Ep 214: Old Beavers, Ironic Howls, and Wing Loading

[00:00:03] Hello, everyone. Welcome to the RC Plane Lab Podcast. I’m Ron. And I’m Dave. No Tommy this week. No Tommy. No Tommy. He’s a little too cool to play with us tonight. Hopefully next time. If not, maybe the time after that. And if not, well… You’re stuck with me again. It’s just us. So it’s been a little bit longer than we usually like to go between episodes.

[00:00:37] I will take some of the brunt of that because we had some family vacations and trips and that kind of stuff planned that we did And I honestly could not fit recording into our schedule.

[00:00:50] Sorry.

[00:00:51] Dave.

[00:00:51] Yeah. You take your summer sabbatical. And then how about you, Dave? Unfortunately, and I don’t really want to touch on this a whole lot, we’ve had some issues within my family. My mother ended up passing at the end of June and my wife is not well, so I’ve been having to work with that. So I’ve not been doing a whole lot of modeling and or flying, but we’re going to try to keep on track as much as we can.

[00:01:18] Yeah. I’m sorry to hear about your mom and your wife, but I will say even with all of that, you have done more than me. Anyway. Anyway. Anyway, I know.

[00:01:30] You’ve got to keep yourself busy sometimes.

[00:01:33] Yeah, I get that.

[00:01:34] I get that.

[00:01:35] And so it’s always good for that. Yeah. It does do that, doesn’t it? Honestly, so that I’ll take the spotlight on you saying that because I have not flown for a little while. And I finally made it out to the field in Monticello for the meeting and I finally took an airplane with me and got a couple of flights in. I forgot just honestly how relaxing it can be when there’s nobody else around. There’s no, there’s no pressure.

[00:02:12] There’s no. I got to wait for somebody else to land. I got to wait. The last couple of times I’ve flown or been out at the field has been a fly in or something like that, to where it’s busy.

[00:02:22] Yeah. A little more pressure.

[00:02:24] Which is more fun a lot of times. But there are times where it’s nice just to get out with you or with your group of friends, not have any other care in the world and just relax and fly.

[00:02:36] And when you’re flying, you can’t think about much else.

[00:02:38] Right. It does keep your mind on the airplane.

[00:02:43] So in my situation, I’ve not been able to get out to fly much. I’ve been able to stay at home, but I’ve been doing a little workshop time and got some projects finished. Yeah.

[00:02:52] We will talk about that shortly, too. So what do you want to get into next? You want to start on some of the new things that we have seen come out?

[00:03:02] Yeah, we’ve got some new stuff coming out.

[00:03:03] So since we have been so remiss in recording, there are actually several airplanes that we have to talk about tonight that we have seen announced, I’m pretty sure, since the last time we recorded right.

[00:03:16] Yeah, all this is new since a month ago.

[00:03:22] And there’s a couple of them that I’m actually kind of excited about. And I’m not saying I’m going to buy them, but I’m thinking about it.

[00:03:29] That’s nice. Yeah.

[00:03:31] So I’ll let you start with one. Let’s go back, forth, back, forth, back, forth.

[00:03:36] Okay. Well, the most recent one I think I’ve came across was the Free Wing People’s Liberation Army Air Force JL-8 80mm EDF from Free Wing. Looks like it comes with a gyro, and it’s a good-looking airplane. I’m not overly familiar with the JL-8 airframe. That’s not an aircraft that I’m used to seeing anywhere.

[00:04:01] Used to seeing, yeah.

[00:04:02] It’s got a lot of L-39 look to it, to me. Kind of looks like a Chinese copy of an L-39. Straight wing. So this will lead into something later. The straight wing will give you good slow-fly characteristics. No harsh stalls. It’s an 8, excuse me, a 6S power system, 100-amp speed control with thrust reverse. It’s pretty standard stuff. Quick-release wings. It’s got a gyro built in. It’s got a fairly detailed-looking airframe with pitot tubes and antennas and so forth.

[00:04:39] Generally, nice-looking Free Wing. Free Wing always does a good job with their paint jobs and so forth. It’s got screwless quick-release wings, so you don’t have to worry about punching them with a screwdriver. Ask me how I know. And it’s got a high-performance 6S system in it. The Free Wing systems always seem to work pretty well. It’s got the scale LED lights. Large, easy-access battery hatch.

[00:05:06] Gives you room to move the battery around if you’re one of the folks that likes to fly with a more rearward CG. And it’s designed to run on a 6L, 4,000 to 6,000 milliamp pack. Comes pretty much everything you would expect from a Free Wing airplane. And the price would be $525, so not bad for an 80 millimeter with gyro. And what? Plug and play.

[00:05:36] Yeah, plug and play. Okay.

[00:05:39] Okay. Generally a good-looking airplane.

[00:05:43] Yeah.

[00:05:44] Different. Got some wingtip, not wingtip tags. It’s got some drop tags under the wing, which I’m sure are removable.

[00:05:50] Yeah.

[00:05:51] So if you’re into Chinese aircraft, take a look at the JL-8 from Free Wing.

[00:05:58] Cool. Next. So this one’s from Hobby King. This is the Durafly Curtis P40 Warhawk V2 Aleutian Tiger. 1100 millimeter plug and play, 43.3-ish inch wingspan for us American people that don’t really know much about.

[00:06:19] Oh, I didn’t give you a wingspan on that, but oh well.

[00:06:22] Well, you got it. You can go back really quick.

[00:06:24] I can’t reach it.

[00:06:25] He’s already throwing his paper on the floor. He was finished with it and he discarded it, but now he had to rush and grab it.

[00:06:37] I even highlighted it here somewhere. Oh my goodness. Yeah, continue on with yours. I’ll get back to you on that.

[00:06:44] So anyway, this is apparently a re-release of a previous release, which is usually how re-releases go.

[00:06:54] Generally.

[00:06:55] So a couple of nice things on this. It has the functional scale split flaps, which is kind of cool. That’s always cool on a P40. Right. And I love the Aleutian Tiger scheme. And they, I don’t even know what that one is, but apparently those that know more than me know much more than me.

[00:07:11] It’s got the yellow tiger head on the nose. It’s got the shark’s teeth.

[00:07:15] Yeah, it does. I made the mistake of printing this on my black and white printer, so I don’t see any color stuff. The show budget definitely went down. Well, anyway. So, yeah, like I said, so this one says it has a heavy duty metal twist and turn retracts with spring loaded oleo struts for less nose over issues. It is running on a 900 kV motor, 45 amp brushless ESC, and runs on the ever so popular 3S 2200 milliamp hour battery.

[00:07:51] You need a 6 to 7 channel transmitter and receiver and glue. Apparently you have to glue this one together. It becomes a little bit undone. One of the cool things about this one, though, that stands apart is that it has the electromagnetic bomb drop.

[00:08:09] Oh, I forgot that had the bombs in it.

[00:08:10] Yeah, right? So how cool is that?

[00:08:12] You can bomb your own runway. I don’t know. I thought it just said one, but maybe I’m incorrect.

[00:08:22] Yeah, one. It says one replica bomb drop, or one replica bomb.

[00:08:27] Let’s see.

[00:08:28] And then it says experience maximum immersion with a functional electromagnetic bomb drop and a thrilling physical propeller howl during low passes. I’m not sure what they’re talking about. So apparently there’s something with this howl that the motor makes. One of their bullet points is reliable power system, and it sounds good. I’m not familiar with it, but it says experience the, okay, this is actually what it says.

[00:08:56] Experience the ironic propeller howl during high-speed passes. I’m assuming that’s supposed to be iconic. I believe this. Ironically, they got the word wrong.

[00:09:07] Yeah.

[00:09:07] But it says delivering a satisfying auditory experience that matches its punchy 3S, 4S performance. Oh, you can do 4S on that, too. But that didn’t say that on the needed to complete.

[00:09:18] I have not watched the video on that one. I’m going to have to watch it now.

[00:09:23] Yes. Under a different area, it says 2200 3S or 2200 4S.

[00:09:29] I have both of those.

[00:09:31] That would be kind of cool. And then we could hear the ironic sound that the propeller makes. Anyway, plug and play. $239.99 new release by Hobby King of a Durafly P40 Warhawk. Looks like a good-sized airplane that might be kind of fun.

[00:09:49] I would say it looks kind of interesting. Yeah. Back to the PL-8. It’s a 44.5-inch wing. Okay. Or for our Canadians, 1130 millimeter.

[00:10:00] So it’s about the same as this one. That’s a 1100 millimeter at 43.3-inch wingspan. It’s very similar. That’s ironic. That’s what it sounds like. And this one is, ironically, half the price.

[00:10:16] The one I had. Yeah. All right. Back to you, Dave. Another jet. This one’s more interesting for me. Once again, it’s free wing. Eurofire Typhoon V2. This one is an 8S or a 6S setup.

[00:10:32] And I know when I printed, I made an oopsie and didn’t print all the prices out correctly. So I have the price for the 8S. Okay. So we’re just going to assume the 6S is going to be proportionately lower. 6S was lower. And then they also had the, what’s it called? Not the ARF. The version that doesn’t include the power system.

[00:10:51] Yeah, sometimes they call that the ARF.

[00:10:55] Okay. Maybe that’s ARF Plus maybe is what it was.

[00:10:57] ARF Plus, yeah.

[00:10:58] So you get like the servos and stuff, but no drivetrain.

[00:11:01] Yep. looking at the price for the 8S, which is what I’ve, all I’ve got is $719. So getting up there a little bit, for 90 millimeter, but you get a lot of stuff.

[00:11:16] You do. Everything pretty much except for the receiver.

[00:11:19] It’s a good looking airplane. It’s in a gray with black skin. No, no, no.

[00:11:23] That’s, that’s printed in black and white, Dave. I don’t.

[00:11:26] No, it’s in gray.

[00:11:28] Oh, okay.

[00:11:28] I was just making sure. I read that here. somewhere along here is, yeah. I double checked that since I couldn’t remember what color it was, but somewhere in here in this typo, it said it was gray with black trim. And it does. It looks really, it looks sharp. I always think the Eurofighters look nice. I always have trouble, telling them, apart from some of the other Delta European fighters, the Rafals and so forth. But yeah, good looking airplane.

[00:11:55] Underwing armament. It’s got, three things under each wing. It looks like we’ve got a tank and a couple different missiles, which I’m sure is removable. Anything I’ve had from pre-wing and 90 millimeters always had removable armament.

[00:12:10] Yeah.

[00:12:10] 12 Blade, 90 millimeter EDF with 120 FPS-C with thrust reverse. So it won’t go shooting off the end of the runway.

[00:12:19] Yeah. That almost when you’re getting to those sizes of airplanes and that much power. They almost need brakes. Yeah. Well, the, the thrust reverse helps a lot. That is your brake.

[00:12:30] This also has a quick disconnect wings. So nice. And formation lights integrated into the existing LED package. So they’ve updated the LED package that was on it. they’ve also molded, and I like this, they’ve got the CG reference marks now molded on the wing for faster, easier field setup.

[00:12:47] That is very nice. I like that. That should be standard practice for all of these airplanes.

[00:12:51] Yeah. Once they figure out where it should be, they should just put that in the mold. Mm-hmm. I agree. it is a striking, scheme from the, I’m trying to read this, X, so 11F squadron Royal Air Force 100th anniversary scheme, medium grave airframe, black spine with dramatic black tail bearing, tail bearing. Oh, and the black tail bearing, the, the 11th Eagle, decal. Okay. That makes more sense. English is hard. it also has a gyro installed, six axis.

[00:13:32] It says all the hallmarks of the, 2023 free wing urifier carry forward into the V2, CNC shock absorbing landing gear. All the standard free wing, 90 millimeter stuff that you expect from them. Yeah. once again, the fit and finish from free wing is usually pretty darn good. so they’re just updating it to the, the higher output, drivetrain and, updated the lighting and a, new paint scheme. And it is a sharp looking airplane. I like it.

[00:14:07] I could definitely, I could definitely see one of these down the road.

[00:14:11] Well, it should be in the air, not down the road.

[00:14:13] Either way, you can run two four cell 5,000 packs in it or one six cell 5,000 pack. I just can’t see what possible fun this could possibly be on six cells.

[00:14:28] Probably more scale-like. More scale-like and lighter. Yeah.

[00:14:33] True. Lower is that wings? Wing loading.

[00:14:35] Yeah.

[00:14:36] It’s Elevon’s, man, it is a, 40 and a half inch wing or 1,030 millimeter. Seen the theme?

[00:14:46] Oh, that’s even smaller.

[00:14:48] Yeah.

[00:14:48] It’s a Delta though.

[00:14:49] Yeah. A lot of wing area there. That is true. Ain’t that all I got to say about that.

[00:14:55] Okay. Moving on. So the next one I saw, and this one you forwarded me actually after I saw it, and I think we were both, kind of excited by one of the features on it. So this is the, through MotionRC, the Skynetic P47 Thunderbolt Passionate Patsy, 750 millimeters, which is 29.5 inch with retracts.

[00:15:19] This is itty bitty bird with retracts.

[00:15:21] So this is a tiny little thing. yeah. And this is like, do of any other airplanes in this size scale type warbirds that come with retracts?

[00:15:33] I am sure there’s one or two out there, but I can’t think of anything off the top of my head right now.

[00:15:37] And right. So same thing with me. This is $229. like I said, through, I think this is MotionRC. And I’m very taken by the fact that it’s small and it is, or has the retracts. That’s, that’s really kind of cool for me. definitely going to be an asphalt bird. And so they’re obviously electric, retractable gear. And it says, let’s see, blah, blah, blah. Feature rarely found in warbirds of this size.

[00:16:06] Watch the aircraft transition from a confident runway stance to a clean scale profile in flight, delivering the look and presence of a much larger warbird in a compact, easy to fly package. So passionate Patsy, are you familiar with that one? Is that one I should know? I am not familiar with that one. Me neither. So that’s good. But it says a living, or a living piece of warbird history. I finished in authentic 310th fighter squadron, 58th fighter group markings.

[00:16:29] This P-47 captures a look, of a real combat or combat thunderbolt that flew missions in World War II, fuselage code H-42, bold nose art, and crisp scale graphics bring that personal history to life on the flight line and in the air. Has a lot of scale, or scale details on it too that I think are neat. For a little bird, there’s a lot there. Right. detailed cockpit. And it says a molded pilot figure, clear canopy, which you have to have that.

[00:16:59] Scale armament details, an authentic, P-tot tube, P-tot tube. add another level, or level of realism, and a four-blade propeller, with a, scale spinner. So, very nice. This is running on a, it says it requires a five-channel receiver, and so it says it’s designed for a 3S 800 to 1200 milliamp power, LiPo. But then, on the requirements, it says 3-cell 1,000 to 2,000 milliamp power, LiPo battery. So, I’m not quite sure.

[00:17:39] And a little off. But, that’s a really common size. I think I’ve got, most of them I’ve got are 3-cell 1800s and 2200s. Quite frankly, they’re roughly the same size.

[00:17:51] Yeah, so this says it comes with a 20-amp speed controller, with a JST connector. So, that would have to change, I think.

[00:17:58] That seems a little weak to me, if you’ve got a 20-amp, because I don’t like to run any more than 10-amps through a JST.

[00:18:03] That’s kind of what I was thinking. But, maybe they know something, we don’t know. and then it has four 9-gram plastic gear servos.

[00:18:13] Kind of sucks, but I mean, for something like that, yeah.

[00:18:17] And, it is a 1 16.5 scale. I don’t know why they have that in there. But, anyway. so yeah, I thought that was kind of cool. Comes with servos, installed ball link control connectors. The ball links are nice. Yeah. ESC four-blade propeller, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. So, yeah, all that for $229.

[00:18:40] Eh, not bad. But, I mean. For what you’re getting, for a smaller airplane, that is a little pricier, but then you’re getting the retracts and the extra scale stuff, so.

[00:18:50] The scale details add quite a bit.

[00:18:51] I can see where just a little bit extra goes. Goes a long way in that.

[00:18:54] Might be something worth considering.

[00:18:57] Do they have a gyro?

[00:19:01] Okay, Dave, make me look that up now.

[00:19:03] I’m just thinking something that small.

[00:19:05] I didn’t think so.

[00:19:06] I didn’t say anything of it. So, maybe an AS3X.

[00:19:08] I was going to say, it all depends on what receiver you put in it. Yeah. But, no, it doesn’t say anything about a gyro. Okay.

[00:19:15] Because they’re all going to have you mix stuff responds really well to it.

[00:19:18] That’s the other thing that kind of stinks with this one, though. Okay. So, no flaps, no lights, no brakes, no gyro.

[00:19:24] Yeah. And, once again, that small, you don’t need it.

[00:19:27] And then hinges are foam and heavy-duty CA hinges on the rudder.

[00:19:31] Okay. At least they went that far because they know you’re going to knock the rudder around when you land. Yeah.

[00:19:37] Recommended environment, by the way, is outdoors. Just in case you’re wondering. Just in case you’re wondering. Probably not well, not good to do in your basement.

[00:19:44] Well, I didn’t read that either, but that’s also on the Eurofighter and the PLA is recommended as outdoors. Really? So, if you’ve got a place to fly a 90mm indoors, go for it. Good on you, right? Yeah. Okay. You’ve got one more, right? I’ve got one more. And this one is actually a reissue, not from this company. But Hobby King, we’ve got the Plug-and-Fly Kit Fox Sport Plane. It’s in a yellow and black scheme.

[00:20:12] I’m not familiar with that one. So, that’s kind of like a cub-looking kind of thing?

[00:20:18] Yeah. It’s a stall airplane. Okay. Backwoods flyer. Big tire. Big tire. High wing. Tundra. Tundra type. Yeah. This one’s kind of hard to nail down because it has two wings options. You have an 1100mm wing or a 1250mm wing. Just in case you decide to change your mind, huh? Yeah. Just in case. Actually, everything I’ve seen, they are recommending that you fly it with a 1250s. So. I wonder what that is. I guess if you like a higher wing loading, you can go with the 1100s.

[00:20:50] But the 1250s seem to be what Hobby King is recommending at this point, based on the videos that I’ve watched.

[00:20:57] By the way, that’s the bigger one is 49.2 inches. In case you’re wondering. Wasn’t, but thanks. Well, I mean, you should be.

[00:21:09] As opposed to 43.3. So, that’s a six-inch difference. We’re all staying in the 40s today. Yeah.

[00:21:16] Look at us. Well, except for my tiny one.

[00:21:18] Oh, yeah. Not even 30. Not even 30. Not even 30. Tiny. Kip Fox Sport plane. I mean, this was a re-release flight test. Had this out previously. And I can’t remember the internet guy’s name that they had modeled after. Trent something. I should have done my homework. Yeah. Anyway, this was out previously under that name. And apparently had a few problems with overheating and so forth. And hopefully, Hubby King’s gone through and remedied those issues. Yeah. Cut some holes in it.

[00:21:53] It is a very sharp-looking airplane in this yellow and black scheme. Very vivid yellow. High-contrast black. Bush tires. Nice. Price is decent. $199.99 for the… I think this is a plug-and-play.

[00:22:12] I would be surprised if it was anything else. I’m pretty sure it’s a plug-and-play version.

[00:22:17] It’s also set up for flapper-ons. So you can use your ailerons as flaps as well. So that’s going to add a fun factor. You can add flaps without actually having flaps. Let’s see here. We’ve already covered that. Fuselage length. It’s 35 inches. It’s got the oversized bush tires and a functional suspension. I’m not sure how functional. How functional, but…

[00:22:41] But it can’t be any worse than most of those timbers. Yeah. True. They’re pretty stiff. Yeah.

[00:22:48] Dual wingspans. So you do get the option of playing around with different wingspans. And they’re quick snap-on, snap-off type of things. With LEDs on them, I noticed, by the way.

[00:22:56] So there must be a quick connect on there for the power.

[00:22:59] You can take it to the field and play with both of them and see which one you like. If it’s a windy day, you can… What if you just leave them both off? Ooh. Yeah. Hi. Hi, wing-loading. There you go. High-torque brushless out-for-runner system. And it requires a 2200 3S, 30 to 60 C LiPo battery with XT60 plug. Nice. So, once again, a common battery. This one is a little different from them. I’ve never seen where they only have a digital building manual.

[00:23:37] They’ve always shipped paperwork with everything.

[00:23:40] It’s been minimal in most cases, but they’ve always shipped paperwork. But this one has a digital building manual. Continuous global effort to minimize paper waste footprint and complete the digital copy manual is permanently available for download online. Files tab, blah, blah, blah. how a hobby game works. Everybody does.

[00:23:57] Yeah, so just to cut you off, that’s the same way with the Curtiss P-40, the Durafly P-40 Warhawk.

[00:24:05] It looks like they’re going to be like their standard… I wonder if they’re going to do that for the European market because they’re pretty harsh on waste.

[00:24:13] Well, I’m going to be honest. Let’s… Let’s… How many times with an airplane like this do you read the whole manual? There’s a couple pages you need, and that’s usually all I go for.

[00:24:26] Okay, so I buy a lot of used aircraft. Which is different, but I understand. And they never come with a manual because they’re used, so… Right. Dave hits the internet.

[00:24:38] Yeah.

[00:24:38] They hit the old Google later, and I always pull up an instruction manual. So what difference does it make?

[00:24:44] I mean, I have a drawer full of manuals that have come with airplanes that I bought over the years. It’s pointless, honestly. Yeah. So good. Save some paper, save some shipping, whatever.

[00:24:57] Building kit, I have found that I’m actually building an airplane from wood or large. I don’t like having to have the computer on all the time. That’s different. That’s different. And I agree. And I ran across that for the first time when I was building the 13th Squadron BF-109. Having to start and stop the video constantly.

[00:25:22] Yeah.

[00:25:23] It was a little annoying. I mean, I’ll have to admit.

[00:25:25] Yeah.

[00:25:26] Not undoable. But I mean, it’s just like, I just missed something back then.

[00:25:30] Rewind.

[00:25:31] Yeah. Whereas having a piece of paper in front of me going, oh, that’s what it was.

[00:25:36] Working at your own speed, all that kind of stuff. But the nice thing about having it online where you can print it, especially if you’re talking about ones where you’re building, I like the fact that I don’t have to worry about getting it dirty or getting glue on it or messing it up. I can print another one. It doesn’t matter. Gluing all the pages together. Right. Spilling your CA glue on it and then like, oh, look, now it’s just one big sheet.

[00:25:57] But no, it’s nice to be able to print your own stuff. And I can see not shipping manuals with stuff, especially because let’s be honest, manuals

[00:26:05] Change too. Yeah. You can update them much more easily.

[00:26:07] Yeah. Digitally. There’s a lot of times where they will ship with a manual that is different than what you go online and find because, oh, we found some errors or we had to change a couple of things or make some improvements. So it could be ironic. Oh, exactly. Such an ironic scheme or sound.

[00:26:26] So anyway, it’s an interesting aircraft. If I didn’t already have several bush type airplanes, maybe something I’d be interesting looking at, but. But you’re all bushed out. I’m bushed out. You are. I’m bushed.

[00:26:38] Bushy bush.

[00:26:41] Bush. Is that it? That’s it. That’s all I’ve got.

[00:26:43] It’s all in the new ones. Well, tell me a little bit about your most recent project. Speaking of bushes and.

[00:26:50] Oh, yeah. It’s a bush. Beavers. Is this a PG-13? Nope.

[00:26:56] When you call it out, maybe.

[00:26:59] No.

[00:26:59] Okay.

[00:26:59] So I’ve spent a lot of time in the shop lately or not as much as I would want to, but I’ve been doing it for my own sanity. Sanity. Yeah. Back in. Was it January? February, February, we went up to Chicago. I think it was one of those two. Well, yeah. I think January. I think it was late January. Went up to a swap me in Chicago, and I’d been looking for one of the Hobby Zone slash Tower Hobbies Beavers, and it’s the same airplane.

[00:27:25] I mean, they actually sell it under three or four different names. Daniel bought one at Toledo a few years ago with floats, and we took it to Joe Knoll, and it flew really nice on the floats, and it looked gorgeous, especially in the evening with the lights on. Yeah. Just kind of tripped the trigger for me, so I decided I wanted to have one, too. And I’d been looking for a while, and we took and found this Beaver in Chicago. It was a little beat up.

[00:27:54] It wasn’t awful, but it was definitely past its prime. Wheels were all wonky on it, and flat-spotted the big foam tires. I remember that one now.

[00:28:05] All of a sudden, that was the one that they didn’t have the spacers in or something, right?

[00:28:09] Yeah, they had actually rubbed on the wheel struts. The wheels had rubbed a hole in the foam. Gotcha. The landing gear was really the worst part of the airplane, and then it was just a type of dimps and dings that you get on a foam airplane. That was Beloit, right? No, that was not Beloit. That was when I went up to the Chicago one.

[00:28:33] Why do I not remember? Oh, it’s been seven months. Why do I not remember that?

[00:28:37] We got there early. We had to stand outside. Oh. We took my truck. I remember that. Yeah. I don’t remember where we were, though. The radio all of a sudden turned into Spanish. I don’t know what that was all about. Anyway, bought it up there, and the guy wanted 50 bucks for it. I didn’t even argue with it. Just, all right, 50 bucks is good. Mechanically, it looked like it was okay. It was just rough.

[00:28:59] And I had plans for it, but it got pushed off to the side because we had other things going on.

[00:29:03] And not to interrupt, but I’m going to again. That was the Fox Valley Aero Swap in St. Charles, Illinois. There we go. February 14th.

[00:29:12] So it was February.

[00:29:13] Yep. Okay. So I was wrong.

[00:29:16] Oh. I’m glad you can keep track of stuff because my brain is shut. It’s on my calendar.

[00:29:20] That’s the only reason I knew. That’s why I had to go check. Anyway, sorry I cut you off.

[00:29:23] So $50 airplane, it seems to be who my budget is anymore for used airplanes at swap meets. Took it home, parked it in the corner for a while. Wasn’t sure what I was going to do with it. I figured I wanted to do some sort of military scheme for it so I could take it to military fly-ins on top of float flies and whatever else. I just got browsing around on the internet a few weeks ago, decided it was time to work on this beaver.

[00:29:50] And I had actually worked on the beaver a few times. In the meantime, I’d stripped the decals off of it. And Ron’s over there laughing his head off. Every time I say beaver, stripping the beaver. Go on. Anyway, I’d worked on it a little bit here and there, gutting out the mechanics and putting them all in baggies. Just my typical, if you ever read my article, you’ll know how I work.

[00:30:15] Anyway, finally found a picture on the internet that I liked, and it was a U.S. Naval test pilot training aircraft. It was gray.

[00:30:25] It was a training beaver.

[00:30:26] Training beaver. Yeah. on wheels, which I’ve, I found a set of floats for it as well. Brand new. 30 bucks. I can’t believe they were that cheap.

[00:30:35] Almost what you paid for the airplane.

[00:30:36] Yeah. Doubled the price of the airplane with the paint and the floats. More than that. So, started working on a scheme, did the filler and the primer and laid the paint out on it. And, the, the stock navigation lights on it. The wingtips are okay. They look good. They don’t flash or anything, but they look good. the landing light is on all the time, which I thought I might throw a switch on that. I’m not sure yet.

[00:31:05] And that’s something we may talk about down the road on how to do that on the cheap.

[00:31:11] Down what road? The today road or another day road?

[00:31:14] Another day. Okay. Down another day. because I got to refresh my memory on how I do that. and, the anti-collision light that was on a pylon on the back of the aircraft or, oh, there was something else I changed. The taillight was red. Should be white. So, I swapped the LED out for a white LED instead of the red. but the red LED that was anti-collision light was just on solid, just red.

[00:31:43] And I’m sure for average people that’s fine, but that just wasn’t working for me.

[00:31:48] Dave’s scale doesn’t like it when it doesn’t look scale. Yeah, or close enough anyway.

[00:31:53] So I got my electronic supplies out and started playing around and made a circuit to simulate a, a, a flashing strobe, not a strobe- a rotating beacon. So I made a little circuit board and worked beautifully.

[00:32:11] It worked great. So what, what is flashing? Just the one LED? Just the one LED. Okay.

[00:32:18] And it doesn’t flash. I wish I could have shown you how it worked, but.

[00:32:22] You burnt it up. So yes, I haven’t seen it yet. It was stupid. Dave made a mistake, but it’s okay.

[00:32:30] After I got done painting everything, I went to start putting everything back together. And instead of plugging the LED directly into the circuit board that I made that had the limiting diode in it, I plugged it directly into the receiver. Which tripled the voltage. Yeah, tripled the voltage. And the LED got really bright for about two seconds.

[00:32:47] And then she went out.

[00:32:49] Then let the magic smoke out.

[00:32:51] Yeah.

[00:32:52] And of course it was the last eight millimeter red LED I owned. So we’re waiting on the Amazon to deliver a lifetime supply for.

[00:33:01] I was going to say I might have one, because I did the same thing with lifetime supply, because it’s cheaper to buy it in a hundred pack or whatever it is.

[00:33:08] Then I probably have two or 3000 LEDs. If I start digging through my stuff. I’m the same way. They’re all one and a half millimeter, three millimeter, five millimeter. I’ve got eight millimeter, which is the right size, but not a single red one. Yeah. They’re all the white. I’ve got red ones in the clear, but I don’t want the clear, which I can actually paint that with clear paint. That’s fine. But the circuit that I designed runs on two volts.

[00:33:40] I could get in there and undo it and change the resistors and so forth to use the clear that runs on. 3.7 is it? 3.7. The higher voltage. Yeah. And then I could change that, but at this point I’m too lazy and it was just easier to click Amazon by now.

[00:33:59] Yeah.

[00:34:00] And it’ll be here in a week.

[00:34:02] Yeah.

[00:34:04] So that’s been a little project I’ve been working on. I think it turned out pretty decent for a $50 beater.

[00:34:08] So what did you do to make it flash? And the only reason I’m asking this is because I love how, I mean, like you go through and you, you, this was a project. This was not just a simple thing. And I, the only, I don’t want to say this because I don’t want to sound rude, but did they make flashing LEDs? I do. Okay. And they flash.

[00:34:32] That’s the problem. I wanted this to ramp up slowly. Okay. And ramp down slowly. So it simulates that rotating beacon. I understand. Makes more sense then. Oh yeah. I, I’ve got red flashing LEDs, not an eight millimeter though, but I could have put one in line to cause a standard LED to flash. That’s fine. Okay. But I didn’t want the flashing. I wanted the slow ramp up to slow ramp down. So it uses a 555 timer circuit, some capacitors, just some basic electronic dobbledygook.

[00:35:07] Parts supply. I’ve probably got $2 worth of parts there.

[00:35:12] Yeah.

[00:35:12] And that’s because I burned up a bunch of them. Whoops. Not right. Whoops. Not right. And I tend to, well, when I solder stuff up on a board, I make the prototype on a breadboard. And then I tend to destroy stuff when I solder it up on the board. I am horrible at using Perfboard. Perfboard and I do not get along. It’s kind of a pain. I’ll be honest. Yeah. It is so nice to use a breadboard. Everything just plugs in nice and neat.

[00:35:38] And then unplugs very quickly and easily.

[00:35:40] It’s like, oh, that’s not right. I’ll change that capacitor out and I’ll change that resistor and everything’s just nice and neat. And then I got to put it on the Perfboard and it’s like, it’s just a disaster. Yeah. And I see people on the internet, you just draw a line with the solder just like this.

[00:35:57] I’ve never been able to do that.

[00:35:58] No. No. I get big globby, globby lines, but I have found that actually on my new iron, if I turn the heat down a little bit, I can kind of draw a line with the solder, but I still, I still suck at it.

[00:36:12] Yeah.

[00:36:12] My board work is awful.

[00:36:14] Well, cover it up with some stuff and nobody will ever see it.

[00:36:17] And I did not have the right size shrink tube to put around it. So it’s wrapped in electrical tape, just, super hack. Might as well, might as well just put duct tape on and call it quits. You should actually. That would be awesome. Yeah. So much for the nice, pretty Dave’s ADD. No, no, this is a mess.

[00:36:34] We’ll just hide it. Nobody will ever see it. So that was one thing, if I don’t want to step on your toes right now, you were showing it to me before and I will admit, I have never seen an airplane with wing tubes like that one has.

[00:36:49] It’s got an odd setup. It’s very weird. Is Daniel’s the same way? Yeah, his is exactly the same way. So one wing has two carbon fiber tubes in it and one wing has one carbon fiber tube in

[00:36:59] It and they go into a V in the middle.

[00:37:01] Yeah. And there’s actually dihedral built in them. They’re not flat straight across. I noticed that.

[00:37:05] Yeah. But it’s so, it’s so weird because the, and obviously it’s because there is dihedral in the wing, but the wing tube goes from the wing to the opposite side of the fuselage into a pocket there.

[00:37:21] Yeah. And it’s a real pain in the butt to line up too. I can imagine.

[00:37:25] And that’s also one that I saw has the single servo in the middle for the flaps. Yeah. So you have to disconnect the flap link every time you take the wing off. So that wing would never come off for me, honestly.

[00:37:37] It’s going to live in the garage in one piece and I’m pretty sure because I’m going to get real sick of taking it apart.

[00:37:41] That’s the way my sea wind was. And I absolutely hated that and no longer have it because it was just kind of a pain. Yeah.

[00:37:49] And then you put the floats on it, it makes it even worse. Because? They’re bolted on and you can’t take them off easily.

[00:37:55] Nice.

[00:37:56] Wow. So they take up lots of room.

[00:38:00] That’s a, that’s a, like I said, that was just a strange setup.

[00:38:03] It’s a motor design and it’s a bottom loader. Where you have the, that’s even worse. The twist little thing in the bottom of the, so you got to flip it upside down and it lives on its wing and tail tip every time you change the battery.

[00:38:16] Which kind of got to be careful to not hit your strobing effect light.

[00:38:21] Well, it used to have antennas. Did you notice the little nubs on the hatch? I did. I just thought those were hand things. They’re supposed to have like an inch and a half long antenna. Yeah, those have been snapped off before I ever got it because you have to flip it over every time.

[00:38:34] Yeah. Which means you probably need to take that hatch off every time. I’m surprised you haven’t glued a stick onto it or something to make it look back to normal.

[00:38:43] Just because I know I’m going to be flipping it upside down all the time. I thought about putting a piece of wire in there, but yeah. No, it’ll just break off or jab me in a leg. That’s the spirit.

[00:38:55] It’s just going to impale me so I shall leave it off. Yeah. So with all the work you did on that, this kind of leads into a high level topic that we’re going to talk about. Nothing too great or nothing too in depth, but you’re adding some weight to it. You’re doing some paint things that add weight to it. With your electronics, you’re adding some weight to it. Obviously, if you’re putting floats on it, you’re adding some weight to it.

[00:39:21] So that’s going to change your wing loading. You want to talk a little bit about wing loading?

[00:39:25] Yeah, we’ve been alluding to that several times throughout the….

[00:39:28] You have, by the way. I was very proud of you for how you did that. I don’t think I got one eludation in. I don’t think that’s the word, but I don’t think I got one in. And you’ve thrown several of them out there. And I was like, ah, I see what he’s doing. He knows what we’re going to talk about. I’m getting professional with it.

[00:39:46] So wing loading. What is it? And it’s actually the weight divided by the wing area.

[00:39:54] Weight of the airplane, all up weight, and then how much… So how much of that weight is spread across the wing?

[00:39:59] How much weight is that wing trying to lift?

[00:40:02] How much weight does that wing have to lift?

[00:40:05] Yeah.

[00:40:05] Right. Per square inch or square unit, whatever you’re measuring. You can do it in square millimeters if you wanted. If you want to.

[00:40:12] I don’t want to do it in square inch, but that’s okay. You can do like a full-size one, do it square feet. So wing loading equals airplane weight divided by wing area. And it makes… It predicts how much lift each square inch of the wing must generate. And that controls your stall speed, your slow flights, wind, how an aircraft reacts to wind. And just general landing characteristics and just generally the way the airplane behaves in flight.

[00:40:43] And that’s why a bigger airplane that is not as heavy can still feel floaty, whereas a smaller airplane that is less wing, less whatever.

[00:40:55] My 108-inch L4 Cub… Floats. Feels like a 40-size sport airplane. Right. Even though it weighs three times what a 40-size sport plane weighs.

[00:41:07] Yeah.

[00:41:08] Lots of wing on that airplane.

[00:41:09] Right.

[00:41:10] We don’t even want to talk about my triplane.

[00:41:13] Because there’s three wings. Four. Oh, that’s right. I forgot about the little part between the wheels. That is a lifting airfoil.

[00:41:21] It does lift add. It does add lift. It does lift add. It does lift add. Anyway. So, by looking at the wing area and the wing loading of an airplane, you can kind of predict how it’s going to fly. And, if you’ve been around it a while, you’re going to look at it and you’re going to see a P-51 and a Cub are going to fly completely different. That P-51 is going to have a lot more weight per square, whatever, square unit. Square unit. There you go. Than the Cub.

[00:41:55] Unless you’ve got a lead brick inside your Cub.

[00:41:58] Mm-hmm.

[00:41:59] You can make a Cub fly like a P-51. Just keep adding weight to it. But that’s also something you need to keep track of when you are doing things like my little restoration project on a Beaver. You’ve got to keep track of your weight. Anytime I repaint one of these airplanes, they’re going to end up being heavier.

[00:42:15] Have you ever measured, by the way? I need to. I would be curious to what you actually add paint-wise.

[00:42:20] I know it’s on a medium-sized airplane like the Beaver. It’s probably in the neighborhood of a couple ounces in paint and filler, which doesn’t sound like a whole lot, but it adds up.

[00:42:37] Yeah.

[00:42:38] It added up to a point where I actually had to add three and a half ounces of lead to the nose to balance it.

[00:42:42] Because there was so much weight on the tail. Yeah.

[00:42:45] There was some damage to the back of the airplane, so I had to add some reinforcement, filler, and paint. Obviously, it adds weight. So, yeah, keep that in mind when you’re doing things. The little scale things. My little circuit board, quite frankly, doesn’t weigh much. I don’t know what it weighs. Maybe an ounce. But you add that to the three and a half ounces of lead I had to add, plus the extra weight that ended up in the tail of the airplane.

[00:43:13] All these numbers gradually add up to a significant number. I know with the Beaver, the extra weight that’s going to be carrying is not going to be a problem. It’ll fly just fine with the extra weight. It’ll land a little faster compared to Daniel’s, which is box stock. Mine’s going to land a little faster. But it’s also not going to get bounced around in the wind quite as much as his. It may not be noticeable, but that’s what’s going to happen. Right.

[00:43:42] The landing speed, a few mile an hour or two, faster. No big deal. I mean, I know this airplane’s going to handle it just fine. But you compare the two side by side, and you’re going to definitely tell one of them is lighter and more nimble than the other. But mine will fly better in the wind.

[00:43:59] Do you guys run the same battery? Do?

[00:44:02] It’s a three-cell, 1800, 2200. Okay. I mean, we don’t have the same batteries, but we have the same size. Same size, pretty much. Yeah. I’ve got three different brands that I fly of that size, and I don’t know what he’s got. I think a couple of his are the same as mine, but way off topic.

[00:44:25] But do you ever weigh your batteries when they’re different brands? When they’re full or empty?

[00:44:30] No, when they’re different brands to see.

[00:44:32] Because there actually is a decent difference in weight on different brands.

[00:44:37] I have never, ever weighed a battery.

[00:44:40] I, excuse me, I have weighed many of mine that I have. Mostly because some of them I have was like the G2 versus G1 smart batteries, and then the non-smart batteries, just to kind of see where we were looking. I don’t have the numbers in front of me because I wasn’t prepared for it, but there was a noticeable difference. Let’s put it that way. Same size brand? Same size milliamp hour, same, three-cell.

[00:45:06] No, same brand even, just between the G1 smart batteries and the G2 smart batteries.

[00:45:11] Okay, so those are technically different batteries. Same size, though.

[00:45:15] So if a plane calls for a 3S2200, you’re either going to go buy your, your old style, cheap, whatever that has no smart things in it. You might get the G1 smart ones from Spectrum. You might get the G2 smart ones, and they’re all going to be a little bit different. So that’s kind of something you have to worry about, too, and look into when you’re doing your CG.

[00:45:35] Honestly, I could use a heavier battery and get it over the other side of the lid.

[00:45:38] Yeah.

[00:45:39] I don’t know if I might be able to stick a bigger capacity battery in it. My biggest battery in that size is a 2200, so I could finally make a 3000.. I don’t know if a 3000 would fit in it.

[00:45:51] Yeah, I don’t know if it’s worth buying a whole new battery just for that one either, though.

[00:45:54] Yeah, but the commonality between all my other aircraft, yeah, I’m not switching. Three and a half ounces of tire weight stuck to the firewall is… That’s a lot for a plane that size. Yeah, it is. And I wasn’t… I was kind of wondering if it was tail heavy to start with. Did you ever fly that one?

[00:46:10] No. No, okay.

[00:46:12] No. And I flew Daniel’s, and his is fine with the stock setup.

[00:46:16] I’d be interested to weigh both of those. His that’s just the way it came, then yours after you’ve done all this stuff to it, just to see the difference. Yeah, I’ll need to throw the floats on it and see, because…

[00:46:27] Maybe he… Well, he’s got floats on his, and I think he’s got the wheels. Yeah, I’ll have to throw the floats on mine so that they match and just see how close they are.

[00:46:38] Anyway, sorry, I derailed that one completely, but that did my mind.

[00:46:44] So, wing loading. We know it’s going to affect the way it handles. A big thing is stall behavior. The lower the wing loading, the slower the airplane’s going to be able to fly. And it’s going to have gentler, more predictable stalls, generally. A lot of this depends on the airframe and situation, but general terms, this is normally what we expect. Whereas a high wing loading is going to have a sharper, more abrupt stall.

[00:47:13] That is something you kind of want in, like, an extra or an aerobatic airplane. You want those sharper stalls so you can get your nice snaps and so forth. And that can be affected by the center of gravity as well. But a heavier airplane with an FCG is going to snap harder than an airplane that’s got a Ford CG and a lighter wing loading. Airplane’s going to fly slower before it stalls, so that is great for landing. My stall bush airplanes, they kind of just kind of float in.

[00:47:46] Very light wing loading. We’ve got flaps hanging out, so aerodynamics and wing loading. Going to add a very slow, drag-it-in flight versus a World War II fighter. It’s got a smaller wing with a heavier wing loading. You’re going to have to fly that in under power all the time. Because if you try to just float it in, it’s just going to snap, stall, spin. Crash. And you’re going to pick up to pieces. Yeah.

[00:48:13] The complete opposite, by the way, of that E-Fight, the slow ultra stick. That one you can literally, hands-off, put the throttle to zero, and it will land itself. Yeah. It just won’t stall.

[00:48:25] I’ve done that with my little bald eagle that I fly. Yeah, I can literally just set it up on glide approach and put the transmitter on the ground.

[00:48:35] Yeah.

[00:48:35] And it just kind of just floats in. That is light wing loading.

[00:48:39] Yeah.

[00:48:40] Conversely, you can’t fly that eagle on a windy day. It’s uncontrollable because it won’t penetrate the wind. That extra weight helps it penetrate through the wind gust.

[00:48:51] Yeah. Because it’s so, because the wing loading is so low on it, any external input affects it that much more. Right.

[00:49:00] It takes that much less pressure to move it. Right. And therefore, it moves around quite a bit. Makes sense. We’re kind of touching on inner retention. heavier airplanes, mass in movement, stays, tries to stay in movement. Heavier airplanes going to try to keep moving. So, once again, it’s less likely to be affected by the wind because it wants to stay in a straight line. And then, low wing loading is going to bleed off speed faster as you.

[00:49:30] You come in for a landing and you chop the throttle, that lighter weight airplane that has less wing loading is going to slow down much faster because the wind is going to affect it more, more drag. I’m not an aeronauter now, so I’m sure I’m just butchering this. So, your low wing loading is going to give you a long floaty, balloony landing. Versus a high wing loading, it’s going to drop like a rock.

[00:50:01] Speaking of dropping like a rock, my F-15 Eagle is probably the highest wing loading aircraft that I’ve got. Yeah, I would say so. Off throttle, it’s a brick.

[00:50:11] It literally just falls out of the sky, which is nice.

[00:50:14] You can use that to your advantage when you come in high for an approach. You chop throttle, let her drop. And then, you have to add throttle back in to a rest. To get it to flare. To get it to quit dropping like a rock and then flare out. Right. So, every airplane is going to fly a little bit different versus, my stall airplanes, like the Eagle, I can just chop the throttle and let it fall because it’s going to get there on its own eventually anyway.

[00:50:39] Won’t they all, though? Well, prettier than others sometimes. Let’s see here. What do you want to add to this?

[00:50:54] I don’t have that much to add to it, to be honest with you.

[00:50:56] You’re doing a great job. We’ve compared to Cubs and the Warbirds consistently. How powers can tune your wing loading battery replacement. That’s more of a CG instead of, you’re not really changing your wing loading at all with that. You’re just changing the center of gravity of the wing. Really, this needs to be a two-part thing. Instead of just wing loading, it also needs to be center of gravity added into this whole trimule.

[00:51:23] I’m glad you thought of that now.

[00:51:25] Yeah. I did not bring my PhD with me today.

[00:51:31] I mean, I think you’ve covered quite a bit on what the differences are and why your Cubs that are slower flyers are going to fly differently and why they’re more beginner airplanes than your Warbirds and your Mustangs or your EDS and all that kind of stuff.

[00:51:49] Because that lyre wing loading is going to react slower to inputs, going to react slower to everything.

[00:51:55] And then the way they kind of get around the wind issue is with your stability and your gyros. Yeah, the UMX stuff uses a gyro to compensate for an extremely light airplane. And that is how you can kind of make a smaller airplane feel bigger.

[00:52:12] Yeah. It’s not pushed around as much by the wind.

[00:52:16] Well, it is, but the gyro catches it and reacts.

[00:52:19] Stabilizes it.

[00:52:20] Yeah. And kind of fixes that.

[00:52:25] Yeah.

[00:52:26] So, I mean, I think I’m pretty good on that one.

[00:52:30] Pretty much covers it. I’m sure I have butchered it to no end. So, please, our professors out there, let me know how badly I did. And we can go into this much more detail if there’s any interest in it down the road.

[00:52:43] Yeah.

[00:52:44] We can actually.

[00:52:45] That means we’ll have to get smart on it first.

[00:52:49] I’ve got other things I want to study up on first. Well, good. You can share later.

[00:52:55] Anything else, Dave? Are you good? I’m good. I’m good, too. So, worst episode ever?

[00:53:02] No. No. It’s right up there with some others. Anyway, okay. Well, everybody, thanks for listening. Until next time, I am Ron. And I’m Dave. Good night. Good night.

[00:53:13] We hope you enjoyed this episode of the RC Planelab 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.