power switches (2) and the main battery (2300 LIFE that feeds both ignition and flight gear). Near as I can figure, I am taking out 2lbs 14oz of “stuff”. So far adding somewhere around 2lbs 10oz inlcuding the motor, speed controller 6S 4000mah battery and a few other odds and ends. Even allowing for another 4oz in battery tie downs etc… would make the change in weight zero! I expect the new motor to produce nearly the same thrust and I could easily afford (at a guess) to give up 20% without losing unlimited vertical. Things are looking good so far!

As I sized up mounting the Power 60 electric motor I realized I needed to strip off the firewall doubler that had been added when the DLE was mounted and close up the hole that had been cut to accommodate that setup. With a bit of judicious application of a wood chisel I am down to the original motor box and I have overlaid the front of the box with a new piece of 1/4″ plywood to provide a nice solid platform to mount the new motor to. With the added 1/4″ of the plywood and the addition of some 1″ spacers I picked up at the Toledo show, I should have the correct spacing to get the back plate of the prop adapter outside the cowl with 1/8-1/4″ to spare. I even remembered to extend the center lines that were on the front of the motor box around to the sides so I’ll have reference marks to extend them back to the front when the epoxy dries and insure the new install is also centered! Yeah me! 🙂

Waiting patiently for the epoxy to dry now… <sigh>

April 5, 2015April 30, 2015

Conversion of the Aeroworks Extra 260 to Electric Power – P1

Whilst still in the midst of converting the Telemaster to electric power… a project that is awaiting a covering job which in turn has gotten in line behind a covering job for a friends airplane… I picked up an extra speed controller and a similar but slightly more powerful electric motor for the AW 260. Contemplating this new project, it suddenly hit me that the conversion of the AW 260 is going to be quite a bit simpler than the Telemaster. This is mostly due to the fact that the 260 is in “like new” condition and was designed by Aeroworks with the option for electric power from the beginning. Here’s a stock photo from the AW website:

.60 - .90 Extra 260 ARF QB

I still have the original pieces needed to do the small amount of conversion needed (some air guides/scoops… etc…) but need a motor mount so I’ve ordered the original conversion box from AW. The ordering process was great… free shipping… nice. Then I got to the part where they charge $6 for handling… Of course I went ahead and ordered and just added an “explanatory note” to explain what I thought of advertising free shipping and then charging handling instead. I still wanted the thing and the price even with handling is not ridiculous, I could just wish for a bit more honesty in advertising… probably an oxymoron but I refuse to lose ALL hope!

Update!!! The worst part, now a couple weeks later, is it turned out that the conversion box from AW was to long to accommodate the motor (EFlight Power 60) anyway so it is pretty much useless to me… Live and learn.

In any case, I have already stripped the motor, tank, throttle servo, etc… and am just awaiting the motor box to arrive before I dig in to what I hope will be a fairly quick and simple conversion. One of my final bits of homework is to try to determine what size battery will be needed to keep this bird airborne for a reasonable (8 minutes or more I hope) period of time. I’m hoping I can use one of the pack sizes I’ve already acquired for use in the Telemaster or Carbon Z Cub. If not, I’ll be in Toledo for the big Weak Signals 2015 where I plan on picking up a new charger and a few more 6S LiPos, including some for this project. I’ll update with weight comparisons and details of the project as it progresses and hope to be able to post flight test details soon!

March 25, 2015

Conversion of the Telemaster 40 to Electric Power – Part 1

I’ve been saying for a couple years that I would eventually like to do away with all of my glow power in favor of either Electric or Gas. With gasoline being so much more affordable than glow fuel and more and more gas powered options becoming available in smaller displacements, I started divesting myself of all my 1.20 and up glow engines and installing DLE-20s or something similar. For the smaller stuff, economical options for electric power in the smaller aircraft have also become available as battery technology particularly seems to have jumped forward. For me the sweet spot for glow power had shrunk to .46-.90 size engines only. Anything else and I was looking for Electric or Gas power options for sure.

Recently I bought the Carbon Z Cub and after a few flights I realized that it might be time to once again look at what electric options were available for my remaining glow fleet. It’s power system is pulling an 8 lb airplane with enough power to provide unlimited vertical (1250+ Watts when running at the absolute max) and since I was going to be buying a few 6S LiPo packs in support of that aircraft anyway I thought if I could find a good alternative using those same packs it might be time to replace a few more glow power plants.

One of my old reliables in my glow fleet is my Telemaster 40. My Telemaster is probably 10 years old and has gone through 2 or 3 engine swaps and 2 different covering schemes. It is currently configured as a tail dragger with a Saito .82 four stroke for power which would seem to be in the same category of power as the Carbon Cub and is far lighter (~5.5lbs), even with floats attached(~7lbs). This aircraft with the Saito makes a great float plane, drop box hauler, glider carrier and sometimes just fun to fly light weight trainer. It is currently covered in Wonder Bread inspired white with colored spots and is always a big hit with the kids as a result.

The Telemaster’s horizontal stabilizer is a full airfoil design which makes it quite different to fly from most other trainers, handling much more like a cub than a trainer when it comes to takeoffs, landings and turns (rudder coordination is highly recommended). I like to think it is my skilled craftsmanship (she started out as a box of sticks, two plan sheets and 4 pages or so of small print) that makes this thing such a versatile and fun aircraft to fly but I’ve seen the ARF version and it flies great too!

After a bit of research I decided that is should be possible to swap out the Saito for a new motor and speed controller without spending a whole lot of money (assuming I can sell the Saito to offset some of the cost) and losing little or nothing as far as performance goes. In fact, most of the power options using the 6 cell LiPo batteries are likely going to be on the high side of what the .82 produces based on the research I did. It also looks like the weight of the aircraft should remain nearly constant if I keep the battery capacity in the 3000-3500mah range.

To start with I did a ton of reading, comparing specs and calculating to find out which motor and speed controller combinations made sense. I also looked for something that might be a good fit for my .90 size AeroWorks Extra 260 while I was at it. The Telemaster needs a healthy power plant to handle all the “extras” I ask of it… so something with just a bit more capability than the CZ Cub has (besides I’d like to have a bit more headroom as the cub can actually draw the rated max from the provided speed controller) maybe 1400 watts or so would be a nice target… Hopefully I can continue to enjoy nice long flights when I’m just poking around but still have plenty of authority when pulling up off the pond or hauling my skydiver up for another drop. Just a bit higher would even be enough to pull the Extra 260. It’s in the 7-7.5lb range so I’d like to have 1600 watts or so on it. With the right choices maybe I could share batteries and run a similar speed controller even if I have to upscale a bit on the motor itself.

Keeping in mind that I wanted to use my 6 cell batteries (My battery selection right now skips from about 2200mah 3S batteries to 6S 3200s!) and limiting myself to mostly what I can get through my local hobby stores, I came up with a couple of interesting options and decided to look at the Rimfire .80. My Saito turns a 14×7 with a lot of torque up to just under 8000 RPM if I recall correctly and the Rimfire calls for something in the 15×6,14×8,15×7,15×8 range and at 500KV on 6S I would expect something in the same range of RPMs… so it shouldn’t be any less capable with the new power system. Also, per the wattage, KV and Prop specifications, this appears like it will be a close match to what the Carbon Z power system does and with only a bit less wing and quite a bit less weight I would again expect to have some fairly “peppy” performance on the Telemaster. Checking weight, etc… and everything looked to be in the ballpark so I had the hobby shop order the motor and speed controller and started to work on the air frame.

Getting started involved pulling the motor, fuel tank and all the rest from the Telemaster and getting an idea how much weight I was stripping out. If things worked out well, I could install the new power system without adding much weight. The last thing I wanted was to end up with a porky Telemaster.

Here is a selection of the items that will no longer be needed.

All told this stuff weighed in at 2 and 1/4lbs and I have since found a few other odds and ends I will no longer need. Even with a fairly hefty/large capacity battery I think I can keep the overall weight close which bodes well for the project. While I’m at it, I’m stripping her down to make it easy to install the new gear and make the necessary mods to install the electric power plant. I’ll post some more as the project progresses.

February 26, 2015March 13, 2015

“Wax” coating for foam airplanes…

As I have ventured into more Electric powered flight I have acquired more and more foam aircraft. Foamies are great as they are durable, easily repairable in most cases and very light. Foam is also easier for manufacturers to shape into all sorts of shapes and allows them to mold in a lot of intricate detail if desired. Sometimes the downside of foamies is that the foam tends to get dirt and dust embedded in it, grass stains and other scuff marks etc… As well, whatever paint has been applied often wears away quickly. That’s not a big deal when the plane is the $30 variety but as the foam and electric planes get bigger, more detailed, and more expensive, you tend to become more interested in preserving them. Even my T28, which is cheap at twice the cost (but don’t tell Parkzone) gets dirty and ugly far to fast in my opinion. I am on my third and have probably 1000 total flights on them, and wanted a way to protect the latest edition.

I have seen folks using a clear spray coating of either urethane or something similar but it can damage the foam (either the spray itself or sometimes the propellant used). As well, many of these eventually yellow and are hard to remove once that occurs. Looking for something better, I ran across some information recommending a coating of Pledge Future floor polish to help preserve the foam and whatever finish has been applied to it. I hunted a bit and found the product had since been renamed and re-marketed as Pledge Multi Surface Floor Cleaner so I went out an hunted down a bottle and first did a test coat on a scrap of foam with promising results.

I have since coated part of my FlyZone Tidewater and all of my Parkzone T28 with it and I have to say the surface seems to be quite tough and very slick and shiny. In both cases I covered the airplanes by simply painting it on with a foam brush but you really can’t tell that by looking at them. I have read that many folks have applied it with an air brush with great results as well but aside from giving you a thinner and lighter coating (which may be important to you if weight is a critical in your application), I don’t think you will be able to tell the difference in finish as the product seems to be self leveling in nature and I ended up with a very smooth, slick finish on both aircraft. Here’s a view of the T28… it may be hard to tell from this but the finish is much slicker now than it was before.

So aside from a small amount of weight there are a couple possible downsides to watch out for. As I learned first hand on the Tidewater, the paint on your foamy may be soluble by the coating! Yep, the paint on the Tidewater started running as soon as I applied the “Future”. So test first with a very small amount of finish in an unobtrusive spot before applying widely. With care, I did manage to coat all of the colored areas with a minimum of runs (a bit of dabbing with a paper towel works wonders). On the plus side the T28 finish had no issues at all.

Secondly, while the viscosity of the product (just a bit thicker than water) lends itself well to application via foam brush or airbrush, it also can run easily so apply lightly. The good news is a little reapplication will often soften the area and allow the aforementioned self leveling to occur. If worse comes to worse, ammonia based cleaners will take it off so you can start over! Keep this in mind while cleaning the aircraft in the future as many window type cleaners will contain ammonia and dull or remove the finish.

Based on my experience so far, I’m planning on having a buddy do a coat of Future with an air brush for my Carbon Z Cub. He has more experience with air brushing than I so once I do a little bit of customization/decoration I plan on handing it off to him for the actual application.

If you need to get some Pledge Multi Surface to try it out for yourself and can’t easily find it locally, here’s a link to Amazon for the correct product. Pledge Floor Care Multi-Surface Finish

It’s cheaper there than I found it locally, even with shipping! I’ll update this post with my experience once flying season is in full swing. Please comment with your own experience here as well.