Just to toss in a bit of my own experience concerning matt wire length vs motor wire length. I try as much as possible to leave motor wires alone. I just extend the batt wires. But still try to keep it as short as I can. In some models you cant help it so when a longer run is needed I up the battery wire guage. My personal choice for it 10ga.

As for ESC placement I also try to always put the ESC in the duct one way or the other. It in my experiences allows you to get the most out of your ESC's without taxing them too bad. Heat is a killer.

JGuilty, On 5S you can expect 900-1050W on the setup I posted. It motivates my 55oz Meteor (retracts added) like no ones business. It should motivate this bird at least as well as my SU-34 in comparison.

Jason

Originally Posted by JGuilty13

Max, I wish I could credit you an "RCG" token or something! You have a lot of knowledge on these forums. Much appreciated.

Can't take credit this is stuff that others have researched and I just try to get the sense of it all.
Actually Jason said it so much simpler. Basically I do the same as he described. Longer on the batt side and gauge up. But then looking at the BVM guys and such I start to realize that each model is different and can be optimized in a number of ways.

Originally Posted by FresnoJay

...JGuilty, On 5S you can expect 900-1050W on the setup I posted. It motivates my 55oz Meteor (retracts added) like no ones business. It should motivate this bird at least as well as my SU-34 in comparison.

Fresno - do you happen to know if the lip is removable on that Detrum 70mm EDF fan?

JGuilty13, It is not but its nothing that a dremel cant solve. You could either make a channel for the lip to sit in (easy) or take the lip off (also easy). Nothing worth having comes without some kind of work .

Jason

This is a very nice model

EDF Mount:
The foam housing is 73mm wide but can be sanded out to take 83mm. The only concern would be the lip and inlet tunnel. The intake tunnel has the Landing gear and wing support spar across it creating little narrowings in the inlet portion of the duct. While both gear and spar are covered these intrusions are why I guess the cheats were added.

Taileron Servo:
I am definitely flipping the Taileron servo arms the other way. It will hide and protect the taileron link rods while adding more resolution to the tailerons movement. The factory way is limited by the taileron plastic mount itself. Easily done since the servo is actually mounted just aft of the rear rudder bolt so cutting a channel for the link will not weaken the rudder mount or taileron mount.

Wiring:
My RC-Castle 3D no drive setup came with the following wiring;
Throttle - Not seeing a provided wire yet
Ailerons - Y'd
Elevators - Y'd
Rudders - Y'd
Gear - A sequencer connects Tri for retracts and Nose Gear Door servo
Vector1 - single line
Vector2 - single line
Vector3 - single line

Landing Gear:
These are the same retracts found on the F-18, Euro etc. They are completely interchangeable with the PZ15090 AKA HK312. But this being a larger model I think they may ware down for some fairly quickly. For myself I already have a spear set of the metal trunnion version of the PZ15090. So I'll be swapping them out even before I start. In fact as NS pointed out there is a little play with these especially on the nose. I think I may add a spring to the support arm track to dampen flex on the nose gear. Note my guess is heavier battery users will need to add a stiffer spring to the nose gear shock. NS mentioned it to be soft.... its great for the recommended battery but if V8 moved a 5000mAh full forward I think this could have been enough to sink the nose just enough on V8s initial roll out.

ESC placement:
Distance from the foot of the battery bed to motor with a slack line of wire was 580mm. Looking at the vent there is a partition in the center which has me thinking this to be why NS thought this to be the ESC hatch because its look to be the only pair of things that you would put there. If you were to utilize it thi way its 380mm from the foot of the vent hatch to motors.

The manual has no mention of the drive system and it doesn't look to be particular to RC-Castle. My guess is it was left out because of the two drive systems. The manual has only FW CW all over it and lots of Chinese.

Travel Range:
While they don't specify the travel range it does show in the pictures the full deflection testing on the last page and just about exactly to scale its range is much like the pic I posted of the parked FS showing the datum. However, this is what may have mislead V8. The 17g servos have standard length arms and the pictures show to put the link in the outer most hole of the servo an middle on the stab horn. By doing this the picture also reveals that the servo swing of only about 15* to get a full deflection. This is opposite to how it should be setup. This would have definitely have made it difficult for V8 to handle especially on high rates with only 35% expo.
Stabilator/Taileron Servos:
Pleasent surprise. They sound like digitals, centre perfectly and they have a good resolution of 4 usecs per incrimental step of the servo arm. I think they opted for using two very good 17g servos especially if these get used as tailerons in some future version where they could command pitch and roll with everything else off.

NOTE: After reviewing the picture setup of the linkage and a more managable setup, I'd suggest putting the z bend in the second to last most inside hole of the servo arm and the plastic clevis on the outer most hole of the horn. This allows full deflection without the link rubbing against the fuse. The most inside hole does. If you wanted more deflextion go out one more on the servo arm but this really isn't necessary as this would move the stab past +/-30* which is past the stll point of the surface. It would act as an air break more than a flight control.


Manual:
Scant and left desiring. The first 5 pages of 20 are devoted to inventory all in English and Chinese. The radio setup only covers 3D so I assume another manual will be made for the other config? The setup is based on JR/Spektrum programming. It reads like someone learning to write Egerwish

Though I haven't power tested any servos yet, my guess is the Stabilator/Taileron servos are the only ones reversed and connected by a Y cable.

You guys V8 and NS never mentioned the cute screw driver that comes in the bag with interchangeable philips bits. Cool... another little hobby tool.

The only glue needed is for the nose and tail. The rest screws together as easy as a Habu.

Though I would hope never to have to belly land this, the inlet duct is actually a hair thicker than the SU-34s. This one just weighs a Kilo more so not likely to survive bellies without some glass or span tape wrap to protect it.

I've been taking pics as I go along and will update all to the initial post I did early on for future new comers to review to keep repeating questions down.

Cheers...... This makes me want to change careers and become a toy maker

Originally Posted by v8truckin

Fuselage tube (square) is 9mm x 9mm

Wing tube (round) is 9mm dia.

Now I see why you couldn't give the length of the wing tubes. The metal tubes are glued into each wing and don't appear easily removable. Those tube IMO are heavier though. I've got tube material like this sitting around and arrow shafts are noticably lighter in the hand.

exactly what I did setting up the linkage. I went off of the pictures on the manual & box & also used the f18 manual as reference. Might of been the mistake...most likely!

well then I guess that's why I seemed tail heavy when It went airborne & difficult to control.


Post some pics of the linkage setup you'll be using and ill do the same. If I'm home this wind fresnojay @ i will be trying another attempt in this maiden flight.

Isn't she a beauty!?!?!

When I setup controls I setup outer on the servo and outer on the surface. This allows a good amount of throw but room for more if needed. If the horn is in the middle at the surface and outer at the servo it would most deffinitly be a serious handfull to fly. V8 I will bring my cam and get you some good flight video. After we get a good shake down first of course .

Jason

Sounds good! Lets hope its good.

Originally Posted by v8truckin

well then I guess that's why I seemed tail heavy when It went airborne & difficult to control.


Post some pics of the linkage setup you'll be using and ill do the same. If I'm home this wind fresnojay @ i will be trying another attempt in this maiden flight.

I'm changing mine to be altogether different but I just recreated the same of the picture.
What the manual Picture showed:
If you placed the link On the outside hole of the servo arm and middle of the Stab horn, it took only 160usecs in one direction to reach full deflection as shown in the full deflection pictures. Explanation....
Servos generally are set to move from 899 usec to 2105 usec with 1500 usec as center. So the full swing of the servo is 1206. Set up as the picture to get the stab to move from end point to end point took only 320 usecs which means this is only using 26% of the servos swing to get the full end to end point of the stab which is way way way too much!!!!!!
It should always be the complete reverse.

Recommended Linkage Setup:
So I instead put the link on the second to last inside hole of the servo arm and the outer most hole of the horn. Then moved the stab to the same end points which this time moved from 1900 thru 1100 or now 800 usecs to make the same swing. So of 1206, 800 is now using 66% of the servos swing.

NOTE: After reviewing the picture setup of the linkage and a more managable setup, I'd suggest putting the z bend in the second to last most inside hole of the servo arm and the plastic clevis on the outer most hole of the horn. This allows full deflection without the link rubbing against the fuse. The most inside hole does. If you wanted more deflextion go out one more on the servo arm but this really isn't necessary as this would move the stab past +/-30* which is past the stall point of the surface. It would act as an air break more than a flight control.
I'm going with a longer horn on the stab and use the most inside hole of the servo arm.

For being a kit, its gottabe the easiest plane to put together.

Originally Posted by FresnoJay

When I setup controls I setup outer on the servo and outer on the surface. This allows a good amount of throw but room for more if needed. If the horn is in the middle at the surface and outer at the servo it would most deffinitly be a serious handfull to fly. V8 I will bring my cam and get you some good flight video. After we get a good shake down first of course .

Jason

Trouble with that instruction is it depends on the servo arm. Standard servo arms are short for a reason; they stress the servo less and add resolution. 3D they are longer. In this case this is a larger servo expected for a larger model so the arm is 1". Most radio setup manuals expect to have the link parallel to the surface and that is for a standard setup. For a full moving stab you want as much movement as possible in the servo to reach each increment to the full end points. The key is precision. Mechanical advantage is using a shorter arm but in this case they have the same tiny little 3 hole horns that were on the SU34 that are not even half an inch. They also set the mount point off the hinge line creating a expo curve to the movement. If the arm were ahead of the hinge at that would allow fine movement near center.
I've already forward the dilemma on to FW via RCCastle.

But hey don't take my word how about one who builds and competes;
A quote from Troy Newman
Geometry of Pattern Plane Linkage
Geometry is a huge part of linkage setup. We're now dealing with precision setups not 3D. We're talking about using the servo to its maximum efficiency and using the best mechanical advantage possible on our linkages.
First step: You want to choose surface control horns and servo arms that give you only as much throw as you need. If you're only going to fly on 10 degs of aileron travel why set up the linkage for 20 degrees maximum? I never run my flying rates less than about 80%. Yes that means D/R values are around 80% this gives me some wiggle room to get a little more aileron travel, if needed, but still maintain the resolution of my servos. You want to run the longest control horn on the surface and the smallest servo wheel you can get away with......
Again, only use dual rates down in the 80% range of what you're flying on. There may be an exception on the rudder though. Sometimes models with highly effective rudders are tough to fly on this high rudder travel. If you're flying such a plane, I'd say you won’t need this much throw—not even for stall turns—and you can decrease your travel mechanically. Another solution is to dial the rudder expo up. It's not uncommon for me to run rudder expo up around 60, 70, or 80% on a rudder. You want to avoid the "knee" in the expo curve, but this amount of expo won't hurt anything.

Originally Posted by Maxthrottle

Wiring:

Elevators - Y'd

Landing Gear:
These are the same retracts found on the F-18, Euro etc. They are completely interchangeable with the PZ15090 AKA HK312. But this being a larger model I think they may ware down for some fairly quickly.

NOTE: After reviewing the picture setup of the linkage and a more managable setup, I'd suggest putting the z bend in the second to last most inside hole of the servo arm and the plastic clevis on the outer most hole of the horn. This allows full deflection without the link rubbing against the fuse. The most inside hole does. If you wanted more deflextion go out one more on the servo arm but this really isn't necessary as this would move the stab past +/-30* which is past the stll point of the surface. It would act as an air break more than a flight control.

Cheers...... This makes me want to change careers and become a toy maker

Elevators Y'd? NOOO!
Tailerons act really good as ailerons specially to help at slow speeds with great deflections, leaving the wing ailerons with little deflection so as not to spoil lift and minimise uncontrolled yawing during a stall. I'm definetely not using them just as elevators but also for roll control.

Is really PZ15090 AKA HK-312 interchangeable with stock retracts?
From hobbyking's specs, the mounting plate has different size and the hole diametre is 3mm instead of 4mm!
The one you give the link seems more suitable both in size and hole diametre.
On the other hand, the new setup for the Sukhoi retracts seems wisely thought since the plastic will be unloading the impact of landing against the body of the retract instead of the working mechanism (Like in the EF nose gear) So I guess it will be able to withstand more landing energy with less wearing. I'll give them a try. Also the wheel diametre is larger and this will help soften the land and reduce the lever reaction that makes them break.

30 degrees for tailerons
Suits fine for level flight and some aerobatics but I may squeeze it a bit more for some sick 3D aerobatics (Enabling Dual Rates)

Lastly, I want to thank you for all the nice review and info you are providing!

Cheers,
Jandro.