JUNE/JULY 2015
www.rcjetinternational.com
AVANTI XXL ADVANCING WITH THE BUILD OF SEBART’S & SKYMASTER’S LARGE AND IMPRESSIVE SPORT JET
JETI DS-16 JETI’S NEW HIGH-END RADIO IS PUT TO THE TEST
A VENOM VENTURE A MICK REEVES’ 1/6 SCALE VENOM GETS AN ELECTRIC MAKEOVER
FLORIDA JETS RC ‘JET TOGETHER’ ‘15 NEW TECHNOLOGY AT PARADISE FIELD
JUN/JUL15 • £5.99 06>
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Contents JUNE/JULY 2015 issue no. 132
REGULARS 6 FROM THE COCKPIT
News and product information from around the jetmodelling world
70 GAS TURBINE PERFORMANCE COMPARISONS Engine data
72 BUYING POWER
Reader’s FREE classified advertisements
74 NEXT ISSUE
What’s in store for the August/September ‘15 issue
ON THE COVER
The Avanti XXL is a large model as the name suggests. Featuring vectored thrust, it’s likely to prove popular with the advanced sports flyer. Colin Straus’ example has been finished in the popular anniversary scheme taken from an RAF Hawk. See page 24 for the final part of the build.
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CHECK OUT PAGE 14 FOR OUR LATEST SUBSCRIPTION DEALS
EDITOR
Barry Atkinson
rcji@traplet.com REGULAR CONTRIBUTORS David Gladwin, Colin Straus, Jorge/Karen Escalona, Sean McHale & Dave Wilshere MANAGING DIRECTOR Tony Stephenson OPERATIONS DIRECTOR Tom Stephenson DESIGN AND PRODUCTION MANAGER Nick Powell MAGAZINE DESIGN AND LAYOUT James Scott
ADVERTISING SALES Angela Price Tel: 01684 588568 email: advertising@traplet.com MARKETING EXECUTIVE Wendy Adams Tel: 01684 588521 ADVERTISING COPY CONTROL Cindi Griffiths Tel: 01684 588517 email: adcopy@traplet.com PRINTER Warners plc NEWSSTAND DISTRIBUTION Seymour Distribution Ltd. (020 7429 4000) HOBBY TRADE DISTRIBUTION Traplet Publications Limited (01684 588522)
US DISTRIBUTION Traplet Distribution USA Ltd., 816 N. Country Fair Drive, Suite 5 Champaign, Illinois 61821USA Tel: 217-355-2970 Fax: 217-954-0472 AUSTRALIAN DISTRIBUTION Traplet Publications & Hobbies, P.O. Box 501, Engadine, NSW 2233, Australia. Tel: (02) 9520 0933 Fax: (02) 9520 0032 email: sales@traplet.com.au SOUTH AFRICAN DISTRIBUTION P.O. Box 1067, Oudtshoorn, 6620, South Africa. Tel/Fax: +27 44 272 5978 Email: southafrica@traplet.com PUBLISHED BY Traplet Publications Ltd, Traplet House, Willow End Park, Blackmore Park Road, Welland, Malvern, WR13 6NN, England. Tel: 01684 588500 Fax: 01684 578558 email: customerservice@traplet.com
SUBSCRIPTIONS 1 Year subscription prices: UK £35.94 Europe £49.99 W/Wide £51.99 USA & Canada US $71.99 2 Years subscription prices: UK £71.88 Europe £89.99 W/Wide £91.99 USA & Canada US $141.99 BACK ISSUES UK £5.99/US $10.99
Customer Service: 01684 588599 Order Hotline: 01684 588599 Online Ordering: www.trapletshop.com © 2015 Traplet Publications Limited. All rights reserved.
This magazine is sold subject to the following conditions: that it shall not without written consent of the publishers be lent, resold or otherwise disposed of by way of trade in excess of the recommended maximum retail price. All rights strictly reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any way without the prior agreement of the publisher. All letters must be accompanied by the sender’s full name and address. The publisher cannot accept responsibility for unsolicited correspondence nor some of the opinions expressed. All material and artwork originated by Traplet Publications Ltd., photographs, drawings, plans used in this magazine become the publishers copyright under Copyright law. Some photographs may have been digitally re-mastered. The Company reserves the right to suspend or refuse any advertisements without giving reasons. Whilst every care is taken to avoid mistakes, Traplet Publications Ltd. cannot be liable in any way for errors or omissions. Nor can the Publisher accept any responsibility for the bona fides of advertisers. © Traplet Publications Limited 2015 ISSN 0968-3291
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FEATURES 10 JET CHATTER
This month Dave Wilshere looks into the continuing buzz regarding gyros and finds time to finally finish and fly the Habu 32X
16 A VENOM VENTURE
John Ranson begins a project of embracing all things electric with a Mick Reeves 1/6th scale Venom – part one
24 AVANTI XXL
In part two Colin continues and finishes the build of SebArt’s/Skymaster’s large Avanti XXL and preps for its maiden flight
32 ON SOLID GROUND
Dave Swarbrick takes a look at a set of Wild-Technik’s electric retracts that might be perfect for your next large model
36 FLORIDA JETS RC ‘JET TOGETHER’ ‘15
New technology and a multitude of emotions were on offer from Paradise Field, as Karen and Jorge Escalona report from Lakeland Linder Airport
46 JET DS-16 TRANSMITTER AND AIRBORNE SYSTEMS
Harry Curzon goes in-depth as he reviews Jeti’s new, high-end radio, the DS-16
54 REDWINGS GRYPHON EVO – PART TWO
Ian Titchell continues his review of Redwings’ sports jet and moves closer to its first flight
58 PIC BOMB DROP MODULE – PART FOUR TEASER
Lee Sinton gives us a short insight into what will be the culmination of being able to build your own sequencer unit
62 PLANNING IT…
Alec Barber highlights the planning issues that can affect our hobby, along with the threats and opportunities that they bring
66 FINDING THE RIGHT BALANCE We look at Xicoy’s excellent new Electronica Digital Weight and Balance Meter system
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ELECTRIC VENOM – PART 1
AUTHOR: JOHN RANSON PHOTOGRAPHER: JOHN RANSON
A Venom Venture…
John Ranson goes down the electric route with Mick Reeves’ 1/6th scale Venom – Part 1
“G
o on”, they said, “make a jet”. And why not? But they went on – “Buy a turbine” they said. “Think of all that unlimited power,” they said, and they went on and on. Any jet that I was to build had to be scale and following my other models I really wanted it be electric. But for my desire to go down the EDF route I took a lot of ribbing from my other modelling colleagues, but why make things easy with a turbine? Yes the batteries are likely to be given a very hard time and it is a whole new learning curve, but it won’t be burning the grass and the sound of these modern fans is so realistic. And starting from a level of knowledge on jets which is close to zero, I could naively pretend to myself that all would be “tickety boo”. Fat chance! Another reason for the Venom project is to complete a De Havilland trio of planes. I already have a 100" electric DH 103 Hornet and a 93" electric 1/7th scale (enlarged Brian Taylor plan) Tsetse Mosquito, so the Mick Reeves 1/6th Venom should be just right. I remember seeing Colin Strauss flying an immaculate and relatively low-level scale routine with his Venom several years ago at Raydon. Also having seen Neil Jarvis’s superb
electric jets flying with high static thrust Schubeler fans, I was convinced one of these fans must be right for the Venom, so the project was hatched. A trip to see Mick and Jim Reeves ended up with me taking away a plan plus an epoxy glass fuselage, booms, canopy, inlets, ply parts, ribs, plastic vacuum formed bits etc. The fuselage and booms are very nicely moulded from epoxy glass to make it light and strong.
Construction
The philosophy I find on building any electric model is to ‘add lightness’ as the main factor is the batteries, which give a limited amount of power. This is the fun of making something which can adequately stand up to all flight loads but not be over-strengthened. All balsa sheeting is weighed and graded, and if a hole and the consequent pile of drillings ends up on the bench, then that dust will never have to be supplied with energy to fly. Wasn’t it RJ Mitchell, the designer of the Spitfire, who said something like – a component must be just capable of withstanding the flight loads, any more than that and it is too heavy? I started with the inlet moulding which needed to be joined together to make a ‘Y’ type duct, with the end glassed inside the fuselage
Mick Reeves inlet ducts joined together
Modified leg with milled out swinging arm
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Electric Venom – Part 1
Ribs needed building up
Wing sheeting just about to be completed
Wings underway
Removing the outer wing section
triangular inlets. With some jigging, the inlets were tack joined then glassed together with epoxy mixed with chopped glass strands. The same method was used for fitting the assembly to the fuselage. From this stage it was then possible to trim the main fuselage formers to be glassed into the fuselage. I drilled several large holes in these very strong ply formers to reduce the weight a bit, and later found they
Wings glued on to the epoxy glass fuselage
are good for some bypass air from the front. On to the undercarriage and on the weight saving bandwagon, I bought some HobbyKing pneumatic air retracts and separate nose leg. The nose leg seems to be universally used on many models but I am still not sure if the retracts will take a heavy landing. But time will tell. The nose leg was then modified by re-drilling
the axle higher up and milling out recesses in the aluminium to make it look more scale. An off centre pivot was made to get the leg to retract fully. But I later found that this is not necessary as the pivot angle in the nose needs to be restricted. Hey-ho, we live and learn.
Wings
There have been a few Internet threads on
Air brake trial
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