Official FMS 1400mm P-51D V8 Thread

[OV10]

Dewey,
You got me baffled when you talk about a 'green' sequencer. I can find none and the only ones that may be the green one might be B and/or C listed below because Motion put this note on its product description of: "NOTE: The photo above(I see it is blue) shows the OLD sequencer. We will update the photo soon".

Which of the 3 referenced links is the sequencer(s) that you have?
A https://www.motionrc.com/products/fm...-p-51-6-second
B https://www.motionrc.com/products/fm...-p-51-3-second
C https://www.motionrc.com/products/fm...encer-3-second

A is a 6 sec sequencer used with 003 retracts https://www.motionrc.com/products/fm...tract-fmmre003
B is a 3 sec sequencer used with 1400mm FMS P-51D V7, V7.5, and 1400mm P-51B with stock retracts (not the 003)
C is a 3 sec sequencer used with ParkZone retracts

My guess on this is: You have the latest rev Sniper with the 6 sec sequencer and the slower 003 etract and your blue 6 sec sequencer is intermittently functional.
When you bought the "spare parts green", it was the incorrect sequencer(most likely a 3 sec) and which also happened to be DOA.
Your best option is to order the first sequencer(A) I listed above.
Good luck and best regards,

[Dewey H Lee]

Hey guys. Noticed not much going on here lately so I decided to bring this to the table. I've got a problem that I have not been able to get solved. I purchased the 1450 snoots sniper from motion a few months back and have yet to get a problem with the retracts straightened out. I've changed receivers tx and the single point connector for the wings and it might work a couple of times or not at all. At first the doors would open and time out and then close. I have changed out the sequencer. The blue one one came in the plane and I have since tried the green one. The green one does not work at all. It was ordered for spare parts. I am certain that the sequencer is plugged in correctly and that all polarity is correct. With the blue one when you flip the gear switch the doors open and then close after 6 seconds and the gear never deploys. This will only happen once. Repeated efforts cause nothing to happen at all. I can then unplug the battery and then plug it back in and the gear doors will function again as before just one time. HOWEVER I CAN HOOK THE GEAR LEAD TO A SERVO TESTER AND THEY PREFORM PERFECTLY. I'm starting to go bald here. Pulling my hair out. It sure would be nice to finally fly this plane. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

[Grossman56]

Good to hear Daryl, I just got back from the field after chalking up three more flights with Big Beautiful Doll, had Shangrila up last week and the flights went very well indeed. Finally, I'm getting in the zone as regards landings, so awesome. Especially since I was flying the Spitty and the P40 yesterday, I'd land fine, but as soon as I lost the wind over the tail, the Spitty would drag a tip. The P40 will but not as frequently (heavier plane and the gear is a little wider) Then you strap on a P51 and all that goes away. Rock solid landings every time, gotta love it.

Grossman56

[wrongroad]

G'day gang,
Another five flights into the log book of Shangri La bringing her to 159 flights.
And I 'shot down' a UFO over my field today.
The Alien pilot was rather upset with me but the sound system left no doubt that he had been blasted out of the sky.
Of course a few minutes later, he muttered 'sizzle, sizzle' I just lasered you. 'Nah', I replied, you can not have......you are already dead!
He said he was friendly.....reply.....[and I have pinched this from someone else btw] If it aint got stars and bars... it is a target!
I must say that I am impressed with the 650 donk and I am getting better performance for the same amount of flight time. Very cool indeed.
If you all want to look at our field

https://www.graftonmac.com

Regards and respect
Daryl

[wrongroad]

G'day mr.frankenjet,
Can I respectfully suggest that you try a no flap take off. I am not a fan of a flaps assisted take off with such a light weight machine.
I am sure you will enjoy the longer run and I find that you will need less rudder input as well.:D
I actually dial in a little nose down for landing, not much but enough to give a positive rate of descent.
I also use my throttle trim to keep power on all the way to the ground. Only enough to be at a slow idle for a glow engine. This does two things for me, one it keeps the sound system alive and, more importantly, it prevents the dreaded wind milling drag that can often stop a light model like a hand brake and the model will fall out of the sky.
I only use half flap for most landings only using full flap if it is dead absolutely calm. No flap for landing in a breeze [wind] that you should have stayed on the ground in. Yes, I have been known to let ambition out weigh ability:p.
This is how I land every time and I have near on four hundred landings between three Mustangs.
Now, this is how I do it, if you find that what you do suits you better, then stay with it.
The only thing I would really caution you on is pulling the power back to zero even for just a brief moment. That can slow you down quickly and cause a stall.
I find that judging my speed on the base leg is the go.
Do not be frightened to land with a bit of speed on either...too slow kills.
I hope that I have given you just a little bit of food for thought.
Regards and respect
Daryl

[mr.frankenjet]

flew over the weekend, been working on the takeoff and landing. Getting better, go really slow with the throttle on take off, 1/3 flap, and be ready for allot of rt rudder to hold her straight.
On landing full flap keep reducing throttle on the downwind leg till she fly's slow but stable. After the turn to final go briefly to zero throttle then back up till the plane just sinks. You now have minimum power and have a reference from zero, control the altitude with throttle and use the ele to slow her down. Takes a bit of time to wind the prop down, the key is to fly to the ground but keep energy and power to just what is needed. I have to get better at lifting the flaps on touchdown, this helps to drop the tail without lifting her back off the ground which can happen when you use too much ele too quickly.

https://youtu.be/NDZ1WzQY86I

[wvrailfan]

Hi guys,

I ran across an APC 15.5X12X4. I am thinking about trimming it down to 14 inches and rounding the ends of the blades so it looks more appropriate on our plane. Of course it will take some balancing and I will have to enlarge the blade openings in the FMS spinner.

I have a 100 amp ESC I can use, but I am wondering if the extra pitch will be too much for the FMS motors. I'm flying both of my Mustangs on four cell, one has the 580 motor the new plane has the 650 in it.

I do have a watt meter, so I can test it once I have the prop modded.

What do you guys think? If this works it could be a one piece 4 blade prop solution to some balancing and vibrations issues.

Has anyone else here already tried this?

Jim

Not one to wait around, here is where I am at on this experiment. I cut the APC prop to 14 inches. I semi squared the prop ends because I plan to use this on my P-51d/F-51d.

I am doing these tests on my 650Kv equipped B model.

I measured several times, marking the prop with a fine tip Sharpie before I made the cut.

Once cut I balanced the prop, which wasn't nearly as out of balance as I had expected it to be.

It became obvious that using the FMS spinner was going to be more work than I wanted to invest, and I would have to come up with an extended prop shaft to fit the APC prop in the spinner.

To the rescue was a 3.5 inch aluminum four blade spinner from Hobby King of all places. I had to ream out the shaft opening to about 7/16 inch so it would fit snugly over the hex head portion of the FMS prop shaft. I considered just filing off the hex portion and may do that if I do this on another plane.

I got it assembled and the new spinner sits about a millimeter further from the cowl than the FMS. I think I can live with that.

I put a battery in the plane and slowly applied some throttle. It spun up smoothly and was pulling hard so I stopped at about 1/4 throttle. I decided I trusted the set up enough to take it out side and test it at higher throttle settings.

Once outside I eased the throttle up and at about 2/3 it was actually hard to hold in place with one hand. Standing with the plane's tail between my feet, full throttle was impressive!

I played with it a few minutes and checked the 85 amp ESC which was just warm to the touch.

I will put a watt meter on it as soon as I have someone to help hold it while I run it up.

So far this is looking promising for anyone who wants, like me, smoother performance or for those who just want more brute power from their FMS Mustang.

Jim

[wvrailfan]

Hi guys,

I ran across an APC 15.5X12X4. I am thinking about trimming it down to 14 inches and rounding the ends of the blades so it looks more appropriate on our plane. Of course it will take some balancing and I will have to enlarge the blade openings in the FMS spinner.

I have a 100 amp ESC I can use, but I am wondering if the extra pitch will be too much for the FMS motors. I'm flying both of my Mustangs on four cell, one has the 580 motor the new plane has the 650 in it.

I do have a watt meter, so I can test it once I have the prop modded.

What do you guys think? If this works it could be a one piece 4 blade prop solution to some balancing and vibrations issues.

Has anyone else here already tried this?

Jim

[Dewey H Lee]

Hey Olwarbirds. If you don't mind could I ask what part of NC do you live as I also live in NC and so does Pauly.

[wrongroad]

G'day Grossman,
When you say do what works for you, you are right on the money and yet people want to ram things down ones throat. And the Rammers are quite often wrong or with little experience.:dodgy: I have has our local 'expert' tell people that they are stupid if they adopt certain [safe] ways of flight. I reckon he might have shares in Hobby King.;)
I have had a great morning of flying with my mates and not a single 'kia' in sight.:D
As you mentioned, the 'kia' never offers to help pay for a new model. In fact, ours simply turns his back and walks away from a crash he helped cause.
Anyway, with that off my chest:cool:, I did have a good morning even if it was a harsh background to be seeing a silver Mustang against.
Heavy dark grey cloud that was blanketing the entire western horizon from the far north to the far south made seeing the Shangri La a bit hard in certain aspects of flight. [the dark clouds were, in fact, dropping snow just seventy kilometres away. Yes it was cold standing on the flight line and, yes, I saw brass monkeys looking for welders.:p]
But another five flights with no frights and topped off by cracker jack landings. Life is good right now.
Regards and respect
Daryl

Hope you have as good a day flying as I have had today.

[AkumaZeto]

https://p3dcreations.com/product/steel-cnc-machined-fms003mustang-retract-trunnions/

[AkumaZeto]

Say fellas p3d is making the billet trunions. I ordered 4 sets for all my fms birds using these retracts.

[Grossman56]

Funny how there's usually one of those in every crowd.
Still boils down to doing what works for you. I take advice from people I respect and appreciate advice from people with good intentions, but why would I take advice from people just to boost their ego?? Bet they don't offer to pay for the damage they cause your airplane!!

Grossman56

[wrongroad]

G'day gang,
There is a lot of discussion on another forum over wheels on or three point landings.
For mine a wheels on landing is much better for a model then trying too close to a stall for a three pointer.
With three Mustangs with over a hundred flights each on them, I can vouch for the two point wheels on method.
I find that landings are much better with a little bit of speed as you have much more control over the aircraft then letting her get into a near stall speed waddle.
I have another club member here who constantly crashes his P-51 on landing as he tries to get it down too slow for a three pointer.
I stood beside him one day and talked him down to a near perfect wheels on landing. I kept telling him to keep the throttle up and not to chop and float. He asked me to stand along side for the next flight and the landing was even better. The rest of the day he was landing like he was born to land.
Sadly, he then listened to my clubs 'know it all' and has spent more time fixing than flying.
Apparently, according to the KIA, I do not know what I am talking about.
HHMMMMM, three hundred and sixty flights just with the Mustangs alone with no loses and nothing but minor repairs to props, gear doors and....well, props and gear doors. [I kicked a gear door once and I replace props as a matter of course from time to time. At $9 a set, it is cheap insurance do you not think?]
Not to count the other FMS birds that I fly and not one has ever been broken to the point of no return. In fact the only repair I have ever had to do has been to the V3 Corsair and it won best foamie model six weeks later. [do nose gear replacements on a Trojan count???]
Speed is the key to landing no matter whether you go for wheels on or a three pointer. But a wheels on with a longgggggg roll out always looks good and gets the round of applause from the peanut gallery. Even the KIA with give it up.
Regards and respect
Daryl

[wvrailfan]

Yes that is my new B. Even with the 100 extra grams of the wrap, it flies great. I went with the 650 Kv motor from the P-40 and stayed with 4 cell power. It is a noticeable improvement over the stock motor.

I flew it two more times yesterday evening, mostly just doing approaches and landings. Basically I find I just have to land the B a little faster than the D in order to get that nice no bounce landing.

Also, I try to land on the mains and let the tail settle as speed bleeds off in the roll out. So far, its working for me.

Jim

[Grossman56]

BTW, is that the new B in the picture?

Grossman56

[Grossman56]

That sounds about right. My Big Beautiful Doll is the best plane I have, hands down. Shangrila does fly differently, weight-wise, she's a little lighter (a couple of oz) but I chalk up the difference in flight performance to the bubble canopy versus the 'razorback'. She needs a bit more power on landings and I played around with the cg by shifting the battery a bit.
I'm probably stating the obvious here, but the biggest over all improvement with my landings came from some advice from Mike Ryan and Charlie. Don't do three wheel landings with warbirds, keep the fuse level and use throttle to control descent. BOOM, like that, my landings improved ten fold. I asked Ryan if he could do a video on that subject, we'll see.

Grossman56

[wvrailfan]

OF those of you with both the FMS B and D P-51, how would you compare the landings between the two. I can grease the landing with my D model 9 out of 10 times. I actually get compliments when I land it!

With my B I usually end up bouncing it a few times. If I land it faster I can get a smoother landing, with a long roll out. I've tried half and full flaps with the same results, plop and bounce, which I know is a sign of landing too slow.

Anyone else have the same issue?

Jim

[Grossman56]

Thanks Jim, in all fairness, I did only use it over the plastic pieces. It did a fantastic job around the canopy. Chrome look with no polishing, gotta like that!

Grossman56

[wvrailfan]

I just make sure the foam is clean. At the very least I wipe with alcohol, if it's EPO I wipe it down with acetone. I've never had any of the vinyl lift or peel off.

Thanks for the offer on the Flite Metal, but after reading about it, I think I'll stick with the vinyl. I've used it enough that I am comfortable with it.

I'm finishing up the wings on what will be a blue nose West By Gawd Virginian.

Jim