Although I have not posted on the blog lately I have been finding time to work on the 104. I decided to install a chute system and that took a bit of time to work out. It is now installed and working.
The turbine needed to be installed and I decided to follow Roland's method out of Germany in raising the motor to approximately a 2 degree thrust from the kits 5 degree set up. You can see the mounting blocks in the picture below.

This also required the pipe to be raised. I also found the mounting rails to be marginal so I beefed them up to reduce any flex.

In this picture you can see the turbine at the end of the thrust pipe and the light ring installed with some weathering done to the afterburner.
I have also scraped my electronics tray as I decided to set the plane up with the Jeti radio system and to make is simple I have gone to the Jeti Central Box instead of the PowerBox Royal which I had originally planned for. I will post some pictures of this change soon.

I have been working on the electronics and air systems. The plane has three fuse parts. Tail section,
mid section and forward section. My goal was to have these parts remain removable for maintenance and inspection purposes. To do this of coarse all the air, electrical and lighting has to be able to disconnect at each section.

The top picture is the panel I have made which is accessed each time the plane is readied to fly. It has the powerbox power distribution computer and screen as well as the air fill for the brakes and retract system. Also there are two small switches to turn the navigation / landing lights and the after burner lights on. The landing lights automatically turn off when the gear is retracted and the burner lights go on when the throttle is in a predetermined position like around 80%.

Well it is time to get back to the 104 in preparation for the test flights next spring. I have been held up partially because I was having difficulty deciding on the best turbine for the plane. Kind of an important decision! After reviewing all the 200 size turbines and their power to weight as well as performance value and features I have decided on the Jets Munt 200. Some of this turbines features are;
Engine Features:

• Small engine size and lightweight construction.
• Design has been primarily focused on a reliable and easy setup for users that are new to turbine models. The engine has a thrust output of at least 200 N (>45lbs)  ideal for large scale jets like the 1/5 Rafale or large Jet trainers like the Diamond. It can power adequately models up to 70 lbs weight.
• Special attention and care have been taken during the development to ease of use and the installation in the model and to increase the reliability to a maximum.
• The internal kerostart system is of an all new design and features a fully automated start procedure.  Start cycles take an average of 45s from the pilot command to the engine running at idle, ready for take off.
• Low operating temperatures enable a long life and fast acceleration time, rendering the control of the plane in critical situations like  go-around much easier.
• JetsMunt have made a big effort to compensate for the weight of the integrated components. The end result is that the weight of the engine alone has been reduced from other models of similar size to only 1500 grams (3.3 lbs).  As the external components needed for the operation of the engine have been reduced to only the fuel pump, the total installed weight of the installed engine, including the ECU,  fuel pump and fuel filter, is only of 1.650 grams (3.6 lbs). Including the suggested battery (not supplied) (7,4V/ 3000mAh 2S Lipo) the total weight rises to only 1.800 grams.
• The M 200XBL can use NON TOXIC synthetic 2 stroke motorbike oil ( 2TJASO FC or better) to keep a clean environment and avoid jeopardizing user and bystanders health. This oil is easily available locally. Ultimate Jets does not support the use of diesel fuel with this engine for the time being.
• Standard service interval is recommended at 25h

 My A-10 flying this year at Victoria's Largest Little Air Show.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VJhvyY84d4Q

Warthog time

Ok I must admit I have stopped the CF 104 build again to focus on flying now with the upcoming air show two months away.

My A-10 will be flying at the air show this year and I needed to get Mike Allman some stick time as I will be flying my Corsair and as the show boss I will be busy. We flew it last weekend up at the Princeton Jet Rally. Once the initial flights were don we loaded it up with ordnance and it flew with authority despite the extra weight and drag. Also experimented with the                                            decelerons which proved very effective with no bad tendencies.

The tail section is held to the mid section by 4 3mm bolts. They go into an aluminum clamp that clamps down on a carbon rod. I am not a fan of this method. I would much prefer to bolt the two halves together directly.

Anyway the kit comes with some nice shinny bolts as you see on the right. The problem with these is that they are soft and it requires a lot of torque to tighten the clamp down enough to hold it secure on the rod. I am sure you know where this is going. Sure enough they hex portion stripped on all four after a few cycles. Unfortunately the bolts were put in place on the clamps prior to the clamp mechanism being installed so the head of the bolt would not come through the hole that you see.
After some swearing I carefully enlarge the holes and removed them and put in some proper hardened bolts instead.
The fuel tank and air trap have been installed and I will need to start the programming soon but it is nice out and it is time to go fly something.

Mid section rigging

Now I can finally start to rig the mid section. First I need to fabricate the wire harness for all the functions found in the tail section which need to be routed through this section.

I have them running through a cool tube but not to keep them away from heat but more for a neat installation. The great thing about the cool tubes is they are very light and corrugated so they can bend any way you want them to.








Here is the little burner control for the LED's in the tail. Once it is set I should not have to bother with it any more but it is still accessible if need be.

Tail section completed

The tail is now complete and ready to move to the mid section.

Here you can see the thrust tube installed with the bell mouth attached. For those of you not familiar with turbine installations the eflux of the turbine sits inside of this bell mouth allowing for air to flow around it.

Here you can see the other end with the after burner nozzle installed and weathered.
The LED burner ring sits just inside here and will light up at certain preset throttle settings giving the visual imitation of the real thing, but not the noise unfortunately.

Burner lights

I need to install the burner lights and get the wiring sorted out. For those who do not know the burner lights simulate visually the afterburner function. When a certain pre determined throttle setting is reached they flicker and then light up stronger and stronger the same way you would see a full scale after burner light up.

These very bright LED's are controlled by a little  controller box that I will place nearer to the front of the plane for C of G reasons. The wiring will need to be routed for this to work as in the previous post and there needs to be a break and plugs attached so the tail can be removed.

The burner bolts into the fuse and then the tail pipe slips inside it.

Here is the wire harness that I need to cut and add connectors too. Waiting for the connectors to arrive. Should be here today.

Tail section work

Finally getting back to the plane again. I have been waiting on parts for the tail section as I cannot complete the mid section until I have all the wiring done in the tail.

There are two lights on the tail on each side. Top ones are amber and bottom ones are white or clear.

You can see the LED now attached to the lens.

Here you can see the tail to mid section break. Not all that unlike the full scale. I will want to be able to remove the tail section for maintenance or replacement of servos etc. so I have to be able to unplug all the wires at the joint. Unfortunately all of the wires are long and so I will need to cut them and put a male and female plug on each one. The tail is also the most difficult section to work on so I took some scrap honey comb cardboard and made up a stand to hold it so I can work on it without damage to the tail and my neck.

Once I have the air lines organized I want to make a perch for the UAT to be installed. This is part of the fuel system and therefore I would like to have it next to the fuel tank. Its purpose is to insure that the fuel that flows to the turbine fuel pump is free of air bubbles. Although there is not any real reason to have to service this item I would still like it to be removable. ( Murphy's law principal )
This is where it will go more or less so now I need to get started on a perch for it.

There are a lot of air lines to deal with and the fuse is 11.5 feet long so I try to route them as neatly as possible.
One way to do this is to run them through a tube. I like these cool tubes because they are light heat protective to 600 degrees F and go around corners. Duralite sell these tubes in different diameters and colours.
Please feel free to comment or ask any questions about anything in the Hangar Deck posts.

There is a bunch of wiring and air lines that will be routed through the plane to the nose section but before I can tidy these up I need to install the fuel tank which is like putting a square tube in a round hole. First the tank has to be plumbed and pressure tested to make sure there are no leaks.

Behind my hand and in front of the tank I will need to make a perch for the air trap which goes between the turbine and the fuel tank.

In the top picture you can also see the hydraulic system for the main gear. It needed to be bled and is now tested and works great. Unfortunately in order to get the tank in I will need to remove it. This can be accomplished without removing any of the hydraulic lines hopefully.

Another task that needs to be done well the plane is in pieces is the landing lights. The nose gear light I needed to make a bracket for to attach to the oleo and the main gear light needed to have brackets to attach them ( one on each main gear door) to the doors.You can tell by the heat sink on the end that this light will be seen on final with no problem.

The 104 from Skymaster had a design change that came out after this air frame was manufactured. There was some concern that if the linkage or servo were to fail on the leading edge flap it would cause a situation that would be unflyable and I have heard of one incidence of this occurring. So Skymaster sent out the engineering fix to all those air frames that were already sold. You can see in the picture to the right that the leading edge flap drops down and is held there by the linkage to the servo. What Skymaster came out with was a phenolic plate with the opening in it for a steel pin that was mounted in the fuse. You can see the picture of the pin that needs to be installed inside the fuse and a picture of it installed and sticking out of the fuse where the wing attaches.

This needs to be done now before the fuse gets more complicated and access becomes severely restricted.
 

Back at the CF-104

I cannot believe that it has been a year since the last post. I am kind of like the guy who goes to the store for a liter of milk and does not come back for a year!!
Anyway I am not determined to get the rigging done on this bad boy so here we go.
There are 4 main systems in this plane.

1. Electrical including the power distribution panel and servos as well as the lighting, receivers and telemetry. Also included in this would be the turbine ECU.
2. Hydraulic system which is primarily for the main gear as they are quite complicated and need the pressure that a hydraulic system provides over a pneumatic one.
3. Pneumatic system which is used to operate the nose gear and gear doors as well as chute deployment and speed brakes
4. Fuel system.   

        

                                                                             
  There are 3 main pieces the the plane not including the wings. All the wiring and the pneumatics need to be routed to just behind the pilots seat.  This part of the canopy system I have made easily removeable so access is no problem.                     

I will lay out wire harness and power distribution panel which by the way is the PowerBox Royal SRS on the bench to get an idea of what I am up against and to make sure my wire harness is long enough.

More pictures to come.