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For you guys who have built this plane, I'm going to start this build, finally, and have a question:

In reviewing the manual, the three plywood battery trays included each hold a two-battery pack, in series, and tied to the tray. The trays are held in place by the canopy hatch and a bit of Velcro.

Can that be right? Seems kind of loose and not particularly reliable. Does the canopy hatch hold the batteries in place?

Have any of you done anything else to keep the battery pack from moving around?

Anybody building this plane?

Or, if someone has, do the batteries stay put OK, if mounted as the instructions direct?

I run 6s in mine and have shaved foam about 3/4 inch thick around the front and sides of battery and no straps, it stays in perfectly.

Thanks gewiens. And the canopy stays on? I guess I need to give the battery hatch a second look.

My canopy held on with 2 little screws so it wont come off. I bought this plane basically new. Had 2 flights on it. Not sure if they all have the screwed on canopy.

Thanks Gewiens, I'm just being overly cautious, I guess. My plane has two screws at the back, going into the fuselage also. It just seemed like their battery hold down configuration might get loose under g forces. I'm still new to all this, and this plane is unlike the two others I've built. I'm not sure about using their suggested battery fixing method, with multiple battery trays, and might do something like what you have there.

Being carefull isn't a bad thing. My 4900mah 6s just lays in there just touching wingtube and it doesn't move at all. Have done all the extreme maneuvers with the plane and never once seen a problem. I have a smaller 6s now that i think of it that i use in there and have never done anything fancy with it either. The foam cradles it in there very good.

Picked up paint and monocoat today. Gonna change all the red to plum purple and got some other colors so will post some pics soon.

Originally Posted by gewiens

Picked up paint and monocoat today. Gonna change all the red to plum purple and got some other colors so will post some pics soon.

Gewiens,

Why would you change the perfect, and very classy, scarlet and gray colors?

Oh well.

Started my build, and so far so good, but have three questions for anyone:

1. The elevator control horns, when positioned at the end of the pushrods, where the pushrods exit the rear of the fuselage, have to be placed right at the inside edges of the elevators. I'd like to position them a bit farther out toward the center of the elevator, so I'm thinking of using a linkage that's offset about 1/8". Anyone else do that, or does it seem perfectly OK to attach to the elevators right at the inside edge?

2. Epoxying the horizontal stabilizer to the fuselage: I did it OK, but it seems like not such a great fit, and seems like maybe it should be reinforced. The stab doesn't quite fit perfectly into the hole it goes into, and there is a slight gap around some of the surface of the stab. Has anyone else dripped maybe a little more epoxy into that joint? I like the way the OP used white pinstriping to fit over that joint; very nice.

3. Looking at the various wood joints, inside the fuselage, etc., seems like some epoxy reinforcing is in order, or is that just overkill/paranoia?

Well, I've built mine according to the book and it went very well. The control horn position is fine and holds strong, I fly with a lot of wing lading and the elevater has yet to fail. As far as the construction goes I didn't add anything and the plane seams to be as strong as any other arf out there, you may need to rebuild the landing gear once or twice depending on your field! I wouldn't add any weight to it if I didn't have too.

Originally Posted by tlr-boise

Gewiens,

Why would you change the perfect, and very classy, scarlet and gray colors?

Oh well.

Started my build, and so far so good, but have three questions for anyone:

1. The elevator control horns, when positioned at the end of the pushrods, where the pushrods exit the rear of the fuselage, have to be placed right at the inside edges of the elevators. I'd like to position them a bit farther out toward the center of the elevator, so I'm thinking of using a linkage that's offset about 1/8". Anyone else do that, or does it seem perfectly OK to attach to the elevators right at the inside edge?

2. Epoxying the horizontal stabilizer to the fuselage: I did it OK, but it seems like not such a great fit, and seems like maybe it should be reinforced. The stab doesn't quite fit perfectly into the hole it goes into, and there is a slight gap around some of the surface of the stab. Has anyone else dripped maybe a little more epoxy into that joint? I like the way the OP used white pinstriping to fit over that joint; very nice.

3. Looking at the various wood joints, inside the fuselage, etc., seems like some epoxy reinforcing is in order, or is that just overkill/paranoia?

I am not a fan of red thats why i changed it. It turned out very nice, I will post some pics soon if i can find my darn camera. I only painted the red on it, all other colors still on except for the wingtips but black and silver lines still there.

Finally finished my Revolver. What do you think?

This required an extensive and time-consuming mod of the motor mount that supposedly fits everything, except for the simple four-hole pattern that is on the back side of the Hyperion motor. And, attaching the last of four screws of the wheel skirts, yes the final, fourth screw, took days. Because of the rounded shape of one of the skirts, the 3/8" screw supplied was too short. Three screws worked ok, but the last one was too short to achieve purchase with the t-nut. So, had to drive all over town to find a longer #2 screw, and then the t-nut broke free from the inside of the skirt. So, epoxy and then more epoxy . . . Result, the last two-minute job I had to do to finish this bird took days.

Have the AR7000 receiver velcro'd to a piece of packing foam epoxied to the wing tube, and it requires a short extension from the ESC, but I think that will work OK.

This will be the biggest, heaviest bird I've flown so far. More than twice the plane that the GP Super Sportster is. Now I have to figure out how to fit it in my car! Hope to maiden it this weekend.

That prop still looks ridiculously tiny compared to the rest of the plane. Wattmeter shows 634 Watts at WOT. Isn't that too little, considering it's about an 8 lb bird? Shouldn't I have a prop that's pulling about 1000 watts, if I want to fly high speed aerobatics?

Anyway, the colors of this thing are perfect, (at least for me), as you can see from the additional decals.