Eflite Cherokee

[Loneflier]

No problem, always happy to help. I have had a few landings in which I needed to go around since it just wanted to stay in the air. Hit the throttle, suck up the flaps, and try again. I found the 3300 battery to really help with how floaty the plane feels. My 2200's just never seem to want to let the plane settle in on landing. Sadly, my Cherokee suffered a rudder failure last week and was a total loss. Rudder went to full right deflection shortly after take-off and spiraled into the ground. The wreckage is arriving at Horizon today for evaluation of what is left. Really hurt watching my favorite plane go into the ground. It had a flawless flight earlier the same evening and had to land to make way for an Army Blackhawk doing touch and goes. Did my standard pre-flight control surface checks, added one notch of flaps, took off and started my pattern flight around the field when it crashed.

Sorry to hear of the loss of your Cherokee. Hopefully, HH will make it right for you. They have always been very fair with me when I had issues.

[BRGT350]

Thanks Loneflier, looks like I am getting a replacement Cherokee. Horizon completed the accident investigation and concluded the rudder servo stripped. They couldn't determine the cause of the stripped servo as it could have been the accident. Could have been me trying to get the servo the move when I had it on the bench. Either way, they are making it right. I am going to upgrade all the servos to metal gear Emax units and a servo-saver to the front landing gear push-rod. My theory is that shock loading from the front landing gear being inputted into a servo isn't good. I don't think this caused the servo failure as the plane had very few flights on it and the smoothest landings I have ever had. I almost never taxi the plane on the grass, I walk it out and back from the runway. I am positive the failure was a freak event with that servo. It is my first servo in 20 plus planes and 680 flights. Chances were good it would happen eventually. I will feel better with metal gear servos as an extra level of insurance. Will do the same to my Timber and B-17 rudder and elevators. I am so happy Horizon is taking care of me with this. I love the Cherokee!

[Jhnybgd]

I just received my Cherokee yesterday.
love the plane ...except the horrible plain white foam,didnt even put it together removed the decals and started painting the white.
looks 100 % better.

I know they keep costs down by leaving the foam unpainted I would rather they save the money on labor not applying the decals and paint the foam instead!

[BRGT350]

I just received my Cherokee yesterday.
love the plane ...except the horrible plain white foam,didnt even put it together removed the decals and started painting the white.
looks 100 % better.

I know they keep costs down by leaving the foam unpainted I would rather they save the money on labor not applying the decals and paint the foam instead!

I am in the process of painting my replacement Cherokee. I removed as much of the red paint as I could as I found that it doesn't stick very well to the foam. Any paint over it would just lift. Going with 2 light coats of Krylon foam primer, a coat of Rust-Oleum 2X primer, and then the white top coat. Wet sanding as needed to improve the finish. Also swapping out the servos while the plane is being repainted. Next up is getting an order for new graphics into Callie.

[F22trainer]

I am in the process of painting my replacement Cherokee. I removed as much of the red paint as I could as I found that it doesn't stick very well to the foam. Any paint over it would just lift. Going with 2 light coats of Krylon foam primer, a coat of Rust-Oleum 2X primer, and then the white top coat. Wet sanding as needed to improve the finish. Also swapping out the servos while the plane is being repainted. Next up is getting an order for new graphics into Callie.

I had great results with Kilz water based primer / sealer.

[F22trainer]

I keep seeing buyers refer to the “flying tail” as an elevon-
incorrect.
It is called a ‘stabilator’, according to Piper engineers, with an anti-servo type trim which prevents full scale deflection and moves in the same direction as the primary surface and at a greater rate. A great addition to a scale model!

On a different note,
Piper is not real happy about the similar looking, use of their Logo without permission either...

[CaptAmerica]

Glad Horizon made it right.

[BRGT350]

Slowly starting to come together
E-Flite Cherokee repaint project by Bryan Redeker, on Flickr

Callie is wrapping up the graphics and once those are done, the plane can start going back together. The aileron servos have been replaced and next up is the stabilator and rudder servos. Not sure how to extract the flap servos from the wings yet. Last step is the scale details like the exhaust tips, antennas, grab handle, foot step, and anti-slip walkway. Probably going to tackle the cockpit over the winter.

[Alpha]

Nice Cherokee, and even nicer Mustang!

I'm excited to see what your final Cherokee looks like with this new scheme. Callie is the best.

[BRGT350]

Nice Cherokee, and even nicer Mustang!

I'm excited to see what your final Cherokee looks like with this new scheme. Callie is the best.

Thanks Alpha.

I wrapped up putting my Mustang away for the year yesterday and moved the Cherokee into the basement to be completed. :( Always sad when fall arrives and the Mustang has to sit until spring before it comes back out. Depending on the weather, the Cherokee might not fly until next spring. I really dislike this time of the year.

[F22trainer]

Thanks Alpha.

I wrapped up putting my Mustang away for the year yesterday and moved the Cherokee into the basement to be completed. :( Always sad when fall arrives and the Mustang has to sit until spring before it comes back out. Depending on the weather, the Cherokee might not fly until next spring. I really dislike this time of the year.

How do you feel about Arizona? Bring her on out when you finish, and you should be able to get it in the Mustang for a stroll down Route 66. While Corvettes are the sports car of choice, Mustangs still run in herds all across the Southwest.
Our flying season is just getting started.
Your Build is looking great and look forward to seeing it finished.

[BRGT350]

F22trainer, my Mustang would love Arizona! The car is setup to run open track and autocross events, but hasn't seen a track in years. For street use, the car runs way too cold and I have to block off most of the radiator in the summer. When temps get over 80'F, the car is happy. That means it doesn't get out very much in Michigan, except this summer when we had record temps and 20 days when it hit 90'. That is highly unusual. With all the insulation, sound deadening material, and HVAC removed, it gets a bit toasty in the cockpit on hot days. Flying season is about done for me and I am putting winter tires on my Fiesta tonight. It was 84'F last week and we had snow flakes falling this past Monday. Freezing temps and mixed precip forecasted after tomorrow. :(

[mrmat01]

Glad to hear it went well for you.

How is the quality of the nose gear? My local hobby shop guy told me his nose gear broke on the first landing, and he's heard that complaint from a couple of other guys.

Any issue there? Nice looking plane that I bet flies great.

I think the nose gear is pretty tuff.
On my second flight yesterday I misjudged the wind gust & stalled. It came in pretty hard on bitumen from about a meter+. It came in so hard it had a prop strike & popped the axel out of the wheel pants on the mains. It hit nose wheel first & it took it well no damage & 30 seconds with a screwdriver & I was back in the air. So as for the nose gear being fragile it’s not it exceeded my expectations.
This plane is awesome & I would recommend it to anyone as s second plane.

[mrmat01]

Thanks Loneflier, looks like I am getting a replacement Cherokee. Horizon completed the accident investigation and concluded the rudder servo stripped. They couldn't determine the cause of the stripped servo as it could have been the accident. Could have been me trying to get the servo the move when I had it on the bench. Either way, they are making it right. I am going to upgrade all the servos to metal gear Emax units and a servo-saver to the front landing gear push-rod. My theory is that shock loading from the front landing gear being inputted into a servo isn't good. I don't think this caused the servo failure as the plane had very few flights on it and the smoothest landings I have ever had. I almost never taxi the plane on the grass, I walk it out and back from the runway. I am positive the failure was a freak event with that servo. It is my first servo in 20 plus planes and 680 flights. Chances were good it would happen eventually. I will feel better with metal gear servos as an extra level of insurance. Will do the same to my Timber and B-17 rudder and elevators. I am so happy Horizon is taking care of me with this. I love the Cherokee!

Sorry to hear that you lost your Cherokee.
Awesome that HH are coming to the party.
But funny that you mention the rudder. I had a sticky rudder on mine. It would not return to centre & the servo would be noisy because it always had a load on it. It ended up being the control rod binding up on the rudder. A bit of light oil in the tube for the control rod & some rubber grease on the control rod & all is good. I will be keeping a close eye on it though. Must of been a Friday plane lol.

[BRGT350]

Sorry to hear that you lost your Cherokee.
Awesome that HH are coming to the party.
But funny that you mention the rudder. I had a sticky rudder on mine. It would not return to centre & the servo would be noisy because it always had a load on it. It ended up being the control rod binding up on the rudder. A bit of light oil in the tube for the control rod & some rubber grease on the control rod & all is good. I will be keeping a close eye on it though. Must of been a Friday plane lol.

Thanks, I would strongly suggest replacing that rudder servo if you had a hard landing. Another Cherokee pilot had a hard landing and it stripped the servo. He caught before the next flight and upgraded it with a metal one. I am using EMax ES08MA II servos in my replacement Cherokee. I am also going with a servo saver for the nose gear push rod. Operating off of grass that isn't perfectly smooth probably causes some torque loads going through the strut and being transmitted into the servo. The spring on the servo saver will take up some of that loading. I expect to lose some steering precision, but not worried about it since I don't taxi with the plane. I walk it out to the runway, aim it into the wind, and go from there. With take-off flaps, it doesn't have too much time on the ground where I need steering.

Good tip on the control rods and something I will do while mine is all apart.

[DzlDk]

Got mine home Saturday night and put together yesterday. Great looking plane!

Too windy in KY yesterday to fly her though... Hopefully the rest of the week holds up.

[Hoomi]

Mine arrived today. all assembled now, except for getting a receiver into it, which I may end up borrowing from Air Hooterville. If I get the Waco repaired before the receiver I ordered gets off back order, I can always reconnect the original Detrum receiver, and just haul the Detrum transmitter along to the flying field.

Only issue I found in assembling, was that the control horn on the rudder was loose. The factory installed the push rod for the rudder with the metal part of the rod on top of the horn, which caused it to push down a lot more than I thought should be. I disconnected the push rod, reglued the horn, and once the glue was set well, reinserted the metal rod from below the horn. Seems a better arrangement, with less lateral pressure on the horn.

I'm assuming the aforementioned horizontal stab alignment mark is the small notch on the right side of the fuselage at the leading edge of the stab?

I haven't decided if I'm going to do any custom decoration on mine yet. I may just remove the stock numbers, order a custom number from Callie, and maybe have my wife make me some more Air Hooterville Flying Pig stickers.

Of course, I'm still a bit tempted to do a complete repaint, and make it match the Cherokee I got to fly for the intro flying lessons a few years ago.

[BRGT350]

Hoomi, yes on the small notch being the stab alignment indicator.

[Hoomi]

Maiden flight this morning (played hookie from work, mostly due to not enough sleep last night). Definitely a lot more responsive than the Sensei. Successful flight, and while the landing wasn't the prettiest, came down without incident.

Then, I had the front wheel catch on the ledge of the concrete slab for the club ramada, and snapped the steering linkage on the nose wheel. Looking at the Horizon Hobby page, the part is $2.99, but I'm reluctant to just replace a weak part with an identical weak part. Wondering if I can beef up the connection a bit to be more robust. I would love to see HH offer a beefier version of the part for those of us with less than ideal runways - maybe aluminum instead of brass?

[Hoomi]