Official Freewing 80mm Avanti S Sport Jet Thread

[Woodcock]

Looks Marvel-less. Welcome mate.

Woody

[MR.FPV]

Looks awesome!

[McsGuy]

EDF questions: What is the difference in performance between a 9-blade and a 12-blade 80mm fan? Which would give a higher top speed? Is it worth it to spend the extra and get a "balanced fan? Is there any consensus on the best LiPo for EDF jets? I am thinking of getting the Avanti S (Red) or the E-flite e-Havoc. Any advice or suggestions are welcome.

All things being equal a 12 blade provides more take off thrust then a 9 blade fan. It also sucks more power and flies slower but sounds more jet like. I typically fly the 11 blade Stumax because it provides an excellent balance of the three factors. However I'm getting ready to pull the trigger on the Avanti S PNP with the 9 blade to try it out. BVM went from 7 blades to 9 blades on their $1900 fan to stay competitive with the jet like sound standard set by Stumax in ~2011. That tells me the 9 blade is probably the most efficient design that provides reasonable sound (I won't fly a jet that sounds like a toy).

Rotor balancing is absolutely essential for the best performance and jet like sound. Flying a poorly balanced fan is foolish in my opinion, search the early threads about the CS rotors exploding in their cheap knock offs of the Stumax.

There are many decent jet lipos to choose from now. It's a matter of weight vs. robustness and life. You can discharge a heavy Graphene (like the Admiral Carbon) regularly down to 5% with no issues but would destroy a standard pack doing that. Here's a load test comparison thread: https://www.rcgroups.com/forums/show...st-Comparisons

Joe

[AFTERBURNER]

All things being equal a 12 blade provides more take off thrust then a 9 blade fan. It also sucks more power and flies slower but sounds more jet like. I typically fly the 11 blade Stumax because it provides an excellent balance of the three factors. However I'm getting ready to pull the trigger on the Avanti S PNP with the 9 blade to try it out. BVM went from 7 blades to 9 blades on their $1900 fan to stay competitive with the jet like sound standard set by Stumax in ~2011. That tells me the 9 blade is probably the most efficient design that provides reasonable sound (I won't fly a jet that sounds like a toy).

Rotor balancing is absolutely essential for the best performance and jet like sound. Flying a poorly balanced fan is foolish in my opinion, search the early threads about the CS rotors exploding in their cheap knock offs of the Stumax.

There are many decent jet lipos to choose from now. It's a matter of weight vs. robustness and life. You can discharge a heavy Graphene (like the Admiral Carbon) regularly down to 5% with no issues but would destroy a standard pack doing that. Here's a load test comparison thread: https://www.rcgroups.com/forums/show...st-Comparisons

Joe

Thank you for this information Joe. Is the Stumax fan still available? I have heard there are some good aftermarket fans which are better than the stock fans which come with many EDF models. Do you recommend any of these? Do you balance your own fans? If so please describe the procedure. Thanks again.

[McsGuy]

Thank you for this information Joe. Is the Stumax fan still available? I have heard there are some good aftermarket fans which are better than the stock fans which come with many EDF models. Do you recommend any of these? Do you balance your own fans? If so please describe the procedure. Thanks again.

Yes, Stumax is still available on a order/build basis, meaning it may take 4-8 weeks to get a fan. However the JetFan from Efflux is a decent, less expensive alternative. You pick the fan, then the HET motor and Gary will balance it properly for you usually within a day or so https://www.effluxrc.com/Jetfan-80mm...t-JF-80EDF.htm. You can call (or email) him and tell him your cell count and performance desired and he'll make the best recommendation on the motor. I don't balance, it's time consuming and very tedious to get right if you don't do a lot of it.

Joe

[Evan D]

Things are never equal, different kV's, different shrouds, ESCs, and batteries. But the theory is correct.


Your statement that you can regularly discharge down to 5% leads me to ignore the rest of your post since it's foolish to do so. That you can is not the issue, that you should be doing so is.

All things being equal a 12 blade provides more take off thrust then a 9 blade fan. It also sucks more power and flies slower but sounds more jet like. I typically fly the 11 blade Stumax because it provides an excellent balance of the three factors. However I'm getting ready to pull the trigger on the Avanti S PNP with the 9 blade to try it out. BVM went from 7 blades to 9 blades on their $1900 fan to stay competitive with the jet like sound standard set by Stumax in ~2011. That tells me the 9 blade is probably the most efficient design that provides reasonable sound (I won't fly a jet that sounds like a toy).

Rotor balancing is absolutely essential for the best performance and jet like sound. Flying a poorly balanced fan is foolish in my opinion, search the early threads about the CS rotors exploding in their cheap knock offs of the Stumax.

There are many decent jet lipos to choose from now. It's a matter of weight vs. robustness and life. You can discharge a heavy Graphene (like the Admiral Carbon) regularly down to 5% with no issues but would destroy a standard pack doing that. Here's a load test comparison thread: https://www.rcgroups.com/forums/show...st-Comparisons

Joe

[AFTERBURNER]

Yes, Stumax is still available on a order/build basis, meaning it may take 4-8 weeks to get a fan. However the JetFan from Efflux is a decent, less expensive alternative. You pick the fan, then the HET motor and Gary will balance it properly for you usually within a day or so https://www.effluxrc.com/Jetfan-80mm...t-JF-80EDF.htm. You can call (or email) him and tell him your cell count and performance desired and he'll make the best recommendation on the motor. I don't balance, it's time consuming and very tedious to get right if you don't do a lot of it.

Joe

Thank you for the information Joe. Much appreciated.

[Speedrick]

Hi,

Past weekend, i clocked the 7th flight on this nice looking bord.
This plane files sooo nice, nearly as a trainer airplane. Flying on 5000mAh batteries, i have a flight time of 4mins, and
still haring 30% remaining.

Today, i was inspecting the airplane for defects, and discovered that the elapor was sheared in the hinge line on both
elevators, between the inboard hinge an the fuselage, exactly were the control horn is located. This is a dangerous situation...
mis this a known defect, and how did you fixed this one? I’m sure this will rip of the elevator, due to induced flutter.



Grts,

Eric

[Mach9]

Hi,

Past weekend, i clocked the 7th flight on this nice looking bord.
This plane files sooo nice, nearly as a trainer airplane. Flying on 5000mAh batteries, i have a flight time of 4mins, and
still haring 30% remaining.

Today, i was inspecting the airplane for defects, and discovered that the elapor was sheared in the hinge line on both
elevators, between the inboard hinge an the fuselage, exactly were the control horn is located. This is a dangerous situation...
mis this a known defect, and how did you fixed this one? I’m sure this will rip of the elevator, due to induced flutter.



Grts,

Eric

The control surfaces can rip off in flight. I tape all foam hinges on one side (even with nylon hinge inserts) and add a bit of glue down the line on the other side. I think the angle of the horn is not quite right on the elevators. The horns pulled out of the original models and since they tripled the size of the base I have not had or heard of any problems.

[McsGuy]

Things are never equal, different kV's, different shrouds, ESCs, and batteries. But the theory is correct.
Your statement that you can regularly discharge down to 5% leads me to ignore the rest of your post since it's foolish to do so. That you can is not the issue, that you should be doing so is.

"Foolish" is a value judgement Evan. It's just possible my 7 years of comprehensive brand testing financed by a $12,000 personal investment learning about Lipo technology better qualifies my judgement on the topic then yours. I don't like blowing my own horn but I like even less when someone is unable to express disagreement without resorting to juvenile insults. It certainly doesn't make you appear more knowledgeable if that's what you intended.

Joe

[Evan D]

I don't care and it's reckless to be posting it's okay to do so as others WILL read what you post, assume you truly are an expert and then wonder why they crash a plane with puffed packs that they take down to 5% of charge.

Yes foolish is a judgement on my part, my opinion, and I aim to have 50% on my packs (actually 3.8V per cell) when I unplug.

Whether you are better qualified is a whole other assumption on your part.

And saying something is foolish is not a juvenile insult. At least not in my opinion. But now you'll say you have a masters in English too?


So to recap to others that are reading this, please do not discharge your batteries down to 5%, it's not a good practice, no matter the brand of LiPo or chemistry.

"Foolish" is a value judgement Evan. It's just possible my 7 years of comprehensive brand testing financed by a $12,000 personal investment learning about Lipo technology better qualifies my judgement on the topic then yours. I don't like blowing my own horn but I like even less when someone is unable to express disagreement without resorting to juvenile insults. It certainly doesn't make you appear more knowledgeable if that's what you intended.

Joe

[McsGuy]

I don't care and it's reckless to be posting it's okay to do so as others WILL read what you post, assume you truly are an expert and then wonder why they crash a plane with puffed packs that they take down to 5% of charge.
Yes foolish is a judgement on my part, my opinion, and I aim to have 50% on my packs (actually 3.8V per cell) when I unplug.
Whether you are better qualified is a whole other assumption on your part.
And saying something is foolish is not a juvenile insult. At least not in my opinion. But now you'll say you have a masters in English too?

So to recap to others that are reading this, please do not discharge your batteries down to 5%, it's not a good practice, no matter the brand of LiPo or chemistry.

Your point is well taken, I agree it's not necessarily a good practice to discharge your batteries down to 5%. My point was the heavy graphenes, as opposed to standard packs do not appear to suffer from over heating, puffing or reduced life in the event one does. I'm very careful with my Hyperions in that regard but I don't have to watch the timer so carefully with my Panthers. Good on you for keeping your packs at 50%, that's a fine practice. I take my standard packs down to 25% and my Graphenes considerably lower. It's been my experience to gain longer flight times doing so without sacrificing performance loss during the ~3 seasons I keep track of. In my opinion it's a reasonable practice and I see no down side sharing it with others as long as there's no confusion about standard Lipo's requiring more careful treatment then Graphenes.

Joe

[Evan D]

I agree with you on that Joe. Good post.

Your point is well taken, I agree it's not necessarily a good practice to discharge your batteries down to 5%. My point was the heavy graphenes, as opposed to standard packs do not appear to suffer from over heating, puffing or reduced life in the event one does. I'm very careful with my Hyperions in that regard but I don't have to watch the timer so carefully with my Panthers. Good on you for keeping your packs at 50%, that's a fine practice. I take my standard packs down to 25% and my Graphenes considerably lower. It's been my experience to gain longer flight times doing so without sacrificing performance loss during the ~3 seasons I keep track of. In my opinion it's a reasonable practice and I see no down side sharing it with others as long as there's no confusion about standard Lipo's requiring more careful treatment then Graphenes.

Joe

[Hugh Wiedman]

Stupid Question #357: (12 blade or 9 blade)

I'm considering getting the 80mm Red Avanti so I have a jet that I can just enjoy flying instead of always being on pins and needles. I'm not a jet aficionado, and my motto has always been, bigger is better so I started out with nothing but 90mm jets. I do regularly fly my 90mm F-16, two 90mm F-4's & my re-painted Stinger 90. Each of those I've put a lot of extra work on with graphics, painting, cockpit mods, etc., especially the F-4 Blue Angel and my F-16 with 4 different liveries, that just the thought of crashing gets my blood pressure up with each flight. (Not so much with the Stinger, easy flight characteristics, but spent a lot of time re-painting it and having Callie do custom graphics) Have yet to have a major accident (crap, just jinxed that) other than replacing a nose landing gear retract a couple of times and a couple strange near misses. They all truly are a blast to fly, but sometimes my nerves are shot at the end of the day. Ergo, I was thinking of getting a simple jet, leave everything stock with no extra painting, graphics, etc. throw it together and just have fun flying it, while getting more "jet flying time" without the associated "high blood pressure" time. Any miss-haps, as there no doubt will be, like all my planes, who cares, replace a part or 2 and send it back up. I need to get enough confidence and experience to the point where I just know I can fly any jet, instead of where I'm at now of "I'm pretty sure I can, but you never know".

So after much consideration, I think the 80mm Avanti is just what the doctor ordered. The question is, 12 blade fan or 9 blade fan. Not sure why the yellow is a 12 blade fan and the red has a 9 blade fan, yet both have the same out-runner. As I said, I don't really know Sh.. from Shinola when it comes to the finer points with EDF's but what's the difference in performance/efficiency between the 2. Really want the Red, as my Stinger was re-done in a yellow and black so I don't want 2 yellow jets. If the 9 blade is more efficient, but just doesn't sound as good, resulting in possibly longer flight times (not a balls to the wall high speed freak), then that's for me. Or is the 12 blade the way to go and why?

[xviper]

Stupid Question #357: (12 blade or 9 blade)
Not sure why the yellow is a 12 blade fan and the red has a 9 blade fan, yet both have the same out-runner.

The two motors are slightly different KV. The 9-blade spins a little faster. They both sound about the same. I replaced the fan in my yellow one with the new FMS 2100kv, 12-blade unit and this gives a little more punch. Quite frankly, the difference between the stock yellow one and the red one will be hard to notice. Choose whichever one that's suits your color preference.

[McsGuy]

My experience has mainly been with Stumax and some BVM so I'm no authority on the FMS or stock offerings from MotionRC. Very generally speaking more blades use more power providing more static thrust then a comparable fan with fewer blades. However the lower blade count fans (again very generally speaking) provide higher top speed. For example I have a couple 110mm Sparks, both maxing out at ~6000W. My 11 blade will push the plane to ~190mph and get off my 300ft grass field with no problem. My 4 blade unit pushes it's Spark to about 205mph but I wouldn't even attempt taking it off a short grass runway (To see the speed difference the top video is the 4 blade in action and the second video down is the 11 blade https://www.rcgroups.com/forums/member.php?u=303061). My Electra used BVM's 9 blade fan and kinda gave me the best of both and better flight times. If there's no sound difference I vote the 9 blade option.

Joe

[Carlbrainiac]

Reprogram the ESC and set timing to low for best efficiency of the motor. I had to do that on my FW L39

Not wanting to sound like an idiot but I usually just kind of plug and go with electrics. If you need an engine tuned I'm your man but all this esc programming with beeps hurts my head and not sure what the differences are and what changes they affect apart from the obvious brake and LVC.

By switching the timing to low what will this actually do? Guessing in the context of that conversation it improves motor efficiency and therefore flight duration but does this mean you also lose a little performance?
surely there must be a reason freewing chose this programming from stock..

[McsGuy]

Increasing or decreasing ESC timing bears similarities to advancing or retarding engine timing. In the case of ESC's it helps "dial in" the motor to a particular performance level. In some cases you can increase the timing and increase the motor RPM at the cost of added heat. The timing setting also effects the motor synchronization. Essentially the rotating electrical field spins around a magnetic rotor in an outrunner, visa versa with an inrunner. The rotating field "leads" the magnetic rotor pulling it around. The gap or "lead error" is controlled by the timing. If it's set too far advanced at high RPM the rotor falls out of synchronizations and stalls squealing like a pig. I know the Freewing Avanti comes set at an optimum level.

Joe

[Carlbrainiac]

Increasing or decreasing ESC timing bears similarities to advancing or retarding engine timing. In the case of ESC's it helps "dial in" the motor to a particular performance level. In some cases you can increase the timing and increase the motor RPM at the cost of added heat. The timing setting also effects the motor synchronization. Essentially the rotating electrical field spins around a magnetic rotor in an outrunner, visa versa with an inrunner. The rotating field "leads" the magnetic rotor pulling it around. The gap or "lead error" is controlled by the timing. If it's set too far advanced at high RPM the rotor falls out of synchronizations and stalls squealing like a pig. I know the Freewing Avanti comes set at an optimum level.

Joe

So if you believe it is already set at an optimum level would you suggest not to adjust it?

[McsGuy]

If it were me I wouldn't unless I was trying to tweek for max speed. For sport flying optimum setting will minimize hassles.

Joe