What a friend gave me.

batjac wrote:What do mean vs.?!?  I’ll have you know I’m a card carrying member and Brother in good standing of Possum Lodge #11.





The only reason I’d use electrical tape instead of duct tape is that the nitro and oil would make the tape let go and the wing would fly off in flight.  Although that would be rather Red Greenish…

The Handy Mark

That’s just too cool!! I am jealous! I almost bought a pair of RedGreen suspenders but needed a new roll of duct tape more..

rsv1cox wrote:Good one Mark and Rene.  I was a frequent watcher on PBS.  What-ever happened to those guys!!!!!!!!!!

They just got old. Happens. Unfortunately, Red Green did his "Farewell Tour', and I didn't find out that he was coming to Portland until after the appearance.

The Disappointed Mark

Marleysky wrote:I am jealous! I almost bought a pair of RedGreen suspenders but needed a new roll of duct tape more..

I got the most recent suspenders, but they are not as good as the quality of the previous suspenders.

The Flannel Mark

Did a little more work tonight.  I trimmed the rear standoffs and tapped them as well as tapping the standoff behind the firewall.  I also slathered JB Weld around the cracks on the standoffs and the rear of the firewall.  Not very pretty, but I just want to get this done as I have too many projects the wife is wanting me to work on.







I then cut a plastic tube and trimmed it to fit between the standoffs for the fuel bladder.







Next is to address the firewall and tweak the engine, and then it’s ready for test flight.

The Neat (Not Really) Mark

I KNEW IT!!!!!!!

I was going to pull the Killer Bee backplate from the Black Lynx and install a fine needle, but when I looked at the engine, I see that it has a #1 cylinder on it.  Nope.  Not good enough.  I want the boost ports. Bernie does have TD cylinders, even if they only have one boost port per bypass rather than two.  As I said in a previous post, I have about everything to build a Killer Bee clone except for the TD cylinder.  I also said that if I go to Bernie for one, it'll turn into a $120 order.  Well, I decided I want the TD cylinder instead of the #1, so I went to Bernie's website to order one.  One?  Well, I'll probably want to do other engines in the future, so let's do 3.  Hmmm... Maybe I'll get this...  And this....  And this....

So $130 later I'm checking out.

The Spendthrift Mark

My order came in from Cox International (Thanks, Bernie!) yesterday.  Now I can get back to this when I can carve out a little time.  The wife has me getting the house ready for new paint, floors, and carpeting.  Doesn't look like much for $130.00, does it?  Better not let the wife see this...






The Interior Decorator Mark

Okay.  Got everything here for my Killer Bee clone.  Looking through my stuff, I’m surprised how many old junk backplates I have that have fine needles in them.




A little time and it all went together.  I sanded the crankcase to remove the ridges around the screwholes, and then just followed the normal assembly routine.  Yes, I did use a metal thrust washer, I just forgot it on the above photo.




Still not sure about the cylinder.  Not knocking Bernie, I know what he’s working with, but the piston drops right out of the cylinder when the cylinder is held up.  I’ll run the engine and see how high it will peak out.  If I’m not satisfied, I’ll have to resort to pulling the piston/cylinder from a TD not currently in use and use a real #4 P/C set.

The Klown Mark

Cool, but shouldn’t a killer bee have a slit cylinder, gold anodized crankcase and a black backplate? Unless it’s an .051 then a red backplate. Should also have a #1702 head I think.

Not an expert here, just going off of memory. Either way it should run well. Believe it or not some of the better running engines have a really loose piston fit. The Paul G. Mouse engine guide eludes to this.

Ron

Cribbs74 wrote:Cool, but shouldn’t a killer bee have a slit cylinder, gold anodized crankcase and a black backplate? Unless it’s an .051 then a red backplate. Should also have a #1702 head I think.

Not an expert here, just going off of memory. Either way it should run well. Believe it or not some of the better running engines have a really loose piston fit. The Paul G. Mouse engine guide eludes to this.

Ron

Not going for the look, just the performance. The glow head is the new production 1702 TD head Bernie sells. The cylinder is Bernie's TD P/C set. It also has the 128TPI needle, whereas I think the Killer Bees had 80TPI. When I say Killer Bee clone, I more or less mean a KB horseshoe backplate attached to the best performance parts.

The Mis-Spoken Mark

I also put together a KB clone several years ago that I named TeeDeeReedie because of the No4 cylinder I used. It takes turns with other horseshoe  backplate reedies in powering my Lil Roughneck, and is a terrific runner after many tens of ours of service. Still as new compression, balljoint only reset once.




Even though it has the KB crank that is known to have a loose fit in the case in general, it has a good fit and does not wobble at all in the purple anodized crankcase I bought from Bernie. The cylinder piston fit is tapered (!) despite the thick wall later production cylinder. It has 2 bypasses but only a single booster in each bypass flute. I do not recall where I bought it, maybe on feebay.

I added a DIY screen to the KB backplate- with no notable loss of power - to protect the engine..a Kamtechnik turbo head completes the tuning measures but now the engine has a Merlin clamp and plug on it.  One of my favorite reedies.






Sorry for kidnapping  your post, Mark.

*** SIGH ***  

Well, as I was afraid of, the plastic is just too brittle and isn’t going to hold.  I guess I’m going to have to find some easy, ugly fix for this.  Not worth trying to be clever.




The Phantom Mark

Okay, just about finished.  I tapped the engine mount holes for the stock screws.  Then I mounted the engine to measure for the fuel tube holes and tubing length.  I made the holes for the fuel tube to exit side of the fuselage so I can pinch it off when starting.  I made up a bladder and tested it for fit in the protective tube.  It’ll need a little more tweaking, but it’s about right.  Maybe I’ll get a chance to run this next week.




The Tapped Out Mark

So I trimmed the tubing down to size and put a 90 degree fitting instead of the standard 180 degree fitting for the bladder.  The fuel system is now complete.  I should have enough room in the fuselage to put in an ounce of fuel.  Just ready to test run and see where the needle needs to be set and how many RPMs I get out of this thing.





The Fit Mark

Cribbs74 wrote:The castor pickled insects are a nice bonus.

That's too funny.

I have had great luck with the Testors plastic model cement using strips of styrene plastic as reinforcement on the inside of fuselages.
CA adhesive also works great and is much faster. With it about anything can be used as a reinforcement.
This is what I buy, available in a wide variety of shapes and sizes.
https://www.hobbylobby.com/Crafts-Hobbies/Model-Kits/Tools-Adhesives/Assorted-Polystyrene-Sheets/p/80968559

The rounds are great for repairing screw bosses. I've reinforced them with aluminum tubing.

The poly is softer. doesn't fracture like styrene. Glue works just as well on it.
The testors glue I have is very old but still good. Tube is orange.
It is the stuff glue sniffers like. Maybe not available now due to those idiots.

rsv1cox wrote:

batjac wrote:*** SIGH ***  

Well, as I was afraid of, the plastic is just too brittle and isn’t going to hold.  I guess I’m going to have to find some easy, ugly fix for this.  Not worth trying to be clever.




The Phantom Mark

Oh well, the old college try Mark.  Doesn't have to be pretty to work.  Eager to see the final product.

Bob

Try reinforcing that screw boss with plastic strips on the outside. Also fill the hole then drill new hole and tap.
It doesn't have to be pretty.

I put the engine on the test stand this afternoon.  I normally like to use a 5x3 prop on my 1/2A planes, but since this is a larger plane, I’m going with an APC 6x3 prop.  I tried three fuels for this.  The last of my 35% Glow Plug Buddy, some old 25% Hobbico Cox Superfuel, and some 33% Traxxas car fuel I doctored up to get 20% oil bringing it down to about 30% nitro.

I started with the Glow Plug Buddy fuel.  When I looked at the new 1702 glow head, it didn’t seem to be as high compression as the old ones, so I only went with two glow head gaskets to start.  Mistake.  Bernie knows what he’s doing, because it was over-compressed.  A third GHG took care of it.  Even though it’s a fine needle, the tuning band on bladder is still only a little over a half turn.  On this fuel, the 6x3 was peaking at about 16,700 RPM.  I’m sure if I tried different glow heads and different props I could get more RPMs.   But, meh…

Then I tried the 25% Hobbico.  It just wouldn’t run.  I really couldn’t get it to start, and when it did for a little, it wouldn’t needle.  Not sure if the fuel is bad, 25% isn’t great on bladder, or I’m just a jughead.  It got maybe 15,500 RPM.

Last was the Traxxas fuel.  Usually car fuel is bad for our engines because it’s very low on oil and it’s mostly (or all) synthetic.  The Traxxas fuel is 16% oil, half and half.  So an ounce and a half of castor brought it up to 20%.  The engine liked this fuel the best and spun up to 17,400.  Not record breaking, but it should be okay.  We’ll see when it flies.

I put it all together and weighted it.  10.2 ounces ready to fly.  A lot heavier than I like.  But oh, well.

The Triple Threat Mark