SMALLnet post379

...Gene also "attached" a full-color poster advertising this upcoming event. SMALLnet is NOT set up to conveniently accept graphical input. But I managed after a bit of manipulation to transfer the file to another server and view the poster.

(Gad, that was a HUGE file!) The poster is well-done, and includes a map to the meet site. If YOU have graphic download capabilities and a color printer, contact Gene -- maybe he can e-mail you a copy of the PopGun poster. [JW]

Greetings to Joe and the rest of the SMALLnet community! It's been a long time since I've submitted anything to the Postings, but have faithfully read each and every one. How about some applause to JW for producing the CD containing all that mass of information submitted over the history of SMALLnet. Great job, - and it lets me clean off my hard drive of all the space they were taking up.

Do have a question though, as usual. Can anyone tell me how many different kits that Flyline produced during its history? I've started a modest collection, and was just wondering how many are out there. My intention is to build some of the smaller ones designed for rubber or CO2, for R/C use.

They are such beautiful kits and plans I almost hate to break into them. If you can help me out or point me in the right direction, it would be appreciated. Many thanks. Bill Kronen

...Bill, the last I heard, Allen Heinrich at Aerodyne had the rights to the Flyline model designs. I believe he sells plans for them all, but I don't think he makes kits.

Source: Plans, Flyline designs

Vendor: AeroDyne

Contact Allen at AeroDyne, 17244 Darwin, Unit H, Hesperia,
California 92345 -- (760) 948-6334.
e-mail < >
web site < http://www.freeflightmodels.com/ >. [JW]

In regards to Curt Hulett's questions about the Playmate -- I remember quite well reading Bill Winter's praise of this design in his Model Aviation column back in the '80s. Bill said that his Playmate was the best 3-channel aerobatic model he had ever flown.

I've had a love affair with the Playmate (flying model!) ever since I read that. I am finally getting around to building one, and as I am an all-electric and sailplane flier, an electric it will be.

The numbers that ECalc provides for the Playmate look good, using an Astro 035 Cobalt with 2.38:1 gearbox with 8 2000 mAh NiCad or NiMH cells -- with NiMH cells leaving the model a bit lighter. Prop will be an APC 10x6, 9x8 or similar 2 blade -- or an APC 9x6 3-blade. Plenty of room to experiment with props.

All-up weight looks to be around 48 ounces with NiCads, a little less with NiMH cells.

I have a few other projects to complete before the Playmate makes it to the building bench but I'll pass along my results when the Playmate's completed.

I have two OS 10 FSR engines NIB with mufflers and motor mounts that I'd like to sell. I even have one 'official' OS heatsink head. Any interest? Offers?

Gary Edson < > leads off a discussion of lightweight model covering. Most of this material has appeared in previous Postings, but it may need repetition:

In response to Ken Phillips' question about lightweight coverings for use on his SIG electric Rascal: The difference in weight between one of the lightest and one of the heaviest commonly-used covering materials for park flyer-type airplanes would be a little over one ounce. I base this on a surface area of about 9 square feet for the Rascal ( my rule of thumb is 4 times the wing area) and on Litespan for the lighter covering and Lightweight Oracover for the heavier one. SIG says that the E Rascal ought to weigh 22 to 24 ounces ready to fly, so the difference in weight would be less than 5%.

I've not used it. And it is 18 bucks a roll. But I saw it on an airplane recently, and it was beautiful!

Litespan is a Solarfilm product, and is made of polyester fibers bonded into a fuel- and water-proof sheet that is heat-shrinkable. It resembles doped tissue, but is much stronger. Litespan is translucent, and is also beautiful with the sun shining through. It has no adhesive, and one must use Balsaloc, Balsarite, or SIG Stix-it on the perimeter of the structure to be covered.

No problem. This is easy; just put the adhesive on lightly. Litespan is harder to apply than the mylar films like Oracover. With heat, the films stretch easily around curved surfaces. The Polyester paper types, especially Litespan, don't shrink as much, and one ends up using more pieces to cover complex areas.

Also, one needs to get the covering stretched out and stuck down rather wrinkle-free before heat shrinking. Litespan is also available from Hobby Lobby.

Another shrinkable doped tissue look-alike is Micafilm. This is a Coverite product and is available from Tower Hobbies. (Coverite claims that the fibers are mica. But I am a geologist, and the stuff looks nothing like mica! I suspect that it is really polyester...(?))

I have used Micafilm for years and like it. It is heavier than Litespan and is much glossier. It doesn't have an adhesive either, and it can't be drawn around compound curves as well as the mylar films. But it's better than Litespan in this regard.

Micafilm will sag with time, and needs retightening with heat. Solarfilm's version of Micafilm is called Fibafilm. It is very similar, but, in my experience, sags worse with time.

Solarfilm is lighter than Lightweight Oracover, but I don't think that some of the transparent colors are as nice. The last Solarfilm transparent yellow I got is really a light orange. It costs about half the Oracover price. Also, one must look out for blemishes. And the adhesive and the color are one and the same; it's easy to mess it up by trying to reheat and lift a stuck-down part, or by dragging it across the structure while heating.

Other than that, Solarfilm really is easy to apply and it goes around compound curves well.

I use a lot of Ultracote Lite or Oracover Lite on a lot of my small models. Not quite as strong as Monokote but much lighter...really pulls around compound curves well.

The Sig prototype Rascal (which was at our e-fly last summer) is covered in regular Monokote.

I have had wonderful luck with Doculam, and am pretty much inept at covering. Chuck Kriete

Tower Hobbies will only provide information about the products they own. So you must go elsewhere to learn about other materials. You might consider using Airspan or Litespan, which can be attached using Balsaloc. (Avoid Balsarite, which can knock you out with its Toluene fumes.) Both materials can be heat-shrunk, and Airspan needs a coat of clear dope afterward.

After the discussion about the Tomboy plans, I recommend getting a copy of the "Aeromodeller 1999/2000 Plans Handbook" from Bob Holman Plans to locate some very nice small old models. I think that Vic Smeed designed some of the most graceful little planes ever. Contact Holman at < http://www.angelfire.com/ct/bhplans >.

Dave Fritzke asked about finding a Webra .10 engine. I referred him to Ebay, which lists a new 1.8cc engine for sale. Ebay is a great place to search for odd modeling gear.

Go to < http://www.ebay.com >, click on Hobbies and Crafts, Hobbies-Models and then Air. Type in the name of the item you are seeking in the search box. You never know what you may find.

Apparently in an effort to regain my youth, I decided to build another one. So I bought one on eBay.

But someone had already assembled the fuselage and the kit is missing all of those fuselage parts. There are several missing fuselage formers and other fuselage balsa parts; both F* parts and N* parts, and the two "base ribs" and dihedral former that form the top of the fuselage. There are enough missing parts that it must have been two balsa sheets, if not three.

What I would like to find is some kind soul to Xerox their printwood for the F* and N* parts and send them to me with the thickness of the balsa for each of those sheets. (One copy of each end of the balsa sheet should have enough overlap to be complete.)

Also any hints for constructing this classic for an OS .10 R/C engine. Will gladly pay postage and copying fees.

Harbor Freight sells a neat little electric. 14" Cessna type. A real flyer. The motor runs forever. Price varies, $10-13. Worth it. Model 42619. 1-800-444-3353 I just got #2 which I will cannibalize to power my Minnow.

We just finished our 5th major storm of the season here, so I haven't flown anything but indoor in Lakehurst Hangar 1 for months. I have a bunch of Rapier models set to light off. Anybody who hasn't tried these is missing a lot of fun.

Too bad about Moffett. CAG 15 used to be stationed there in 1955. I flew Banshees in VF-152.

About lightweight incidence meters for rubber models: Here's one designed by Bill Schmidt. It is from Scott Cannon's web site.

Just some ramblings from Garden Grove, California. 1) My Tom Hunt "Stikota" R/C is flying great with 8-cell 500AR pack and a Speed 400 with a Mini-Olympus gearbox and 9X5 Slim prop.

Increased dihedral, tail size and lots of right and down thrust has made this an anti-stall pussycat. It ROG's easily off lumpy grass, lands easily, loops, barrel rolls, and can go like H.

Will fly slow in a confined space with its nose held high, but likes to zip around. (Why doesn't somebody kit a gear-drive 280 size R/C version of the original design -- there is such nostalgia for the Dakota!!)

2) Another flier and I are chasing each other around with our foam Chubby Ladies. Had slippage problems with Mega Mig 280, Horst geardrive and 2-piece slow flier prop that came with it. Hobby Lobby service guys rebuilt the gearbox and mounted a 10X7 APC Slow Flier prop, no cost, now it flies great even fighting 10 mph winds.

Plastic pinion was slipping and original prop slipped on drive gear drum shaft. I'm getting 10 minutes + with NiMH 270 mAh 8-cell pack and 15 with the 600, including repeated ROG's, mild aerobatics (strapping tape on wing bottom). Prefer fast climb and slow fly performance on 2-ounce 270 mAh pack, although it flies nicely with up to 500 mAh AR packs. (Almost too easy to fly; you get reckless.)

3) My Ziroli 35" Aeronca with Titanic Airlines GD-280 has had about 8 hours total flying time and has gained weight (total 12 ounces) with each wing or fuselage repair. I'm not crashing as much since Hitec retuned my old Prism 7 transmitter.

Lost some dihedral in one of the wing repairs, snappier now. I'm about to build a Berkeley Aeronca Sedan from plans and may retire the Ziroli Champ while it still looks decent.

4) I have been doodling some plans for a 36" GD-280 powered version of my 1959 Sterling Mambo. I'm planning to build interchangeable stabilizers, one lifting type for rudder-only plus speed control, and a flat one with elevator control. Fuselage will be 1/8" stick with 1/16 balsa sheet inlay to trailing edge of wing. Will use 2" Trexler wheels to handle rough grass/dirt.

We have the local good guy cops on our side and give them stick time even though technically it's a "No Powered Models" site. One cop is a model Navy ship combat nut. They fire ball bearings with compressed air cannons; ships sink but have automatic flotation devices to bring them back to the surface for repair and re-use.

The Tomboy was published in the November 1950 Aeromodeller, but there was no full-size plan. I've been a compulsive builder of Tomboys even though the first one I built (for a FROG 160 glow) had a badly-warped wing and never flew.

The next one, with a FROG 150 and floats, was much better. When I got started on the 'vintage' kick, I began with Tomboys, building them at first for ACE pulse rudder-only. The first was for a Doonside Mills .75, but also flew with other Millses and ED Bees.

The second was again for a FROG 160 and had the plug-in floats, slightly enlarged for the extra weight of the radio. The 160 was too hairy, so a 100 went in -- and that flew well for many years, until it died at Old Warden due to a cracked mainspar incurred while moving house.

Currently I have one with 2-channel radio (rudder and throttle) and it has had a variety of different PAW 049 and 06s in it. It, too, has the detachable floats.

But the Tomboy, marvellous flyer though it is, has a number of design faults. I've never built one that didn't have too much positive tail incidence, so one should reduce that by around 1/16 inch. Next, the wing structural design is very prone to warps, so I stiffen the TE by epoxying hard quarter-grain 1/32 under the 1/8 X 1/2. Also I use an extra top spar of 1/8 spruce.

I cover using Litespan or Airspan, both coverings which are not likely to induce warps. The fuselage has curved 3/16 square longerons, which I replace with two 3/16 by 3/32 strips. Don't 'improve' the design by replacing the rubber band wing fixing with bolts. I've never reduced the wing dihedral, for R/C, but Sid Sutherland suggest halving it.

If you do use the plug-in undercarriage, I recommend you solder on some hooks and use rubber bands to secure it. Don Myers did this on his, and he hasn't suffered the ignominy of losing gear in flight -- I lost my favourite pair of 2-inch Kraft wheels.

Servos have become much smaller since I built my last Tomboy, so I expect any future R/C Tomboy of mine will have elevator control. Nobody should be without a Tomboy. A modern 049 is plenty of power for ROW, and I've seen Tomboys with MP Jet 06s that really don't seem to get off the water any better. For free flight an 0.3 to .049 is plenty of power.

A few years later, Aeromodeller published a scaled-down Tomboy called the Tom Thumb, for the Allbon Bambi. I built one for the AE 0.1 and it has served me very well, though there were a couple of heart-stopping occasions when it flew out of Gananoque airfield. It is covered in Litespan and has never needed any trim adjustment nor any repairs.

The half-size Elfin 0.5 @ 0.25 cc is made by VA, in Russia. The Australian agent is David Owen, and in North America you can get them from either Neville Palmer or myself. It is beautifully made. All the recent VA designs have worked well, but I still prefer to run them before shipping, and I'm waiting for better weather.

I understand David Owen has not run into any problems running his. This little Elfin has its tank below the engine, like an Arden.

Saw your bit about the high-priced Cox glow head gaskets. I noted recently the very high price in the Tower catalog for the Cox glowheads, close to $10 as I recall! This is absolutely outrageous! I think this will kill the market for them, with the Norvel and AP prices being much lower.

I should mention that I have been a long-time Cox engine user, since way back in grade school, around 1964 or so, starting with a Goldberg 1/2A Viking freeflight. I flew a lot of 1/2A Flight Streaks too, some modified with flaps. (I still like to do ukies; designed a Giles 202 1/2A U/C a year ago, using a Tee Dee .049).

When I got into college and started flying R/C, I learned on rudder-only, but then bought a Kraft 2-channel brick, and I began to fly 1/2A pylon racers because they looked cool. Quite a handful for me at the time because until then I had only flown rudder only, ha! ( Ah, the foolishness of youth!)

Anyway, I used the Cox Tee Dee .049's and .051's, and as soon as I read the instruction sheet about adding the pressure port to the side of the crankcase, I had to try it. When I finally learned not to flood the little fellows, I had great success; and from then on, always ran all of my 1/2A Tee Dee's on pressure. These engines were all great, and I still have 4 or 5 of them.

Getting back to the glowheads, around 3 years ago or so, I bought some Tee Dee glowheads made by the new Cox company. And believe it or not, I could only get two runs of 4 minutes each on a glowhead before it died! The older heads would run for several years! I was pretty torqued considering the approximate $6 price then -- but at $10 a pop now, I wouldn't touch one.

My solution to the glowhead dilemma was to get a Nelson conversion head from Kustom Kraftsmanship and run the very reasonably-priced Nelson plugs. They work well and the RPM is nearly the same as with the Tee Dee glowhead. You do have to tighten the Nelson plug well, however, as it has no gasket and will loosen if not torqued adequately.

You could also use the GlowBee heads, now made by Lite Machines. In fact, all my racing engines had lapped pistons, bored-out carbs, and GlowBee R-1 heads using bladder tanks. These were (and still are) real screamers, but the ball socket must always be set with no slop, or the engines will blow (I have blown the tops out of pistons, broken rods, and broken cranks).

Unfortunately, I fear the new Cox Tee Dee's might be as poor a quality as the newer glowheads, and I would be afraid to buy one, especially considering they are $60 now. There are other alternatives if you need a hot .049. I'm sure you know them all well.

A buddy bought a C.S. .049 a few years back. We ran it without the mini-pipe and it was a good performer. Very heavily built with a stout conrod. I always wanted a Shuriken, but could never justify the expense.

I have an AME MK III .049 I purchased 3 or 4 years ago from Norvel (non-R/C). It was a very good performer, turning 24,000 rpm on 40% nitro with an APC 5x3 cut down to 4.25x3. I got to looking at the timing and decided I could improve it, so I put the block on my milling machine and milled it so the cylinder dropped down a bit more. I also pulled the screen from the carb, put a Kirn needle on it, and put it on the test stand.

I tried a lot of glowheads, and the GlowBee R-1 was the best by far. Anyway, using the 4.25x3 prop mentioned above, and 40% nitro/20% Castor oil/40% alcohol fuel (mixed for me by Red Max), I am getting 29,100 rpm! Yee Haa! When running this behind the house, you need hearing protection, as it is really loud! It is almost scary, and I take care not to stand near the plane of motion of the prop.

I am looking forward to breaking 100 mph this spring on my racer using this jewel of an engine. BTW, the AME MK III has a stout, rectangular cross-section conrod. I had an AME .049 R/C which was a couple of years newer, and it had a smaller, round cross-section conrod. That might not hold up to the modifications I made. I got rid of the R/C version because it wouldn't idle reliably below 8000 rpm.

It's a shame about the apparent demise of the new Cox engines, but the glowhead problem can be solved with the Nelson conversion head or the Lite Machines head.

I forgot to mention that I also have a split case VA .049 which I converted to R/C using a G-Mark .061 carb I modified per Andy Woitowicz's directions, and I had the engine lapped in by Andy himself. It idles fairly reliably at 4700 rpm and turns 21,300 on the top end using an APC 5.5x2 on 25% nitro.

Transition is not too bad. I use a home brew muffler. The engine is very light, weighing only 1.8 ounces with carb and muffler.

I cannot close without mentioning that I have a Thunder Tiger GP-07 that I have been flying on a kit-bashed Herr J3 (made it into a clipped-wing with ailerons, and fixed most of Herr's non-scale parts). It is an absolutely fabulous running engine and has been right out of the box. Very quiet, super low idle, and perfect transition to full throttle. I don't know who did the design work, but they knew what they were doing. I can honestly say this engine runs as well as my old O.S. .25 R/C engines, and that is excellent. The workmanship is as good or better than O.S., and I like the angled-back needle valve.

This motor will handle a lot of different props, but the best match for the Cub is the APC 7x3. That prop cuts the rpm down to around 14000, and so the little TT GP-07 isn't making as much horsepower, and it slows the Cub down some.

Well, I've rambled far too much, sorry. Just couldn't resist commenting on my former beloved Cox engines when I saw your comments. I hate to say it, but I will be buying Russian .049's from now on and using the fabulous TT GP-07 whenever I need throttle. It's a heck of a note when we have to go to Russia and China to get good stuff -- who would have ever thunk it??

Also, I enjoy the SMALLnet postings; some good bits of information in there for real modellers.

On the subject of glow head gaskets and C*x in general, C*x has lost a lot of good people. Back when I was working on throttling the TD .049, I was pleased and surprised by how accessible Larry Renger was. He encouraged my experiments and even sent me some cylinders to play with for free.

After Larry's departure, I was lucky enough to encounter Mr. Don Hatcher. He was with C*x for many years and was their parts and service manager. I can't say enough about the excellent service and special consideration he afforded me for all my requests.

At one point he sent me lapped cylinders without the exhaust and by-passes. These were needed so that I could apply new timing numbers to see how they influenced throttling. Mr Hatcher has since retired, and this is surely C*x's loss of a valuable employee. He gave the kind of excellent service that we now enjoy from Norvel.

Speaking of which, the gaskets provided with Norvel engines are a perfect fit for Cox engines.

I recently put together a Norvel .061 using the AAN piston and cylinder from a Lite-Machine's .061. It should be noted that these are produced by Norvel for Lite-Machines. To my great satisfaction this hybrid does 18.5K down to 4K with very good throttle response on 25% fuel and a 6 X 3 Black Tornado. Not bad for a very well used engine. Still required is a sealed muffler with pressure to the tank and an adjustable air bleed throttle.

The Lite-Machines AAN engine and the new Revlites have the same by-pass port design. Experiments with early Norvel AAN engines with the older by-pass design yielded only mediocre results. This leads me to believe that port design also contributes significantly to good throttling. Additional experiments should confirm this.

Regarding batteries. In a previous Posting I related my experience with soldering up non-tabbed NiMH batteries. The 500 mAh unit I did has stood up very well to a season of flying. The 250 mAh pack has not fared so well. Both packs have remained dormant for the winter, and a recent check of both has revealed that the smaller pack will now deliver only about 40% of its rated capacity; while the larger pack is just fine.

The smaller pack has been cycled several times (both slow and fast charge) with an Ace Smart Charger, to no avail. I would guess that the larger pack had more heat-sink capacity, and wasn't damaged to any degree by my soldering process.

Bottom line is that I would not recommend soldering NiMH non-tabbed cells. I've never had a problem with soldering Nicads in any size down to 110 mAh.

My latest experience with NiMH's is with 150 mAh packs that are the same size and weight as 50 mAh nicads. These have solder tabs and do deliver about their rated capacity.

My cycler discharges at 300 mA, and the 150 NiMH's give me an honest 25 minutes when slow charged. However, using the Ace charger gives me only 15 minutes. The Ace unit has a pulsed charge rate of 500 mA even at the 120-400 mAh setting. It appears that the NiMH's are giving a false peak when fast charged.

A 25-ohm, 5-watt resistor was applied in parallel to the charging circuit to shunt some of the current, and it now delivers a pulsed 300 mA. This works very well, as I now get the full 25 minutes.

The downside is that I need to disconnect the little NiMH pack immediately after the charger goes to "maintenance mode". What happens then is that the battery begins to discharge through the resistor. I've tried installing a diode in the circuit; but this doesn't work, because now the charger can't sense the battery's voltage.

Has anyone else had experience fast-charging small NiMH batteries, and knows how I might resolve the discharge issue?

Also, I need some advice with a delta I'm building. This one started out as a slope soarer, but I'm going to install a Norvel .061 in the nose. I know where the balance point is, but I need a starting point for the downthrust, if any is needed.

Also, being a delta, it uses elevons. I'd like to install a piezo gyro and am wondering how this would be done or if any special problems might occur with such an arrangement. I could install separate servos for a separate elevator and ailerons, but the elevon arrangement is quite convenient with a computer radio.

Finally, where, in Canada, might we get Marvel Mystery Oil, and how does Singer sewing machine oil differ from good old 3-in-1 oil?

SMALLnet Posting post379