Strike #10 from the list of incompletes, the Pulsar aka Simply the Best is ready to fly. The only damage from its test flight crash was a small dent in the “D” tube of the wing at the center mounting peg, not worth trying to fix. The fuselage has now been faired into a 30mm spinner and painted with a rubbed out finish of red Krylon.
The wing tips were (as purchased) covered with a pretty apple green film that was almost invisible when the plane was up high, reducing the visibility of the plane by the area of the tips. They have now been recovered in the same red as the rest of the wing - seeing it is much easier now.
The motor, a Razor 2500 with a CC 25 amp ESC/BEC turned a 9″ x 6″ folding prop for the test flight. Next flight, with a draw of 12.5 amps on the 3S 1320 TP Prolite pack, will be with a Freudenthaler 10″ x 7″. The radio is a 4 channel Berg controlling the motor and a mixed V-tail.
There are too many unfinished projects in my workshop. Items No. 7 & 8 are being worked on actively. My plans are to expand on their assemby here, with pictures, as work goes forward. Here’s the list:
1 - An RBC kit from the Netherlands of a model called the Microbe. It’s a small takeoff on a Clancy Speedy Bee. It’s covered and just needs final assembly and painting.
2 - A rebuilding of Tom Hunt’s Ellipstik as ARFed by Sal at NES. I bought it from Tom, warped and holey; after straightening it out I started to recover it but it’s on a shelf.
3 - Two Zagis with modified wing structure. One to be a pusher (like the stock Zagi) and the other a tractor (as an experiment).
4 - An old timer, a Quaker Flash, “shrunk”, from a Flyline Kit - waiting to be covered.
5 - A flat foamie original 3D type design, ready to assemble and finish.
6 - An Aveox Embat - built and partially assembled, ready to cover.
7 - A Blade XL with the world’s ugliest predone decoration scheme. It’s progressing slowly with light coats of white Krylon H2O and alcohol based white spray primer being applied to tone down the original paint.
8 - An Eflite MiniFuntana, slowly but surely coming together. The motor mount has been a major project, installing a Mega 16/15/3 in a ModelAirTech belt drive gear box (3.33:1). Some day it will fly, hopefully soon.
9 - A scale model of a German 1930’s low wing trainer, the Klemm 125(?). It’s all framed up but in the intense flurry of building it I invented an impossible Rube Goldberg contraption to direct the controls of the tail feathers. The model was put aside until sanity returned but so far it’s still out of town.
10 - The smaller Pulsar glider with a vee tail has been flown but suffered a bit from an encounter with a tree. It’s undergoing repairs, epoxy is setting and it will be airborne again, soon. It’s powered by a Razor 2500 with a 4.4:1 gear box with a 9″x 6″folding propeller. It goes up real well, glides, glides, glides and finds thermals all by itself. The damage it suffered in the crash was surprisingly light.
Mike Glass has a new foamie he’s calling the B&W Matrix. It’s made with black and white foam used in a really ingenious way to give the plane its unique look and its structure. There was more to see about Mike’s plane at his website but he’s closed that down now and gone out of business.
Mike brought it out to the field Sunday and put it in the hands of Rick Casella to have it wrung out. They worked all day fine tuning, cutting foam and getting it to do its best. Alan Wander brought his (he and Mike built it the night before) and flew it as well. Mike and Rick had the prototype flying beautifully by the end of the day.