Official Freewing 90mm F-4 Phantom II Thread

[Hugh Wiedman]

old stock outrunner vs. 12b inrunner upgrade from motion rc

Now your cooking the right strudel my man! Got one of my F-4's out yesterday and just more and more impressed with the 12 blade. I now have 4 of them and just ordered a 2nd Hornet and a 12 blade for that as well. Their expensive, but IMO, worth the price of admission!

With the old stock outrunner, if our grass was wet, it was always a 50-50 proposition if it would get off. Now, nothing stops it!

[Flamingo]

Hey Flamingo, guten abend! You mentioned the battery and showed a picture of the Zippy 6200
Many of us are using the Roaring-Top 6250, they perform really well and are somewhat lighter.
I just thought I would show you for comparison:

Zippy 6200: Weight: 835g (including wire, plug & case)
Dimensions: 157x45x60mm

RT6250: Weight 803g (including wire, plug & case)
Dimensions (mm): 154x47x53mm

with Hobbyking you cant rely on their specs.
have 6.2 from August 20 weight 870gr in real
have 6.2 of April 21 weight 890gr
it was worse recently with the so called high capacity ones
have only 10C
HK replied that they do not have influence on actual chemestry😏

unfortunately Europe seems to have sourcing restrictions
or it will get quite expensive, so on rcmotion eu

[rickfe101]

I just purchased the Ultra Performance 8S version. I searched and could not find explicit answer. Is anyone using a LiFe battery instead of BEC? Want to make sure before I plug it in and fry everything.

[Evan D]

The BEC puts out 5V, your LiFe is close to 7 full charge. Many have reported landing gear problems and MCBe issues using them but others say no problem...

[flyinhigh042]

My first F-4 is nearly flight ready. Wow this is a fantastic looking model. I’ve been so impressed by it I’ve already ordered an 8s version... haha

This one is equipped with a JF-90 V3 fan, HET-709-68-2100 motor and an Aura 8. I have a set of vinyl graphics from Callie I will apply.

[rickfe101]

The BEC puts out 5V, your LiFe is close to 7 full charge. Many have reported landing gear problems and MCBe issues using them but others say no problem...

I bought this to try for the first time. https://www.smart-fly.com/BatShare%20Standard I have used dual bec's but since this has one battery I wanted Life + Bec. So no worries frying things, but may have an issue with gear...

[Flamingo]

she made 2 nice flights🤩🤩🤩🤩
with separate trimmings on different flight modes
normal, take-off and landing as on above pic w/flaps 40mm down
however she struggled with crosswind landings
so better changed to glider

[rickfe101]

I just realized I have to paint the tail blue instead of some decal... Same for nose black? I have never had any luck painting foam as the paint comes off with the masking tape. I guess for the tail I can take it off and paint the whole thing, and re-wire the rudder lead... What do you guys do to paint the nose? I guess I could just paint the cone and forget the canopy part... Thoughts?

[Evan D]

I'm sure there are better ways but since I have blue painters tape I use that. I cut small 1/4" wide (or thinner) strips to mask off the areas. If worried about paint I'll stick it to my shirt to remove some stickiness but usually don't. Once I get the outline I tape newspaper to that 1/4" wide strip.

[locharrow]

I just realized I have to paint the tail blue instead of some decal... Same for nose black? I have never had any luck painting foam as the paint comes off with the masking tape. I guess for the tail I can take it off and paint the whole thing, and re-wire the rudder lead... What do you guys do to paint the nose? I guess I could just paint the cone and forget the canopy part... Thoughts?

Give the surface a couple of coats of satin varnish before you try to mask it. Use low tack tape used for masking graphics on motorbike tanks. That way the paint stays put !

[Flamingo]

have maidened my 2nd Phantom
upgraded with FW 12blade 4068 1835KV on 6s
worked great on wet long grass

[Evan D]

Awesome, congrats!

[Hugh Wiedman]

have maidened my 2nd Phantom
upgraded with FW 12blade 4068 1835KV on 6s
worked great on wet long grass

Excellent, welcome to the 12 blade F-4 inrunner Club! They certainly have incredible power. On weekends when I'm not flying, I hook my two F-4's up to a plow a trench my garden.

[Hugh Wiedman]

Got out with my F-4 Blue Angel. First time since upgrading to the 12 blade inrunner. I've been flying my F-4 camo quite a bit with that same fan, so needed to make sure the BA would perform the same. It does, love that fan! Also got a bunch of flights in with the F-16 and F-18 Canadian, both with the same 12 blade inrunner, and my SU-30 with it's upgraded FMS fans. Finally got all my EDF's performing nicely!

[locharrow]

"On weekends when I'm not flying, I hook my two F-4's up to a plow a trench my garden." Thanks Hugh, I'll give that a try. Usually use the wife but she doesn't plough a straight furrow anymore !!

[The43rdHammer]

Hi all,

I'm thinking of getting a second one of these and was wondering if anybody had compared the 8S (which I currently own) to the 6S high performance?

All of my other EDFs are 6S so it would be more convenient to only take 6S batteries with me. I would also estimate the weight saving to be around 350 grams.

Cheers

Andy

[Hugh Wiedman]

Hi all,

I'm thinking of getting a second one of these and was wondering if anybody had compared the 8S (which I currently own) to the 6S high performance?

All of my other EDFs are 6S so it would be more convenient to only take 6S batteries with me. I would also estimate the weight saving to be around 350 grams.

Cheers

Andy

Great question Andy, would be interested in that comparison as well. According to the stats on those fans listed on RC Castle's site, the 8S provides 5000-5200 g thrust while weighing 600 gr vs the 6S 9 blade providing 4000 g thrust weighing 443 gr, so there's a 25 % increase for the 8S. You're probably correct in the additional weight once you consider fan, ESC and battery choices. I'm using an SMC 6200 40C at just under 795 gr.

Since you're first one is 8S already, I suspect a 2nd on 6S would be a slight disappointment, choice of batteries not withstanding.

For me, upgrading my 2 F-4s to the 12 blade 6S was a huge difference, but then both had the 9 blade 1750Kv outrunner. Another member at our field has an 8S F4, and while mine now seems to perform almost as well, at least getting off on grass and vertical, he may have a faster top end and gets a little more flight time. I get around 4 minutes flight time. I went with 6S only because top end speed is less important to me and because of my total lack of compatible 8S batteries. Just my "less than" 2 cents opinion.

[The43rdHammer]

Hugh Wiedman that's actually awesome and great information, thank you so much! I will be getting the 8S version again in ghost grey as I want to customise her (clearly the F-18 experience wasn't painful enough 😱🤣).

So a few updates, over the lunch hour today (possibly it might have extended to two... but who's counting) with some advice from mister Evan D I moved the battery tray back. I have broken 2 nose wheel pins on perfectly good landings and suspected it was nose heavy. When I measured the CG it was at 172mm which was as far back as I could get the batteries. So I carved out the foam box that the control board stood on, pushed the control board back into the fuselage and it's now at 195mm. The alternative was adding 128 grams of weight to the tail (which I never want to do):

[Evan D]

Good work!

[Hugh Wiedman]

[QUOTE=The43rdHammer;n313055 I have broken 2 nose wheel pins on perfectly good landings and suspected it was nose heavy. When I measured the CG it was at 172mm
[/QUOTE]

Andy, 172mm is definitely too nose heavy, except maybe for a snow plow. I seem to like 195 to 200 mm, allows for a nice nose up landing.

If you want, you can change the front stock nose pin to the 1600 mm Spitfire main wheel axels. Requires grinding a longer flat spot for the set screws and grinding the end to a smaller circle to allow free rotation in the retract, but no big deal. The axel is a softer metal that will bend but never break. The stock pin will take a little more abuse and never bend, but instead when it goes it just breaks. I used those for maybe the first 50 flights or so on each, but went back to the stiffer stock pins the last 50 or so flights. With your further aft CG you should get more use now out of the stock pins, but the axel is always an alternative, at least it keeps from damaging the nose and gear door with a broken pin.