EDF jets and grass runways

[Pappy]

I really like EDFs - problem is I am on a grass field - not golf grass - grass like your front yard. I have had a lot of bad experiences with small landing gear. Is there an FMS jet that has good size wheels and power to take off from this type of grass? I could also do a hand launch jet - had the small Panther jet that doesn't have wheels - but performance was lack luster...any ideas?

[TiredIronGRB]

Welcome to Hobby Squawk!...I'm not sure about FMS but there's several Freewing jets we fly on my field, the A-10, F-86, A-4, A-6, Stinger and Mig 21.

[Porkster]

Also worth thinking about is Freewings Avanti S its a treat to fly off grass with its big wheels and trailing link gear.

[Twowingtj]

I can highly recommend the Freewing 80mm Avanti S and the Freewing 80mm A-10. Very well powered and grass friendly. I've flown them at my field when the grass is upto about 3" long, When the grass is freshly cut to about 1 1/2", I can even fly the Freewing 70mm F-16 6S Pro V2. The F-16 needs the upgraded gear to handle the grass well though. All fly great and sound good too.

Another of my club members has the Freewing Me-262, and it does real well too.

[Evoman]

The best solution for your dilemma is using Geotex to put down your own runway. Then if its not your property you can just fold it back up for the next use.
With this solution you would be free to fly any EDF your heart desires.

[OV10]

The best solution for your dilemma is using Geotex to put down your own runway. Then if its not your property you can just fold it back up for the next use.
With this solution you would be free to fly any EDF your heart desires.

Wouldn't all grass strip clubs love to benefit but @ a $5k entry structure(cheapo) and more like a nominal $10k as mentioned in the video puts this out of range for most :(

[TiredIronGRB]

That grass shown earlier would be perfect if it was cut to about 1"...I love grass:Cool:

[SCAT XXV11]

Looking for some info.on the correct size pilot's for my 70mm FMS Phantom & the 64mm F15 Eagle,any info. would be deeply appreciated.

[xviper]

I used to belong to a club that had Geotex runways and it was a huge expense. Granted, for just laying out a short, narrow strip for take off, the cost would be much less but still up in the thousands of dollars. You don't just go up to a possible runway and roll the stuff out. The ground must be somewhat smooth, without large tufts of grass or dirt. If the grass is too tall, after you pin the material down, you'll still have lumps all over it like a quilt. Some extensive "rolling" will be necessary. Even permanently installed Geotex require re-rolling every couple of years, especially if you leave it over winter months (where you get real winter). Then there's the pinning and un-pinning. My old club had a 12" pin every foot. If you are alone when you go fly, this is not something the average person would want to do just to fly a few jets. If it's your property, you'd likely leave it there all the time. Weeds, grass and settling dirt will make it look like a quilt again. Then there's gopher's and moles and what they can do. If it's not your property and you can't leave it down for periods of time, how many will haul this around every time they go fly? If alone, not likely. If you've got 1/2 dozen friends, trying to coordinate all of them for the same time will be infrequent.
That video made it look too simple. We saw quite a few guys in that video. How many more were there not in frame that helped out?
Most of these new EDFs, even ones with small wheels, will take off from rough, field grass that has been recently mowed. The really plush grass that we would see in peoples' front lawns will always be more of a challenge and anyone with such grass is not going to be happy to have it covered for too long.
My philosophy is ......................... Fly what ya got and if it doesn't work, don't bring that plane to the same place next time. Of all my EDFs, the 2 that I have trouble with is the 80mm Mirage and the 90mm Eurofighter. Those have a hard time getting rolling fast enough to lift off in a reasonable distance. But then, get the right wind conditions and using 100%+ rates on the elevator can solve that problem, too. If I can get the nose lightened up with lots of elevator 1/2 way down the grass strip, it goes. Not pretty, but will work.

[DrDeath]

I can highly recommend the Freewing 80mm Avanti S and the Freewing 80mm A-10. Very well powered and grass friendly. I've flown them at my field when the grass is upto about 3" long, When the grass is freshly cut to about 1 1/2", I can even fly the Freewing 70mm F-16 6S Pro V2. The F-16 needs the upgraded gear to handle the grass well though. All fly great and sound good too.

Another of my club members has the Freewing Me-262, and it does real well too.

I am glad I read the responses before just adding mine. I have the Freewing A-10, The Goshawk and now the AvantieS (just maidened it this morning). I have only 7 flights on the Goshawk and it isn't great on my grass field. Having said that, the A-10 and the AvantiS are AWESOME on my grass field. The AvantiS surprised me on the first flight today as it was off of the ground in about 150 feet!!!! With the front gear and bigger wheels I HIGHLY recommend it for grass fields. The A-10 well, it's a Warthog and they do well in grass or mud. LOL. Seriously though, get either of those two planes. We also have Stingers at the field which don't do too poorly on our field. Only time they have trouble is when our field is damp due to morning dew. Here is the order of planes for grass ops

1a. AvantiS
1b. A-10
3. Stinger

Hope this helps.

[Evoman]

This thread had me thinking of what other military jets would be a good candidate for operating off grass. After a while the Sepecat Jaguar came to mind. Its landing gear was specifically designed to handle grass and unimproved fields as well as providing more ground clearance for big tanks or ordinance.



This video shows it flying off grass.

[xviper]

This thread had me thinking of what other military jets would be a good candidate for operating off grass. After a while the Sepecat Jaguar came to mind. Its landing gear was specifically designed to handle grass and unimproved fields as well as providing more ground clearance for big tanks or ordinance.



This video shows it flying off grass.

But you must realize that's on a "real" jet. Translate that into a model and those double wheels become smaller wheels, as opposed to a single larger wheel. On the real plane, the rough ground and grass wouldn't come that high up the tire. On a model, tall, plush grass could bury those tires. It's not ground clearance that matters to a model, it's the ability for the wheel to get rolling out of thick grass and to roll through the grass and how much power there is to push it through the grass.
For grass operations, if you've got little wheels, you need lots of power. If you've got low power, you need big tires. One great example is the Freewing 70mm Yak 130 running on 6s. It's got tiny little wheels, but it has enormous power to weight. It doesn't get bothered by thick grass. Now, take the Freewing 90mm F-16. It's got fairly big wheels compared to the Yak, but it's a heavy plane and it's sinks into the grass. On pavement, it's fine, but on thick grass, it can't get rolling fast enough to take off effectively. It can barely get out of the way of its own shadow. It's somewhat under powered for its size.

[Evoman]

You must also take into account the very design of the Jaguar's trailing link landing gear which is what makes it ideal to easily handle unprepared fields . That is a crucial design element that has made the Freewing Avanti and the A-10 so well suited to grass operations. Compare the A-10 which only has rear trailing links and has rather thin tires. The Avanti has trialing link suspension on all the gears but the tires are also thin. Now look closely to the Jaguars gear, it has trailing link suspension all around except the nose gear's trailing link arm is even longer than the Avanti's. The Jaguar also appears to have wider tires almost balloon like than that of the others. The rear gear also has double tires giving it a wider foot print. For those very reasons stated the Jaguar appears to still be a good candidate and could even be better than the rest. Also take into account that the Jaguar is a small jet so it would make for a rather light EDF.


Nose gear of the Avanti

[wvrailfan]

I and another member of our club routinely fly Dynam Turbojets from our club grass runway. I have flown it from grass both on 3 cell and 4 cell. Of course the 4 cell really wakes the plane up. We keep the runway cut short and well maintained.

[Kurtzz]

I fly a Freewing A10 off a grass runway. To me, it has the best combination of landing gear there is for grass, trailing link mains and an oleo nose gear. I have flown EDF's that have trailing link nose gear, they seem to all pack down and compress, creating a negative angle of attack of the wing, causing more pressure on the nose gear, squirrelly steering and so on. I know there are mods to stop this, but I'm talking about buying and flying without having to do mods. My field is a morning field and about 1 1/2 - 2" thick, real thick, the dew in the early part of the day just streams off the tires, a tuff environment for a EDF, the A10 with big tires and awesome LG just powers out.

[NewbieBob]

Having discussed the length of grass and dew conditions, what length of grass field are we looking at as a minimum. 100 feet may do for some EDFs on pavement etc but what would the acceptable length of runway be on grass for some of these models.
Cheers
Bob