FanFacts W
elcome back! I hope everyone has been flying as much as they desire, staying hydrated and us- ing sunscreen! We’ve recently
had several flyers have to have small can- cers removed, so sunscreen and broad- brimmed hats are a good thing … ’nuff said. In the May column, I mentioned the tetris-bukvorez method of foam building. Enter Wade Joos. He ordered the F-104 kit which arrived in surprisingly short order from Russia, and with minimal arm twisting has shared a few photos with us. The foam sheets are shrink-wrapped in plastic (to keep all of the parts together) and then placed in a tight fitting cardboard box, which makes them almost impossible to smash while in the mail. Removal of the shrink wrap has the parts almost falling out of their sheets, so care is needed at this stage! Wade reports that he is favorably im- pressed by the quality and smoothness of the cuts, and the way they just slide out of the very minimal-waste foam shucks. He has promised updates as he gets into the build, so I am looking forward to his reports! Also in May, I showed a photo of an Aus- trian Air Force Saab-105 trainer done up in Tiger Meet colors. This year, the biennial Jet World Masters is being held in Switzer- land and one who is assisting rather than competing is Jim McEwen. Following the crash of his computer with all of his docu- mentation photos and the theft of his hard copy materials, he couldn’t get his plane close to being ready for competition. The airplane he is building, a Saab JAS-
39 Gripen, has a really neat Tiger Meet color scheme from the 211 Squadron of the Czech Air Force, and most importantly (for this conversation) the application process of the vinyl decals, yup—decals. So, the next time you feel the need for some out of this world graphics and don’t want to do decals, consid- er talking to your local sign maker, they can
by greg moore You can reach Greg Moore via e-mail at
jetflyr@comcast.net
PHOTO: ROD HART
Rick Paquin’s Venom F-86 Sabredoes a fly-by. The stock 70mm fan on a 4S battery provides a nice smooth flight. Excellent appearance and flight characteristics are the mark of this foamie.
probably set you up! More photos and some information can be found on the squadron’s web site at:
211squadron.cz.
Moving on, we have a tale of two air- frames on two continents—half-a-world apart.
Recently, Chuck James saw a year of work on his ModellbauUSA Tornado come to fruition at the hands of George Powers. With an older Wren 54 pushing it, it had plenty of poop, even at Denver’s mile-high altitude. Well done Chuck and many suc- cessful flights!
Now, several thousand miles away we have Jeremy Daly with his Falcon 120. The Falcon started life as a pusher-prop air- frame for a 1.2-cubic inch sized engine, and given its very minimal price point, has be- come a popular, world-wide turbine powered airframe. Granted, there are a large number of modifications that need to be done to make it safe/strong enough, but with a thread at 183 pages (and growing) on the jets forum of RCU, and who knows how many facebook
construction/modification
threads out there, this is an airframe that many consider worth the time to build/ bash/modify to their specifications. This is the route Jeremy took, and as
shown in the photo. It looks quite nice and he states that he has a lot of fun with full flap, short-and-tight, power on landings/ touch and goes.
Fast forward a few years and Modellbau brought out their version with most of the re-construction done for the buyer, though there was still work to be done. So whether it is a generation #1 Falcon, or a Mk 1–4 ver- sion of the Tornado, they are variations on the same theme and a heck of a lot of eco- nomical fun (yup, I’ve had, and have one). So if you are looking to get into a turbine pow- ered “trainer” that happens to be a fantasti- cally fun airplane to fly, give one of the vari- ants a chance. They do well as an edf conversion, too!
This summer our winds have been much more cooperative (versus the last few sum- mers) and have actually allowed us to fly a fair amount, so I have been having a heck of a lot of fun with my HET Super Sniper 90- XL (imported by The Electric Jet Factory). Designed for their 700 series of motors (39mm in diameter rather than the “stan- dard” 36mm), HET needed to redesign their 90mm fan unit to accommodate them. These motors are designed for 8 to 12 cells, and mine has the appropriate Kv of
PHOTOS: WADE JOOS
With four sheets of F-104 parts securely shrink-wrapped and packed in a form- fitting cardboard box (above), this is a package that will be hard to damage while in the mail system! The cleanly cut, minimal waste and ease of popping the parts out of the shucks is easily seen in this sheet (at right) of F-104 parts using the tetris-bukvorez method of foam building.
36 SEPTEMBER 2013
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