PFFC 2012!!!!

Hey Everyone,

I was poking around RCGroups.com, and I got invited to submit a video to the Park Flyer Freestyle Contest. The PFFC is a freestyle contest for planes under a 61" wingspan, and all you have to do is take a video of you flying your plane, fit it to music, edit it using 2 or less cuts, and upload it to YouTube or Vimeo and post it on the thread on RCGroups.

So, yesterday I brought out my 48" Extreme Flight Edge 540T EXP with the Motrolfly 2820-680 and Savox servos featured in my "Wind Therapy" video. I haven't flown the plane in months, but I know from experience that normally one of the best flights of the day, for me, is my first flight right as soon as I get the stuff out of the car and the battery strapped in... must be a release from the monotonous half hour drive on the highway to get to the field. So my dad turned on the camera, and as it turned out, that first flight ended up being the flight I use in the video.

I didn't really have a song in mind, and figured I would go home and mix together some production music I have on my computer for the music aspect. However, when I got home and reviewed the video I learned that I wasn't going to need to mix any music, or even use the production music; AC/DC hit the nail on the head with their song, "If You Want Blood, You Got It" and it came out better than I expected.

Here's the video. Keep in mind the contest is open until September 18th, so you still have time if you want to participate. Pilots like Daniel Holman are also competing and have already submitted their videos. Below is also a link to the RCGroups thread if you are interested in joining in the fun.

Enjoy!

PFFC 2012 Forum Link:
http://www.rcgroups.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1639479

--Tom K.

More Cowbell!... er, I mean, GODFREY!

We went out to the field yesterday and managed to shoot some video of the Godfrey again. This time I decided to go about filming a little differently. I wanted to make the intro a little more exciting than a title screen, some funky music, and a takeoff... so I did some thinking and I think the result was pretty cool. The video is below, but first, I just want to say a few things about this amazing airframe...

With an 84" wingspan, this 27% Extra 300 was pretty much built to be powered by a DA-50, or similar 50cc gas engine. However, I really haven't had that much good luck with gas engines... maybe that's because we bought a first generation DLE-30 before they made some necessary tweaks to the design... but I digress... Anyway, we wanted to go electric. There aren't really a lot of good choices out there for a 50cc electric motor. You could go the knockoff route, but you may end up playing magnet pickup... or worse... You could also go a heavy underpowered route, which, let's face it, is so 10 years ago. Or you could go for a super light setup that gives you almost a 2:1 power to weight ratio. I, being me, chose the latter. For the motor, we turned to Hacker. I learned from the Sham-Wow guy that the Germans make good stuff... so we did some research and decided on the Q80-7M.

The Hacker Q80-7M can swing a 24x10TH Mejzlik Carbon Fiber propeller about 6400 RPMs and provide roughly 32 pounds of static thrust when measured with a fish scale. If you just found my blog by googling "RC Airplane" that means it swings a big prop, fast enough, to provide insane power. Also, with this setup, it pulls about 116 amps on the ground via an inline meter; and if you wanna go crazy, you can stick a 24x12 Xoar on it and pull about 130 amps and 37 pounds of thrust. Oh, did I mention this is all happening on 10S? Well yeah, 10S. It's a light and sweet setup, and it rarely comes down over 120 degrees F on a rather balmy Florida summer day with a heat index of somewhere around 105 F.

So, we had the motor figured out. Now it was time for the speed controller. Again, we have a few choices... well, two actually. One with a smoke system, and one without. So we turned to Castle for a Castle ICE2 160A HV ESC with wires about as thick as my pinkie finger, or one without a smoke system. Upon later testing, we discovered 160 Amps for an ESC on this setup may have been overkill... but hey, better than learning you pull 120 amps on a 60 amp ESC and wondering why your cowling's on fire. This ESC is a monster. It's big, chunky, and yet surprisingly light for its size. And since there's such a high amp buffer between 116 and 160, it comes down cool.

So all in all, we run 10S through a Castle 160A ICE2 HV ESC that turns the extremely awesome Hacker Q80-7M motor 6400RPMs that, in turn, swings a Mejzlik 24x10TH CF prop that blows 32 pounds of thrust over a 19 pound airplane, and let's just say... it's pretty sweet.

Not to mention it sounds Bad@$$!


--Tom K.