Ep 225: Night Flying, EDF Mishaps, and Too Many Lights?

00:11

Hello, everyone. Welcome to the RC Plane Lab podcast. I'm Ron. I'm Tom. I'm Dave. I'm Daniel.

Hi, Daniel. Hello. Hi, Tommy. Doctor. Doctor. Doctor.

Great movie. It is a great movie. What was that? I can't remember.

Oh, come on. You have the Lego house of it.

Wait, what? Did you buy the Lego house of that movie?

No, it's Spies Like Us. That's right. I was thinking of the scene in Christmas Vacation.

The doctor thing was Spies Like Us. Chevy Chase and Dan Aykroyd. You're right—right person.

You were probably just a child, weren't you? I don't even know when that came out. It might have been after my birth or before my birth.

You're doing okay? You're still eating. Sounds like your dentures are falling out.

He doesn't have dentures. If you did, I wouldn't know, because they're that good.

I don't want to get my phone because it's a little bit out of reach, and I don't want to make the old-man noises as I try to grab it.

Let me guess. Do you know the year? Not yet. I'm going to say '93. Oh, wow, you're wrong. '83 is what I meant. I did mean '83. What is it? '85. Okay, so I was four.

I'm not saying I saw it when it was brand new. I was about 14 or 15, depending on when in the year. I got my entire decade off.

A new nurse started this week with us. She's 23. If you double your age, you can still be my child. It's scary.

With the majority of people at my work, I've been there longer than they've been alive.

Who's older? Dave is older than Daniel. I've been at my job, as of yesterday, 29 years. Congratulations.

At my work, everywhere I go, I am the oldest person in the room. I'm not surprised. There's a bunch of 18-year-olds around there, just getting in.

03:16

We were talking before we started recording about jets. Dave was talking about something.

I need propane-start parts. Propane bottle adapters. If anybody has one from the old propane-start days, from way back when. From what I see, there's this Badger Propel can adapter for airbrushing that people have been using. I can't find this adapter anymore.

I might have one of those. The old one that screwed on top of the propellant?

The key is it's got to have the nozzle part where you screw in an adapter for the hose. That's got to be able to screw on. A lot of them now are not a screw-on.

Mine was definitely a screw-on, because the hose I used had a fitting that was knurled. I'll look at it and see if that might be the part you need.

You're talking about a piece that screws onto the propane tank that also has to push the button on it?

It's got a valve on top that you screw in, and it pushes down on the check valve, or whatever that is. Almost like the filling kit—not propane, the Freon recharge kit.

You've got to be able to adapt that to the tubing. I'm surprised you don't have one of those, actually.

I've always used the compressor. I've never owned a Propel bottle.

I don't get why you can't use the normal propane-tank things.

You're supposed to have some sort of regulator on it. I'm speaking hearsay here, because this is just quick reading. If you have too much pressure going into the combustion chamber, you get hot starts and flames, and bad things happen.

You don't want flamey things coming out of that end. Correct.

I'll try to remember when I get home tonight. I'll look through my old airbrush stuff. I'll look it up and show you what it's supposed to look like. It's been years since I laid eyes on it.

Somebody ought to make a note, because we're all old and we're not going to remember.

That's my first thing: track down the propane-start parts so we can see if we can get this thing running.

The guy you bought it off had it running? Yes. Does he not have them?

He does. He wasn't willing to sell them with the jet because he's got another propane jet, so he needed to hang onto them. He said it was really janky. It looked like somebody put it together out of bits and pieces. I wanted something nicer, and he needs it anyway.

Where are you at with the rest of the project? Have you stripped it?

I showed it to Daniel, and that's about as far as I got. He didn't realize I had two of everything.

I was like, where does this go? That's a pile. It's got two booms, two wing panels, and a tail. He didn't realize I had all the extra parts. The only thing I don't have two of is the fuselage.

So you were trying to figure out how it goes together? That's exactly what I was trying to figure out.

It's a biplane. The booms go in the front and the booms go in the back. It kind of looks like an old Wright Flyer. Kitbashing.

A biplane jet would be really cool. With all the extra parts I've got, it wouldn't be that hard to do. Four booms—try keeping those in alignment.

07:29

So, Daniel, now that Dave has said that he—

Nope. Not going to happen. I know exactly where that was going. Nope.

Dave said he would never buy a jet, and yet he has one now. He did say that. When are you getting yours?

This would not have happened if it wasn't so darn cheap.

If I was to spend that type of money, it would be on a radial engine. I'd rather have one of those. A Moki 250 or something like that.

A Saito FA-90R3 is a radial. It is a radial. It's a baby radial. I'm sorry to rain on your parade, but you have to admit a Moki 250 or a Moki 400 sounds a lot better than that.

Would you like to hear a video of mine? It sounds amazing. I have to find it, so talk amongst yourselves.

That's what I would spend my money on if I was going to do it.

I also went down the rabbit hole of looking at redoing my Yak. Apparently those had radials on them. I can't justify the cost, but how cool would that be?

Have you looked up the cost? Yeah, they're [price unclear in supplied transcript]. You can buy a jet for that—a complete jet, pretty much, not a basket case.

There's something about the sound of those. I would like to do that sometime. They sound so good at idle, and they sound good wide open, but they sound so much better at idle.

It's got that cam sound to it. They sound amazing. When they unload and they're coming by, they sound good. The cool factor really drops off once they go past idle.

No jet—just a bunch of other airplanes, but no jet. I'll play that one to Denise.

[The group listens to an engine video.]

Sounds pretty good. That does sound good. Tommy, you're right. I'm sorry. That sounds awesome.

That's not better than a jet, I'm here to tell you. Now a big Moki, maybe.

There are some jets I've heard that are just ear-piercing and not very good-sounding. I'm just talking about cool factor. That little engine is cool. I'm not sure it's as cool as a jet.

Is it nitro or gas? Nitro. I agree then—it's not as cool.

I think I have a six-ounce tank in that little Gee Bee. I've got a ten-minute timer set, and I always land with fuel. It's a four-stroke. If you've ever run a really tiny four-stroke, they hardly use any. It's actually pretty reasonable to operate.

You can see we don't have much to talk about today. Are we going to continue talking about what sounds better and how we can get Daniel to buy a jet, or are we going to move on?

He seems pretty set on not getting a jet. But Dave was also set on not getting a jet.

Then there's the other side of that coin: Reggie was all set to get a jet, got one, and still just won't fly it. It sits in my workroom, and I haven't even looked at it in three weeks.

Reggie has had his jet long enough that he needs to replace the fuel line already. It's only been flown once, by myself.

I'll have my license long before he gets his. I'm sure you'll do it in the spring. You'll have that rebuilt this winter.

12:39

You guys went flying without me because I was on my last hurrah camping trip with the family.

We did. We thought about it for a minute. We actually flew twice without Ron. We went night flying, and then we spent an entire day at the field.

That's not hurtful at all. That's okay. I had a good time with what I was doing. It was family stuff.

You were making core memories for your daughter.

It was a good time. We love Halloween, and it was a Halloween-themed weekend, so it was pretty cool.

I'm glad you went too, because you brought back lots of candy.

That's not even from that. That was stuff we took to give out. I asked Piper first, and she said, yes, go ahead. We share because we care.

I bet she's hidden it somewhere now.

The stuff you got was the candy we don't like that we had packed away to hand out for trick-or-treating.

If it happens to be the stuff I do like, that's good to know. Starburst and Jolly Ranchers. It was very sour.

14:36

Tell us about your flying. What did you fly? What did you do without me?

I came to the realization that everything I have that's a night flyer is a flying wing. I don't own anything other than wings with lights, unless you count the paramotor. It doesn't have a tail, not really.

We had both Shadow Seekers, so we could fly side by side. There's a huge difference between the two: the Shadow Seeker X versus the standard version.

The Shadow Seeker X is a much more exciting aircraft to fly, whereas the original one is a more relaxed, chill plane to fly—something you would associate with a night plane. Generally speaking, I wouldn't associate night flying with performance.

But the McTwist, though. The McTwist is fun to do the little Frisbee thing in the dark, because you can tell which way it is faster.

The original is much more relaxed, easier flying. Just kick back and enjoy yourself. You can get more out of the more aggressive X or the McTwist if that's what you want.

I flew my Slow Ultra Stick that I finally got around to buying. We talked about it a couple of episodes ago. I put lights on it. Man, that airplane with the lights is fun to fly at night.

You've almost got too many on it.

This coming from you? You look at your airplane for two seconds and see spots for days. When I was carrying your airplane, I was lighting up the trees. I could see the trees plain as day 30 feet above me. I could count every leaf that was still up there.

17:02

We flew our Assassins. Ron, you decided not to join the cool crowd and finish what you started before everybody else.

Hey, let's all get Assassins. Okay, cool. I'm sorry, this was never told to me.

Yours has sat on the counter for the last three years, started, kind of.

Knowing you guys all bought one might have urged me on a little bit.

Would it? Maybe. That's the goal right now—to push you to finish yours. A couple of evenings of work, and you'd be done.

I've got to order lights.

You fly one, you'll do it. It takes much longer to put the lights on than it does to build it.

Knowing I was going to have to paint it, which I'm not a big painter, and looking at that covering you have to wrap around—it very quickly went to the back burner.

I understand your concerns because I thought the same thing. When I got my kit and opened it and saw that covering, I thought, there's no give to this. It's going to be wrinkled. It is surprisingly easy to work with. It really is.

That's reassuring. I like “heartening” better. It's the opposite of disheartening.

Then you bought your wing at Joe Nall. That was one of those things where I thought, wings just kind of suck. It's nothing I find interesting to do. Then you guys got your Shadow Seekers, and it was like, okay, maybe. But the Assassins seem like they fly much faster.

You flew the Shadow Seeker X that night. At least with the setups we were using, the Shadow Seekers are faster than the Assassin.

It didn't look like it out here tonight. I wasn't flying it wide open. Mine was maybe half open. You can't open it up here.

The original Shadow Seeker is not fast. That's the one that sounds like it's going a thousand miles an hour, and then you're like, oh, no.

I still think you didn't have enough prop on it. Doing more research, it was way short on prop. It was only pulling ten amps.

So he had a bigger motor on the Assassin? He followed the directions: use this motor with a 7 × 6 prop. It was a dog, a total dog.

You guys are going to have to tell me what you're using, because I probably need to replace what I have for it.

Ours are 2822s. We got some bigger motors based on internet research that said, this is the way to go. It's not, unless you prop it correctly. You'd have to cut a big chunk out of the back of the wing to clear a ten-inch prop. That's way too big for something like that.

It flies fine on this 2822. I like how I propped mine with the 7 × 4, because it sounds like it's going ballistic, but it's maybe doing 50 miles an hour. It's not a boring speed by any means.

They're very fun to fly. I think you'd really enjoy one. Fly mine tomorrow.

It's another thing on the list of things that need to be done. I need a month off everything—somehow throw another month into my life just to do this stuff. Pre-tober.

I'm hoping as winter hits and stuff gets less busy, there'll be more time. I just have to make time. Spring will be here before you know it. I can't believe we're already almost in November. You were gone for a year. I don't know where that time went. It went by very fast.

23:20

We saw some cool stuff while we were flying that night.

I thought I was having a stroke. Dave was very concerned. He was looking at the night sky and saw stars, sparks, and dots moving.

I've had issues with my eyes in the past. I've had a retinal bleed, so I'm worried about retinal detachment and things. One of those things is you see stars and so forth. Turns out we were looking at the Leonid meteor shower. [Editor's note: The identification of the meteor shower has not been verified.]

We actually saw quite a few. While I was flying, I was like, did I just see that? Yeah, Dave, you just saw a shooting star. I just saw it too.

The other thing we saw, courtesy of Daniel's lights on the bottom of his airplane, was a deer out in the field. Just a quick flicker. Was that a deer? Daniel, go fly over there again. Sure enough, it was a deer hanging out there watching us fly.

It's like, what are these morons doing? That's what I would have thought. The things you get to see when you're flying at the field at night are pretty cool. If you don't have a night flyer, you should get one. It's a lot of fun.

24:47

These Assassins are tough. We have all bounced them. Well, you haven't yet, but it'll happen.

Daniel, that was impressive. It bounced high enough that I'm pretty sure if he'd got back on the throttle, he could have flown out of it. Nose-first into the ground, and it had to go back up four feet. It never did anything to it.

I was trying to figure out how to launch it. It launches differently than the Shadow Seekers. I was launching it more like a Frisbee, like I do the Shadow Seeker, and it kept wanting to go to the right real bad. I couldn't get my hands back on the controller in time.

You just let it go. You put a little bit of a toss in—just kind of loft it up. Try not to do what I did to Dave's this evening. I put a little too much on it. But you flew out of it, then promptly crashed. That wasn't my fault.

That was me. Like I was explaining earlier, when we fly at Ron's, we fly in a much tighter area and have to stand looking up. With my center of balance being shifted, standing with my head tilted back isn't ideal for me. I got a little disoriented, and that happened.

It looked like a stall and then a spin, but these things don't spin.

I got a little dizzy and was spending more of my brainpower trying to stand upright than fly the airplane. I got into a stall, and the trees were right there. It bounced pretty good. It didn't crush the nose. The battery didn't move. None of the electronics moved. I picked it right back up and threw it again.

And crashed it right back into the ground again.

That time I thought I did something to the motor. When I went to power it up, it sounded like a gear was stripped. It was weird.

Maybe you got a piece of dirt in there? I don't know. I spun it by hand; it felt free. I hit it again, and it literally sounded like a stripped gear. Unplugged the battery, plugged it back in, and it was fine.

Some sort of timing issue? Maybe a high amp draw when the prop hit the ground and confused the speed control? I don't know. We're speculating.

It took three good hits to the ground before I figured out how to launch it. That's when you said, just let it go. Don't throw it. Off it went.

The sweet spot for mine seems to be right around three-quarter throttle, maybe just above half to three-quarter. As soon as I let it go, move that stick out. It's happy flying just over half throttle.

What are you using for batteries? [Battery size unclear in supplied transcript.] Mine flies even better on the smaller battery. The 3S 1300 doesn't fly as long, maybe, but it's so much lighter. They're so much fun.

No 4S, though? Probably not. There's enough foam there that you could probably get a 4S in it, but it doesn't need it. Some guys are doing that for speed, maybe, but 3S is plenty fun for me.

3S is nice because you can power your lights right off it. I power my lights right off the balance plug.

I don't have those lights, and I don't want those. They should be on a switch anyway, so when you plug it in, you don't blind yourself.

I only pull five amps.

But how many lumens? Fourteen million.

If we ever get too many clouds, just have Dave fly around. It's going to be sunny out. Can you imagine flying those at night in fog?

The nice thing was, when Dave did crash, even though it was nighttime, we knew exactly where it was. There was no guessing. You could see it from the next county.

29:37

That was night flying. What night was that? Friday night. Then Sunday, almost all of us went out to the field and spent the whole day. It was awesome. Even Reggie showed up. Eventually.

He brought that huge Pawnee Brave with all kinds of issues, not the least of which was that he forgot the wing bolts.

It gets better. After you left and took the wing bolts with you, he figured he was done. I had loaned him four wing bolts. He was fighting the motor, and when I left, I took them with me because he was done.

Dave carries a hobby shop with him everywhere. Thank goodness. I've benefited from it before too.

He was having issues with the tank leaking. After Dave left, I had him pull the tank out. It wasn't that hard. Pull the lines off, and it slides right out the back. He said you had to take the motor off to pull the tank. Why? No, just pull these lines off.

We got the tank fixed, got the engine running, and I was pretty sure I had some quarter-twenty bolts in my flight box. I loaned him four wing bolts, and he flew it. He did at least get to fly that. He also brought a Timber of some sort—one of the multiple generations of Timbers.

That's the engine I put a new ring in. It runs good. We didn't have to touch the needles. It had no compression to start with, that DLE-20. With the factory ring, it was shot, and it was a brand-new motor.

I put an RMJ Machine Worx ring in that DLE-55 that was on the Double Vision biplane. The factory ring was gapped at sixteen thousandths.

Doesn't he gap them at something like one thousandth?

He'll sell them ungapped, which is how I bought mine because I wanted to gap it myself. Depending on where you read, they get pretty hot, the ring swells, and the gap shrinks. I like a little more gap, so I went with two and a half thousandths. The factory ring on that 55 was sixteen thousandths. What I'm getting at is that the factory ring on that 20 was probably way out of whack.

[Editor's note: The ring-gap figures above describe the hosts' recollections of their engines, not a specification for other engines.]

Anyway, Reggie got to fly. That was fun. We had our Assassins. In that Facebook Marketplace estate find we talked about before, there were two of those 25e-sized E-flite Cubs from around 2006 or 2007, back when E-flite made a lot of balsa stuff. They both needed work, but I fixed them up and flew both.

33:35

It was an EDF day for me: the F-105 and the F-16, which had an issue. Want to talk about that? Sure, why not.

Should I send a message to the AMA about it? No, it was my fault.

It was the HobbyKing F-16 I picked up at a swap meet for fifty bucks. I've been flying it. Is that the one you crashed before?

I had launching issues with it until we figured out that you have to launch this one with full-up elevator. It had a little paint issue on the front, nothing major. I was going to fix it this winter. I'm still fixing it because I ordered a new canopy.

If it was in stock, you have to strike while the iron's hot. That's all they had in stock for it. Nine-dollar canopy, nine dollars shipping. I've got eighteen dollars in a canopy for a fifty-dollar airplane.

I was flying around, getting close to the end of the battery. I came in, setting up for final approach, got an RSSI-low warning on the radio, and the nose dropped. The nose wouldn't come back up.

It took a while to walk out to get it. It was a ways away. That's a small EDF.

I was going to land because my timer was going off. By the time I got back with it and plugged the battery in, it was reading fourteen percent. I'm sure it had recovered by then. I'm pretty sure it just browned out. It has a Spektrum receiver in it, and that's what I think made it tuck the nose down and not recover.

[Editor's note: A brownout is Dave's suspected explanation. The recording does not establish the cause of the loss of control.]

As hard as it went into the ground, straight down, the damage was minimal. It's crushed, don't get me wrong. You were going to repaint it anyway.

It completely destroyed the canopy, and the nose is split open and jacked up. Once I get the new canopy to help align everything, it'll go back together and get a quick repaint. Reggie walked out there with me. That was nice. I didn't destroy a battery for a change.

That was a new battery too? No, that was the battery that came with it. Every time I put a new battery in something is when I destroy it. Just stop buying new batteries.

I'm getting comfortable flying it. It's not the best-flying thing I've ever owned, but it's an F-16. It looks cool.

Not one issue with the launches this time, contrary to prior experiences. I've got that figured out.

I launched it for him once. You have to throw this one hard. You can watch it leave with full-up elevator, and the thing's just kind of mushing, getting closer to the ground. Then it gets on step and goes. It's wild. Those first five seconds—it's high alpha from the moment it leaves your hand until it picks up speed.

It tracks really nicely. It's super stable in flight once you get it launched. It looks more stable than the F-105. The F-105 wobbles back and forth, but it flies well.

Could you use your glider launcher, one of the big rubber bands? I'm not sure the foam would be strong enough.

I don't fly with gyros for the most part, but I think the F-105 would greatly benefit from a gyro. It would dampen those oscillations. I don't know why it wobbles. It just does. It's not awful, just annoying to look at.

It was a fairly successful day of flying. I was there after you left. I think I got home at about 5:30. I had laundry to do. You had chores.

38:51

I did learn a lesson with the UMX Viper. I've swapped the leads on those because I don't use the Spektrum—what do they call those things? IC2, for the small ones. I use XT30s because the batteries I bought came with XT30s, so that's what I swapped it to.

I've used XT60s a lot and never had any issues. I found out that you can plug an XT30 in backwards very easily. Oh, no. Very easily.

Big smoke show on 4S. It unsoldered one of the power leads.

That's probably a good thing. It didn't do any other damage? I thought for sure the speed control would be fried, especially if there was smoke.

I held the lead together and plugged it in right. It fired right up. We flew it all day. Boy, does it fly well.

Daniel flew his first jet ever. He flew the Viper. Never flown an EDF before? No. Now he's got a taste for jets. That's how it starts.

It's a ducted-fan Cub, is what it amounts to. It tracks so straight. Easy.

That's how all the Vipers are. I have a Viper for you, Daniel—the 70-millimeter. It's one that's going to Toledo. I have other EDFs that I fly over that one, and I don't find myself taking it when I go places.

In my opinion, the 70 is the perfect Viper. It's the sweet spot. Small enough to fit in your car in one piece, but big enough to fly like its big brother, the 90. It flies great.

The newer orange version has lights, retracts, and flaps. You do have to use 6S batteries, but not the big ones. I don't remember what that one takes. I haven't flown mine in forever. I'm taking it tomorrow.

41:49

Do you want to talk about that next? Ron and I took a day off work. We're trying to get Dave and Daniel to do the same, but they're like, no, I have to be an adult and go to work.

We're going to Eli tomorrow. We're going to spend the whole day there. It's probably going to be my last trip to Eli this year, honestly. Probably mine as well, with the weather, the dark, and the wind.

We're taking a little bit of everything. My thought process is, if you don't take it, you can't fly it. It's better to have it and not need it than to need it and not have it. I didn't want to use the word “need.” Better to have it and not want it.

We're taking the jets, just in case. I need to at least run mine up. Which will turn into taxiing. Oh, look, it taxied out there. The runway's right there. Might as well see how fast it gets up to speed. The flaps are already set for takeoff. How did that happen?

We'll see. I need to test mine anyway. I haven't flown it since I repaired it. That way you know, and you're happy with your repair.

You came out tonight with your new trailer to put stuff in my trailer, which looks so skinny now compared to yours. Your trailer is seven feet wide. Mine's only six. It's only a foot, but it looks like more than a foot.

My trailer is eight feet wide. But it's not here, is it? It hasn't moved in three years. You should bring it tomorrow. I can't, guys. You won't—don't say can't. You could. You won't, and it's okay.

He just wants my trailer because it has heat and air conditioning. I have heat and air conditioning in mine too. I've got a full kitchen and refrigerator.

He's got a fridge, but does he have a full kitchen? Does he have a toilet? No. I just go in the yard like an animal. He does live in the country.

Eli has good porta-potties. They take good care of those. Remember the one at McLean that had a foyer? You open the door, and it's like the TARDIS: bigger on the inside. It's like fifteen feet back before you get to the business end. There's room in there for a couch. Room for activities. The Taj Mahal of porta-potties.

We'll be making a day of it. I don't know what time we're leaving, but I don't plan on being home before dark. I'm hoping to night fly a little there.

I don't know if I have anything that will night fly yet. You have your Slow Ultra Stick. I haven't repaired it from going through the ring of fire to make it night-worthy. There's an Assassin in the bed of my truck. You can fly mine or my Stick. We'll see.

I got the new parts put on, so it should be ready other than the lights. I'm taking it tomorrow to fly it. I don't know if the lights work.

47:29

I'm not sure you intended me to hear it, but I heard your comment about the lights on mine and how you liked the orange lights. That warmed my heart. For once I did something Ron appreciated.

I'm warming your heart because it looks like an electric stove element. It does. Honestly, it just looks good. I don't want to build you up too much. There's a lot of lights on it.

I want to look at the amp draw. You're not powering that one through the balance port? No, it's plugged in through a switch. It would still be good to know the draw for your own edification.

Tonight was the first night I saw it in person. You used the orange COB lights. They glow more. They look a lot better than the blue lights I have on mine. I love the blue, but it's hard for me to see.

I have some blue COB LEDs if you want to try them. Maybe. The blue distorts your vision a little bit. I don't know if it's a focus thing. On my Assassin, it's red, white, and blue, of course. At certain angles, when the blue mixes with the white, it turns a different color. It's hard to explain.

For me, it's almost like my eyes can't keep up with the blue or can't focus on it. I can see it, but I can't get sharp focus. Everything else is fine.

On mine, it's the tail only. Everything on the front is lit up nice and bright, and the lights on the horizontal stab give me the colors I need. But I can't look at the rudder because it's blue and I can't focus on it. I don't know how else to describe it. It looks cool close up.

Yours does too. You did a great job.

Do you like the Spektrum signal on the wing? It's so nerdy that, yes, I do. I think it's cool. I don't like copying things, but I might. It turned out really well.

I'm glad I only did it on one wing, because it was a pain. Lots of soldering.

That kind of disappears when you're flying. I meant the color and the way you have it laid out. The one thing I like better on mine is that you have two LED strips underneath running the length of the wing. I have one and then multiple strips coming back. It reminds me of a piano. I like that on the bottom of mine, but I really like the orange.

I think going with the COB lights is better for that application. They look good on your Assassins. I wish I'd gone with those on mine. The next one. Everything I've done recently, I've done with COB lights, and I much prefer those to the little puck ones.

Is there any difference in amp draw between those and the standard lights? I'm going to have to put some on and see. You can usually look it up when you buy them. It'll tell you the amp draw. How accurate are those numbers? Usually pretty accurate. Figure out what it is for one segment, then multiply that out per segment.

We probably don't need as many lights as we have on our airplanes.

Oh, I disagree. To facilitate being able to see them, we probably don't need as much.

Dave's Daylight—that's what you need to name that Night Assassin. That one might be a little overkill, but it looks good when it flies.

Here's where I have issues with how bright it is. You can't put it on the ground, walk twenty feet away, and take off, because it doesn't have wheels. It's literally right here, and you have to look away while you're throwing it.

I've got sunglasses. That doesn't surprise me. I have transitions. I wonder if they would transition. It has to be UV. Blue is UV, isn't it? No. I don't think so. I could be completely wrong. [The group speculates about LEDs and photochromic glasses.]

That would suck. As soon as the airplane goes away, I wouldn't be able to see it because my glasses would be dark.

Yes, mine is bright. It's overkill. I had no idea when I set it up. I buried them in the foam. They're pointing into the foam as well.

I like the amount of light, if it had wheels so you could walk away from it, or if you could turn it off. You plug it in, and then you have to look away. It's very bright.

It's a lot of fun, especially doing low, slow passes over the runway and lighting up the runway underneath with a huge glow. Or lighting up deer in the field.

53:54

I bought a new Slow Ultra Stick to put together and relight, because the one I have has seen better days. Something about flying through fire. I don't know how that happens. That'll be my new one just for that, because it's fun.

One thing you fools haven't done, that I'm going to have to do because nobody else has, is take pictures while I do it to post on the website.

Actually, I've got the Shadow Seeker X. I just have to write the article. Tell them how you did that one.

I got excited and blasted through the first three steps without taking a single photo, so I borrowed his kit. I got mine built for free. In the photos, you'll be seeing two different airplanes. I hadn't started mine, so I said, if you want to go ahead and put mine together.

I retract my fools comment, and I'm sorry. It's not fools, plural.

It's not that I don't take pictures. I talked about the RMJ ring in the DLE-55. I took photos of the whole process of re-ringing the engine and gapping it. I've just never done anything with them. They're on my phone.

Give me the pictures. It's a lot. That's fine—the more the better. Look for that on the website eventually. Glad you didn't say soon. I didn't.

Tomorrow, we're taking the jets. I think I'm going to take the Super Scorpion to see how it flies. Hopefully we'll have a great day of flying.

56:11

I stuck with a theme for tomorrow, and the theme is speed. I only brought faster planes—well, except for the Cub, but the Cub's kind of fast on 4S. I brought faster planes to reacclimate to speedier airplanes so I can fly the jet.

I'll admit I'm a little nervous, because I'm very much out of practice. I haven't flown for a long time. It comes back fast. I hope so.

I'm taking the V900, which flies very fast on 4S. I'm bringing both Vipers, which are fast-ish, and the Cub on 4S. The little UMX Gee Bee too. Tomorrow's theme will be speed.

Dave just showed me a picture of his backwards-plugged XT30. I don't understand how that could go in so easily. It slid right in there. Very little additional pressure was needed to push those together. That's crazy. That looks bad. That's smoky. Not something you want to see.

You flew with that afterward? Multiple times. He called me on the way out to grab my generator and soldering iron, so I turned around and went back home. Soldered it back together.

I figured he had a soldering iron with him. Don't you have one that runs off a battery? No, that's my hot-glue gun. Everybody has used that except me. I've never used it. I don't remember what I used it for. Probably gluing something. Probably something that needed to be hot.

Dave showed me a picture of the F-16. It's crunchy. It didn't look like that when I left. Maybe it's time to pass that one on instead of fixing it.

I've got a nine-dollar canopy now. I'm sold. It'll be back for the next crash. Hopefully not. Will next time be the last time? Depends how bad it crashes. It'll probably get put back together a few times and then go to a swap meet, just to move it on.

59:04

Going back to our day of flying without you, I also took the Ace 4-40. It really needs a different name. Something to do with Arizona or the hotel room I built it in. Hotel Arizona.

That's going to Toledo. That got me thinking about all the stuff we're taking. We're planning our Toledo trip already. We're taking lots of stuff. We have more tables this time than ever: five.

Lots of airplanes, new-in-the-box airplanes I picked up while I was away. Nice airplanes, actually. I'll have to go through them.

I shouldn't get anything. I don't have the room or the need. We'll have lots of stuff for sale because I've got to buy another engine. Those aren't cheap. It's no Moki price, but about half, I guess.

What size? For the Atom, probably a 130. According to Dan, I don't need much more than that, since I'm not really a 3D pilot and don't need thrust vectoring. He says a 130 would be perfect. Actually, he says a 102 would be perfect, but I already have a 102. I need a 130.

You don't want to do the same thing in multiples.

With the direction you're going, Dave, you'll be there soon. Jet number two. Unless I find another one [price unclear].

Here's the question: will Dave have jet number two, or will Daniel have jet number one first?

That's not where I thought you were going. I thought you were going to ask whether Dave would have jet number two before Reggie flies his jet.

No, I was bringing you in, Daniel. Thank you.

I got a deal of a lifetime. It was a good deal, but you said never, and now you have one. Never say never.

1:02:03

A couple of new airplanes—do you want to hit on those quickly? Another new Cub. I got excited about this one at first, and then my excitement waned. Almost like a new Timber. At least it's not a Timber.

It's a nice-looking Cub. Hangar 9 came out with a new Carbon Cub 15cc. Mine is a 10cc. I was expecting a hundred-inch wingspan, or 104 like you guys, so I could get something the same size and be in the cool club. No.

I want to say it was 93 inches. That was disappointing. They're doing the same thing they did with the one I have: it comes as an ARF or with an electric-power plug-and-play version. The ARF is five hundred bucks, and the electric plug-and-play is nine hundred. It comes with the motor, a 100-amp Smart ESC, and six [servo model unclear in supplied transcript] servos.

If you're going electric, that's the way to do it. What I like about the Spektrum speed controls is the Smart features and telemetry back to the transmitter.

Ninety-three inches is almost big enough to be in the cool club, but it's not. That's why I'm not doing it.

You could always build one. Not going to happen. Balsa USA makes big Cubs.

What is it called? Hangar 9 Carbon Cub 15cc. It shows ninety inches. Ninety-inch. Mine's eighty-two. It's not worth it.

Would it be worth it if it were a hundred or bigger? Probably. I'd probably sell the one I have and upgrade to this one. At the end of the day, it's still a Cub. It's a Carbon Cub, sure, but it's a Cub.

Would you put it on floats? Absolutely.

The eight-inch difference isn't worth the extra money by the time I change it out and put a receiver in it. I think it's preorder. November 11 is when it's supposed to be [available].

[Editor's note: Product sizes, equipment, prices, and availability are discussed as understood during the recording. They have not been independently verified for this transcript.]

1:05:47

What else? The Freewing Avanti S 90mm. Eight-cell, right? I think so. Plug-and-play prices are six-fifty-five for 6S or six-eighty-nine for 8S. Go with the eight-cell on that one. That's close enough.

Maybe that's something Daniel will start looking at if he's going to get into EDFs. That's not a no. We'll see. That's how it starts. Baby steps.

I think you'd like EDFs, as long as you start with the right one. I've got a nice Freewing A-6 in the garage not doing anything. That might not be the one to start with.

A Viper—you can't go wrong. Or a Super Scorpion. Mine flies very much like my Viper. You'll see. I'm hoping so. I need to figure out CG with you, though. I know where it's supposed to be, but it's very far off without nose weight. We can talk later.

Those are the two new ones coming out. The Avanti has a 54.3-inch wingspan, red-and-white and red-and-green schemes, and 6S, 8S, and ARF Plus choices. Those fly well too.

I've got the 64mm version of that. I take that back: that's a Futura. It's very similar. That little 64mm Futura flies really well. I was going to take it to Toledo.

Does it have retracts? No. The 70mm Viper does. That would be a good starter. It has to be something that flies off our field too. You absolutely can with the 70mm Viper. Tommy has.

The Futura's wheels might be a little small to fly off grass. Plus they don't retract. They look dumb, but it tries. They need a thing where you can take off with them, then push a button and they fall out. You could rig up something like the Me 163.

1:08:33

The last thing I did: I finally bought wing and fuselage bags for my MB-339. I don't know why it took me so long, but it needed to be done.

I wish I had something like that for my Ranger, but the Atom came with them. It's nice to be able to grab it. It's safer. They come with handles. You can carry them over your shoulder and carry the whole thing. It's pretty cool.

I got them yesterday and put the airplane in. My only fear is I forgot something that's still sitting here that I should have put in the bags. I'll find out tomorrow.

Make sure you have the wing tube. I do. It's inside the fuselage. And the stab tube? Got it. There's only one. I think I have everything. You should be fine.

Anything else you guys want to talk about? Poor Dave. Right, I'm the timer now. In that case, we'd have been done an hour ago.

That's all I've got. Daniel? Yep. We've talked way too much stuff.

Thanks, everybody, for listening. Until next time, I'm Ron. I'm Tom. I'm Daniel. And I'm Dave. Good night.

We hope you enjoyed this episode of the RC Plane Lab podcast. For topic suggestions, questions, or feedback, connect with us at RCPlaneLab.com or email us directly at ron@rcplanelab.com or tom@rcplanelab.com. You can also text us or leave 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.