Official Freewing Twin 80mm/90mm A-10 Thunderbolt II Thread

[Elbee]

A-10 Demo Gator Narrates - YouTube


Hawg Dawgs, I ran across the A-10 Demo Team inflight ride on Erik Johnston's ewetoob channel, The pre-flight is informative and the vid is from the pilot's perspective from run up to shut down. Best, LB

[Coconut]

Thanks for the help on the RF chokes, GG.

[GliderGuy]

I'm hoping someone knows how to do this, does anyone know how to replace the nose landing gear mount? Mine busted where you screw the retract in and I ordered another one.

Edited: If you see any screws securing the plastic mount from the topside, remove them first!

Work bullishly carefully to remove. After removing the broken mount, the new one will install easily.

The trick is getting the broken mount out with minimal foam damage. Bullish = Dremel it out in sections…cutting, tugging, removing piece by piece. But carefully for minimal foam damage.

Or…..

Sometimes, if you grab the plastic mount with a tool and keep wiggling and pulling, like a molar in your mouth…it will unstick and come out in one piece.

It’s an individual job. By that I mean, you gotta figure it out the best way you can.

Once you get the broken one out, install the new one with Foam-Tac glue.

-GG

P.S. If you want a REAL challenge, try getting one out that is held in with screws that have the screw heads on the topside that you cannot get to. The MiG-29 main gear plastic mounts are such as this. MRC support says, “Not intended to be replaced!” But, it can be done with hours of work and patience. LOL

[GliderGuy]

I checked on Amazon for the RF chokes, and there are different size and brands. Is there a particular one that we suppose to get?

Get a variety pack….example;

https://a.co/d/6NPm5hn

Install them as close to the ESC as possible on “ALL” the wires shown. One larger choke can have several wires running thru it. Pick the ones that fit the space. Larger chokes provide better function. Since the ESCs are in each nacelle, install the chokes as near each nacelle as possible.

For good measure, put a small one near the green ring choke, too. It can’t hurt.




Below is an example of the installation on the AL37. The ESCs are just below the battery tray area. You can see how several wires run thru one choke.

Note: The photo below shows the motor side of the ESCs.

You don’t need chokes on the motor side wiring. The motor side puts out less RF noise. The other side of the ESCs is more important to choke. In the AL37, both sides of the ESCs are easy to get to, and it can’t hurt to choke both sides of the ESCs.

I add extra security with zip ties to keep them clamped shut.

-GG

[Coconut]

I checked on Amazon for the RF chokes, and there are different size and brands. Is there a particular one that we suppose to get?

[Ry680AS]

I'm hoping someone knows how to do this, does anyone know how to replace the nose landing gear mount? Mine busted where you screw the retract in and I ordered another one.

[rkh_78]

THANK YOU ALL !! Really appreciate the feedback and I will report back and post some pics. Definitely planning on an Arctic paint scheme :-)

[Hugh Wiedman]

Completely with DCORSAIR and GliderGuy. No mods necessary, a great flier and IMO the easiest EDF I have to fly and land. The single most important issue with the A-10, for me, is the CG point. If you balance it at the recommended 78mm, ALL of your landings will be a bit too hot and the chances of coming in and touching with the nose wheel first is a real possibility, resulting in the "bucking bronco" and a really bad day. I know some fly it there but it makes no sense to me. I'm at 92mm and after 100 landings, all have been nice and slow with a good nose AOA, all due to the balance point. Landing is my biggest piloting weakness and if you at least start around 85mm and work your way back, you won't have any issues.

The A-10 is somewhat unique for most of the EDF's in that the jet wash is directly over the elevators. If you balance it at 78mm, the required up elevator trim to keep it level in flight puts exaggerated pressure on the elevators. Therefore, when you try to slow down for landing, that jet wash is reduced and only moving air flow is affecting the elevators resulting in the tendency to nose down. You'll have to use either more throttle or more elevator to keep the nose up. Most use more throttle, resulting in a hot landing. Additionally, in flight, if you trim it at 50% throttle, when you go to full throttle the nose rises (from the increased thrust over the elevators and the extra up elevator trim required) and when you reduce it below 50%, the nose falls. I've found at 92mm, once I trim it at any throttle position, it stays fairly level at all throttle positions. I can cut the throttle to 0 and it stays level. This allows you to adjust altitude when landing by the amount of throttle you use instead of elevator which would change your AOA. I believe I can consistently land my A-10 at a slower speed than even my Avanti or Stinger (may be an optical elusion due to the much larger size of the A-10)

Sorry to drone on about the CG, but I really believe with the A-10, your continued flying enjoyment is directly related to where you balance it! Additionally, at a further aft CG, the A-10 will knife edge much better without the need for much elevator. You also may want to add a carbon fiber tube on each side of the fuselage in the battery bay. I forget the size I used, but you'll see that a channel already exists there for the tube, which runs from about the mid point of the fuselage all the way forward.

[GliderGuy]

I agree with others, stock is fine. She’s a solid flyer!

Suggestions:

1) Move the CG back per other posts in this thread to reduce the chance of the crow hop of death.
2) Enter RF chokes or chokes in the search window. Read / learn / install them. I lost an A-10 twice before I installed them. No issues since I began using RF chokes.

-GG

[DCORSAIR]

Hi Everyone!

About to board the A-10 Warthog project. Been flying 60cc gassers, helis and Motion RCs T-152 (which is very fast with the Sport Motor upgrade) for years. I am a bit confused about the suggested upgrade here. I understand the 90mm upgrade makes no real sense, but the motor should be upgraded to 12 blade fan option from the Mig-29 instead? Any clarification on what I need to get would be great. Want to order all at once. Thx in advance!

I wouldn't do anything to it, fly it as is stock, it's a great jet to fly, I flew mine a whole bunch and it was all stock, never had an issue with it, just don't come in hot and fast and hit the nose gear first, bad things can happen from what I understand, fly it in nice and slow and flare it on the mains and you will do just fine, that's my opinion....

[Hugh Wiedman]

Hi Everyone!

About to board the A-10 Warthog project. Been flying 60cc gassers, helis and Motion RCs T-152 (which is very fast with the Sport Motor upgrade) for years. I am a bit confused about the suggested upgrade here. I understand the 90mm upgrade makes no real sense, but the motor should be upgraded to 12 blade fan option from the Mig-29 instead? Any clarification on what I need to get would be great. Want to order all at once. Thx in advance!

xviper is correct, the 12 blade is too expensive for the results. I also agree with crxmanpat the stock outrunners are just fine in the A-10. The only reason I upgraded the fans in my A-10 to the 9 blade inrunners that come in the Mig 29 is because I upgraded my Mig with the 12 blade FMS 2100Kv fans (which gave me about 20% more thrust and a nicer sound) and had the stock Mig fans sitting around without a home. I put those 9 blade inrunners in the A-10 and I feel that it gave me about 10-15% more thrust and seemed to be more efficient than the outrunners, giving me well over 5 minutes of flight time on 2 SMC 6200's (7-8 minutes if flown around scale at 50% throttle-but no fun in that). The stock otrunners each drew 87 amps and 1995 watts at full throttle on a fully charged battery while each of the 9 blade inrunners drew 102 amps and 2410 watts. Not exactly translating to thrust, but after swapping them out she got off our grass in about 70% of the distance it took with the outrunners and vertical performance was outstanding. I'd stick with the stock version first as it offers the best bang for the buck and you'll be very happy with it.

[crxmanpat]

Hi Everyone!

About to board the A-10 Warthog project. Been flying 60cc gassers, helis and Motion RCs T-152 (which is very fast with the Sport Motor upgrade) for years. I am a bit confused about the suggested upgrade here. I understand the 90mm upgrade makes no real sense, but the motor should be upgraded to 12 blade fan option from the Mig-29 instead? Any clarification on what I need to get would be great. Want to order all at once. Thx in advance!

Welcome to Hobby Squawk!

There is no need to upgrade the power system on the stock A-10. The supplied power system is perfect for this model and gives a good 4 minutes of flight time, with plenty of power. About the only upgrade I'd suggest is either the upgraded nose strut, or upgraded mains. Switching out one or the other will get all struts as the same type.

[xviper]

Hi Everyone!

About to board the A-10 Warthog project. Been flying 60cc gassers, helis and Motion RCs T-152 (which is very fast with the Sport Motor upgrade) for years. I am a bit confused about the suggested upgrade here. I understand the 90mm upgrade makes no real sense, but the motor should be upgraded to 12 blade fan option from the Mig-29 instead? Any clarification on what I need to get would be great. Want to order all at once. Thx in advance!

The 12-bl inrunner will only give you an extra 100g of static thrust and for big money. The 9-bl inrunner is a lot cheaper and will do the same job. Of course, if you must have 12 blades, then you pay.
You should just get the ARF+ and a combo set like this (but that's me, others may differ):

https://www.rc-castle.com/index.php?route=product/product&product_id=8801

[rkh_78]

Hi Everyone!

About to board the A-10 Warthog project. Been flying 60cc gassers, helis and Motion RCs T-152 (which is very fast with the Sport Motor upgrade) for years. I am a bit confused about the suggested upgrade here. I understand the 90mm upgrade makes no real sense, but the motor should be upgraded to 12 blade fan option from the Mig-29 instead? Any clarification on what I need to get would be great. Want to order all at once. Thx in advance!

[Hugh Wiedman]

Actaully, I was just looking at the SMC batteries to funny.

I do agree with your response. However from the information I gathered about the 90mm upgrade is disappointing. Reading other's experience with the 90's is that, it was dismal upgrade. Performance was minimal at best. Flight times shortened. And lastly the price!

In my test, I used the exact two batteries. I fully charged them at the field for the 1st flight. Let them cool down and then charged them again while I did the edf swap. There was roughly a two hour window between flights.

The gain was seen with the same batteries. So the C rating is not a factor. But I will definitely agree that a better C rating would increase the performance of both (outrunner & inrunner). However I believe the overall results between the two would be the same.

Guess I will buy the SMC and get back to you after I have a chance to test it again. The motor swap takes 10 mins per side. So I can do it again. LOL

Thanks for your response.

Tim

I agree with xviper and Evan D. I upgraded my A-10 with the same 80mm inrunners that I took out of my Mig 29 as I upgraded that with the FMS 80mm 12 blade 2100Kv motors, which added about 25% more thrust to the Mig. The Mig fans in the A-10 added about 20% more thrust than the stock A-10 outrunners and I agree, the vertical is so much better and the inrunners are certainly more efficient. I did notice a shorter take-off distance at least on grass. Regarding the batteries, definitely go to the SMC's either the 5300's or the 6200's which is what I use. Those will give you probably about 15% more thrust at take-off over the hugely over rated Spectrum batteries. I fly my A-10 on the 6200's for a minimum of 5 minutes and if I fly it nice and scale like, up to 7-8 minutes. I do have in-flight pack voltage telemetry so although my timer is set at 6:00, I usually begin my landing sequence when it tells me I'm approaching 21.7 volts.

Regarding the 90mm upgrade, a friend did that to his but obviously it depends on the fan you put in. He used the FMS fans and I have to say it's a rocket ship. Takes off on grass in almost half the distance and there is no end to the vertical. It's actually way too fast for my liking (as I watch the decals peel off), just doesn't really look like an A-10. I've tried to fly mine with him, and with the upgraded fans it's sort of close, but I whole heartedly agree that the 90mm upgrade is definitely over kill, but the Mig fans in it are sweet!! Probably the easiest and most fun EDF I have to fly. An excellent pilot flew mine at the Lakeland E-Jet Fest this year and won "Best Scale Flight" with it, something I could never do!

[xviper]

Tim, I have no doubt that what you observed is factual. I'm not surprised that you saw a distinct improvement in performance. I have seen this myself with similar upgrades in other planes (ie, outrunner to inrunner). As you have already seen, an increase in thrust doesn't necessarily translate into more top speed. What is very apparent is what I call an increase in "grunt". That is to say, with the inrunners, the power delivery is more push for better vertical performance and better sudden acceleration. It's like describing HP and torque in cars. It's torque that gets things going. It's HP that gets more speed. Here, we're talking torque.
The A-10 is one of my older jets and I've been satisfied with the stock performance, but admittedly, I'm leaning towards getting some high performance inrunners myself just to help this old jet "keep up" with some of my other newer EDF's.
It's complicated for me to get the SMCs delivered to me in Canada, so Iook forward to your "in person" impressions of how they work for you in this plane. I know several flyers here swear by the SMCs and in those people, I trust greatly.

[Evan D]

I think the stock system is a very well matched set up to what expect from a scale A-10. That said the 90mm to me looks odd and I don't think it needs the thrust. Upgrading to the better 80mm's to me is a great choice especially if you are at higher altitudes. As noted good batteries can also make a huge difference.

[TGoelzer]

You are right about the cost. To go to 90mm, with new nacelles, EDFs, ESCs, the cost would be (IMO) astronomical - another $500.00+ to get it all done. However, the increase in thrust would also be an eye popper. The stock outrunner 80mm has a posted static thrust of ~2.9kg. The upgrade Inrunner 80mm - 3.0 - 3.1kg, so a marginal increase. Going to the 90mm would give you about 4.0kg, so another kg X 2 of static thrust, but at a huge cost.

Another thought. When you're in the market for new batteries, consider getting something that has a higher "real world" load tested "C". Those Spektrums advertised at 50C are likely only giving a real world output of just over 15C. (This is based upon an extrapolation of real world load tests done on Spektrum 100C, 6s LiPos giving only 25C.) EDFs tend to give their best performance with batteries that can crank out genuine C of 35 to 40C. The ones that can do that are the ChinaHobbyLine 65C (real 35C) or the SMC flight batteries 40C (real 35C). I only use these 2 as examples. There are many other brands that give the desired C ratings that work well in jets. Spektrum just isn't one of them.
My A-10 is stock and when I went from my Gens Ace 50C Lipos to my CHL 65C, the plane became a rocket ship. If you're going to get new batteries anyway, this may be an even cheaper option over the inrunner EDFs.

Actaully, I was just looking at the SMC batteries to funny.

I do agree with your response. However from the information I gathered about the 90mm upgrade is disappointing. Reading other's experience with the 90's is that, it was dismal upgrade. Performance was minimal at best. Flight times shortened. And lastly the price!

In my test, I used the exact two batteries. I fully charged them at the field for the 1st flight. Let them cool down and then charged them again while I did the edf swap. There was roughly a two hour window between flights.

The gain was seen with the same batteries. So the C rating is not a factor. But I will definitely agree that a better C rating would increase the performance of both (outrunner & inrunner). However I believe the overall results between the two would be the same.

Guess I will buy the SMC and get back to you after I have a chance to test it again. The motor swap takes 10 mins per side. So I can do it again. LOL

Thanks for your response.

Tim

[xviper]

You are right about the cost. To go to 90mm, with new nacelles, EDFs, ESCs, the cost would be (IMO) astronomical - another $500.00+ to get it all done. However, the increase in thrust would also be an eye popper. The stock outrunner 80mm has a posted static thrust of ~2.9kg. The upgrade Inrunner 80mm - 3.0 - 3.1kg, so a marginal increase. Going to the 90mm would give you about 4.0kg, so another kg X 2 of static thrust, but at a huge cost.

Another thought. When you're in the market for new batteries, consider getting something that has a higher "real world" load tested "C". Those Spektrums advertised at 50C are likely only giving a real world output of just over 15C. (This is based upon an extrapolation of real world load tests done on Spektrum 100C, 6s LiPos giving only 25C.) EDFs tend to give their best performance with batteries that can crank out genuine C of 35 to 40C. The ones that can do that are the ChinaHobbyLine 65C (real 35C) or the SMC flight batteries 40C (real 35C). I only use these 2 as examples. There are many other brands that give the desired C ratings that work well in jets. Spektrum just isn't one of them.
My A-10 is stock and when I went from my Gens Ace 50C Lipos to my CHL 65C, the plane became a rocket ship. If you're going to get new batteries anyway, this may be an even cheaper option over the inrunner EDFs.

[Elbee]

This past weekend at my local field I decided to fly my 1st flight with the original outrunner edf's. Then replace the motors with the inrunner edf's for a back to back comparison...Hope this helps someone that may be looking to upgrade their A-10.Tim

TG, welcome to Hobby Squawk! Thank you for posting your results and taking the time to do the comparison in the same afternoon. A great review and a very timely topic. Best, LB