Chambers R-1 build

Very nice build and quite innovative! Good luck in your contest!!

@OVERLORD wrote:Good luck Jim, I love the details on the plane. Where is the CG located?

The CG is right on the leading edge at the wing tips.

Very nice looking. I hope it flies as well as it looks.

Phil

That thing looks cool from every direction. You're an aviation artist, Jim.
For finishing touches, I recommend these:

Long story short, 2nd place multi engine limited, 2nd place single engine limited, I brought the plank award home again, and I was the only Musciano participant.

That's quite a nice trophy. Did it have to fly to qualify for an award?

Thank you Rusty! You have to fly at least one lap to make it an official flight and qualify.  It is a perpetual award, I brought it home last year as well. There was only one other "plank", Keith Trostles Farman with 3 Pee Wee .020s'. He couldn't get all three to cooperate for an official flight.

Keith assured me I won't be taking the plank award home next year. I love a challenge!

Jim

Hats off Jim. I've been following this thread from the get-go, and
have enjoyed every post. Beautiful work!
Bob

Congrats Jim!! The finish-photos look beautiful man! I loved the flight-vid! (ear to ear grin).. The L/G design was something I marveled at when you built it. Your flight-landing appeared to be a smooth touch-down.
In that vid post, you mentioned needing a bigger tank. How did that work out? The tank in the recent photos looks great! Judging from the copper vent-tube, I assume that you re-plumbed it. Nice work. I'd like to try that with one of my small wedges. Do you have any tank-mod photos from this build?

Roddie,

Sorry I took so long to reply. The tank worked great, got about a three minute flight. Much longer than needed for 1/2a scale. I've done a uniflow mod on a few wedge tanks. I pull both vent tubes, solder over the bottom vent tube hole and put the uniflow vent through the top hole. To fuel you undo the feed line, tip it on its nose, and fuel through the uniflow.

Unfortunately I had a minor landing gear failure and nosed over on the landing, nothing like the video. Probably cost me first place.

Jim

@JPvelo wrote:Roddie,

Sorry I took so long to reply. The tank worked great, got about a three minute flight. Much longer than needed for 1/2a scale. I've done a uniflow mod on a few wedge tanks. I pull both vent tubes, solder over the bottom vent tube hole and put the uniflow vent through the top hole. To fuel you undo the feed line, tip it on its nose, and fuel through the uniflow.

Unfortunately I had a minor landing gear failure and nosed over on the landing, nothing like the video. Probably cost me first place.

Jim

No worries Jim. I was curious if you'd pulled the rear-cap to solder the uniflow in place on the inside.. A bit more work.. and easier when building a tank from scratch. How far back does your vent-tube go? I positioned my uniflows' between 1/8" to 3/16" forward of the fuel pick-up to allow clearance for bubbles.. but my tanks were also rectangular.

I imagine that un-soldering a wedge-cap could be tedious. Have you ever done it? I had some thoughts on how it could be made easier.. but they're just thoughts. Drill a small hole in the cap to accept a piece of music-wire having a short "L-bend" into the hole. Lock the wires' straight-end in a bench-vise. It allows for turning the tank while heating the joints.. and gradually pulling on the cap at the same time. Solder-up the little hole before you put the cap back on. I'd imagine that it's probably been done that way before.

I didn't know there was a video. I just went to Jm's channel and watched it. It really scoots, much faster than I expected. I'd hate flying something like that over pavement.

@RknRusty wrote:I didn't know there was a video. I just went to Jm's channel and watched it. It really scoots, much faster than I expected. I'd hate flying something like that over pavement.

Yea.. the vids' wicked.. especially if you'd been following the build. I am curious if the tarmac was different in Tucson. Were there paved circles for the scale-event? Curious about what happened with the L/G.

@dckrsn wrote:Hats off Jim. I've been following this thread from the get-go, and
have enjoyed every post. Beautiful work!
Bob

My sentiment too! A very smooth and dedicated build.

Thanks guys!

Rusty,
I'm actually going to try and speed it up a bit and go with longer lines, at least 42' as opposed to the 35' it's on now. That flight was with 15% nitro and a cut down master airscrew 6x3. I'm going to bump up to 25% and an APC 5x3 and really get it moving.

Roddie,
The top solder joint in this photo loosened and let the gear swing back about 3/4". I'm going to redo the gear mount for a more scale appearance and hopefully save at least 1/2oz of weight.




Jim