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

[T-CAT]

Congrats on the maidens today guys!

[RCAV8R]

Nice video Aros! Glad it went well and a great promo for the beautiful Pacific Northwest! Thanks Alpha for the delivery update...we can't wait!!!!! Rob

[downwindleg]

Mike, if you saw how hard mine hit on the nose after my botched landing, I think you'd know they aren't needed. I ripped the nose piece off and tore the nose gear out of the mount. The rest of the fuselage laughed it off. People are over complicating this plane.

Wow, I don't feel so bad now Pat and afjetmech after my hard landing. I did get a small stress crack at the aft starboard side of the opening for the canopy/hatch. I tried repairing that area by cutting a slice straight down on that side and glueing a piece of 1/64" ply into it but actually made it worse by running the knife out through the side of the fuse below and behind the crack ....DOH!!!!! But it's all glued back together now and hopefully stronger than before. Brad

[downwindleg]

Way to go Aros. There is no chance I would have done video on the maiden so my hat's off to you. Brad

[Aros]

Way to go Aros. There is no chance I would have done video on the maiden so my hat's off to you. Brad

Thanks my friend (and everyone else for the kudos)... The way I look at it is either the maiden goes well and I have good video of it, or it goes really BAD and some would then say I have GREAT video! LOL

[downwindleg]

Great way to look at it!!!!

[crxmanpat]

Congrats on the maidens guys! Great to see you join the Hawg Club! :)

[1horse59]

It will work for sure...you will be in the ball park for CG. Make some personal adjustments if desired after a few flights. Make sure and "Fly her in" with power when landing. You will be all smiles flying her!

I am in the second group to receive the A-10, and have learned so much from all of you, I too am thankful for your patience and how you pilots go above and beyond to help:Cool:

[Alpha]

OV10, RCjetDude, PilotRyan, and Captain Mike, making us all jealous.

[1horse59]

Maiden Success!

The school was virtually empty other than some of the janitor's vehicles but they were off the main "runway". A fairly pesky crosswind but nothing I didn't think she couldn't handle. This was my only shot before my trip to meet downwindleg and enjoy his beautiful island this weekend so it was now or next Tuesday. I put my Mobius on the port wingtip assuming it wouldn't create much if any issue with lateral stability. The takeoff was fairly uneventful but the nose gear did seem to fish tail on me at WOT...I may want to dial down the rudder throw on low rates.

She lifted off and immediately I knew I had to give quite a bit of right trim. How much was that due to the port-mounted cam? I won't know for sure until the next flight when the camera is center mounted. I got her fairly trimmed but with the winds it was impossible to dial her in completely. I was surprised how floaty and agile she felt. I expected her to feel a bit more "brick-ish" in the air. Not at all. I flew on low rates and even though I dialed down my ailerons A LOT (from recommended) I still need to dial down another 10% or so. A little too responsive on the roll axis for me. Yaw trim may need to be adjusted a touch too I think but it's too hard to tell with a cross wind component. As you can see in the video below, there wasn't much to the maiden. I generally "Grandma" my birds on the maiden until I learn the language they want to speak. Once I do then it's balls to the wall, lol.

I basically had the gear down for half the flight trying some slow-ish approaches with flaps to get a feel for the landing sequence in my limited runway. Boy does she eat up space! I didn't realize how much until watching the video! I had no choice but to slow her down pretty good with full flaps on the approach. She really does want to float! Once she was in ground effect I had to really battle to get her down as she was eating up my limited runway in a snap. Finally got her down and no bounce! Well so I thought! Once I watched the video there was a small bounce as if to mock me.

Son of a... LOL

You can see how I had to turn hard right as I ran out of runway (and praying my depth perception was on its game or it was going to hit the light pole or curb).

Summary: While I still have some dialing in to do, and I think she was ever so slightly on the aft side of the CG, this is one hell of a foam A-10. Hard to add what hasn't already been said about her. Fantastic scale looks and size and performance. Fans sounded nice and balanced. Can't wait to paint her up and get her decals on and spend the Summer and Fall rocking this beast!

Nice maiden Aros. Billy

[Mike_Then]

Maiden Success!

The school was virtually empty other than some of the janitor's vehicles but they were off the main "runway". A fairly pesky crosswind but nothing I didn't think she couldn't handle. This was my only shot before my trip to meet downwindleg and enjoy his beautiful island this weekend so it was now or next Tuesday. I put my Mobius on the port wingtip assuming it wouldn't create much if any issue with lateral stability. The takeoff was fairly uneventful but the nose gear did seem to fish tail on me at WOT...I may want to dial down the rudder throw on low rates.

She lifted off and immediately I knew I had to give quite a bit of right trim. How much was that due to the port-mounted cam? I won't know for sure until the next flight when the camera is center mounted. I got her fairly trimmed but with the winds it was impossible to dial her in completely. I was surprised how floaty and agile she felt. I expected her to feel a bit more "brick-ish" in the air. Not at all. I flew on low rates and even though I dialed down my ailerons A LOT (from recommended) I still need to dial down another 10% or so. A little too responsive on the roll axis for me. Yaw trim may need to be adjusted a touch too I think but it's too hard to tell with a cross wind component. As you can see in the video below, there wasn't much to the maiden. I generally "Grandma" my birds on the maiden until I learn the language they want to speak. Once I do then it's balls to the wall, lol.

I basically had the gear down for half the flight trying some slow-ish approaches with flaps to get a feel for the landing sequence in my limited runway. Boy does she eat up space! I didn't realize how much until watching the video! I had no choice but to slow her down pretty good with full flaps on the approach. She really does want to float! Once she was in ground effect I had to really battle to get her down as she was eating up my limited runway in a snap. Finally got her down and no bounce! Well so I thought! Once I watched the video there was a small bounce as if to mock me.

Son of a... LOL

You can see how I had to turn hard right as I ran out of runway (and praying my depth perception was on its game or it was going to hit the light pole or curb).

Summary: While I still have some dialing in to do, and I think she was ever so slightly on the aft side of the CG, this is one hell of a foam A-10. Hard to add what hasn't already been said about her. Fantastic scale looks and size and performance. Fans sounded nice and balanced. Can't wait to paint her up and get her decals on and spend the Summer and Fall rocking this beast!

Congrats on the maiden Aros! Especially the music selection... that was awesome! I'm guessing Dream Theater? That's a guess because I'm not a huge Dream Theater fan but it definitely sounds like them to me..

[Amjet]

Any word on that second container? You guys are having way too much fun! Can't wait to join in!

[Mike_Then]

Any word on that second container? You guys are having way too much fun! Can't wait to join in!

See Post #4338, just a few posts above.

[bill34207]

Finished up my storage, transport and assembly stand this morning. Full construction details in my blog on RC Groups. https://www.rcgroups.com/forums/show...m-A-10-Warthog






.

[Kurtzz]

Any difficulty in applying the nose art and getting it symmetrical?

If I did it again I would separate the two heads from the one snout and make a 3 piece and apply dry. The nostrils on the snout are a tad off, but in their location its hard to see. Both heads on the sides are perfect

[JetFlyer]

Got my ordnance decals from crxmanpat. GREAT JOB!!!! Thank you for your extra effort so we can trick out these weapons...

[gravity tester]

Hi all,
So I am prepared for the possibility that this is the dumbest thing I ever posted but I was thinking during the ride home from the Jet Jam about the elevator position everyone seems to be starting with (top surface of the elevator aligned with the radar warning bumps). In other words, dialing in some "up" from the start. Depending on batteries, some seem to be dialing in even more after take off. Has anyone thought about maybe changing the horizontal stab incidence to even this out? Maybe a shim or maybe just a washer or two under the front stab mounting locations so you could make the elevator plane even with the stab plane again? Maybe it is not worth the risk of inducing some other bad tendency, but its just a thought. Hey, it was a 2.5 hour ride home. The mind wanders... It would be easy enough to fair in the foam so you don't have a step from the fuse.

Congrats on the out of the box maiden, Sam. Good to see you again and put faces with several names on the thread. What a great hobby this is. Wish I could have hung out longer.

Cheers,
Dan

[crxmanpat]

Got flights 12 and 13 in today, this time with the CG pushed back to 90mm. Did not seem to affect current trim at all, or change the flight characteristics. I'm thinking this thing has a fairly wide CG range, or may just be nose heavy at 78mm. I'd like to try and move it back some more by moving the upper battery further back. I'll have to think about that. No flying tomorrow, so it won't be until next weekend.

[Clearblue]

Finally a free day to build this awesome Machine! Wow, just Wow..
Only one small issue, two really. The control board is not quite wide enough to plug everything thing into it easily. But after removing the steering servo, so that its on its own channel. Everything else plugged in fine.
The other thing was the speed controllers wouldn't connect at first. A quick call to a fellow pilot had me singing.
I did install four of the frisbee whistles, here's a quick clip of that.

https://youtu.be/tRnDS_bwXv8

Jim

[dahawk]

Cool I installed two. Pretty night effect on taxi