Running old sparkers.

Nice prop strike mark on the index finger of the right hand holding the busted crank. I've had more than enough of those. I'm now a chicken stick wuss. Did it break just doing a bench run? I'd like to see a sparker run and a diesel too. Never seen either. those spark engines looked big.

I got a lesson on flying in the wind Thursday, but only 14mph according to NOAA. Not as windy as your day, and I put up six flights. It's the most wind I've ever flown in. I got the pattern(still beginner) done in all but two flights where I came out of the OH8s early, but landed every one pretty well. Because of this experience, I'll be more prepared next time it's windy. It was 84 degrees, and I busted out into a full blown sweat. Sweet! It's back to normal now though.

My favorite engine today was a Nelson 46 in David Smith's new carrier plane's maiden flight. That was a scary beast. Those things are really fast. So was John Gibson's Russian combat plane. He and Howard Shenton flew some while the rest of us spectated. Today was calm up at Watt's, but my pattern flying inexplicably sucked. No excuse, just one of those days. The old Skyray has been good to me though. Probably will go again this coming week.

Sorry, I should have made my own thread for all that. I'll cease now.
Rusty

Great stuff Ken, way to keep those old sparkers going. Better than keeping them on the shelf!

Ron

Good stuff. I like it. All nice, but love that Mc. 49.
One of the guys here has one here in a Playboy Snr. flying Free Flight on glow, and it sounds magnificent.

Roddie, the fuel bowls and timing advancements are typically missing on a lot of ignition engines. However, your .60 there would run just fine on glow. Put a plug in it and go fire it up. I had a one yesterday running. They do concern me due to the cylinder head being spot welded on. You could blow the top right off. Our fuel was nothing fancy, 1/4 part castor to 3/4 gas. No fancy measuring devices, just poured it in the bottle and gave it the ole good eye. We fly a few spark ignition engines now and then. Very rarely as they just take a lot more patience. We also had the Drone diesel going . I'm fascinated by the technology of yesteryear. I vote you find those needed parts and get those ole turkey's running again. Ken

The Fox though was a bit upsetting when it broke. I'm seeing more and more of this as our engines our getting considerably older. We run them pretty much weekly when we can and this one was almost at flight 500. Typically the Fox .35 breaks at the cutout in the crank across one of the square corners. Mine broke a few weeks ago at the pin. These engines though have lots and lots of flights on them. Good news is, it's already repaired. Ken

Thanks for the advice Ken! Apparently there's a LOT more to getting the Sparkers to run.. I get the concept.. kinda".. but I always thought that all you needed was a battery and coil unit. I watched some vids.. and I seem to see a lot more gadgetry involved.

Glad that the Fox is fixed!   

Woody Bartelt is Aero Electric, he has parts for dozens of spark engines including GHQ, Ohlsson, Dooling.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/REPRODUCTION-ANTIQUE-MODEL-AIRPLANE-ENGINE-PARTS-CATALOG-LATEST-EDITION-/281228841590?pt=US_Radio_Control_Control_Line&hash=item417a8b9276

Ken. you might have addressed this before since I have some memory of the Fox crank failure at the edge of the fuel channel. Has anyone tried rounding the corners to hopefully relieve some of the stress in that area?
Rusty