Ep 117: Bjorn Baal from RMJ Machine Worx

[00:00:01] Hello, everyone, and welcome to the RC Plane Live podcast. I'm Tom. I'm Dave. And I'm Ron. And today we got a guest. Bjorn Ball from RMJ Machine Works is on the line with us. Hello, Bjorn.

[00:00:24] Good afternoon, everybody. Thanks for having me.

[00:00:26] Yeah, no worries. No problem. This is exciting. It is.

[00:00:29] Yeah.

[00:00:30] I don't know how quickly do we want to get into things. Like, I'm curious to know the history of RMJ Machine Works.

[00:00:36] Well, yeah, we'll get to that. But let's have Bjorn tell us a little bit about himself first. How about that? Good idea.

[00:00:43] I stand corrected again. All right, Bjorn.

[00:00:45] The floor is yours.

[00:00:46] Well, I don't have my wife here to glare at me because I am the world's worst when it comes to talking about myself.

[00:00:52] Don't we all?

[00:00:55] Well, so I guess first and foremost, I'm a father of three, very rambunctious. I have a 14-year-old daughter and twin 8-year-old boys that are – they live up to the hype of what boys represent.

[00:01:09] Oh, yeah.

[00:01:10] And have a day job that's extremely demanding. And when the kids go to bed, at least for the last – since 2017, when we opened the doors back up for – when we took over for Frank Bowman with Bowman Rings, we conduct our ring business, which is at home from when the kids go to bed until the work is done. And then I get some sleep and then rinse and repeat.

[00:01:36] Man. Wow. Busy guy.

[00:01:38] Very busy. Yeah.

[00:01:39] I assume the kids are probably involved in all the activities at school too, right?

[00:01:44] Absolutely. Yeah. And I'll send you guys some – I don't know if maybe afterwards I can send you some pictures where, just the kids involved in just the business at home and I guess in the hobby as well.

[00:01:56] Oh, that's awesome. So you got them involved in the business?

[00:01:59] Oh, yeah. The boys can – so I have a – I guess we'll just kind of start talking about the business. I have two CNC machines, a CNC lathe and a mill, and two manual machines, a Logan lathe, which is 1950s era. It's the same machine that Frank used to make, hundreds if not thousands of rings. That's what I learned on. I learned the manual processes before I ventured into the CNC world as well as a manual mill.

[00:02:27] And you guys will probably remember, or everybody listening, when you get our rings, they ship in a PVC ring, just to prevent bending or mishandling from our wonderful postage carriers, the USPS primarily. But our boys can practically run the manual lathe to make those PVC rings on their own.

[00:02:52] At eight years old.

[00:02:53] At eight years old. That is awesome.

[00:02:57] I think – I'm sorry. I think that's awesome.

[00:02:59] Well, I really appreciated it. they're quick studies. They're a pain in the butt sometimes because they are quick studies. They think that doesn't know anything. Of course. Typical eight-year-olds.

[00:03:10] Oh, yeah. Of course. Nine-year-olds or 10-year-olds or 11-year-olds. Or, yeah, 15-year-olds. It doesn't matter. Yeah. Parents are stupid until the children are out on their own and then they suddenly come to realize how smart we are when they realize how expensive everything is.

[00:03:24] Absolutely. Absolutely. And on a daily basis, we try to, repeat those lessons with our daughter because she's smart as a whip too. And, her nickname is Mini-Me because she's a female version of me. And, oh, sometimes I can pull my hair out just trying to communicate with her because it is like talking to myself and I can see what my wife deals with. So, this – I might be a bit self-deprecating here, but, honesty is the best policy.

[00:03:55] Yeah. Yeah. We're the same way.

[00:03:56] No, I think that's fantastic that the boys know how to run that sort of machinery because that's a very valuable skill. if they decide that, college isn't for them or whatever, they've already got a skill, to get them ahead in the job market.

[00:04:13] I think that's wonderful. Absolutely.

[00:04:14] And the manual version of that. Exactly. Yeah. Yeah, so that teaches – Yeah, –

[00:04:19] Go ahead. Go ahead.

[00:04:20] I was going to say it teaches them, I mean, not just the dexterity but math. I mean, there's math involved. you have to measure things in – well, depending on what system you're using, but like thousands of an inch or millimeters. I mean, it's just a – I think it's a very, very good thing to know how to do.

[00:04:38] Well, I try to incorporate – because my boys are homeschooled. And I try to incorporate what my wife covers with, related to, when they're covering math subjects. Yeah. And trying to get them just to transfer those lessons into something practical, and it actually has an application. Yeah. And I'm not saying that, operating a manual lathe or a manual mill, is equivalent to, first or second grade math.

[00:05:04] It's far from it. But, it takes a fair bit of patience to try to explain those concepts to an eight-year-old. So, I've done – I think I've done a good job trying to incorporate those lessons. And, this is what you learn, with your mom, when you're in school, air quotes. And then this is how you would apply it here on this particular machine, making this particular thing. Yeah. whatever that thing may be.

[00:05:30] Right.

[00:05:32] Awesome. Speaking of that, I mean, there's like this whole list of things I want to talk about when it comes to the, the ring business. But because you have manual machines and a CNC, are you thinking about doing other stuff besides rings?

[00:05:46] So we, right now, like I mentioned before, with, how much free time I have. Sure. Primarily, the ring business has definitely – it takes up about 98% of my free time. There have been some one-off projects that I've been able to do for a few customers here and there. And it's been very time sensitive, and I'm very, very particular on what type of projects, for whom, and definitely taking into account how long those particular projects would make.

[00:06:24] Because, ultimately, the ring business definitely, it pays the bills. And I'm not – I really can't set that aside for one-off projects because typically that's what we're approached with. It's just one-off projects. And, you have to price it accordingly. And oftentimes, I'm – if I run the numbers myself and I find myself, I wouldn't pay that much for it.

[00:06:46] Right.

[00:06:47] But, it's just one of those things. It's just, supply and demand and just basic economics. And we – even though we do our best to provide an excellent service for our hobby, I also have to be very practical, one, with my time and then also, taking our equipment away from what actually pays the bills.

[00:07:06] Yeah. I'm writing notes down. More stuff I want to talk to you. Yeah.

[00:07:13] And I – go on. No, go on.

[00:07:15] No, we've made some, world – a guy in Clay Ricks, he had a world model third-scale cub that he was putting some larger – what do you call it? B.R. Bush wheels is what I have on mine. But I forget which manufacturer he has, but just the big, big tires on the cub.

[00:07:39] Ron Shaggy said he loves big wheels on airplanes.

[00:07:42] Bigger the better. Absolutely. I'll send you guys a picture. Mine is just on – it's just not even right.

[00:07:49] I love the bush look, yeah.

[00:07:51] It's – well, it's a third-scale cub with 120cc engine and gigantic, almost 12-inch tires. So when it flies around, you see the wings, and then you can't help but just stare at the tires when you do a flyby. It's just not even – That's awesome. It's definitely overdone on both the horsepower and the tire size of things. Sure. So it's a great airplane.

[00:08:14] Yeah. And you had to machine some bushings for the wheels. Is that what I took for that?

[00:08:18] So I had to machine some adapters to tie into his existing landing gear, but also so that he can utilize those larger wheels on that airplane.

[00:08:29] Nice. So to educate some of the folks who may not know, we keep mentioning rings, and what we're talking about is piston rings. So Dave and I, and to some degree, Ron –

[00:08:41] No, Dave and you, pretty much.

[00:08:43] That's okay. We're engine guys. We like engines. We like things that make noise and stink.

[00:08:48] Oh, never mind. I'm sorry. That's not where I thought you were going with that. So yes, that includes me. Go on.

[00:08:52] So a piston ring is the little part that goes around the top of the piston that rides up and down in the cylinder that seals off the combustion chamber. And Bjorn makes replacement aftermarket rings to replace the factory ones that sometimes don't seal so well. And get worn. And get worn over time, yeah. So in case anybody didn't know, that's what we were talking about.

[00:09:15] And that's what Bjorn does for RMJ – well, as part of – or as RMJ Machine Works.

[00:09:22] Are you going to incorporate the son's names into the business since they do some of it?

[00:09:27] Yeah, at some point, I think we will. we haven't – like I said, I'm one of those highly analytical, not very creative individuals. So, I typically live in a black and white world. Sure. So my wife is the complete opposite. So that type of creativity, I'm going to go ahead and leave that up to her. But just to provide some context, what – it's Frank Bowman, and the name of his company was Bowman Rings when he was doing it.

[00:10:01] He closed his doors in 2014 just from – he's getting older and just didn't want to do it any longer because it's one of those situations where he turned a hobby into a job. And, over time, it just was getting overwhelming. And so the more common name is Bowman Rings. So that's a more, I guess, a more common household name. But just to provide some context, Frank's email address was Ringmaster46. I want to say it, AOL – I can't remember. Not AOL.

[00:10:37] It was MSN.com. Sure. And so Ringmaster, that kind of goes without saying because the man taught me – he's one of those machining Jedis that has forgotten more than I'll probably ever know. I love that term, Jedi. Yeah, he's machined, and just the things that we've talked about over our – just every time I talk to him, it's just a new story and just a fascinating individual.

[00:11:02] And so, just to continue on with Frank's legacy, which is one of the reasons why we decided to take over for Frank is, just to continue on his legacy.

[00:11:12] Well, yeah, I mean, not to interrupt, but, I mean, when Frank decided to stop doing it, that left a really huge kind of void, really. It did. So all of us old guys like me and Dave with these, older nitro engines and gas engines even that no longer being supported by their manufacturer were just done, on the ringed engines I'm talking about. So when he quit doing that, it was like kind of a sad day.

[00:11:40] It was like, well, now I've got to be really, really careful with these engines now,. Maybe I'm not going to run this engine anymore. But then you came in, and it was awesome.

[00:11:51] Well, there was a – let's see, we took over in 2017. So there was a three-year void, and Frank, he said, I've never sold more rings with such enthusiasm from our customers, until he made a public notification that, he was closing up his doors. Because I think everybody understood what that meant.

[00:12:08] Yeah.

[00:12:08] Because I think, at that time, we made – I think we were going through quite a few businesses. And I think that still continues to this day to a certain degree. But, our businesses and our hobby that, you would consider – you thought they were longtime anchors. Right. flagships for the hobby that just, either out of the blue or financial hardship or whatever the case may be, just closing up doors.

[00:12:32] Yeah, hard to imagine, this – been in business for years, and now he's not in business. Now what are we going to do? Yeah, I know exactly what you're talking about.

[00:12:40] Right. So, with Frank's email handle being Ringmaster, I wanted to, one, continue the legacy of just the work that he's put in. I mean, just countless hours that he's put in to get it to where it was when we took over. And so if anyone is wondering, like, where is this RMJ – what's the connection here? Well, Frank's email address was Ringmaster. RMJ stands for Ringmaster Junior, in case we didn't know.

[00:13:07] So, and I wear that with pride because the amount of time that, I apprenticed under Frank, all – we had some discussions on, generic machine work and machining concepts. But all I focused on, because I knew that's the business and time also, free available time, I focused on, okay, how do we make these perfect, layman's – just a layman's explanation of it, just these perfect circles.

[00:13:39] Yeah.

[00:13:40] How do – what do I need to do? and that's what we focused on. And as free time permitted, then we would venture into other topics and other areas of machining. But the primary focus was making piston rings. So the machining aspect of it, the hand finishing aspect of it, and then the precise heat treating procedures. And I can go on and on because there are so many steps to the way we make them.

[00:14:11] So can I ask you, did you have any machining experience before you bought the company or before you continued on?

[00:14:17] I had zero.

[00:14:18] So you learned everything from Frank, hands-on.

[00:14:21] Yes. Yes. That's awesome. Yeah. It was always very strong in math and, just all the STEM subjects. Sure. But nothing – I mean, it's good to have that, in your back pocket. But when you're actually applying that in a machining environment, it's a whole new world.

[00:14:41] Yep. Absolutely. To me, it's – so how long was that transition? Like how long did it take, Frank, to bestow upon you all of his knowledge?

[00:14:52] Well, this is the honest truth. So we started – my wife and I – so we live in Midland, Texas now. I'm sorry. Sometimes I just kind of babble on. But, everything really has a – it's a neat story.

[00:15:07] Yeah.

[00:15:07] My – so Frank closed his doors in 2014. That's – that summer, we were flying, and he kind of started putting – laying the seed, planting the seeds and say, hey, I'm thinking about closing the doors. You should probably take over. But, again, as I mentioned, our boys are – my wife was pregnant. We had twins on the way at that time. Yep. And I knew.

[00:15:32] I, I didn't want to be just ignorant to the fact that the amount of time and energy and attention that it takes for when you – not only when you have one child, but when they show up two at a time. That's a whole different ballgame.

[00:15:46] Yes, for sure.

[00:15:47] So, when that happened, I told Frank, when I have some time and you still have it and you haven't – someone hasn't come along and bought their business from you, we'll sit down and chat. So –

[00:16:04] So before we go too far on this, sorry, how did you meet him? Like, is this a friend of yours that you've had for a while, or what was the connection?

[00:16:11] Oh, that's another story. Let me tell you that story. So we'll come back to how we started the business. But so I – we were living in Farmington, New Mexico. So that's where Frank lived. I got into the – or I got back into the hobby. My wife was teaching kindergarten, and one of her students, her dad, was flying model airplanes. And she had mentioned it to my – So Chris is the dad. He's my friend from there, from Farmington. He's the one that got me back into it.

[00:16:47] Now, that story – that whole interaction went with – along the lines of, yeah, I had a Tower Trainer 40 with, a radio and a long antenna and a crystal, just from what I could remember, because it had been a while since I'd been – I'd been out of the hobby. And he started mentioning terms like, oh, no, it's not like that anymore. You just bind and fly. And I looked like – I looked at him like he was, speaking a foreign language.

[00:17:12] Because, yeah, because I had been so far out of touch. I hadn't – I'd been – I got out of the hobby in – oh, let's see. This was around 2000, 2001. Oh, yeah. And I didn't get back in it until about 2008.

[00:17:25] Oh, yeah.

[00:17:26] Right in that –

[00:17:27] Huge changes in that time period.

[00:17:28] Oh, man.

[00:17:29] Yeah.

[00:17:29] That was a steep learning curve because I could not believe the advancements in radios, just the basic radios, compared to what I used to have.

[00:17:37] Right.

[00:17:37] But – so Chris got me back into that. And when I got back into the hobby, I bought – it's just – I guess everybody kind of goes through these phases where you have a good deal. And, I got back into it. And the last thing I knew was a glow. So I got back into a glow. It was on a stick. I know that's your favorite airplane there. Of course. Should be everybody's favorite, right? Yeah, absolutely. It was a 40-size stick with a Sato 56.

[00:18:06] And I bought it from a hobby shop. I have no idea how long it had been hanging there. But needless to say, I was having problems to the point where I was getting ready for this airplane to get stepped on. I just – if this is my introduction back into the hobby, this – I don't want to – yeah, I'm not having a good time.

[00:18:23] Yeah, Nitro does that too.

[00:18:24] A lot of the guys – Stop it. So a lot of the guys at the Airfold, they said, you should probably go see Frank. And I'm thinking to myself, who is this Frank character,? I'm an A&P. At the time, I was an A&P, which for those that don't know what that means, that's an airframe and power plant. So I was an airplane mechanic. Yeah, me too. So, I made that mistake of thinking, oh, I know all things mechanical.

[00:18:48] And it's got to be broken if I can't figure it out.

[00:18:51] Yeah, if I can't fix this, then it can't be fixed.

[00:18:53] No, I get that.

[00:18:55] Yep.

[00:18:55] And so I get Frank's phone number. He lived about three blocks away from our house. All right? Convenient. So to put some context on this, he lived about three blocks away from our house. I had no idea that who Frank Bowman was. I had no idea he was the piston ring man. I had no idea, just his resume on the engines and his expertise at all. So I brought my engine over to him. My impression was, there's no background noise.

[00:19:30] My impression of him was that he was just a local guy at our airfield that could fix engines. That was the extent of what I knew. And, well, needless to say, a week goes by and I get a bit anxious and definitely impatient. So I call him. And he was pretty short with me at the time. And he said, listen, Bjorn, I don't know. Maybe I didn't convey to you that I'm busy and I work this engine in when I have some free time. But I'll let when it's ready.

[00:20:04] Okay.

[00:20:04] I think a day or two goes by. And I'm thinking to myself, man, he's rude. Not even thinking that. Not even putting it on myself. Well, not even that. I was just like, I was definitely not rude. And I think I gave him enough time.

[00:20:18] Yeah.

[00:20:18] Again, it was not my fault. Just definitely not looking at this, introspectively. And anyway, he was able to fix my engine and it ran like a top. And several years go by and I still didn't put two and two together because I started flying gas at that point. That was the only glow engine. I just went directly to gas.

[00:20:42] Okay.

[00:20:42] And so needless to say, when Frank was starting to get into gas, gas, piston rings, the DLE 30 that I had on a, it was a 30 or 25% SBAC or SBAC or however you call that thing. Yeah, I don't know what you call him either.

[00:21:03] I like him.

[00:21:04] I just don't know what you call him. I love him. I love him. Excuse me. But that was the, so his piston, we got measurements off of that engine. And that was a prototype ring, the, one of the first gasoline, piston rings that Frank made.

[00:21:22] Oh, that's awesome.

[00:21:22] Everything, everything before that was, were glow engines. So, you're running the mill, all every, almost exclusively, glow engines. And, so that, that's pretty much when we started, we became friendly because I knew what, what Frank, I, I educated myself and, I became enlightened to, oh, oh, you, okay. I'm so sorry. Right.

[00:21:52] And that was, oh, that was probably around 20, 2010, 2011, right, right in that, right in there.

[00:22:00] Okay.

[00:22:00] It might've been a little earlier, but, yeah, that's, that's, that's how I, and over time, we became very friendly. Sure. his wife, Valerie, she wanted to learn how to fly. So I was her flight instructor. Oh, nice. And, she was flying, I was flying large, 30 and 35% gassers at the time. And again, we were friendly. So we had to rapport, the relationship. And, so I, she had a e-flight apprentice.

[00:22:25] So, oh yeah, we spent lots of buddy box time and it was, it was awesome. So that's how, that's how, that was my introduction to Frank.

[00:22:33] Okay. So that's what, what began the, the relationship and kind of started you down the path, for absorbing all of that work.

[00:22:41] Yes. But, I will tell you before we approached Frank to, potentially take, open the doors back up, I had never set foot in his machine shop. It was his, I'd been to his house, but never, I'd never seen the equipment. I'd never seen the process up until we, we, we sat down and we made a formal agreement. Okay.

[00:23:04] So all those years that you guys were just, just flying buddies, you never, you never saw the business, never saw what it took to produce a ring. None of that. Right. Oh, that's really something.

[00:23:15] Right. And when you say flying buddies, Frank did not, Frank did not fly anything without a, a tether to it. So he was a big control line guy. Oh, he never flew radio control. Not while I was around.

[00:23:25] So that explains ring caster. Yeah. Well, yeah. Yeah.

[00:23:28] I'll be darned.

[00:23:29] He was, I think to a certain degree, he still flies, control line.

[00:23:35] I'll be darned. Yeah. I would just, one would probably assume people would assume that, yeah, he's a big RC guy, but.

[00:23:42] Well, I wondered why you had to teach his wife to fly. And now that makes sense. That makes sense. Yeah.

[00:23:47] Yeah. Huh. So that's what I tell you. Everything has a story just to provide some context.

[00:23:51] Yeah. Yeah. The fact that it slays me that, that you guys were doing stuff together for years before you actually even saw, what it took to produce a ring. So in my mind, I'm thinking like, what, what did you use as a, as kind of a, as a, I don't know what, to bring you back to reality when the time came to make the decision to open the doors? Yeah. Cause you had no clue.

[00:24:16] Yeah. You wanted to, you wanted to open the doors back up, but you didn't know what that even meant. Yeah. Cause you hadn't seen any of that. That's funny.

[00:24:21] Well, I, exactly. I didn't know the degree of the amount of work that it took, and, I can't imagine. So, so when we, when we finally had, we had a sit down, it was, it's one of, it's really one of those storybook, situations where we, we sat at our, at our, we invited both Frank and Valerie over, to our house again, about three blocks away. So it wasn't really, it wasn't really, not at all, not at all.

[00:24:49] And, we, we, we explained our situation to them that, we, we finally, the boys were a little older and, it could definitely fit some free time. And, and Frank definitely warned me and he said, are you sure you want to do this? that was why one of my last opportunities for an out.

[00:25:06] And, my wife and I, we talked about it, to, to a great degree, somewhat understanding, probably with a 75, 70, 60 to 70% understanding of what, what it would entail. And, we were comfortable enough with that one with the time commitment, but also just, just carrying, carrying on with the legacy, Frank's legacy essentially.

[00:25:32] And, and everything that it represented because of, and also, the, the reputation that he had built over the years. Right. It was, it was, you, we invited both of them over. We, looked over some documents and it was one of those handshake deals and, yeah.

[00:25:47] And that was that.

[00:25:48] And that was, as, as they say, the rest is history.

[00:25:51] And your life would never be the same.

[00:25:53] Oh man, I'll never get back to sleep that I've lost over the last small window on it since 2017. And, well, there have been lots of sleepless nights and especially, especially running the, making everything on the, on the manual lathe. That was, that's a very, very time consuming process.

[00:26:12] Well, sure. Yeah.

[00:26:13] So I'm pre in a, in another career, I was a machinist. we had a LeBlond, I think it was a 1958 model, manual lathe in our shop that I took, took a long time to learn how to use that thing. And you learn every little quirk of every machine, right? So, if the tail stock is off by three thousandths, to, shim the work or whatever, there's always some little.

[00:26:38] So many different tricks.

[00:26:39] Yeah. And, and to learn all that and for what it's worth, to produce something, the quality that you produce in the time that you produce it is to me, really telling. I mean, you've obviously put in, put everything that you had into the business to make it the legacy that it is. And it still continues to be. So like I said, for what it's worth coming from me, there you go.

[00:27:06] Well, I really appreciate that. Thank you very much.

[00:27:08] So I'm, I'm curious. So to produce, just, just to give everybody kind of a, a clue, how long does it take to produce from start to finish one ring ballpark?

[00:27:21] So, so on the manual, I'm free to explain the process. Okay. So again, we thought, we talked about financial feasibility on, small batch work. So typically if it's, if it's a one ring, request, we, we, we would, gladly turn it down just because it's not, it's, it's really not worth the time, and especially, in one worth the time.

[00:27:47] But then also if you, if the customer does want us to, is definitely insistent upon it, then the price goes up and it's, it's really, it really has to be worth our time. And, I view it as, if I don't have any existing orders, I substitute working in, in, in, in our garage machine shop with, spending time with my family.

[00:28:07] And, and it really has to be worth the time because it's, that's, hate to sound cheesy or, broken record, but as you get older, you, you, you definitely start to realize you cannot get that time back at all, ever. so I, so it's, for me, it's definitely, it's, it's a strong motivator and, and, and a dose of reality.

[00:28:29] But going back to your question that, let's say everybody's favorite engine, the DLE 20, I typically make them in a batch of say 15 per, per run on the CNC, just the machining side of it is approximately, to do to do with my latest changes to feeds and speeds. It's probably about just under five minutes.

[00:28:56] Oh, wow. To do the whole.

[00:28:59] Yes. Okay. So wait, wait, wait, that's just the machining. So that's just the machine work side. And then once the machine work is done, then there's a deburring process. So in order to deburr 15 rings, that's about a 20 minute process. And I'm talking, this is all by hand. Okay. And then, then, in order to put the, anti-rotation pin on there, then I have to set it up on the fixture, run it through the, the mill.

[00:29:25] Cause, we have specific end mills we run just based on which engine and, and, and the anti-rotation pin diameter. so set up and, and, and just, Bob, just a lot of setup time. so that'll be another say 10 minutes or so. So this is a manual process. And then once that's done, then the, the rings are lapped down to the proper axial thickness. So with the DLE 20, that's a 47 thousands.

[00:29:52] So to do 15 rings, that's going to be about maybe, 15, 20 minutes, depending on, just what I encounter. Once that's done, then you have to separate them. Then you have to set them up on a heat treating jig and then you have to heat treat them. So in total to do 15 rings, it's probably over just over two hours. That's incorporating a manual process.

[00:30:14] If now with the CNC mill, I find, I've finally been able to get my fixture plate set up for, for the deburring and notching process to be automated. So total machining time is about, so just under five minutes for the lathe, about 20 minutes on the mill. So that's 25 minutes and then lapping is going to be another 20 minutes. So we went from an over two hour process to just, just, just shy of an hour.

[00:30:47] That's fantastic.

[00:30:48] And that's just a batch of 15 rings.

[00:30:50] Now, does that, does that include all the setup time and all that too? Cause I mean, let's be honest to change, to change setups from say doing a DLE 20 to a DLE 35. That's going to be some time, right?

[00:31:01] Yes. Which, which, the, the amount of time that I spent just designing fixture plates, just for all of those different setups. I can't tell you how much time I've spent just, just on those, just designing those fixtures, machining those fixtures. And then also, you can, you can be as, as, conscious of every moving part in a machine as you possibly can.

[00:31:24] But if you don't factor in the height of a Allen head bolt that holds a retention or retaining plate on top of the rings, and then, you go through and then the machine, oh man, well, you don't machine it off. You break the end. You break a bed.

[00:31:37] Yeah. Sounds like an experience situation here. Yeah.

[00:31:40] I'm sure he's speaking from experience. I am not speaking from experience at all. I am. So, yeah. So, so that's, that's been the experience there. So that's just, so now for, for, for rings that we make, on a repetitive basis, I picked the DLE 20 because that's probably one of our, well, the DLE line, the RCGF line, the, GP, engine.

[00:32:05] So all the popular brands now, we, we, we definitely, we have production runs on them just because they're, they're such a common ring for us to, that we get orders for.

[00:32:14] Yeah. Yeah. So you mentioned, doing, doing batches of them, obviously you keep some in what I would call a stock like status, right? So how many just ballpark, you don't have to, but like how many different rings do you keep in stock ready to ship?

[00:32:34] So I'm looking at our bins right now. how many bins would you say we have, Emily? well, it's there, it's probably 20 plus bins with probably 20 plus pockets in each bin.

[00:32:49] Oh my gosh.

[00:32:50] So, yeah. So we, we, we have over, I think our account now is just, it's over 1800. I want to say it's probably closer to 2000 measurements.

[00:32:58] Holy smokes.

[00:32:59] For, for rings that we make. Yeah. Ready to go.

[00:33:02] Well, the reason, the reason I ask is, so a while back I, I ordered a ring from you for a fairly, I don't want to say obscure, but it's a, it's an engine that, folks don't use much anymore. That Irvine 40, one of them I put on the dualist project. And like, I think I had the ring from you in less than, it was less than a week for sure. So obviously you didn't make that for, you had that ready to go probably. Right.

[00:33:26] Typically if we don't have it, now the typical turnaround is, I, within the United States, we can, we can definitely have it to our customer within, within a week. That's incredible. I, we, we can't, I'm sure you guys are well aware, but, we can't, we can't, be held responsible for how long or, or, or, or how quickly the U S postal service works.

[00:33:54] So, and, and over the last couple of years, it's really been trying on our patients just because we, we've had issues with lost parcels or just really, really, really delayed deliveries.

[00:34:07] Yeah.

[00:34:08] So, but typically, in a perfect world, say you ordered on a Sunday, cause typically on Sundays when I think everybody kind of goes through their, either their inventory or they have an issue with an engine or it's, it's, a service time or whatever the case may be. We'll get an order on a Saturday or Sunday or Monday, but typically you can have it before the next weekend.

[00:34:28] That's fantastic. I mean, to me, that is amazing for something so specialized. And I mean, let's be honest, it's a niche market to have something ready to go that quickly is amazing to me. And this is in addition to your full-time job. I mean, this is something you do. Yeah. So you run, you have a full-time job and then the kids and the family stuff. And then, oh, by the way, we run this really awesome business. Yeah. To me, it's incredible.

[00:34:59] Yeah.

[00:34:59] Like, I don't know how you do it, but I'm glad you do.

[00:35:01] Well, that's why I said, I'm the world's worst about talking about myself. just my, my wife usually, she either just kind of take over those duties or I, cause I usually just kind of.

[00:35:13] Skim over it. Yeah.

[00:35:15] I skim over or I just kind of just retire myself. I've got stuff to do. I don't have time to talk about myself, so I'll just go back to work.

[00:35:21] Well, yeah, I'm happy to do it for you because like I said, that engine has never ran better, by the way. So.

[00:35:27] Well, I really appreciate it. Thank you. And I don't know if you want to share the story with when that, what happened with your order.

[00:35:34] Well, I was, I was hoping not to, because it was a mistake that I made, but I'll tell everybody what happened. So I ordered the wrong ring. So Irvine, not to get too far in the weeds, but Irvine made their 40 in three or four different marks, right? It was a mark one, two, three, four. And they each had these minor little differences. Well, to the average Joe Schmo like me, Irvine 40 is an Irvine 40. I'll just order an Irvine 40 ring and it'll be fine.

[00:36:02] Well, no, that wasn't the case. Got the, got the ring that I ordered from you and it was obviously the wrong ring because I didn't do my due diligence and you happily sent me the correct ring.

[00:36:16] Well, I really didn't want to focus on, on that part of your order where the mistake happened. But what you're, what you're alluding to is you, so I was, I remember that day distinctly because I was in the living room playing with the boys. And so you called. Oh, I'm so sorry. I interrupted. No, no, you're, you're, you're, you're, it's perfect. It's perfectly fine because it happens all the time. And usually phone calls, they're, they're usually pretty quick.

[00:36:38] I, I can, we've been doing it long enough that I can typically identify the issue rather quickly. And so you called and mentioned your order. We look up the order and I asked you, is it a dykes ring? And after a brief pause, you said, I said, okay, does it look like an L? And he said, yeah, it does. I said, okay. So you ordered a standard ring and you needed to order a dykes ring. And then I followed up with, can I ask you a question? And you said, sure.

[00:37:11] And I said, are you on a podcast? And you shyly kind of acknowledged it. And I said, okay, yeah, I listen to you guys all the time when I'm in the machine, when I'm working on rings. so that, I think that's what, that, that really kind of stood out for me. I could tell from, just from your voice. I figured that, what's the worst that can happen? I might as well just ask.

[00:37:32] So I've heard this guy somewhere before. Yeah.

[00:37:36] Was in prison. Yeah. Was in prison. Well, I didn't, like, so kind of like you, I'm not big about talking about myself. And I certainly don't want to bring attention to myself when I'm, when I'm placing an order with a company or something like that. Because I don't want to come off as, hey, can you do me this favor? I run this podcast. I'm on this podcast. I'm a, I don't want to be that guy. So I, yeah, I tried to keep that quiet. And yeah, you found me out.

[00:38:04] Yeah, you certainly did. Because I was going to send you a free ring and you were very insistent upon, no, no, no. I'll, I'll, I know what I need to order. So I'll just order the ring.

[00:38:14] Yeah. Yeah. I'm the ding dong that ordered the wrong one. So, and I learned something, which is actually to, to further that conversation, not only did I learn a little bit more about the differences in the, in the cross-sectional view of the, that particular ring. I also learned something about the composition of a piston ring. You want to, do you want to talk about that a little bit?

[00:38:35] So that's, that's one thing that's definitely been, I wouldn't say a point of contention. It used to be, I just really quit arguing with people online.

[00:38:45] Just because,.

[00:38:46] You never went online.

[00:38:47] Yeah.

[00:38:47] Well, I just, I just carry, I've got, I have better things to do with my time. I just, I'm tired of repeating, rinse and repeat and explaining the same thing to individuals. The information is out there. If you, if you have specific questions, by all means, I'll definitely, talk to, to, to whoever about it. But if it turns into a, gotcha, gotcha kind of question back and forth. I just, I don't, I don't have the time or patience for that.

[00:39:15] But, just, just to provide some information. So we continued on, we, we did not change anything when it came, when it comes to material selection from what Frank, Frank did. And as I mentioned, just with his wealth of knowledge and in not only machining, but also metallurgy, why reinvent the wheel? it's essentially what I, what we, what we came up with. And so we, we, we use a very specific grade of cast iron, why cast iron?

[00:39:42] Because it's not, it's not one of those, extraordinary, exotic metals. Why would you just use plain, plain old cast iron? Well, primarily the main reason why we use cast iron is just because of its, for all the geeks, nerds and geeks out there, because I'm including myself in there, we take advantage of the one metallurgical property that it has when it comes, and that's the coefficient of expansion.

[00:40:09] A lot of folks wonder, why can you run such a tight end gap? And by end gap, that's just the space between the ends of the piston ring. When compressing your cylinder, the, the, the allowable space we, we, we file those ends to is approximately one thousandths of an inch. And for perspective, you're, my, my hair off the, my head, it's closer to four thousandths of an inch. So that gap is approximately four times smaller.

[00:40:37] Yep.

[00:40:38] So just, just for perspective, a sheet of paper, right. A sheet of paper is approximately, depending on the brand is between three and a half thousandths to four and a half thousandths, just, just to kind of put perspective in there. So when, when I, when we ship rings and I gap them before shipping, it, the, you can't really, you can't find a, well, for practical purposes, you can't find a feeler gauge that's one thousandths of an inch.

[00:41:02] They typically start at one and a half. And that's the smallest feeler gauge you can find commercially available. And that's too big. Yep. So just, just for perspective. But a lot of the arguments are, well, when, when the engine gets up to temperature, everything's going to expand. And because that gap is so small, the ring ends are going to butt up against each other. And you're going to, the engine is going to lock up or it's going to rip the top off the piston.

[00:41:26] Yep.

[00:41:27] And, typically that's just, we're, we're going to talk or compare it to just what the typical generally accepted practices are. for one inch of bore, you go three to four thousandths per one inch of bore. So that, that consideration is essentially, it's really, it's, it's determined by the material selection. And as I mentioned, most commercial, most off the shelf piston rings are made of some kind of alloy of steel.

[00:41:57] Yeah. And, and that's a great material. It's it, the longevity, there are lots of pros and cons that comes with that material selection. However, steel's coefficient of expansion is ridiculous compared to cast iron. Right.

[00:42:09] And usually where that's used, you have a, you have a larger margin for that also.

[00:42:13] Right. Right. And so if ever, if people, are ever wondering, why there's typically a wide margin. So you'll have, we'll stick to the DLE 20. I've seen end gaps range from 10,000s all the way up to 22,000s. From the factory? From the factory. Yes. And that is a wide, wide margin. Now you'd, you'd say, okay, well, maybe your cylinder inside diameter is different.

[00:42:41] The ring, the ring being the constant, but the, the machining. So how much the, the bore diameter on your cylinders, I found I've, in my experience, I found minimal differences in bore diameter. So the variable is going to be the piston ring.

[00:42:57] Yeah. So, when you have such a wide variety of, of tolerances, when, when you have piston rings, they're built thousands, commercially available or OEM piston rings. They're built typically thousands at a time when you have, when you have that kind of volume, the, the, tension, the tolerance, depending on how the QA is set up in those factories, it's typically not achievable to what we're doing.

[00:43:24] And, and granted, we do them in, on a much smaller scale, but we, the, the, the control of the quality is extremely stricter.

[00:43:32] Yeah. And that explains why, and I hear this all the time, why a brand new engine, A, doesn't run as good as my brand new engine, A. Well, there you go. I mean, the differences in that machining process or the, or the QA, could, could certainly factor in why some engines run better than the other. Even. Charge is just getting up on you. Even given from the same manufacturer. Yeah.

[00:43:55] And that's why. Yeah. I mean, just, just think about the, the, the models you guys are talking about, having twin engines. the typical, what's the typical approach you typically tune for the weaker engine.

[00:44:07] Exactly.

[00:44:07] And that, that really is that, is that generally acceptable? Yes. Of course. In my world, that is absolutely unacceptable. the engine, both engines, whatever engine, it doesn't, I don't care. It doesn't matter the name that's stamped on there, whether it's, one of the most popular brands or, just the, or a knockoff of a knockoff of a knockoff.

[00:44:30] And, I'm, I'm, I may not, I'm not, I'm not exaggerating when I say three times knockoff, because that, that does happen.

[00:44:37] Oh yeah.

[00:44:38] Sure. and, and, and, and to get them to all to perform, at tip top shape, that's, that's, that's, that's where I, I thrive.

[00:44:48] Yeah. And we're just talking engine rings or a piston ring.

[00:44:51] Yeah. It's just a piston ring.

[00:44:52] I mean, we're not talking about the knockoff carburetors and I mean, we could go on and on, but yeah.

[00:44:57] Yes.

[00:44:58] That's why, that's why I'm so thankful you do what you do because that's one, because that's one variable you can eliminate from the factor or from the equation.

[00:45:07] What I mean? Well, there are lots of variables, when it comes to growing pain so we can just eliminate primarily just with, with the, just with the piston ring. And, one thing that, another thing that we, question we get is, well, why, why would you, why would you change the ring out?

[00:45:27] Well, if, if you've been one of the portals that have, dealt with a, a, a tough tuning or inconsistent tuning engine, you've put a new carburetor on there and guess what? It's still doing the same thing. Well, one thing to keep in mind is when you, when you have a OEM ring and it's a hard steel ring, the heat treating process could be inconsistent.

[00:45:47] So you could have a lot of ring tension, at some point around, around the ring and we're definitely getting off in the weeds here. However, with, with our ring, I've spent, once we got the machining processes optimized, I've spent hours upon hours upon hours of making prototypes and trying them out.

[00:46:08] Just the surface finish, on, on the ring, which I call the business end, which is the, the, surface of the piston ring that's interacting with the cylinder walls, but just optimizing that finish so that your break-in time is, is almost non-existent anymore.

[00:46:27] So typically the issues that you have with break-in is just inconsistent running, high idle. you can achieve your, your top RPM, engine compression is, it feels almost non-existent, on and on and on.

[00:46:41] Yes.

[00:46:41] And on the, on the issue of, of compression, I, I, we have customers that call or, the men that it's mentioned on, on, whatever groups you may look at on social media or the popular, RC groups, flying giants, RC universe. the, it's, it's often explained as, our rings will, will increase your compression.

[00:47:06] And to be perfectly, honest, I would, I would, I don't ever tell our customers that it's going to increase your compression. What I do tell our customers is you will recognize the compression the engine was designed to have.

[00:47:20] Yes.

[00:47:21] And the reason why that is, is, with the OEM ring, there's so much blow by and there's so many areas for improvement where whatever your, whatever seal that piston ring is supposed to provide it, it does not. And with our ring, the only place for blow by is going to be the end gap. And as I mentioned before, it takes a lot to get past the one thousandths of an inch.

[00:47:43] Yes. Only so many molecules of air can pass through that.

[00:47:48] Yeah. Yeah. And I, I don't have enough free time. I can probably calculate that. That's okay.

[00:47:53] Yeah, we don't, it's fine. Yeah. So, so you, you chose or, or Frank, whoever chose, would you say it's a ductile iron or it's just a plain cast iron that you guys use or that you use?

[00:48:08] What I always tell our customers is a very specific grade of cast iron.

[00:48:12] And you use that as opposed to steel because there's a difference between iron and steel. Yes.

[00:48:18] Absolutely.

[00:48:18] There is iron in steel, but there's a lot of other crap in iron or steel also. Right.

[00:48:25] And so you choose iron because of the, somewhat minimal coefficient of expansion.

[00:48:32] Yes. Yeah. And, if you really look at it, think of an engine, what's, what materials are involved in, on the, on the, in the combustion chamber. You have a, typically it's an aluminum piston. You have, and this is a steel liner in the, in the, in the situation of a glow engine. Typically if, if it's a liner type engine, and a cast iron ring.

[00:48:55] So we, I think we all understand that between steel and aluminum, they expand their rate of expansion or their coefficient of expansion is extremely higher compared to iron.

[00:49:06] Oh yeah.

[00:49:07] And, it's just, we make some, we, we make some tweaks on the, just the specifications between the OEM ring and, and what we end up, making commercially available. and, but we, it's, it ultimately ends up being, we just take it, we definitely work the advantages in, in our end, on our end.

[00:49:28] I love it. I'm just like, so like, these two guys are just kind of looking off into this, but this really, really, intrigues me. I could go on and on, but let's.

[00:49:40] I don't think that's fair. I knew, like, I know this episode is one you were just going to geek out about and watching, like your face is just like, I mean, you have not stopped smiling this whole time. So. Yeah. Well, it's awesome. I know.

[00:49:52] But that's a black science to me, so.

[00:49:56] All right. Before, before we move on to like what these guys would probably consider the fun stuff, although this has been really fun for me.

[00:50:03] I enjoy getting into leads too when I understand it.

[00:50:06] Yeah.

[00:50:06] Okay. So it's, I, like the whole time I'm sitting here listening, forgetting that this is not like a published episode somewhere else I'm listening to. what I'm talking about? Like, cause you just, you get into it. You're like, okay, cool. Oh, oh, I'm supposed to talk now. Hold on. Yeah. So. Yeah. I get so lost in the, in what he's talking about.

[00:50:22] I don't want to interrupt. Yeah. so Bjorn, before we move on, go ahead.

[00:50:27] Hold on, hold on. Just a second. Just, I guess for the two laymen in the room, what this is going to translate into is you're going to have a significantly lower idle. I can, I can really go into the weeds on why that is, but I won't. and then, and also typically what we see, with a properly tuned engine, you can have, yeah, you'll end up with several hundred more RPM on the top end. Yeah. So it's a win-win for everybody.

[00:50:50] Yeah. And even on, even on my small little Irvine forties, I noticed huge improvements on both, the idle quality and the top end performance.

[00:51:00] Once you got the right ring.

[00:51:01] Once I got the right ring and I got it broken in properly.

[00:51:04] But yeah, it did take a few tanks, but man is, yeah, they, well, anyway, really, I'm just going to say, I will say, I will say, Tom, you more than likely got, well, as you mentioned, it's a pretty, it's not, I'll just be nice. And I say, it's not our most popular engine that we make rings for.

[00:51:23] So more than likely the ring you got was probably, it was more than likely, a non-optimized ring when it comes to surface finish, just to be completely transparent.

[00:51:33] Okay.

[00:51:34] Yeah.

[00:51:35] Oh, I see. So you're getting at why it might have taken a little bit longer to break in.

[00:51:38] Yes. Yeah. So that surface finish I mentioned earlier, again, not to get into the weeds, but the other guys in the room, but, that's more than likely the reason for that.

[00:51:47] No, I'm totally tracking. And by the way, I'm, I'm totally okay with it taking time to, break in because I really enjoy running engines on my workbench. I really do. Like it really, it's satisfying. Yeah, it is. And I, it's just one of those things I'm a, an engine geek or whatever.

[00:52:03] So, and that's okay.

[00:52:05] Yeah.

[00:52:05] All right. So that's enough talk about work.

[00:52:08] Is there anything else you want to talk about as far as the business goes that you want people to know that, that are listening?

[00:52:14] So, we, we, we process all of our orders through our website, which is, rmjmachineworks.com. we, when you, when you go into that, it'll take you to our homepage. It'll just kind of give you a broad perspective of what we offer.

[00:52:30] It's an impressive list, by the way.

[00:52:33] Well, and I, yes, thank you. And, and all I've mentioned to tell you, it's rmjmachineworks.com. So that's w o r x.

[00:52:41] Yes.

[00:52:42] Yep. So just, just, attention to detail there. And, we, we, we have, just, just to kind of give you a broad overview of what we do on the homepage. And then, on the business end of it, just click on the online store under categories, pick your manufacturer, and then pick your, your displacement and ring style. So in case you have a standard ring, you have a dykes ring.

[00:53:04] Sometimes there are three options where you have a standard ring with no pin relief. You have a standard ring with a pin relief, or you have a dyke style ring. Sometimes it's even more, you have a dyke style ring without a pin relief. Oh, it's just on and on and on.

[00:53:18] So, yeah, for, for the listeners on our links page, I'm pretty sure Ron has added at my request, probably, your rmjmachineworks, website on there.

[00:53:27] So yeah, we'll do that. And then we'll put the link to the, at the bottom of this episode, obviously. Yep. So excellent.

[00:53:32] And then, and for the situation, for the, for the oddball situation, and why I say oddball, some custom rings, the most custom one, we've, we've done, some rings for a machine or, a speech. Shop out of Houston, their, their, their main business is restoring older Porsches. So we've done, it was a 1972, 73 era Porsche air-cooled engine. So those rings were unobtainium. that's not a metal. That's just, that's a statement.

[00:54:00] Yes. I understand. some people think, well, what is this unobtainium? I've never heard of that. Well, and I've never seen it and you probably never know because that's it's unobtainable. Get it? Yes.

[00:54:11] Yeah. Right. So we've, we've made some, some rings for, for those folks and they're, they're, they, they, they were very happy with one, being able to find someone that actually can make them, but also just the, the precise nature of, of the rings, anymore. It's just, that's just a standard process anymore. It's not, typically when the higher the precision goes to the more one-off things get, but for us, that's just the only thing we do.

[00:54:35] Yeah.

[00:54:36] Yeah. That's awesome.

[00:54:36] And then to get that, and then probably to get that instant feedback, like when, when they install them and run them, they probably are like, Hey, by the way, we ran it. It's awesome. Thank you. And that's got to make you feel good. Right.

[00:54:48] About what you do.

[00:54:48] Yeah.

[00:54:49] That. And then we, we've done turn up the century steam engines. it's just a wide variety. We've done Caterpillar, or John Deere hit or miss engines. I can't tell you how many of those we've done. they're typically, rotor tillers that are turn up, turn up now, not turn of the century. Those, probably thirties, forties, fifties era engines that just, you just do not have parts for.

[00:55:15] Maytag washers. Cause some of those.

[00:55:18] If it has a, if it has an engine or if it has any, any requirement for compressing, I'll, I'll leave it at that for compressing. We've made piston rings for it. Nice.

[00:55:28] Cool. It's actually good to know because I've gotten old hit and miss. Yeah. John Deere hit and miss out in the shop that I've not had a lot of luck getting running. -oh. Here we go.

[00:55:37] Yeah. You probably, I was probably the last person you'd ever hear, hear the, say the words hit or miss. Yeah.

[00:55:42] I wasn't expecting to go there on this one. Yeah. Yeah. I was not expecting that either, but, Yeah.

[00:55:46] I was just wondering if you did things outside the, model airplane side of things. Yeah.

[00:55:50] Yes. Yeah. It's not, about 90% of our businesses, model airplane or RC car, related or tether car. we've done those as well. and, free flight models that do have the timed, I, I, I'm not an expert on that, but they have the, timed run, engine run time. And then there's only enough fuel to get up to a certain altitude.

[00:56:14] So we've, we've done those as well, but we, we've done some, some tricks to increase the output for those engines. And so, okay.

[00:56:23] All right. It's not cheating if it's still running the same.

[00:56:25] Hey, man, if it's not in the rules, if you're not caught, if it's not in the rules or if you're not caught, it's fully legal. Exactly.

[00:56:34] Just ask NASCAR, right?

[00:56:36] Yes.

[00:56:37] All right. Okay. Well, Bjorn, thanks. that was awesome. So now let's, and like, I don't know how you find time to, to do this next bit. the, the airplanes, but, you, you, you sent us a list, of, your number, which by the way, what is your number?

[00:56:57] I put approximately 25.

[00:57:00] Okay. Yeah. And to me, that's a, that blows my mind because I, you have a full-time job and then, oh, by the way, you run this really, really awesome ring business on the side. Oh, and by the way, I also fly airplanes. Like, how do you find the time to do all of that? It just blows my mind.

[00:57:19] Yeah. Sometimes I, I, yeah, for me, it's just like, oh my goodness. Sometimes it's just.

[00:57:26] Yeah. Go ahead.

[00:57:27] All right. So I'm looking at your list and I got to tell you, Ron, Ron is, is really, really impressed by your list.

[00:57:33] Yeah. I see a lot of yaks on there. So I'm, I really like that.

[00:57:36] He's a big guy, a lot of gas, which makes me happy, obviously not a lot of electric, which makes me happier. so we'll just, I'm just going to move on down the list here. so you, we start with a Krill Yak 55, the 37 and a half percent, that's got a DLE 170. So that's about a, what, 110 ish wing?

[00:57:56] A hundred and big. No, it's like 122. It's a big plane. I like that. A hundred and big. Yeah. It's, it's big. Okay. It's the biggest plane I have. Yeah.

[00:58:04] Okay. So before I go further, like how often do you actually get to fly?

[00:58:11] Now, all my friends listening that I fly with locally are probably going to laugh. Not enough. We'll just say not enough. Not enough.

[00:58:18] Okay.

[00:58:19] No.

[00:58:19] That's fine. That's fair. so next we have a, a comp RF edge 35% with a 3W 110 on it. what's it? Okay. So next is an EG aircraft MX2 30%. What's EG?

[00:58:33] I don't know. That was, this is probably my oldest airplane. Okay. if you remember, so it was EG aircraft slipstream. So slipstream was the budget, the budget side of it.

[00:58:43] That rings a bell. So was that marketed together?

[00:58:47] Yeah. Yeah. So EG was the, the, the really up high end line. Okay. and then, slipstream was the, the budget version of it. So, I mean, this plane is over, right? 12 years old now.

[00:58:59] Okay.

[00:58:59] So.

[00:59:00] And it's a 30% with the DLA 50. 55 would that be the RA?

[00:59:05] No, this is the original. Oh, that's 12 years old. The RA hadn't even thought of.

[00:59:11] Yeah. No, this is the original side exhaust. so this is where I'll just leave that story alone. no, feel free. It's okay. That's why we're here. It, it, it really opened my eyes on the, QC that goes in between, the engine distributors. Yeah. So needless to say, I had an EG aircraft MX2 and I had an EG aircraft Raven. Raven I sold to a local flyer, but the, the engine that I had in my Raven came from a distributor that shall not be named.

[00:59:43] Okay.

[00:59:44] But it's a very common distributor. and compared to the amount of time I put on the MX2, which, excuse me, didn't even compare, but the amount of mechanical damage and failure that I had on the Raven, it was, this is unbelievable. Yeah.

[00:59:58] Okay.

[00:59:58] So I ended up getting replacement repair parts for that 55 in the Raven from the, the distributor that I bought the, MX2 55 from, if that makes sense.

[01:00:09] Okay. Yep.

[01:00:10] Yep. And never again did I have a problem.

[01:00:13] Okay. Well, and so, so I'm, I'm looking ahead at the list and I'm noting what, what manufacturer is missing. So, I'm trying to read between the lines, but we'll, we'll leave.

[01:00:25] No, no, it's not a, it's not an engine manufacturer. It's a distributor.

[01:00:28] Oh, okay.

[01:00:29] All right.

[01:00:30] Specifically limited to, okay. Well, fair enough. Yeah. Yeah. All right. So moving on, we have a world models, third scale clipped wing cub. And unfortunately it says sold. Why'd you sell a cub?

[01:00:42] Well, there's such a local flyer, Jim, Jim, I hope you're listening. Jim wanted it more than I did. So, Jim's a good guy and, and, and I know he's going to treat it well. So therefore, yeah, I, I definitely agreed. My wife looked at me when I decided to sell it. She said, are you sure? Are you feeling okay? Yeah. I love that cub. So yeah. They were fun to fly. Yeah. And which goes back to, to, to that, what's further down the line, the boomerang.

[01:01:09] So the boomerang didn't disappear out of thin air. I had to fund the boomerang.

[01:01:12] So I want, when we get to that one, I want to talk to that. We'll talk about that for a little bit.

[01:01:17] All right. So I'll move these through these real quick. So Ron can talk. extreme flight, slick, 35 CC, DLE 35, sky wing edge, 35 CC electric. It says here, is this your only electric?

[01:01:30] No, no, I have a couple.

[01:01:31] Okay. sky wing edge, the 70 CC size, with a GP 76, tower hobbies, 60 trainer. So this is like the odd man out, right? The, the tower trainer among all these fantastic airplanes, which I'm not saying that the tower trainer is not a fantastic airplane, but it's just kind of the odd duck in the collection so far.

[01:01:50] Well, you have to have a trainer. Well, that's true. And that one, that one replaced a, an apprentice and, and, and in defense of the apprentice, I did buy all of the parts that they had been sitting on the shelf, in a hobby shop for, I have no, I probably several years. So that form was not the best, but, I, it, it didn't, it flew with incidents issue. It, it, it was horrible.

[01:02:13] So I, I found a good deal, ironically from a customer who ordered the ring that's in that engine that we were, our daughter was going to a marine biology camp, a week long camp in, in Galveston, Texas. So we were driving through and I, I saw that deal come across and, we stopped by and we visited and, it's good to put a face to a name, but it was one of our customers that ordered a ring that's, that's on that engine.

[01:02:38] So we visited, we, we talked about more than just a hobby. He had a nice Mustang in his garage and yeah. Yeah.

[01:02:46] It's funny how, how, how the, how the ends meet sometimes. let's see. Oh, so mag, that one has an 80 four stroke on it, a Magnum.

[01:02:56] Yeah. And it's in the process of being swapped out for a Sato FG 14 gas.

[01:03:00] Ah, okay. Well, that's okay.

[01:03:03] But you're wondering about that, but you were wondering about that being the odd man out. so the boys there, that's, that's going to be their trainer.

[01:03:13] Excellent. Nice. So teaching them the business and also flyers. Oh, I love it. I have got to go to Texas and visit you guys. This is awesome. At least fly with you.

[01:03:23] Come on out.

[01:03:25] All right. Next is a value hobby stick, a 60 to 90 gas with a DLE 20. I bet that fly is awesome.

[01:03:32] It's, it's a rocket ship.

[01:03:33] Oh, I didn't ask you before I move on, because we're on the stick right here. Can I ask, do you have a go-to airplane? Like when you go to the field, the one airplane that, that always makes the trip.

[01:03:44] So the last time, the last time out, I brought the stick with me, but, further down the line, you'll see that I have a, e-flight Viper 90 millimeter EDF. That's a, that's my first eat one EDF, but also first airplane with, retracts, just local guy. I, it was just one of those deals I couldn't refuse. Plus I knew I was getting the boomerang. So I wanted something to kind of, kind of prepare me for the boomerang. Nope.

[01:04:11] I got it.

[01:04:12] Yeah. So, but, but, just a go-to, I usually have to stick with me. the, the extreme flight slick 35 CC, this is just kind of, if I just need to get it in and go fly, I, and it's, I don't have to take my trailer with me. I can put both of those in my truck and just go to the field.

[01:04:32] Yep. Gotcha. all right. Next we have the extreme flight MXS V2, that has, oh, that's electric. Okay.

[01:04:41] And the dual sky, blah, blah, blah. Right. Okay.

[01:04:44] Sorry. we have a lamb yak. I'm not familiar with that profile electric with a G30. Oh, okay. That's an electric. Okay. G I saw a G32 and I was thinking really a G32. I didn't know it was going to made a 30, but it's not electric. I see.

[01:05:01] Yeah. This is another one of those really, really old airplanes, but it, it, I was, I, I still, I still have a couple of profiles, but, it was getting into the 3d style of flying and that was the most economic way for me to do it with these profile planes.

[01:05:15] So you can, you can just beat on them and, yeah, typically if you break the prop, I, I'd be surprised, but once you make a pretty big mistake, it's usually, they're pretty robust airframes and, you could just, slap a new batteries on and keep flying.

[01:05:28] But they're so ugly.

[01:05:30] Well, it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a

[01:05:34] Pretty, it's a, I suppose if you look at it in that regard, that it's a tool, then, okay, I guess I can look past how.

[01:05:40] When your buddies come over, this is not the airplane you're showing off. It's not the one you want sitting on the bench. Right.

[01:05:45] Okay. Well, there was a group of guys that I was flying with that all they exclusively flew were profiles. So yeah, we were proud of our profiles, but that's a very, very small group of people. I can imagine.

[01:05:58] Next we got the, the value hobby Sabre 56 profile electric, a Sabre 56. So is that like a, well, I'm not even going to try to imagine what that looks like.

[01:06:09] Cause it's, it's just a, it's a, it's a big profile. Yeah.

[01:06:12] E-flight Opterra. And then we have an E-flight Cemetery. You say you've never flown. I had a Scimitar and I also never flew it before I sold it. Is that the one, that's the one with the thrust vectoring, right? Yes. Yeah. They look like they fly cool, but I never flew mine either before I got rid of it. So if you fly yours, let me know.

[01:06:33] It probably won't happen. I'll probably sell it.

[01:06:36] An E-flight Sukhoi, the green one. And then we have here the E-flight Viper 90, which is your prep for the next one, which is a boomerang Elan 140.

[01:06:48] But, just to rewind to the, to the Viper one, it was my first ever, ever experience flying an EDF.

[01:06:57] And, or, or a jet at all, I, I, and I was blown away.

[01:07:02] Right. Yeah. So I wanted to, I wanted to bring that up because I, I, okay. So we have talked about before, I'm sorry, now I'm getting flustered. So we've talked about before the fact that I want to get into turbines in the next couple of years, most likely. Right. and so that was what you have here is actually pretty close to what my exact thought was start off with the 90 millimeter, the Viper.

[01:07:23] Cause those, I've, I've know a couple of people that have them and they fly wonderfully. yes, I've not flown one before though. What, like compare it to a normal airplane? Like what, do you see a lot of differences in it or is it just pretty much like any other airplane you've flown just propellers smaller and in a, that's inside of a tube. And it sounds like a hairdryer.

[01:07:46] Right. Right. Well, yeah, it does. so the, the one major difference is that, flying, I do have a tendency of overpowering my airplanes.

[01:07:55] No, I noticed that was a third, or a third scale cut up with a 120 CC motor.

[01:08:00] Yeah. Yeah. That, that's just ridiculous. But, it's at the, there's a slight bit of lag associated with the EDF. when you don't have that prop thrust over your control surfaces, it's, it's noticeable, but I will say the way, I used to be one of those, I didn't like AS3X, people just because I was basing it off of early, early, early AS3X technology,?

[01:08:30] And again, everything, there was a huge lag between when I got out of the hobby and when I got back in and then the amount of time when the boys came along with the amount of available flying time, fortunately for me, the technology progressed so much that it definitely skewed my perspective. the, the, the, the Viper, it has the AS3X, but I don't, I guess there are two options for AS3X where it has safer, just AS3X.

[01:08:55] So I just fly in the AS with the, I guess the, the AS3X version, not the non-safe, right version of the receiver and just, just the flight characteristics of it. it w it was, man, it, it was, it definitely re re, directed my, just my, I guess enthusiasm for flying an EDF jet, cause I, before the major holdup and it still is, is the short flight times, but I typically don't fly.

[01:09:25] I, the left stick is not a switch for me, so I definitely modulate the throttle and, I was able to get six minutes flights, no problem.

[01:09:34] Yeah.

[01:09:35] Cause typically the guys that I, that have flown that plane here locally, three and a half minutes and you need to land and I was squeaking out, six, six and a half minute flights. But I typically, I just like to see the airplane fly by at a maybe medium speed, just cause I just appreciate the lines of the airplane. I'm just one of those guys. I don't, I don't need to burn holes in the sky.

[01:09:56] I just, I really like looking at airplanes and, and, and flying them. It doesn't have to be the fastest thing around, even though it's more than capable. Cause I tried that and it's just, it's just, yeah, it's just, it's a, it's a wonderful flying airplane.

[01:10:09] A low, slow pass is like gorgeous to me. And that's, that's what I like seeing and like doing too.

[01:10:14] So yeah, drop the flaps to landing flaps, keep the gear up and just, keep it barely in the sky. It's just awesome.

[01:10:22] And see, I, I kind of used to be on your side too, about the AS3X stuff until like, I always thought it was cheating, but it was, it was explained to me, like we're members of Eli field. And when we were over talking to some of the horizon guys, it was explained to me in a way that actually made it click with me to where I'm like, okay, now I fully understand it, which it's, it's weird how you can hear one sentence that changes your mind on things. But the guy said, go on.

[01:10:49] No, go ahead.

[01:10:50] I was going to say what, what he, or the way he explained it to me was it's like driving a car and imagine having a car that has no suspension whatsoever. Yeah. It's still going to get you from point A to point B, but when you hit the pot roads or potholes in the road, you're going to, you're going to see it. It's going to be problematic. It's not going to be as smooth of a ride with AS3X.

[01:11:10] It's like putting suspension on the car and you're still completely in control over what the car is doing, where it's going, all that kind of stuff. It's just smoothing out the potholes in the road when you're driving. And it's like, Oh, that makes a lot of sense to me.

[01:11:24] And I used to share that point of view as well, because my perspective of gyro or assisted gyro flying was a, I had an Eagle Tree Guardian, in a, a park zone, extra 300, a foam, the foam orange airplane. And, so that was my first venture into, flying with a gyro and, I made a bonehead mistake that one of the gains was opposite of, or the, yeah, the correction on the elevator was opposite.

[01:11:53] So it hit up, I turned on the gyro, I trimmed the airplane, turned on the gyro and it made a beeline for the ground. And that was probably the fastest I've ever switched the switch on my transmitter. And I grabbed the full, a handful of, elevator brought it back around and realized the mistake that I'd made, and, and, and adjusted it. But, this, again, this is over 10 year old technology.

[01:12:19] And, the, what, what people most, often describe it as, is that it feels like it's interfering when you're flying,? And that particular gyro definitely felt like, it was interfering with what I was wanting to do.

[01:12:32] Back then.

[01:12:33] Yeah. And, yeah. And, and now the gyros are just incorporated in, at least the, the spectrum gyros, they're incorporated into the receiver and the way the, the pre-programmed one and the Viper, at least, the way it flew, it was, it felt very, very, very minimally invasive.

[01:12:51] So, I mean, only time you could really notice that it was, that it had a gyro is if you're doing a four point, roll, and it's trying to correct, granted, it was one of those windy days, but when I say very, it's, if you really had to pick out a negative, on this particular airframe again, it, that was the only thing that I would have to complain about. And I didn't complain about it at all,? Yeah.

[01:13:14] It's kind of the way it is with my carbon ZT 28. Don't even know it's there. Yeah. Until I roll it inverted and then it's trying to fight to pull the airplane back upright. But other than that, you never even know it's there. Yeah.

[01:13:25] Yeah. And the one, when I would notice it is if you're doing, your first, like again, put a four point roll, that first 90 degree turn, that's when you can kind of feel it. And then as you roll it, roll it to inverted, you can kind of feel it again. And then the next 90 degrees kind of, and then as you're rolling, going back to right side up, it's just, it's back to business. But again, you guys are talking about gyros.

[01:13:47] I live in West Texas now and the wind blows pretty much all the time. and that, that, that alone will make you a believer, I don't, not all of my airplanes have gyros, but I don't frown on the ones that do, because I actually, they, they really do open up more flying days, and on a day that you otherwise would not fly just because of the wind. Well, that's almost a thing of the past.

[01:14:11] Well, and here's how I look at it. If, if it's a tool and it, makes flying more enjoyable, then you're probably going to fly more and get more out of the hobby. So who cares? what I mean?

[01:14:23] Right. Yeah.

[01:14:23] That's the way I look at it now.

[01:14:25] So, yeah.

[01:14:26] And I, I used to feel the same way, Bjorn, I used to feel exactly the same way. Well, I don't need a gyro to control my airplane. I'm in control of my own airplane, but yeah, I've gone away from that now too, because just like you said, it's so seamless. I'm sorry, just like Ron said, it just kind of smooths out the bumps. It's not doing the flying for you. You're still flying. And it's just making it better and more enjoyable.

[01:14:48] I think there's some confusion between AS3X and safe and all that kind of stuff to where it's not safe.

[01:14:53] Yeah. And, and I will tell you, I was one of those confused by it until I actually took the time to read the manual and understand it. that's because I really believe that probably in the past. And again, just like with that Eagle Tree, guardian gyro setup that, the Momo behind the controller doing the setup, which was me, I made the mistake. And, the same thing would probably apply with, say for AS3X setting up. Yeah.

[01:15:21] Yeah. I agree completely. And I know what you mean about the, like the four point rules and stuff. I have one of the eFlight YACs and it does, I mean, like with that one, it just seems like as soon as you stop giving it input on the aileron, it's just locked. Yes. Yes. And that it's, it's very, I mean, it's kind of reassuring, but yeah, it does. It's, it does a good job on that. So yeah, it's there, but you're right. It's, it's background stuff that just works good.

[01:15:47] Now I, I noticed one thing on your list that you don't have any UMX, type airplanes listed. Have you ever flown any of the UMX stuff with AS3X on it?

[01:16:00] Yeah, very many, many years ago, but that was an indoor, I think it was the second flight. when, horizon had the, I think they have the Sukhoi now or it's either Sukhoi or YAC, but they used to have a green extra green and white. I don't know if you guys are familiar with that.

[01:16:18] I think I know what you're talking about. I have the old Sukhoi that doesn't have AS3X built into it, the UMX version.

[01:16:23] Okay. Well, the one that I had, it was, it was, it looked like it's a profile, but it was a green and white, extra 300.

[01:16:31] Yeah. And I know that the, yeah, I got you now. Sorry.

[01:16:34] It flew great until, again, we were having an indoor, I hate too many people flying, but we had a midair and that pretty much retired that particular airframe. And I, I loved the way it was, I was getting it, trimmed and exactly flying the way I liked it. And then we had a midair and that ended up. Yeah.

[01:16:53] Yeah. I've got a couple of the, the UMX, YAC, the profile ones. Orange one. Yeah. The orange one or red. It's a red and white. Yeah. That's it. And when I, I saw another one up the hobby shop a couple of months ago or whatever, and Tommy made fun of me so much for buying a spare to it, but they fly so great and you can't get parts for them anymore that.

[01:17:13] But, and they are really, really flimsy.

[01:17:15] Like, I know. And that's how they're supposed to be though, but you can crash them and they don't break.

[01:17:20] Yeah. I can tell by the tone of your voice that the hobby shop owner was definitely twisting your arm to get that one.

[01:17:27] No, actually, I'll be honest. I think that was priced a little higher than I should have paid for it. But especially cause the other one I bought was at a, at a swap meet, but I knew that those are the only two I've ever actually seen. So it was worth it to me.

[01:17:41] All right. So they're joining the family of unobtainium.

[01:17:44] Yes, exactly.

[01:17:45] It's getting there, unfortunately.

[01:17:47] So Ron really wants to hear you talk about the boomerang. Yes.

[01:17:50] So now let's move on to that. So.

[01:17:51] Well, I, I, I won't, I'll provide as much information as I can, but full disclosure, it has not flown yet.

[01:17:58] Well, it says, we can talk about it. Yeah. Yeah. No, I, I understand that. Okay. So what made you decide to go with that airplane? because there, I mean, there are so many different turbine kind of trainer things. What, what made you go with that one?

[01:18:15] Well, ultimately the, just the research that I did, and I'll play it up as much as I can till I tell you the truth. but, ultimately it's the research of that particular airplane and it's many iterations and manufacturers that have made that design. But, for me kind of dipping my toes on the, in the, in the pool of, of the turbine world, it, it, it'll do everything that I wanted to do.

[01:18:42] Aerobatics, slow speed characteristics that I mentioned, slow speed characteristics. Yeah. yes. With, just, I wanted something very predictable. I wanted something that was stable. I wanted something that I can actually enjoy. And I also, and here's the truth. I also wanted something where the dollar signs wouldn't obstruct my enjoyment of that particular airframe.

[01:19:03] Yeah. Yeah. I totally get that.

[01:19:06] Yeah. So, I, I heard you guys talk about it on your past podcast, but you, you can, if you look and you look often enough, you can definitely find a good enough deal because, this particular airframe, it came up and I, I saw it, I think the third or fourth time that I saw it, I think I'd made the decision, but, it was, it was in out of Waco, Texas and a friend of mine, James, he, he, it's all practically local to him.

[01:19:31] So I sent him a text message and he went and got it for me. So, and he's, that's more central Texas and I'm in, in West Texas. So, James, he travels back and forth for work. So it was a easy enough, arrangement to be made.

[01:19:46] So did you, did you have to do any assembly or anything like that? Or was it ready to go when you got it?

[01:19:51] Ready to go. The only thing I'm, I have to do is put my, my own, it'll have a jetty receiver, or a receiver cause it's, it's set up on, on spectrum now, but it'll fly on, on jetty.

[01:20:04] Yeah. That's, that's interesting. So then you got it all ready to go. You did, I mean, moto is installed and everything in it for you.

[01:20:09] Yeah. I think it's flown maybe once or twice. It hasn't seen much airtime at all. And just, looking at the overall condition of the airframe, yeah, it's probably been more of a static model than anything.

[01:20:20] Yeah. Well, that's cool. I can't wait to hear that or how that flies because, I saw one of these fly over in Monticello and yeah, you're not, you're not wrong about how well it slows down on those. I mean, like he was making some really slow, low passes and it was a very nice looking airplane.

[01:20:37] Well, I'll tell you one thing. When, when, so James, my friend who picked it up for me, he, he chatted with the owner of this, of that, airframe and he said, on, on landing. So your approach flaps definitely want to go with the book, the rec with the book recommends.

[01:20:53] And I, when James told me they're practically 90 degrees, so they are definitely, you would consider them barn doors, into the, incoming airstream, but, So they're creating more drag than lift. Oh yeah. Oh my goodness. It's, it's practically a barn door, and, and they are definitely 90 degrees and you wouldn't think that, for an airframe like that, it would, it would be necessary. But, apparently it is.

[01:21:18] And I'll let you guys know how, how it goes on, on the maiden.

[01:21:21] Well, that's interesting. It's interesting that you say that because, I have one of those Taft Hobby, 90 millimeter Vipers. It seems like everybody does a Viper. but the same thing when, when I got it all set up and I, I cycled the flaps, like what I would call approach flaps was, 15 degrees or so. And then I clicked the third position and they went almost 90 degrees.

[01:21:45] I'm like, wow, I can't believe that's accurate, but it sounds like that's a, that's a thing. Yeah. So yeah.

[01:21:51] Depending on the airframe.

[01:21:52] Yeah. I have not flown it with them deployed that far yet. Cause we have a nice long field and I got plenty of, well, but still go up high. I'm going to try it. Now that, you've sort of confirmed that that's actually a thing. yeah.

[01:22:06] So I have by, by no means an expert. I am an advanced beginner, sir, but not even, you won't even give yourself intermediate.

[01:22:16] Come on.

[01:22:17] Oh no, I'm an advanced beginner. I've said that for many, many, many years.

[01:22:22] All right. some more details on this particular, on the boomerang. it's the Elon version. It it's designed for an 85. Typically what would you would find as an 85 size turbine? Oh, this one has 140. So I am continuing the theme of overpowering.

[01:22:38] Yeah, so, well, with the bigger, with the bigger motor, will you, will you, I mean, obviously the fuel consumption will be more. So have you also increased the tank size or can you, the thing that now granted it's,

[01:22:54] It's, it's ready to fly. So the fuel tank and, I think it's standard with, with turbines, but the fuel tank on this thing, I've never seen such a big fuel tank on anything that I've flown. And that includes my 170 CC, piston engine airplanes. And I thought, 50 ounce, 64 ounce tanks are big. No, this, this is, yeah, this is going to be concerning for my fuel budget. We'll just say that. Yeah.

[01:23:22] It's cheaper than, it's cheaper than glow fuel.

[01:23:24] Yeah. It's kerosene though. Right. So that shouldn't be too bad.

[01:23:27] Yeah.

[01:23:27] Although I don't know.

[01:23:29] Yeah. I'm telling myself that, trying to convince myself that as well. But, I think overall it's one of those considerations when you do make the step into, like, like I said, you dip your toes in, into the deep end and you start to, get into turbines. it's, it's, it's just one of those things. Fuel, fuel costs is, is minimal compared to the grand scheme of everything else.

[01:23:53] Yeah.

[01:23:54] So.

[01:23:55] Yep. Cool. But then, do you want to ask him? And like, I was going to say like with a bigger engine too, you're not going to be running full throttle all the time. So it's not going to be sucking fuel as fast as.

[01:24:05] Right. So I don't have my, I don't have my turbine waiver yet, but I have several guys local to me that, that fly turbines, which for those listening and are wanting to dip their toes into the turbine world, if you do have a local, group or individual that flies turbines, that makes it, I mean, by, by many, many, what's the word I'm looking for?

[01:24:32] Orders of magnitude.

[01:24:33] Orders of magnitude. It makes it so much easier because they're, it's, it's a, it's a different animal. There are different setups and, and what you would, or what a turbine person would consider the norm. When you come over from the glow or gas or electric world, you would have no idea that that's the way something would be set up, or what, what a norm would be.

[01:24:55] So, I know if Steve is listening, he's our, he's our local, he, I would consider him the turbine guru, but, I've probably asked him the same question, probably 30, 40 different ways, just so that I could understand and make sure I had a full appreciation for, just not only just the questions and just my natural curiosity, but, just to get a good understanding before I made that leap.

[01:25:22] Yeah. Yeah. And I'm, I'm kind of the same way. Like I know I'm not to the point of doing a turbine yet. So I'm not even looking because I don't want to get in trouble and find one I really, really like. And then, cause that, like I said, that is still like a year and a half, two year goal kind of thing. So as soon as we get closer, I'm going to reach out to, it, it seems like all the guys over in Monticello at Eli field all have like multiples.

[01:25:49] So they, they will be a great source of information to have somebody local enough to where we can go talk to them. Yeah. but I will definitely be waiting until I'm closer to that time.

[01:25:58] Well, you might, you might even strike it, strike lucky. And, maybe one of those folks have either, a boomerang or a airplane like that. And they might even be able to buddy box you and, so you can dip your toes in and, have that safety.

[01:26:14] Except Ron doesn't like flying other people's airplanes. Well, if it's on a buddy box, that's different because they're making, they're in control. You'll make an exception for that.

[01:26:22] Well, I don't, it's, it's really gonna, it's really gonna open your eyes. what I mean? If someone's genuinely, and you're genuine about, being inquisitive and, I would really like to fly one before I make that financial decision.

[01:26:34] I'm sure you can probably find someone that's willing to set up, an airplane for you to fly and, keep it, four mistakes high and, just so you can get enough of the experience and exposure to make it a yay or nay decision, because you never know if it's something that, if it's a type of airframe and you happen to, the moon and the stars and all, everything lines up for you to, to be able to set up a buddy box situation and you actually fly it.

[01:27:01] And to your surprise, you may not like it. That's the, that's better. That's a better way to actually, I guess, find out rather than after a financial commitment.

[01:27:10] I never even thought of that. That's a great advice. That's a good, very good point. Yeah. And, although I can't imagine I wouldn't like it.

[01:27:16] There's so many guys there that have them. I wouldn't be surprised if one of them was like, well, well, Hey, here you go.

[01:27:21] I'll set up a date or something. Yeah. I'll definitely have to reach out. Like I said, so.

[01:27:25] Yeah. Awesome. All right. So I'm going to, because I'm a completionist, I'm going to quickly finish your list. so after the boomerang, we had the, yeah, the two drones. I'm just going to skim over those real quick.

[01:27:37] Let me read what they are.

[01:27:39] Okay. He's got a DJI FPV, and then a DJI Mavic, Mavic Pro.

[01:27:45] Mavic Pro. Mavic Pro. Okay.

[01:27:47] There. You happy? Next, we have the Twisted Hobbies Crack Yak, which I assume is a profile.

[01:27:54] Yeah, it's a foam, foamy profile.

[01:27:56] Okay. And then a couple of JTAs, an extra and a yak. What's a JTA? do?

[01:28:03] Jace, Jace Duccia. Oh, okay. It's his company.

[01:28:06] Yeah. He's got his own suite. Excellent flyer, by the way. We saw him like, not to go off the rails here, but many, many years ago, the club. 2013. Oh, so you do remember. Yeah.

[01:28:18] So that was my first experience, believe it or not, with RC airplanes. Like the week before, is when I went to the hobby shop to buy my first airplane. And then that's when they told me that they were having a fly in the next weekend at the local club.

[01:28:32] Yeah.

[01:28:33] That's when I went. And Jace was the first person I saw fly. Yeah. And I was like, oh, so this is what it is? Yeah. No, it's not what it is, by the way. That is, that is not normal.

[01:28:42] Like how old was he? Eight, nine then? I have no idea. I mean, he was just a- However old he was in 2013.

[01:28:49] Yeah. He was just a little guy. How old is Jace? I don't know.

[01:28:51] Yeah, he's young. He's still pretty young.

[01:28:53] Yeah. 20?

[01:28:54] Maybe.

[01:28:54] Yeah. He just had a birthday. I want to say maybe 20 or 21. He just had his birthday. Well, then there you go. Yeah. We saw him.

[01:29:02] Yeah. Yeah.

[01:29:02] We saw him two years ago at Ice House. That was probably one of the biggest events that we'd been to. But he was there. And talk about recalibrating your perspective on what this hobby or what, what people are capable of. Of what's capable. Oh, man. He did maneuvers that I thought the fuselage should have kept going one way and the wings the other way. it's just, it was absolutely amazing.

[01:29:27] Yeah.

[01:29:28] And, my wife and we were all there. And everybody was just in awe, whether you were in the hobby or not. It was just amazing. It was just an amazing experience just watching him fly.

[01:29:40] Yeah.

[01:29:40] He's a very good pilot. Yeah.

[01:29:42] Even back then at 10 years old. Yeah. I was blown away with what he could make an airplane do.

[01:29:48] Still, I'm absolutely a quarter of what he can do at my stage right now. So, yeah. If that much, to be honest.

[01:29:56] And then very talented. Very talented. For sure. Last on the list is a multiplex funny cub. I'm not sure I know what that is. I mean, I know what a cub is, but what's a funny cub?

[01:30:07] It's also one of those flat foamy profiles, but it's mostly for indoor. You can fly it outdoors, but it's.

[01:30:13] You've got a lot of tools, if what I mean. Tools is in the profile foamies. Oh, yeah.

[01:30:18] Yes, yes, yes. Right. And, for me, just when we, so we have two, I wish we had more, but we only have two major indoor events. And we have one coming up, which is at the CAF or the Commemorative Air Force here at the local airport, they pull out. It's probably one of the most awesome flying environment or backgrounds that you can have.

[01:30:44] I mean, you have warbirds just in the background, and we have our little, $100 foamies or whatever the case may be, just flying in, in the open area, open space. It's just one of those things where you kind of have to, just take a pause and just really appreciate what, what we're actually doing. Yeah, full scale, any, quite a few different era warbirds just in the background.

[01:31:07] And then we're just flying our foamies in that, in that hangar. That's awesome.

[01:31:11] Yeah.

[01:31:11] Yeah.

[01:31:12] And then we have another one. They have quite a collection of airplanes, actually. Yes, yes, they do. They get them out, periodically. And I think they fly some of them up to, up to Reno, when the, when the races are going on.

[01:31:24] Yeah.

[01:31:24] Yeah. I love, I love everything they do. It's awesome. And their collection is amazing.

[01:31:29] Oh, it's, it's wonderful. And then the other one is in San Angelo and that's, that's a big arena. Just the big, big, big area. So, and it's, it's just awesome. It's just flying indoors. And we have some, probably some of the most creative people that I've ever met, and I've seen some large, ridiculously lightweight, just somebody thought of something to make and they made it and made it fly, made it fly well.

[01:31:55] So it's just, it's just, it's just one of those things where I guess, the nostalgia just kind of gets to me. I just kind of have to take a minute and then just kind of take it all in and really appreciate that. This is one, it's just a hobby air quotes. It's just a hobby. Yeah. But, it's just so many different aspects of it.

[01:32:12] Really, I mean, yeah, it's a hobby, but to me, it feels like more of a community, especially now with social media and being able to connect so easily. Yeah. It's, it's a community to me more than a hobby. Yeah.

[01:32:24] Yeah. And like, like I mentioned, when we bought that trainer, I didn't put two and two together until the guy who I bought the airplane from said, Oh yeah, I put your ring in this engine and I remembered a story because it was a similar situation as you, Tom, where he ordered the wrong ring. Thanks for bringing that up again. But we had a, we made a connection, that, that's, that's ultimately what I'm getting at.

[01:32:48] We made a connection and, and, and we're just talking and then from that led to, we had a really nice Mustang in his garage and my wife is like, we're not, I know we're not going to leave and you're not going to talk about the Mustang. So we stayed and talked about the Mustang.

[01:33:02] Okay. Sorry. Since you brought that back up, what year was it?

[01:33:06] It was a 94. Oh, cool. Yeah. And I had a, a 93. So I had a Fox body. So you had a Fox.

[01:33:13] Yeah.

[01:33:14] You had a last of the Fox body. Yeah.

[01:33:16] Well, I've got a 90 Fox body convertible. So yeah. Nice. I had an 01 convertible. Yeah. Dave's got an 01 convertible.

[01:33:23] Oh yeah.

[01:33:23] That's very nice.

[01:33:24] Awesome. Yeah. The, the, the, the, the 93 I had, I found in a junkyard and it was a four cylinder. And I wanted the, the notch back. I want to, I love that body style. The, Sleepers. Yes. And the owner, he said, well, the lady that dropped this car off, she gave us the title because she couldn't afford the bill for the head gasket. It was, like I said, it was a four cylinder automatic and I bought it.

[01:33:49] I practically stole it, but bought it, drug it home and, converted, gotten converted it over to a five speed. So it ended up having a three 31 stroker with a 70 millimeter turbo and a, a five speed TKO 500. Nice. Just to handle the, the torque.

[01:34:08] Yeah.

[01:34:08] But, again, just kind of continuing on with my tradition of ridiculously overpowered. Yeah.

[01:34:14] My, so my, my first Mustang, I ended up, it was a V eight to begin with, with an automatic transmission. I tore that out and put a, five speed in, and then I put a three 47 stroker kit in it. So nice. The rear main seal was going out. So that's when you have to pull a motor to change it anyway. So it was like, yeah, why not?

[01:34:31] So yeah, I wanted the, I wanted to take advantage of the rod stroke ratio of the three 31 and a force induction application. So that, that's why I, I, it was a toss up between a three 47 or three 31, but longevity wise, the three 31 was going to give me more of what I wanted.

[01:34:45] Yeah. Ironically enough, I never drove that car when I finished it. cause I never finished it. I just got rid of it and then bought another one that was bone stock. And as it sits, it's still bone stock.

[01:34:57] So if I ever, if I ever did it again, I would probably end up with the 91 or 93 notch back LX again, and probably a four cylinder that hadn't been beat up, but more likely probably a, a 427, all naturally aspirated high RPM. Nice. Yeah. Yeah.

[01:35:14] Yeah. My first car was an 88 LX hatchback four cylinder manual transmission. So yeah.

[01:35:21] No, we're fast.

[01:35:23] No, it, it sounded loud, but it, it couldn't get up its own way. It was pretty bad. Yeah. I think it was 90 horsepower.

[01:35:31] Yeah. I think when the last dyno numbers I remember on mine was over 700 foot pounds of torque and close enough to close with the horsepower as well. And this was on low boost, on a street tune. So yeah, very fun times. But then my, my daughter came along and I needed to keep my job and my driver's license. So I had to get rid of it.

[01:35:50] Oh yeah. Yeah. Those are, those are fun cars. So,

[01:35:54] Well, they're the kind of car that you cannot keep your foot out of it because it's, it's just so ridiculous. So it's such a light airplane.

[01:36:01] Yeah. The sound and everything just, yes. But for us up here, it's not a winter car. Like no, that killed me so much. Like you cannot drive it at all in snow. So mine has never seen the snow.

[01:36:14] Yeah. Well, it can't,

[01:36:15] I mean, it will not go anywhere.

[01:36:17] Wet pavement is hard enough to drive.

[01:36:19] Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well, that got us way off topic. I'm sorry. When you say Mustang, that's what gets me, but I didn't mean to cut you off. You're still talking about your, when you met with that other guy with your.

[01:36:33] So now it was, it was just one of those, connections, in the hobby that if you really think about it other than, one, I'm a vendor in the hobby, but had, had any, all the other circumstances been different. One, I, we would have never met, let alone him and invite us over to, just to, we, we met his, his, him and his wife.

[01:36:55] And this is a very nice, it's just one of those things, the connections that you would otherwise with circumstances being different, you'll probably never make those connections, let alone just, just because of our hobby, and you make, make those connections.

[01:37:08] I mean, this is a primary example of, you guys have been doing a fantastic job with your podcast and you're, you're meeting all different kinds of people and, and vendors and different aspects of the hobby. And we're just striking up a conversation because we have that one common thread is our hobby.

[01:37:24] I could not have said that better myself. Yeah.

[01:37:27] Yep. Well, I tell you what, Bjorn, this is, has been a blast. I mean, and I could, I could go, I could go on for hours, but unfortunately I'm an old guy and I've been sitting a long time. So I think this would be a good, a good place to, to wrap it up.

[01:37:41] I think I know what that means.

[01:37:45] I'm so glad you, you agreed to do this Bjorn. Thanks for the, for the, the insight into what it takes to, to run. Absolutely. I mean, let's be honest, a niche business and to do it successfully and, and to the appreciation of people like me. I'm so glad you, you picked up the reins and continued on.

[01:38:05] Well, I would like to take the opportunity to not only thank you guys for, for reaching out. So we could sit down and do this and take the time to do this, but I, for everybody listening and for, whenever it's published, I'll, I'll share it on our, on our website and our, my wife probably do it, but on our Instagram and Facebook page. Right. Thank you. Like I said, I've got an, I've got so much stuff going on.

[01:38:28] So we'll share it with our, with our customer base. And, for those that are listening, whether you're seasoned veterans to the podcast, or you're going to be, newly christened to this, this, this, this podcast or this episode, I just wanted to take a moment and say, thank you. We, we, we, we started this endeavor just to primarily to continue on with the legacy and, and continue on with the reputation and everything that Frank had done.

[01:38:56] And, I do get, I do get feedback from Frank, from, from old customers that he's had over the years, just to kind of reiterate and for him that he's made the right decision and picking us to continue on with his legacy, but also, for our current customers, our existing customers, our repeat customers, we. And future customers. Again, see my, my wife is keeping me on track, but just, we, we just want to say thank you.

[01:39:27] It's been, it's been definitely been a wild ride as, as time, finances and technology keeps getting better and better. our processes are getting better. Our efficiencies are getting better. And, just one, our communication and availability to our customers is also getting better. So if you, if you aren't a customer of ours, we, we invite you to try, try our product.

[01:39:53] If you have some more specific questions that I may not have covered, please, by, by all means, reach out. We can be reached via our, our website. We have a question correspondence there on the website. We can be reached through our Facebook page, through messenger. We can be reached through Instagram. Our, my phone number is on our website. So it's, we have multiple ways of communicating. So if you have, again, if you have any questions, you have any,

[01:40:23] Maybe one off, or if you're in the middle of a restoration, which you, where you can't get any, any piston rings, just give us, give us a call and we can, we can talk and we can more than likely provide a solution for you. So I just wanted to say, I just wanted to say, in not so many words, thank you.

[01:40:41] No, you've done a fine job. I think, I think on behalf of, probably the tens of listeners that still listen to our podcast, there's a large percentage of us that are thankful that you guys do that. So like I said, I'm, I appreciate it and look forward to buying more stuff in the future.

[01:41:03] Awesome. Awesome. And I guess it may, for, for those that don't know or don't, cause everybody, we're, we're so suspicious of things or I guess if you want to hear from the horse's mouth, we do have one designated U S distributor and that's, that's Valley view RC.

[01:41:20] Oh,

[01:41:21] They've, they've, they've really worked, earned their reputation and the hobby, just for honesty and, and, and just everything that they do in their hobby. So they're, they are one distributor in the U S D LE Australia. They are now under AR radio or Buma RC, excuse me, that's Buma RC. So the same company B O O M E R. No, no B O O M A.

[01:41:51] Oh, okay.

[01:41:52] Yeah. Buma RC. So for, for the, for the guy, okay. If you're going to get into jets and you may hear about the AR radio or smooth flight, those components, the, the, they're the manufacturers of it, but they took over for, the, the folks that were running D LE Australia. So they are Australian distributors for D LE rings. so we're, we're kind of off and on working on, potential distributorships throughout the world.

[01:42:20] But we potentially may have something working in Europe, but with the situation in Europe, that, I think everybody's aware. so that's, that's been on hold, but, once the cloud or the dust settles, we'll definitely, carry on with that. But I just wanted everybody to, to know exactly who, who we, we associate with on a distributor basis. And, but yeah, that's, that's all right on.

[01:42:47] Ron, do you got anything else? I think I am good. This has been fun,

[01:42:50] Dave.

[01:42:50] I'm perfectly fine.

[01:42:52] All right. Well, Bjorn, thank you again. it's been, it's been a blast and I would love to continue, but like I said, I'm going to have to get up and move these old legs. So, on behalf of, the crew. Thanks again. And, unless you have anything else to say, I think we'll wrap it up.

[01:43:09] I think we're good. I think I've said enough today.

[01:43:12] All right. Thanks for listening.

[01:43:13] Thanks guys.

[01:43:14] All right. And, thanks for listening. And I'm Tom, I'm Ron, I'm Dave,

[01:43:17] And this is Bjorn with RMJ machine works. I just wanted to say thank you and good night, everybody.

[01:43:22] We hope you enjoyed this episode of the RC plane lab podcast for topic suggestions, to ask questions or to give any feedback, connect with us at rcplanelab.com or email us, direct at either Ron at rcplanelab.com or Tom at rcplanelab.com. You can also text us or leave us a voicemail at 818-351-9846. Please subscribe, rate, and review us on your favorite podcast app until next time. May your landings be gentle.