Project Fun Fly Bomber

Brian wrote: Glad to see you cancelled the "swim". Is there still room for the golf ball?

Golf ball? On Yes! I am going to paint it black with white lettering saying "compliments of Barnes Wallace" :lol:

Referring to Mike's earlier post I had not thought of dropping sweets to be discovered.

An update on this Fun fly bomber. I maidened it on Tuesday 7th March. It appeared to take a bit of an effort to "unstick" and although I thought it might be a bit nose heavy, once in the air it flew nicely after some elevator down trim :huh: Flew around quite happily at half throttle or even less. No quirks.

The motor, a rather noisy NTM Propdrive 42 produced 750 watts. 5 cells at 40 amps.

Second flight with no issues other than "unsticking" from runway this time with the bomb on aboard. On second circuit dropped down to about 20 feet and dropped "bomb". Angle of decent appeared to be steeper than I imagined which may be an advantage to hitting whatever target.

At home i decided to replace the motor with a SK3 5045 660kv, easy job. Um! Not so. 1. It would not fit to the motor box. 2. The new heavier motor mounted on 55mm stand-offs would make the nose really heavy. My only option after some head scratching is to the bring the motor back towards the firewall. Using RS 16mm stand-offs the motor mounted easil,y more so because the original Tiger IC engine mount captured nuts were the correct distance apart.:woohoo:

So, now the Thunder Tiger is a "Snub-Nosed" Tiger. Waiting at time of posting for some 14 inch props. If all is well then I may make up some fuselage sides to cover in the motor area.

I also replaced the nose leg to lift the front up a bit as I think it may have been a little low causing the"unsticking" issue.

You suggest that the model is flying nicely at half throttle...so it had enough power. A longer noseleg might have been the only fix needed instead of adding more power.
Also consider that it will unstuck better when the grass is shorter and drier.

"Tundra" style wheels might help. Easier than mowing the runway.

Another thought on long take-off run with a trike U/C. Are the main wheels in the right place? Not too far back from the C of G ?

MikeSeale wrote: You suggest that the model is flying nicely at half throttle...so it had enough power. A longer noseleg might have been the only fix needed instead of adding more power.
Also consider that it will unstuck better when the grass is shorter and drier.

You may be right there Mike but tried to cover two bases in one go. The NTM 42 motor was a bit noisy but there again it's an NTM.....:lol:

Brian if you look at the images it has a "tractor" wheel for nose wheel...:lol:

To evaluate the changes waiting on the rain to stop sometime. Grrrr.

Yes indeed, that's a fine big nose wheel. But, looking at the earlier photos, I wonder if the main U/C can be fitted either way round? So if the legs are raked back slightly, reversing the U/C would bring the wheels closer to the C of G and might make taking off a bit easier.
Just one more thing, in your post of March 4th. You wrote ........"with the compliments of Barnes Wallace" I'm surprised that David didn't remark on that one. Wallace is either Wallace as in" Wallace and Gromit" or a Scottish King of long ago.. It should be "Wallis" as in "Bouncing Bomb".

You are nearly correct in your statement. Except that a very clever dog who shall remain nameless gave all the necessary requirements for a successful bomb drop. but he never got the recognition. He even got the blame for the wrong trousers from his human counterpart as usual.

A window of opportunity arose this afternoon so took the "bomber" and some other electric quick assembles and glad I did. A reasonable few hours it turned out to be. Bomber Trainer seems to have better taking off now although the larger prop for it did not arrive today so used the 13 inch APC. Landings though are glide in with a little power although today was a bit breezy.

Hate it though when I am up there on my own - Sad sod....

Watching Tuesday's weather with interest.

Phil reported

Hate it though when I am up there on my own - Sad sod

No offence Phil but I do worry about flying alone. Remember what happened to John Norbury could happen to an equally careful person. Thank the Lord there were first aiders present that day. Be safe and please don't end up being an even sadder sod.