Check this fully sick RC jet out! It's a scratch built foamy that resembles something the Russian's would have built back in the Cold War days.
What's fully sick about this RC Jumbo jet is it has 10 EDF (electric ducted fan) units to power it!
This is what RC is all about, pushing the "fully sickness" of RC.
The ugly side of flying/owning my F-35 EDF RC jet eventually happened. It wasn't pilot error for a change but the cheapo ESC and motor. That survived a lot longer than I thought, I might add. The culprit was the ESC I am pretty sure.
What happened was I plugged in my fully charged LiPo, ready for another fully sick flight. But...the ESC started making funny sounds and would not "arm". Servos worked but I had no throttle management. Unplugged, replugged few times to try and reset it. In till at about 50% throttlesetting the motor worked but sounded rough and started pulsing. One more flight???
I was desperate for a flight. There was not a breath of wind and I felt abit adventurous. So I launched it into the blue sky. Flew around at full throttle, did a few barrel rolls. Then silence...no more motor....no worries I''ll just glide in.....but then no more control. I was lucky it was low and it's made of foam. It crashed into a fence breaking a aileron and denting the wing badly and the intake scopes. Nothing abit of epoxy didn't fix. When I retrieved the RC jet the motor was boiling and so was the ESC. Mmmmmm......
I brought a new 30amp ESC to see if the motor was OK, but nothing. The 3800kv cheapo brushless motor is officially dead. My local hobby shop didn't have any motors to my KV rating, so I found one on a online hobby shop that sells EDF stuff. Will have to wait for it but this one is 4200KV rating, so a worth while wait. Will let you know how this performs.
Stay tuned!
The good news for this weekend is I managed 6 successful flights after I had sorted out the "sucking in the wire incident".
My verdict for this RC jet is.... it is NOT a beginner EDF, way to fast and to small ( not saying I'm pro ). But it looks fully sick in the air. Has a awesome profile and flies like it's on rails. Once you have it trimmed out. Remember to dial down your throws on your servos. Trust me, there is alot of moving surface's for this little RC jet.
I did crank mine up abit and wow, it can do a huge amount of barrel rolls in a very short amount of time.
What's even better are the landing's. It glides in beautifully, a little fast but that's EDF for ya. To really slow up when low to the ground. Pull up quick and RC jet will do a little high alpha maneuver and stall. It's fully sick!
Overall I love this RC jet, even though it's not the best one as an introduction to the world of EDF. But if you check your trim, decrease your throws and check the C.G (centre od gravity). It should be fine and you'll be hooked, Like me.
But like the saying goes " all good things must come to an end " happened......but thank the RC Gods it happened on the ground, until I risked it for one more flight.
Report in the next post.
The maiden flight of my RC F-35 EDF jet was short and sweet. Sweet, meaning I had a safe landing when all of a sudden the EDF unit cut out. Thank the RC gods, I had some height to line up for a descent landing.
First thought when I took a closer inspection of the F-35, was the cheapo battery that comes with it, can't hold a decent charge. I used the cheapo one because if I did crash I didn't want to puncture one of my better LiPo batteries.
BUT..... upon even closer inspection in my "RC domain/shed" I realized the wire that goes from your ESC to your receiver to provide power to your servos had been SUCKED UP by the EDF unit. Resulting in the wire being cut in half. Resulting in unsuspecting loss of power.
It could of been alot worse though. The wire could have actually been wound up by the blades thus sucking up the whole ESC and spitting it out the other end with a busted up EDF unit and TOTAL loss of control of the RC jet. I have heard of this happening.
Anyway, the short time I did fly my RC Jet I realized that it is pretty fast for a EDF virgin,really sensitive on the roll but otherwise fly's like it's on rails. Just need to fix this slight mishap and I'll be back!!!!
Next time, a flight report that hopefully will last more than 30 seconds.
Well there may be a few different methods to break in a EDF (electric ducted fan) RC Jet, to get the best performance and reliability. When asked the question to the manufacturer, this was their response.
I will be honest with you. I did not remove the EDF unit and put locktight on it etc. It requires hacking up my fully sick RC jet which is just too nice to hack-up. I'm going to take the risk that a blade won't fly off ( touch wood ).
But I did throttle up and throttle down to hear or feel anything out of the norm. It sounded fine, to me anyway.
It terms of pre-flight checks, make sure there is NO slop on the control surfaces. That the linkages are the same length, resulting in the elevators being straight and level with each other. Keep your antennae away from the ESC and servo wires to minimize interference. Do a range check. Make sure your control surfaces are moving in the right direction. Up is up and left is left.
Test everything again.........then throw.....................!!!!!
Next Up - The Maiden Flight
Well, today I installed two good quality Hitec HS-55 micro servos that fit perfectly in the original holes, without the need to hack away any foam.
Installed the receiver, which is way back due to the short slack of the servo wire. It should not effect my CG (center of gravity) too much. I plan on using a 2100mAh lipo anyway for longish flight times when I do plenty of those super fast super low passes everyone loves.
This RC jet is going to be really sensitive in the roll and pitch. Due to it's small size and large flap area. According to this guy the best positions to setup the linkage between the flaps is this way. Dial down your exponential on your transmitter as well. You don't want to "over fly" this thing.
Next post will be about how to break in your EDF ( electric ducted fan ) unit in your RC jet and the pre-flight checks before that nail biting first flight.
Well today I glued on the wings and tail plus the cardboard nosecone. Why cardboard??? possibly because that will be the first thing to be squashed into mother earth??
I used 5 minute epoxy as my choice glue, didn't even both with the stuff that came with the RC jet. To be honest it looks OK, but that Chinese writing puts me off. ( I'll give it a test on some scrap foam, to see the results)
Moral of the story in gluing the wings etc is to take your time. Give the glue time to dry and make sure everything is lined up OK, otherwise your RC jet could handle like a pig.
Next I ripped out the cheapo servos, at the same time realizing that the foam that makes the plane look and feel solid, "dents" easily when you use it as a leaver to get out the servos. Oh well, dents and paint chippings gives my RC F-35 jet character!!!
I did not install the new servos yet. ( it was getting cold in my shed/Area 51/hangar ). But I could not help myself firing up that EDF motor. Man, all I can say is FULLY SICK Dude!!!!!
I'll keep you posted.
Today I got my first EDF ( electric ducted fan ) RC jet. A BlitzRCWorks F-35 scale model, with a 64mm edf unit and ready to fly. EDF RC jets have be come really popular lately, so I thought I'll try one..........
Opened the box, first impressions.... "fully sick". A real nice scale body made of glueable foam. Which is always a good think when "the sun got in my eyes" excuses start happening. It did come ready to fly, which means dodgy radio,receiver and servos. Those will be the items that I will be replacing with quality stuff. I just don't want a servo to lock-up when I am doing that low speed pass.
Comes with LiPo battery,charger and LiPo balancer. Mmmmm, personnally I would stay in the same room when you will be charging, just in case a electrical smell starts developing.
Otherwise, a nice looking RC jet that will fly like this, I hope.....
Next post I'll let you know how the gluing of the wings,tail etc went. The swapping out of the cheapo servos and how the flap linkage works. Then hopefully a test run, without the EDF sucking up the speed controller....
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