What did you fly today?

[f4u ausie]

Thanx viper. Have 3 charger's.. I'm sure 1. Will do it and I guess comparing new lipos. To that old 1. Will also give a hint

[xviper]

Must learn how to check resistance.

The easiest way to check IR (internal resistance) is to let your LiPo charger do it for you. Of course, this is contingent upon your charger having this feature, which most modern chargers do. Once you get a LiPo started charging (it takes between 15 to 30 seconds for it to measure and display the IR, you should be able to scroll or flip through the various menu items without interfering or interrupting the charging process. (Or you can buy an Internal Resistance meter that will take a reading on its own. These can be purchased in places like Amazon or a hobby shop. They run around 30 US bucks, give or take, depending on how fancy you want to go.)
Here is a photo of my charger in action, showing the IR of one of my 5 year old 3 cell LiPos. The measurement shown tells me that this particular battery has very good IR. When the numbers start to get into double digits, you are looking at a LiPo that may be on it's final legs.

[f4u ausie]

Dave I had that Sunday morning with my 90 fms Avanti 6s. I had a flight with an almost new 5000 HRB all good.. second flight. A 5 year old same HRB.. got off ground good but under continued load burbs and hesitation.. so landed... All cells equal... And checks as u would expect.. last flight. An almost new again. Not any trouble at all.
So think battery is capushca. Must learn how to check resistance. I will b honest 5 years is a good go at it... Have fun b safe

[jetfool]

Two Beautiful aircraft plus the surrounding view. Good job.

[davegee]

After taking the winter off, my Freewing F9F Cougar took to the skies again today. I only got one flight in as the wind picked up after my first flight. What a great airplane! I maidened it last summer and today was my 47th successful flight so far. It has lots of ordnance, nose refueling boom, drop tanks, etc., but I left them at home today.

I'll attach a pic of it after the flight. If you look carefully under the nose you'll see the deployed printed speed brakes that I added from an STL that someone had. They work great, very functional and welcome at this alititude of 5000 feet MSL. I use them on every landing and sometimes to help slow it down during maneuvering.

Cheers

Davegee

I flew two planes today. One is the F9F-7 Cougar and the other is my Flightline B-25J, Cactus Kitten. Even though I had not flown CK since last fall, everything went pretty well. I overcontrolled the steering on the first takeoff, but settled down after that. I made up several semi-scale "parafrag" bombs lowered by parachutes. I just installed two today for a general test. These are flown in scale fashion, very low to the ground, with the parachutes giving the bomber just enough time to get away before they explode on contact with the ground. I was happy with this first outing of the year for the B-25.

Regarding the Cougar, I had some issues I have not experienced before. I used a 6S SMC 5000 battery. I have 57 flights on this aircraft already and have used this battery on many of the flights. Today, however, things were a bit different. Normal takeoff using takeoff flaps and full power takeoffs. Things were normal until I started to turn downwind and retract my flaps. When I did that, the power sagged quite a bit. I thought at first it might be a flameout, but it was still flying. I very carefully set up for a quick landing and that went well. I wasn't sure what happened. so I did a quick rebind of the receiver. Everything seemed ok, so I made another attempt at a quick flight. Same thing happened, and when it got on the ground the ESC made three "beeps" in quick succession and repeated until I disconnected the battery. Nor sure what that was all about, except some sort of warning.

I did a ground test with my battery from the B-25 flights. I ran it up to full power and then retracted the flaps. It stayed strong, but when I tried it with the SMC battery, it sagged again when the flaps were retracted. The battery was "puffed out" a bit, and I suspect it is no longer a flyable battery.

Tomorrow I will do another test with a new battery and see what happens. I have not had any difficulties with this airplane in all the flights I have put on it so far. so I'm hoping it will behave normally again.

I'll attach some pics of the B-25 after putting several flights on it this morning.

Cheers

Davegee

[davegee]

After taking the winter off, my Freewing F9F Cougar took to the skies again today. I only got one flight in as the wind picked up after my first flight. What a great airplane! I maidened it last summer and today was my 47th successful flight so far. It has lots of ordnance, nose refueling boom, drop tanks, etc., but I left them at home today.

I'll attach a pic of it after the flight. If you look carefully under the nose you'll see the deployed printed speed brakes that I added from an STL that someone had. They work great, very functional and welcome at this alititude of 5000 feet MSL. I use them on every landing and sometimes to help slow it down during maneuvering.

Cheers

Davegee

[Hugh Wiedman]

Thanks Elbee and f4u ausie , always appreciate the compliments. Would love to have you both at next years electric event. I'll ask my "buddy" DJT to send Air Force One around to pick you guys up! If they can send it for the USA Hockey Team, both of you should be a Shoo In!

I'm lucky to be able to fly at an outstanding field. We have an East/West runway (prevailing Easterly Winds) of 70 Feet by 1000 Feet (which I still sometimes miss ) as well as a 60 feet by 500 foot North/South runway for those unusual winds where mostly the Heli's get to fly. We also have electric hookups, 5 pilot stations and covered pit areas to setup our aircraft and stay somewhat cool in the 90 degree summer heat with 15 large benches. Our runways are cut to 1/2" height making take-off for electrics a breeze. What more could you ask for! We do have the occasional alligator and herds of deer show up at the field, but now that I'm the New Field Security Officer, we've found that gator indeed takes like chicken and there's nothing like a fresh venison steak on the barbi!

[f4u ausie]

As always great pics hugh. Yours are of course the best paint jobs on the planet

[Elbee]

Hugh Wiedman,

WOW!

Great Event, Sir.

Envious, obviously, as I would have loved to have been there.

You own a great stable my friend.

And that ambush pass through the trees.... "Gutsiest move I ever saw, Mav."

Best, LB

[Hugh Wiedman]

And a few others to round out the field:

[Hugh Wiedman]

Let's see some other great electrics!! The next few are Jorge Valverdi's large scale balsa electric, with wing spans of over 6 feet. He flies them on either 2 6S 10,000's (single engine) or 4 6S 10,000's for close to 15 minutes. Who needs those noisy gas engines and the associated clean up!.

His incredible B17:



Now His Magnificent F4U Corsair:

[Hugh Wiedman]

Last Group of Mine, Thank God!!!

Lets Shoot down a Tiger Cat for Fun!!!

[Hugh Wiedman]

You gotta be kidding, not more?

How the hell did I get thru those trees (either major cajones or horrible pilot)

[Hugh Wiedman]

This last weekend we held our all electric 3 day event which I was lucky enough to Co-Chair and had great weather and over 100 aircraft. Brought a few myself and our resident "Top Gun" pilot and master builder of large turbine jets spent the 3 days taking photos. Marvin Alvarez is not only an incredible pilot but a great photographer. He ended up with over 750 outstanding photos and I've picked out a few (whether you like it or NOT ) Sit back at take a look if you want, or just move on to something more interesting. I'm starting out with some of mine of course:

[f4u ausie]

As always Hugh. Great stuff. Loove the paint

[Hugh Wiedman]

Finally Got out and Maidened the Freewing 90mm 8S F22 "Red Lion". This is definitely one of the best flying EDF's I've tried. Over 5 minutes on an SMC HiV 8S 4900 and even more on the 5900mah pack, but I like the lighter 4900 pack best! Can't wait to put more hours on this bad boy!




Video of the Process and Flights Below:

[JohnVH]

Loving how this Spitfire looks and flies! Check out my grass maiden! Discount code: JVHRC5%

[Elbee]

I spent maybe about 100 hrs on it.....:

Hugh, my friend, it certainly shows.

What a beautiful result. you are to be congratulated.

Bravo Zulu, Sir

Best, LB

[Hugh Wiedman]

AaaaaaAbsolutely. Incredible looking machine in the air Hugh. Can I ask ballpark,, how many hours to paint it,, and I believe all 90mm. Really need 8 cells lastly could not possibly miss that in the air.. just awesome

I spent maybe about 100 hrs on it, including painting, masking, applying graphics and setting it up (but I'm not "Speedy Gonzalez" and don't even have an air brush), so I definitely take my time. Also upgraded the horizontal stabs with ProModeler DS150CHLV servos. Took me over a month from when I bought it to finish as it seems I'd do a little over time maybe only 2-3 days in a week and of course had to wait out the paint to dry completely before moving on. I do enjoy that part of the hobby as well, especially when the weather sucks, and find that I have this aversion to flying an aircraft that others have the exact same thing of.

And you are absolutely correct, 8S is the ticket on 90mm's. Both of my 90mm F18's are now also 8S and they fly so sweet with the Plus RX that it's become a favorite, when before the Plus and on 6S on grass, it was the "adventure"!

[f4u ausie]

AaaaaaAbsolutely. Incredible looking machine in the air Hugh. Can I ask ballpark,, how many hours to paint it,, and I believe all 90mm. Really need 8 cells lastly could not possibly miss that in the air.. just awesome