Freewing 90mm F-22 Raptor - Official Thread

[Hardway]

Good luck on you maiden

[downwindleg]

OK, 12S F-22 #2 is ready to maiden. I was hoping to get all of the formation lights done by this weekend, but I only got the verticals in so far. Waiting on MRC to get the P-38 plastic lens covers back in stock so I can do the navigation and strobes in the wing. I want to do all of the lighting wiring in the wing at the same time, so holding off on the formation lights there for now. Some scale detailing I've done to this one:

Painted the struts and interior gear bays white.
Put a 90mm F-16 nose wheel on in place of the stock one.
Printed and installed Radar-Guy's main wheel "hubcaps".
Printed and installed RCJetDude's twin nose landing light mod.
Printed and added pitot tubes.
Did the panel lines in charcoal and sealed with Testors Dullcote.
Painted the exposed servos. Covered and painted the wire run for the vertical formation lights.
Added all the extra decals provided in the kit based on my prior posts about those.
Painted the underside engine panels to match the top.
Filled in the slots on the wings and stabs where the support rods show through and painted.

Maiden on Thursday, then we have the Arizona Electric Festival Fri-Sun. Plan to get a bunch of flights in. Still running a JF90 with a HET 700-60-1120kv for 12S.

Looking good Pat. Working on my list as well but nowhere near ready to maiden. Best of luck with the maiden!:Cool::Cool:

[I-fly-rc-aircraft]

I, admittedly, have had some lousy landings with my Raptor, although the last couple were very decent. I've also had an issue with the nose wanting to veer off to the right when taking off. So bad that it veered off and the right wing hit a pole and was damaged.
So, I repaired the wing and noticed the nose gear being loose. Enough that it would cause steering problems.
Well, repairing the nose gear is no small chore as the foam was molded around the plastic mount. I had to cut quite a bit of foam from around the mount to get it out in order to epoxy it back in.
Repaired now and am printing the nose gear brace.

Tom

[RCjetdude]

Your issue with the nose gear was not with the retract itself but the plastic mount for the retract was loose?

[I-fly-rc-aircraft]

Yes Sir, the plastic housing came loose. The foam seems to have been molded around the plastic.

PS: I can't find the .stl for the light housings to mount on the main gear doors. I've read just about every post here and in the 3Dpup thread.

[RCjetdude]

I will post the files later this afternoon.

[adb2@suddenlink.net]

I, admittedly, have had some lousy landings with my Raptor, although the last couple were very decent. I've also had an issue with the nose wanting to veer off to the right when taking off. So bad that it veered off and the right wing hit a pole and was damaged.
So, I repaired the wing and noticed the nose gear being loose. Enough that it would cause steering problems.
Well, repairing the nose gear is no small chore as the foam was molded around the plastic mount. I had to cut quite a bit of foam from around the mount to get it out in order to epoxy it back in.
Repaired now and am printing the nose gear brace.

Tom

I found that the steering wire going through the screw down collar on the nose wheel steering was loose so the wire was loose and sliding. Fortunately tightened up the screw before any damge occcured. It came that way.

[I-fly-rc-aircraft]

Mine was tight but keep an eye on the screws that keep the shaft inside the struts. When i cut off the springs I noticed they weren't at all tight. Lost one of those suckers and have blue locktited the rest of them.

Tom

[Hardway]

Please go thru every screw, nut, bolt, connector, everything... Do it like you were going to maiden a full scale and you won't go wrong. It is a pain and it takes several hours to do it right, but you will not lose a bird over crap that is missed at the factory!!! ;):Cool:

[crxmanpat]

PS: I can't find the .stl for the light housings to mount on the main gear doors. I've read just about every post here and in the 3Dpup thread.

I don't think anyone has done housings for the main gear doors. The full scale does not have landing lights on the mains, just the nose. Steve did the dual housing for the nose gear to replace that huge one that comes stock. It looks great!

[I-fly-rc-aircraft]

I got some white 1W LED's off of eBay, made some 3D printed mounts for them which I then just glued to the gear doors. I made a three to one harness and just plugged the nose strut light and two main strut lights into the take off light spot on the MCB-E. I then recessed the foam in the wing where the light fit when the gear was retracted. I think Pat did something similar on his.

Steve made some housings for the main gear doors

[JLambCWU]

Run the lightest 2S battery you can. I recommend these 450 mah ones I found on Amazon. Make sure you solder plenty of lead to the battery connector as well.

Fish the wires through by sticking the fishing wire in from the avionics bay.

I’ve installed at least 8 of these center burners now. It’s definitely worth ordering f the right connectors if you don’t have them already.



https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B071H...mob_b_pd_title


https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B01DD...mob_b_pd_title

Any tips or tricks to the center burner install? Should have mine Thursday.

[RCjetdude]

Steve made some housings for the main gear doors

Here is the file. Pat is right about the FS bird not having lights on the mains but I made this to help with visual orientation for landing if desired.

[Husafreak]

I got an Admiral 10 channel receiver plus satellite and I'm ready to maiden mine. No jitters. I had no steering and rudder jitters with the Spectrum AR610X I tried or this Admiral 10. The original Rx I used unsuccessfully was an old Spectrum AR7000 DSM2. I have no idea how a good Rx could be incompatible with the Freewing blue box but there you go.

[I-fly-rc-aircraft]

Here is the file. Pat is right about the FS bird not having lights on the mains but I made this to help with visual orientation for landing if desired.

That's exactly why I wanted the lights, to help with visual below the tree line especially on a overcast day. Thanks Steve although it's an invalid file.

Tom

[RCjetdude]

Trying again Tom....

[crxmanpat]

That's exactly why I wanted the lights, to help with visual below the tree line especially on a overcast day. Thanks Steve although it's an invalid file.

Tom

Tom,

Not sure what you mean by an invalid file. When you click on the link, it should download the .stl file Steve posted. Then you open the file in your slicer program to create the .gcode file for printing. Works just fine for me.

EDIT - Steve posted just as I was typing. I'm referring to the first file he posted.

[tclaridge]

Are the streamline parts and hub cap by Radar Guy available for download in stl?

[I-fly-rc-aircraft]

It worked that time. Thanks Steve.

PS: You may or not remember but we have met. I was gluing together a 3D printed plane at E-week in '17.

Tom

[crxmanpat]

Are the streamline parts and hub cap by Radar Guy available for download in stl?

Yes, look in the F-22 3DPUP thread stickied at the top of this forum.