leccyflyer

One other aspect which hasn't really been addressed it that there does seem to be a bit of a nostalgic uptick in the use of small diesel engines, though I accept that could conceivably just be my perception since I'm noticing them more, having brought a few back into use. However there's certainly a number of FB groups dedicated to vintage diesel usage. I've kept a very small number of glow engines, for purely sentimental reasons, but now have more small diesels than glows and a sum total of about half a dozen small engines. The fuel is ruinously expensive and they are undoubtedly messy, but I'm hoping to have my first diesel powered flights later in the spring when the weather improves a bit- since I'm far too nesh to be bothering with diesels in the freezing cold of winter.

Ah, okay - I thought that you meant that they had just run out of a particular colour. They obviously can't keep up with the rate that you are turning the aeroplanes out Eric. 👍

B and Q will never run out of sample pots if you take something in to be scanned. Those are then bespoke colours which you can save to your profile. I'm getting towards the bottom of my sample pot of Sky Type S, which has provided for several models in the past few years.

Is that clockwork? Those folks at Dacia really need to work harder on naming their vehicles. Their budget SUV is the Duster and you see quite a few of them knocking around Aberdeen, where the name has very unfortunate connotations, translating to an unsuccessful " dry hole" or essentially a dud.

All viz is pretty bad - the cockpit tub was so cramped the engine instruments were on the nacelle.

One of these GG?

Murat - no doubt you will have received the HR training at some time, which will have described such attributes as being those of a Completer/Finisher. 😎

Didn't have any photos on Sunday, but my pal Steve did take some whilst I was flying, which I received last night, so here's a couple, featuring the remaiden of my wee 18" span VMC Hurricane and Durafly P-51. I particularly like the one of my P-51D Candyman, with John's homebrewed F-82 Twin Mustang in the background. The post processing is very evocative of contemporary grainy colour slide film from the 1940's, so looks like some of the rare colour footage of the time that I have in print.

No Operator ID anywhere? If you are on a farm you might anticipate the owner coming to claim the drone, assuming that they know roughly where it came down. You absolutely did the right thing pulling the battery IMO -as you said, you don't want it attempting to lift off inside your house.

No problem Richard. 1. Mossie, as described above, dolly launch, belly land, nae flaps, 64" span and I'd be happy to rig such a beauty at the field. >>> 2. Hellcat, 55'60" ish, dolly launch, belly land 3. P-47 Thunderbolt, Razorback, 55-60" ish, dolly launch, belly land, postscript retract option, like the FW190 intention?

It's just part of life's rich pageant and different personalities. I have modelling pals who will only ever have one model under construction at one time. The have the discipline to methodically work through completion of that model in a linear fashion and that sort of order fits with their personality. I have other modelling pals who operate on more of a parallel processing style approach and will have more than one model on the go at a time, at various stages in the process. I'd estimate the latter type forms the majority. A lot of modellers really enjoy the building part, where results are often very rapid, starting with a box of wood and quickly progressing to something tangible in a short time. It's the exciting bot for them and you can soon arrive at a model that is 90% completed, with just the 80% left to do to finish it. Quite a few don't like the covering and finishing stages anywhere near as much and the temptation is to put that to one side and move onto another model for their favourite bit. It's a hobby, not a job, so that is perfectly acceptable. Then there are those - myself included - who find the greatest joy in the research, seeking out, selecting and kicking off new ideas and the pesky real world parts of putting that into tangible form is to be transcended in order to achieve an end result. These are essentially dreamers and will often have multiple projects on the go, quite often leading to project inertia where lots of projects are stalled for the sake of a few hours work or a minor tweak. To give an example, I have a wee foamie Me163 that I bought the "kit" about 25 years ago, finished it bar the painting within a couple of years, but which has been sitting pending just adding some markings for about 20 years. I finished that last year, but I still haven't flown it. My Balsacraft Hurricane has been sitting, repaired, awaiting some tape stringers for the rear fuselage for more than 20 years, but is now at the point of just needing some panel lines and weathering, having recently done the stringers and moved on to painting. Add to that a tendency to see benefit in taking on other folks uncompleted projects and that's how you can end up with dozens of works in progress, some of which stay in that state for years. However, it's a hobby, not a job and provided that you are comfortable with that and enjoying what you are doing, it shouldn't be a problem. Such a situation would be viewed as catastrophic and stressful by the chap who must have one project on the go at one time, but we are all different and that's fine. So try not to beat yourself up for starting another model before you've finished the last one - in the end it's a hobby, a pastime and a passion and we can all enjoy it in our different ways.

At a recent swap meet there was a table of small glow engines for sale, for a pound each, including a little run Enya 25 in very clean condition, a beautiful piece of engineering. You literally couldn't give them away, though I've actually given away quite a few engines in the past few years. There are still loads of glow engines out there, if they never made another one there would still be sufficient to meet the likely demand. Better that they get used, rather than languishing in engine collections or worse still abandoned in a box under the bench, but TBH the demand doesn't seem to be huge, as electric is so much more accessible, easy to use and effective. In the size range that glow engines tend to inhabit then it's become perfectly clear that good electric solutions are readily available to do that job. It is only in the larger sizes, where petrol engines take over that electric propulsion becomes more challenging.

Andy is referring to his own club test in order to allow solo flight.

What a brilliant idea - nice one Mike! 😎👍

Agree 100%. I have no particular interest in this topic, never having owned a Laser engine and never likely too, but there are IKMO, far too many unnecessary calls to close perfectly reasonable threads in this forum. This thread was started in good faith, to discuss continued customer service issues into the future and ought not be closed.

Definitely interested. After breaking two sets of the small EFlite twist and turn retracts, which use a very fragile extra ball link for the twist function, I modified an FMS set, which uses a short metal stub to actuate the twist, so anything which would make this style of retract more robust would be worth a luck. My larger Corsair uses the FMS 1450mm retracts and one of those is playing up as well.

Ta. I never use the U-Turn button, but the telemetry is a major boon and we regularly get 10-12 minute flights, so especially useful if there are a bunch of wee fellas up in the air at the same time.

I'm still very happy with the Creality Ender 5 Pro that I posted about. It has given good service and produces good quality prints, with very few failures to date. I now have it in an enclosure with a view to trying to print in ABS as an option, where the Maylan 150 failed dismally due to curl on the margins of the prints.

Agreed - twist and turn retracts are even more of a pain than plain ordinary retracts.

Would prefer a Hellcat to a P-47 TBH, since there really aren't that many Hellcats around already, but loads of options for P-47s.

Interesting. Does the low voltage telemetry still work when the model is assigned to the Taranis or Radiomaster transmitter?

Yes, it was fine in the 70#s but hugely surpassed by far, far better, more robust and higher quality films, such as Profilm. Solartex certainly deserved preserving, but Solarfilm surely won't be missed, in all it's saggy, wrinkly glory. The Far East films, like the HK ones were far superior to the original Solarfilm.

Lovely Spring morning here and a good turn out at the very soggy field. No photos this week, but enjoyed successful maiden flights on my VMC Hurricane, after the extensive wing repairs and my new Volantex Corsair. The latter exhibited some remarkable wing rocking coming out of turns, which must be somthing to do with the gyro stabilisation but other than that was very enjoyable to fly. Also flew a couple of depron profile jobs and my venerable Durafly P-51D Candyman/ Moose. What we need now is a few weeks of dry weather to dry out the car parking area.

That's what I found, when I inadvertently let a 3s1p LiFe transmitter pack run down to dead flat. Below 3v a cell they were goosed and even after getting them to take a charge. they were slightly puffy, they ran down rapidly and couldn't deliver under a modest load. I wouldn't consider using such a pack in a critical location and it went to the tip.