All-New Freewing PJ50 Twin 70mm EDF Jet - Official Thread

[Twowingtj]

James Looking forward to seeing more. Thanks.

Both companies have put a lot of effort into bringing a nice sized bizjet to us. Both companies are going to have to split the market share. Both offerings have their plusses and minuses.

Ultimately the competition will drive both companies to bring better products to market. We reap the benefit.

I spent my money where I wanted to.

[MeyerVW]

I just had a sick idea. Epstein air. Put people like bill clinton in the windows. Oh man that would a controversial aircraft.
My daught says its to far.

[James]

Just back from a great day of flying the PJ. Did numerous flights just touching and going and what a doll at slow speeds. Keep your eyes posted for the video. I'll share here when its ready. Probably tomorrow

[xviper]

Ok you don't like the gear set.

X-Fly has a close up of their main struts now and guess what? They are also TRAILING LINKS. And those nose wheels? Virtually identical. And those main wheels? One is no uglier or better looking than the other. (If you hate Victoria Secret, then ALL their models are ugly. )

[xviper]

As to people commenting, both positive or negative, isn't this the place to do it, its really best for everyone involved.
Issues people find help providers make better products, if all they are allowed to receive are positive remarks products wont get better.
Don't take other peoples comments personnel.

Judging from the number of "likes" on that post of mine, quite a few people understood what I was saying. However, for those who didn't get it, I'll explain...........

I have no issue with those who have an opinion or have criticism (constructive or otherwise). As you say, it's good for the betterment of the hobby. However, some poststhat arrive here and on other sites are FANBOI motivated and hence lead to HATER motivation. It's not unlike the "I love Chevy" and "I hate Ford" fanboi/hater rivalry. There's no rhyme or reason for it and just leads to unpleasantries and condescending declarations. It's "GOON" commentary. Looking at the X-Fly Facebook page's reference on their new BizJet, we see the same thing. Fanbois for X-Fly and haters for X-Fly. It just negatively adds to the already too tragic and oft-times too ignorant world we live in.

[MeyerVW]

Ok Karen Biden

Why are you here then. You work for for Xfly? You just came here to talk trash but not offer any suggestions for improvement. There cant be to much since the aircraft are not in the publics hands. Ok you don't like the gear set. Does anyone even have either of these aircraft yet?? Other than the few test pilots. I will not speak for Xfly but freewing has made an aircraft for the majority not the minority. Thats OK.

[xviper]

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[Evan D]

A person said $560 at Banana. I would assume Bitgo would be the same. My question at both sites is shipping. They currently have free shipping but say it's for a limited time. Motion has always had free shipping.

[Thehoker]

I am definitely interested in this one.
Thank you Motion rc.
As to people commenting, both positive or negative, isn't this the place to do it, its really best for everyone involved.
Issues people find help providers make better products, if all they are allowed to receive are positive remarks products wont get better.
Don't take other peoples comments personnel.
Comments about the landing gear and wheels are of no concern to me, ( I do fly off of grass about seventy five percent of the time), however- if it it is true the fuse is flexing that's very important and should be addressed by Freewing before its offered for sale.
I'm going to wait on the release of the xfly version as well.
I like all of my Freewing purchases, but choices are nice to have.
What I've read about xfly seems positive as well.
Anyone have a confirmed price on the xfly version?
I've read 500.00 and change. Is that 500. 99 or 599.00 or somewhere in between?
One hundred dollars or near that will definitely have to be taken in consideration .
I really like that coast guard scheme shown earlier, it seems Callie will be ready when I want one.

[Gilatrout]

The way I see it if you see something you don't like, then it is up to you as a modeler to correct it to your own personal satisfaction. Either buy it and make the mods you want or don't.

As no one has actually seen one, the other "issues" raised are merely theoretical and speculation is just a form of masturbation.

If you are concerned, then don't preorder and either ask James or those that got evaluation models questions and you will get answers, or wait for the actual owners reports and don't pollute the thread with BS trolling and hand wringing.

[MeyerVW]

Well I guess if you want perfect scale, from a foamie, your in trouble. To make these things do what we need them to do and for a large number of peeps, They had to mod some things. It is a business after all that is trying to appease a large market of people. I am sure we will see a side by side at some point. I am just glad we something new, different, good size, and nice looking. And for that, I thank you.

[ridgerunner]

Unlike the majority here on "The Squawk", I am not into military jets. When I heard the news that the latest offering was to be from Freewing, I thought - "Oh no, here comes another military jet." I must say that I was pleasantly surprised to find out that no - its a sleek and sexy commercial business jet. Far out!

and... Pre-ordered!

[xviper]

For years, so many people post up, "Will this plane fly off grass?" Whining and yipping and crying about having wheels that will not get swallowed by grass or struts that won't bend or snap off when landing on grass. So, little by little, Freewing/Motion starts making their (yes, that right, it's spelled "their", not "there") planes so as to appease all who demanded good grass ops. That meant bigger wheels, unscale like gear and trailing links. So, we get this and now, people are coming on to say they want more scale looking gear and a more scale stance. Insofar as one plane standing taller than the other, quite frankly, with the available pictures of the X-Fly effort, it's really hard to say one stands taller than the other. And those "gawd awful wheels"? Again with what's been shown for the X-Fly, I can't tell them apart. But I suppose if you just had to have something to bitch about, you can see the difference. For me, it's not going to be this kind of strut or that kind of wheel or how it looks sitting still on the ground. The general package and pricing, the history of the manufacturer, plus other factors will make it or break it for me. I'm excited for both offerings.

[GliderGuy]

Hi Evan and Hugh….
Thanks for the discharger info. However, I rarely need to discharge. And, when I do….sometimes it is all 10 6S batteries and 6 4S batteries. That’s a lot of dischargers and discharge cycles.

As much as I fly, a few more runs on the ESCs and motors is a drop in the bucket regarding usage.

Interesting note….over thousands of flights across all my birds…only one AL37 motor bearing has started to squeal. That’s amazing! MRC offered to replace it. Love MRC customer service!

Avanti127…Regarding downtime / Three birds out to fly = 6 or 7 flights with the AL37 with little down time, then 4 or 3 on the F-4 then 3 on the P-38. By then the first set of batteries are ready and the AL37 goes back up for 6 or 7 more…little down time. 16 batteries and 3 400 W chargers keep me going. AND a good alternator on my truck. I know….I’m nuts. But I love to fly (40 flights in a day with lunch and bio breaks is my record). If I flew at a club, they’d kick me out for hogging the airspace. LOL.

I tend to find the design limits of things.

My point...I do stress the AL37's ESCs and perform thermal management with an external fan during battery changes to keep things cooler to help ensure the electronics last longer. Those who fly in hot weather and don't have cooling-off periods between flights would be wise to also do things to remove the heat from the PJ50's ESCs. Just common sense care of electronics.

JLamb….She’s a screamer! Thanks!!!

-GG

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[killickb]

I would think that the "other contender" would be the yet to be released Xfly version of a twin 70mm Gulfstream. At the risk of loosing a spot in the first F/W batch, I am waiting to be able to compare the two Gulfstreams. Have many F/W jets so i know that the quality will be there. Also fly the Xfly Sirius and it has provided me with equal quality and flight performance as my F/W models. Love the competition driving ever better models into our fleets.

[Evan D]

I have a discharger too, great item.

[Hugh Wiedman]

Ummm….Yes.

Consider 4 min of runtime on the ground at cruise power vs sometimes hours on a discharger vs who knows how many trips up and down a runway at taxi power (a lot of taxing…more than a few trips) to use 60% to 70% of a 6000 mAh cell and reach the recommended 3.8 V storage voltage. Assuming a 10 amp draw at taxi power = almost half an hour of taxi trips (just a guess = 10 A). And I have 10 batteries to discharge if the weather turns bad.

I’ve done it and learned it isn’t a good idea when the ESC shut down. If I do it now, I supply cooling airflow to the ESCs on birds that don’t have the ESC mounted in the engine airflow stream or propwash stream.

Call it….Lessons learned and passed along for the edification of others.

Best way….Use the MiG-29!!! 2 batteries at a time and ESCs mounted in the fan’s airflow stream. 10 batteries discharged in 20 min without any ESC overheating concerns.

-GG

Just an idea, as I also used to discharge batts occasionally with a twin EDF, but then RudyD54 turned me onto the ISDT 200W Discharger. Takes about 15 minutes to discharge a 6200mah 6S fully charged to 3.84 volts per cell, or whatever you set it to discharge to. It can hook up to your phone and control it from there or just by hitting a couple buttons on the unit itself. Discharges 2S-6S up to 25A/200W, or again whatever you set it to do. Comes with a fan and saves me tons of time if I don't discharge a battery to a low enough storage value during flying or sometimes have to leave with a fully charged battery (yes, that's sacrilegious). It doesn't balance discharge but you set the level you want to discharge to, then at home I put the batts on my charger to balance storage charge to 3.85 V per cell. Can get it at multiple outlets for about $79. I can charge up to 8 6S batts with my current set-up, but unfortunately the discharge function I have is lame at .5Amps and just about the time "hell freezes over" is when it's finally done! Was thinking about getting a 2nd one but so far one has been sufficient.

Now I can't discharge 10 in 20 min like you do with the Mig, but I'll discharge some at the field while packing up, put some on in the truck on the way home so by the time I home, I'm done. Also didn't like putting "extra hours" on any of the EDF's or ESC's.

[JLambCWU]

A little more durability testing footage that Jeremy Solt and I grabbed while evaluating the new PJ50 for Motion RC.

Motion takes product quality seriously and wants to offer the best products to its loyal customer base. Just one of top speed testing passes to see if we could pull it apart. 139mph over the ground!

[avanti127]

Details of the testing are unknown, but I'm glad to hear that.

However, the points of my post were #1, FACT: I had an ESC stop working/shut down during a hot day ground run w/o any cooling air flow (stupid of me). and #2 FACT: Any electronics will last longer if you take care to keep the operating temperature down.

What I can state is that making a lot of flights on hot days with very little down time between flights AND all this flying has been done with cooling the ESC with the external PC case fan while the battery is being changed has given me good results (i.e., no more ESC failures). I prefer to have the maximum amount of margin possible.

Bottom line, if you're gonna get the PJ50 AND you fly in hot climates AND you do a lot of flights with little cool-down time between flights....you have another data point to reference.

-GG

I agree on the down times. I always wait between flights anyway that's why I take at least two bird with me to the field.

[Twowingtj]

avanti127 That's pretty sweet.