The muffler was the cure.

I put the mostly stock muffler on the engine and an APC 10 x 4 propeller. I broke the prefeered APC 9 x 4. Then I installed a normal O. S. brand needle valve assembly into my homemade venturi and the engine ran very well. i have a bunch of flights and it's running as good as it ever has. I have the new copy of the plane ready for paint. I may spray the base white later today. I found another brand of clear lacquer spray paint at Home Depot. I've been testing it on other planes to see how it reacts to engine exhaust. So far it's going well and I'm planning on using it as the top coat. I don't think the new plane will be ready for the El Dorado contest.

Got help for the engines.

I got even more help for the engine problems. I started with my go to tank the Du-Bro 4 ounce then tried to fit a metal tank but it was too long. I had cut out a 1 inch trough for it in the balsa I added for vibration. I couldn't use the metal tank so I went back to the plastic tank but now I removed more balsa so it would fit. Today I figured on trying a smaller plastic tank but I found out that it should be mounted wide side in not the narrow side like I always did. That meant even more balsa got cut out and the tank had to be re plumbed but the tank fits nicely. Pretty soon there wont be anything left but a pile of splinters.

I posted that I was having bad engine runs and got a lot of suggestions about a fix.I tried one that had me put the stock muffler on the engine and it helped a lot. I wa able to get some good flights out of it. That added a couple ounces of weight to the plane and I wasn't sure that the muffler was the cure. Today I tried the tongue muffler and that went very well where it didn't go well at all before. The only change was to use the stock needle valve set up and to turn the rpm's up to 12800 at launch. The rpm increase could have been the problem all along. Anyway I cut away some of the balsa I glued to the front to cure what I thought was the problem, vibration. I opened up an area so the fuel tank sits in it. The plane is flying very well but with all the changes and mods it looks pretty raggedy. I may have to build another using what I know about the design.

Engine run problems.

The Wild Thing flys very well. The engines (I've tried two) run great on the ground but go lean right at launch. It may be the fuel tank location and I've added a brace to hold it in place. I'll try that next time out. I had some tree branches trimmed and left as I figured I would chip them up. I didn't plan on the branches not wanting to go into the chipper. I cut smaller branches off the main branch and they went in but still gave me problems. I sharpened the cutters and figured that I could shim them to make them take a bigger bite as I feed the branches in. That worked very well and the chipping now goes a lot faster. I only used a .010 shim on the blades.

Wild Thing.

The new smaller plane is flying quite well so far. The .25 engine is plenty for the plane and I have a .20 that may be better. I'm waiting for name graphics to finish it off. I finally got sick of the old Pathfinder's raggedy looking paint scheme and stripped it off. I put on a scheme I used several years go and it looks a lot better. The Vector, for some reason, started flying very well. I had to put all the controls and balance back to where it was in the beginning. The new electric Legacy 40 is flying well also as are the two "Pixey Bob's" The first contest is in El Dorado, Ar in May. Our son got a car that had an over heated the engine ruining it. The rest of the car is in great shape. He found another car with the same engine at the local Copart yard and won it in the auction. So he got both in less than a week. Not even enough time to plan it. He will probably have the engines swapped in a week or two. He is documenting it on you tube. Search for aaron s. rose.

Possible solution, maybe.

The electrics on the new Legacy 40 have been behaving normally. It's possible that the Deans connectors were dirty cousing the erratic operation. It took 25 flights to get the plane flying fairly well. I chased several trim fixes before adding wing tip weight which almost cured it. I think it's going a bit too slow so I'll ad some power for the nextr session. While that was going on I started to build another plane. Smaller and profile. I finished the colors today and will clear coat it when the humnidity drops.

Battery test.

I re charged the 5 cell battery that I didn't use the other day and the two 4 cell batteries. I upped the flight time a bit and the 5 cell went off normally. I put oneof the four cellss in and I was surprised that it flew the plane very well. The other 4 cell went just as good. At hopmw I turned the flight time up to about 5 minutes. I'll need a few flights to get it at 5 and a half for the full pattern. Ice storm last night and very cold. Almost everything closed because of it. I need to get to the DMV to straighten out something about the El Camino. I think I know what it is and I have papers that says I'm in the clear but the computer hasn't been told that. I want to file a statement of non use so I canb drop the insurance.

First flight in the books.

I charged three of the 5 cell batteries and headed for the park. When I hit the start button the motor just twitched back and forth. I tried it a couple of times and figured it may work. In flight I timed a lap for information. I tried a second battery and upped the rpm's. The lap timne was the exact same which is not right. I put it in the truck. I tested the start function several times and it started to act normal. This morning I gave it another test and it was still normal so I headed for the park. It acted normal when I hit the start button and after the delay period the motor ran normally. Lap time was very close to what is needed so things seem to be back to normal. I have two 4 cell batteries that are 3 ounces lighter than the 5 cell and I plan to give them a try. I also made room for the batteries to be pushed aft an inch or so and that should help cornering. My next project is going to be a smaller version of the Twister model that I re engineered into a full fuselage plane. I hop to be able to get the original plans reduced about 10% at the UPS Store when they open on Tuesday. If they can't do it I'll have to go to Office Depot and hit the small copiers. I have a .20 and a.25 size engine doing nothing.