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

[Sky Wolf]

Yeah, the guy/gal who comes up with either a battery or a power system that makes EDF flight times longer, will be a very popular and wealthy Man/Woman.

But it I think most of us have gotten used to throttle management.

[Topshot19]

Maiden day! Went awesome. I got two flights, this is an awesome plane. It’s so stable, I usually get the knee shake on new planes but this felt like I have flown it 100 times. Both of the landings were greasers I was very excited !

[Sky Wolf]

TopShot, that is Totally Awesome dude! Love the scheme against your background. Congrats on a successful maiden and two greased landings!

[crxmanpat]

Congrats Topshot!

Got 3 more flights on mine today with the upgraded trailing link nose gear. Two of my landings were not absolute greasers, and I set down harder on the gear than normal. I have to say the trailing link nose gear is doing its job just fine! No bounces back into the air.

[Twowingtj]

Congrats Topshot!

Got 3 more flights on mine today with the upgraded trailing link nose gear. Two of my landings were not absolute greasers, and I set down harder on the gear than normal. I have to say the trailing link nose gear is doing its job just fine! No bounces back into the air.

That's the report on the new nose gear I've waiting to hear. Thanks Pat. Out of all my landings, only had one bouncer. Nice to know the risk of recurrance is less.

Congrats Topshot! I agree on how easy the bird is to get comforatble with.

[Porkster]

Thanks for the welcome! Funny, having spent a few weeks reading all the posts in this thread along with the modifications thread, I feel like I already know some of you guys.

I entered this hobby to fly jets and had a steep learning curve with nitro powered ducted fans back in the early 80's, and always dreamed of having a turbine. A few decades later the pioneers of this hobby made it possible. I enjoyed turbines but found they require a lot of time to setup at the field and the cost involved for the average guy can take away from the enjoyment in flying. So, another decade begins and this one will be with my first EDF. From my research, FW seems to have a good product for the money. The club member who showed up with the first Avanti a few months back kind of got the EDF thing rolling at my field. Now, there are four of them and another few guys threatening to follow suit.

Batteries seem to be a area of concern and I plan to use jeti telemetry to count mah's consumed. Have found this to be a great tool in all of my electric powered models over the past 5 years and using this approach has allowed my batteries to now last for seasons vs months. I just started using flight controllers (gyros) a few months ago and really like how they take the edge off on windy days. The A10 will get one and eventually will slip in my spare gps unit to determine stall speed and convert that to a audible tone on landing approach.

John

Hi John I use a MUI 150 in mine and it's great . I set an alarm on approx 3300mah consumed knowing I have a good go-around or two before hitting 4000. (80% of my batteries) I can generally get around 7 minutes of flight time on a reasonably calm day.
I only use one mui connected to one battery so you still don't know if the other has a problem. You could use two and set an alarm at a much higher level on the second as a back up but after measuring my batteries at landing they near as damn it match.

[Pete Lane]

[Pete Lane]

Finally getting to my maiden a year later.
Wanted the first batch delay award....lol
Their will be two grey ones out also .
Will try for vidio and pics.
Maiden is on Monday.

Pete

[downwindleg]

Best of luck Pete. Leave yourself plenty of time for approaches and go arounds. It might take a few to get in the groove.
Brad

[Pete Lane]

Thanks for the well wishes and advice Brad !
Am driving 100 miles to utilize the one mile long concrete runway at my other club. No trees within
a few miles of that. If you have time...look up Crows landing air base California.



One note while I was using the CG stand my nose gear clevice was broken. I replaced it and the pin just snapped off again? Its where the rod from the servo attaches to the nose gear. We soldered up a metal clevice and its bullet proof now. Glad it happened now and not at the field. Just dident seem very robust on a 12 pounder . Perhaps just a brittle batch.

I have a spare complete nose retract and 3 sets
Of packs so am going to try my best.

Pete

[Jimrc73]

This is my first post to this thread. I've made it through all 7000+ posts and always read threads like this before starting a new project. Started my assembly last week and have about a hour into it. Have not applied power to the system but am at that stage.

No plans to paint or put a lot of scale detail on her to start with. I do however have concerns after reading so many comments on the landing gear and at this point not sure which approach I'll take (leave stock, flip the mains and or replace nose gear with T/L).

I fly from a 1500 foot grass strip and have owned 4 turbine powered models over the years. All of those models worked best with T/L gear vs oles. I still remember watching my BVM Bobcat doing the bucking bronco on my first few outings and the repairs I had to make to a $5000 model. Over time, I learned the importance of getting her slowed down, touching with the mains first and finding the correct center of gravity. All of which so many of you have mentioned over and over again. I'm really leaning toward flying it stock and seeing if my past experience pays off.

Anyways, I've enjoyed reading all the posts and look forward to flying the A10 in the next week or so.

John

John:

Welcome to the thread! I just joined a couple of weeks ago myself, as I will be building my A-10 starting this week. This is my first EDF Jet, as I previously flew ducted fans (last one being an F-15), so I'm excited to get going (although I'll have to wait until it warms up a bit where I live to go fly). The guys in this thread are consummate professionals, and I have thoroughly enjoyed engaging in the conversations. I have lots to learn, but I know that once my project begins later this week, I have a great team of individuals in this thread who are always willing to provide advice. In an early thread, I wrote that the reason I chose the A-10 is because back in the late 1970s, I was fortunate enough to build the real A-10 at Fairchild Republic for the Air Force. Proud to say that my fingerprints are on over 600 of the 713 A-10s built! What a great airplane. Anyway, look forward to building mine and hearing from you as well as you progress on your journey. I applaud your dedication in reading through all the posts - I've read through several hundred, but perhaps I need to do more. Enjoy!!! :a10

Regards,
Jim

[Jimrc73]

Maiden day! Went awesome. I got two flights, this is an awesome plane. It’s so stable, I usually get the knee shake on new planes but this felt like I have flown it 100 times. Both of the landings were greasers I was very excited !

Topshot:

Congrats on the maiden!!! I hope to get mine in the air for the first time in a few weeks (after it warms up a bit), as I will be building it this week. I appreciate your post - makes me feel much more comfortable reading your, all of the guys' posts when all is going well. Enjoy!

Regards,
Jim

[Grossman56]

Hey Jim and John, great to have both of you on the Squawk!
Best of luck with the A-10's!!
Pete, great choice of paint schemes, is it patterned off an actual scheme? I don't know that much about full size A-10's ........

Grossman56

[Pete Lane]

No...lol.
it was actually a dare from 1moparman1 my buddy.
Twas a choice between yeller or mopar purple.
I flipped a coin and yellow came up. Going fun scale took some of the pressure off. Besides you can't miss it !


Pete

[Topshot19]

Ya I was so surprised how easy it was to fly.

[Sky Wolf]

Did anyone else catch the Super Bowl National Anthem tonight? Cool flyover by two A-10’s!

https://youtu.be/69ShK4TYHJk

[john2kx]

I did. Had to do a double take as it was so ironic. Was just about to put juice to the electronics for the first time to my A10 when they did the flyover.

[MikeT]

Did anyone else catch the Super Bowl National Anthem tonight? Cool flyover by two A-10’s!

https://youtu.be/69ShK4TYHJk

Boycotting the NFL but did see a interview there's supposed to be inflight video posted soon.

Mike

[EDFjetpilot]

Did anyone else catch the Super Bowl National Anthem tonight? Cool flyover by two A-10’s!

https://youtu.be/69ShK4TYHJk

It was the USAF Heritage Flight team...a P-51, two A-10s and an F-16.

Sean

[john2kx]

Hey Jim and John, great to have both of you on the Squawk!
Best of luck with the A-10's!!
Pete, great choice of paint schemes, is it patterned off an actual scheme? I don't know that much about full size A-10's ........

Grossman56

Thanks! I've got all the linkages adjusted and throws set. Amazing how easy it was to get the radio system up and running. What normally takes me days on a model with retracts, flaps, doors, lights etc only took a few minutes. Fired up both fans and all is well there. Should be ready to fly by weekend but it looks like rain on both days. Oh well, no hurry on this one. Want to take my time with this one and go over everything at least one more time. And, then there are decals to install :(