Official Freewing 80mm Avanti S Sport Jet Thread

[Mach9]

It's a new name and I am sure it is over rated. They claim a 6 month warranty which is probably worthless. If it does half that at 25C and is 5200mAh that would be 130A which is 30A more than the ESC. A 5000mAh at 20C would be 100A but that is pushing it too hard. I think the ESC is pulling 85A WOT. I did look at Glacier (Same as Gens Ace?), Gens Ace, Roaring Top and Floureon. It seems many places are always out of stock.

[Topshot19]

How do I get more led lights the avainti has. Way brighter than the rest of my models. They don't sell them separately. Anyone know where I can get some ?

[ronwc]

Some of this has probably already been mentioned, but here is my mini review. Ordered a new Avanti from Motion last Friday and got it in Wednesday, great service. Very well packed, no damage. Twelve screws later and whole plane is together, very quick assembly. I had a pilot left over from a Stinger 90 that I put in that helped a lot.

Test flew it this morning using my Futaba 10J and a Roaring Top 5000. I have flown a lot of 70, 80, 90mm stuff and had a feeling the Avanti was going to be right. Had all controls set at about 70 percent throw with 15 percent expo. Took off and cruised around about 1/2 power feeling it out and setting the trim didn't need much. Did a few touch and goes without flaps and it was fine but wanted to slow it down more. When I dropped the flaps they were not equal so I got a slight right turn, but no problem, adjusted them slightly after landing and they were fine after that. Also mixed in 6% down elevator with flaps. Flew about 4 minutes with a few low altitude high speed runs and some big 300 ft loops, plenty of power.

I would agree with some of the other comments I have read comparing this to the Stinger 90 which I have flown a lot. The Avanti is a little better at everything. A little lighter, faster and feels a little better in the air, more nimble, lands slower - looks sleeker too. I will be out flying it again tomorrow, will try to get some pics and or video.

[Tmsflyer]

Howdy fellas. I have a question. I received my Avanti on the first pre-order. It was only my second EDF, after 35 years of flying glow and gas. My first EDF was the FW F-86. Never had an issue with that plane and still fly it. I liked the Avanti even more. Well, the Avanti is totaled. After only a big handful of flights, it rolled left for just an instant, just after take off. I didnt think much of it. But others noticed it too. After about 5 smooth laps, while banking and turning left, I started to level out, but it continued to roll left on it own and of course hit the ground, HARD.
Others have mentioned apparent issues with the connector board and thus bypassing it altogether with extensions and Y harnesses. So, my question. Is there any strong feeling among you all about whether on my new Avanti I should simply bypass the connector board from the start, or just write what happened off as a fluke? Oh, BTW, I never take my wings off because I haul my planes in a trailer. So I don't think there should have been any issue with aileron or flap connections unless the board had an issue.

[Tmsflyer]

Oops, sorry for the double post!

[Shirty]

Sorry to hear it. I've had no issues with mine, I'm comfortable using the board as it was intended. Some aren't, up to personal choice I think really. There's only been a very small number of people who reported issues with connections.

[OV10]

Sorry to hear it. I've had no issues with mine, I'm comfortable using the board as it was intended. Some aren't, up to personal choice I think really. There's only been a very small number of people who reported issues with connections.

That's great that you haven't experienced some anomaly with either the control or connection/distribution boards but there are more than the isolated cases starting to rear its ugly head of post hole events.
I personally am not into a sport jet but a friend of mine who is a skilled pilot at a giant scale club just lost his to a similar event like Tmsflyer described so there IS something going on.
This is where Motion's excellent reputation of outstanding customer service should be the benchmark on resolving the anguish of those affected. ;)

[Rosytime]

I wrote about my experiences with my Avanti. I had a flap servo that wouldn't go all the way up on occasion until you touched it. I too left my wings on. After reading about some other pilots having issues, I took out the board and used extensions. The only down side was that I had to get a LED control board, from Motion, to operate the lights correctly. The board has a circuit on it that reduces voltage to the LEDs and makes the strobe effect. After flying with this set-up, the flap servo still had this occasional anomaly. I figured that since it only happened after I landed, I'll just watch it. Well, numerous flights later I was setting up for a landing and the jet went crazy into a hard roll after hitting the flap switch. I threw the switch back and the jet leveled out. I knew then that the servo had went bad. Tried it one more time before landing with the same result, so I landed without flaps. On our short runway it went a long way. I have since replaced both flap servos and since they had a 550 mm wire, I eliminated one servo extension to each flap. I have about twenty flights since and no more problems. It does make a sloppy looking wire bundle in the fuselage, but it works. I believe that after reading some of the scenarios, there might be more of a servo problem than the control board. And remember, there's a lot more Avanti's flying with no problems from people who don't post on the forums. As a side note, I had the Freewing Yak-130 which had a flap servo go bad. Considering all the servos that Freewing uses, a few bad ones is a small percentage of the total.

[Mach9]

I also had a flap problem a couple of times and then no more. I understand why the flap servos are positioned the same direction so that a reverse servo is not needed, but why did they make the openings where they did? Seems like they were trying to compensate for using 2 normal servos and made a mistake. It does not make sense. They could have made the openings in the same relative position and have the horns in different positions or they could have made the openings in different positions and have the horns in the same postion, but this is neither. If I was to choose, I would make it with the horns in the same position more toward the middle of the flap.

[Twowingtj]

That's great that you haven't experienced some anomaly with either the control or connection/distribution boards but there are more than the isolated cases starting to rear its ugly head of post hole events.
I personally am not into a sport jet but a friend of mine who is a skilled pilot at a giant scale club just lost his to a similar event like Tmsflyer described so there IS something going on.
This is where Motion's excellent reputation of outstanding customer service should be the benchmark on resolving the anguish of those affected. ;)

It was me that OV10 mentioned with the recent Avanti loss. Was 1 1/2 minutes into flight and was making a half throttle runway pass. Throttled up for the upline into a split S. Rolled right at the top and when I went neutral stick on the ailerons to level the wings, it continued to roll right with a significant yaw to the right. I realized that the right aileron had not gone back to neutral. I put left aileron input to stop the roll and the right yaw stopped as well. Now the nose was pointed down with both ailerons up and pullin up elevator:Scared:. Results resembled a disassembled yard dart landing where a bean bag chair had exploded previouslyLOL.

I was running telemetry and surprizingly, the ESC, receiver and Lipo were still connected and transmitting telemetry. There were no signal drops and the flight pack showed 23.5v. The crash site confirmed both ailerons were up at the time of the crash. The distribution circuit board was destroyed in the crash. I disconnected the wing boards and pluged each aileron servo into the receiver to see if there was a receiver or servo issue. Both the receiver and servos worked without issue:Confused:. The crash destroyed the airframe and a near new Admiral 5000mah Lipo(still worked but pretty crumpled up):(.

Contacted Motion RC CS. The main circuit board(what's left of it), ribbon cables and wing boards are enroute back to MRC for investigation at this time. I too was one fortunate enough to have adequate transport space so the wings didn't have to be removed. Hands down the best flying sport jet. A joy to fly. One way or another, I'll have another one.

[rpellicciotti]

Howdy fellas. I have a question. I received my Avanti on the first pre-order. It was only my second EDF, after 35 years of flying glow and gas. My first EDF was the FW F-86. Never had an issue with that plane and still fly it. I liked the Avanti even more. Well, the Avanti is totaled. After only a big handful of flights, it rolled left for just an instant, just after take off. I didnt think much of it. But others noticed it too. After about 5 smooth laps, while banking and turning left, I started to level out, but it continued to roll left on it own and of course hit the ground, HARD.
Others have mentioned apparent issues with the connector board and thus bypassing it altogether with extensions and Y harnesses. So, my question. Is there any strong feeling among you all about whether on my new Avanti I should simply bypass the connector board from the start, or just write what happened off as a fluke? Oh, BTW, I never take my wings off because I haul my planes in a trailer. So I don't think there should have been any issue with aileron or flap connections unless the board had an issue.

Sorry for your loss. Just a couple of general comments. (Knocking on wood), I have not had any problems with my airplane like those that have been reported.

First, I did find a couple of connectors on the control board that were not pushed on all the way during assembly. I checked and re-seated all the connections before first flight. I have only disassembled mine once. I usually transport it with the wings on.

Second comment. Many of these incidents sound like "holds"or "fades" to me. If your radio supports it, it would be nice to know if there were any holds or fades recorded. One thing to consider that is different about these models is that they have a big metal fan at the back and big chunk of battery right in the middle of the airplane. I think it is critical to have antenna diversity in these airplanes. In my big, turbine Avanti I am running 4 satellite receivers. These are mounted forward and aft in the airplane with antennas oriented horizontal and vertical. In my Avanti 80mm, I am running the Spektrum AR9350 which has a built in antenna and two satellites. The satellites are mounted forward and low along with high and aft. One is vertical and one is horizontal. I have checked many times after a flight and I have very few fades (some are expected in aggressive maneuvers) and no holds.

I am old enough to remember all the interference problems we used to have on 72MHz radios. Some fields had channels that could not be used at all. The first radios that came out with "failsafe" or "hold" were useful. It saved a few airplanes that would have been lost otherwise. Today, we hardly even think about interference. The 2.4 GHz radios are fantastic. Still, at our field, I have watched 3 airplanes in the last couple of months roll over and crash at the northeast corner of our field. These were different aircraft types and brands of radios. All unexplained. I fly right through that area each flight too and have not had any problems. It is mysterious.

Rick Pellicciotti

http://www.avantijet.com

[Grossman56]

Interesting, we noticed that at Nefi, there's an area on the right side of the field that has earned the name,'the Nefi triangle'
I agree that it's always best to have a satellite. I switched from Spektrum receivers to Lemons and have had no trouble with them at all, can't say the same regarding Spektrums.
Both the Avanti and the Tigercat are running Lemons with no gyro and I have had nothing but success. The two accidents I had at Nefi we using Spektrums. Coincidence? I can't say, but it makes me wonder.
Still, checking the wired connections in the fuse is a great point and I'll add that to my preflight.

Grossman56

[Mach9]

I use 72Mhz FM with no problems whatsoever. No fade, no failsafe, no hold, it just works. If the same technology was used with 72Mhz as with 2.4Ghz, the 72Mhz would be FAR better for the purpose of RC aircraft use. The only reason for the push is because tech companies want the 72Mhz band! I work with and install various radio equipment for WiFi and the 2.4Ghz band is absolutely full. BTW, that is the frequency of your microwave oven (because it resonates water very well) and many RADAR towers. If several people are having problems you should rent an analyzer and scan the area you fly at. You could be in for a big surprise. ;) This is an interesting site: http://www.antennasearch.com/

[t33jetman]

Now comes the sanding and painting. ....

[Twowingtj]

In the case of my incedent, I was using Lemon 7 channel DSMX telemetry receivers. One main, with two diversity antennea and a sat receiver also with two diversity antennea. All properly placed. When I do a range check, I always test all the way around the aircraft checking for any "dead zones". This has always proved to be good practice. Telemetry showed zero holds or signal issues. We have identified two areas at our field that prove to be problematic for Orange DSM2 receivers, especially if used without a sat receiver.

One nice thing about the Avanti is that there is lots of room to ensure good radio and equipment placement. Just need to make sure that you read and follow the manufacturers installation and use instructions.

There has been some mention of control horn installation issues. All of mine were solidly affixed. Even after the crash they were firmly attached. Must have been a good day at the factory:Cool:.

[Pheonix]

I am glad I read these threads at times. Mine is still in the box. I just checked to see that all parts checked out. I may start the build this week. I am afraid to take it out of the box and have my wife see me building it. I have plane all over the place. Well, he might as well get ready for another one--- the A-4 Sky Hawk. I will try and bribe her with something :Confused:

[t33jetman]

I am glad I read these threads at times. Mine is still in the box. I just checked to see that all parts checked out. I may start the build this week. I am afraid to take it out of the box and have my wife see me building it. I have plane all over the place. Well, he might as well get ready for another one--- the A-4 Sky Hawk. I will try and bribe her with something :Confused:

This plane goes together so fast , you couldn't drink a cup of coffee that fast.

[T-CAT]

If anyone has the stock EDF/motor that you never used or used a few times, is in great shape, and want to sell it please let me know. There must be at least a few people that modified the plane from the get go and aren't using it :).

[Litespeed]

New to thread but learned a lot from all the great posts. Have 10 flights on my Avanti and I cannot get enough. Flies so well on 5000 mah and lands so nice on grass. As posted previously minwax makes her shine really nice. I spray on and quickly brush with large soft brush before it starts setting up. Looks great. Lowe's sells it and one can did 3 of my planes including a large Cessna 150. Hope this plane stays available for a long time.

[Topshot19]

Trying to set up landing lights. How do I set up the mixing to have it turn on when the gear comes down. Using a dx8