Community Build F/A-18 Super Hornet 2B the FT-18 when completed

T-Richard

Active member
uneventful, flew great, was well balanced. now I'll paint it and make it look the part. I flew only one battery so I am heading back in the morning to burn a few more packs. I'll post pics and stuff after the week end once I got it painted. Thanks Hillda flyer the F-18 is much nicer looking then an f-22 and scales nicely
 

HilldaFlyer

Well-known member
FT-18#4 Glassed and SuperSonic

I finished the latest update on the FT-18#4. It sports a 0.73 oz/yd fiberglass skin over foam and a SuperSonic 2200 kv motor.
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HilldaFlyer

Well-known member
FT-18#4 Maiden

Here is a video of the two trimming flights.
On the second flight I lost sight of the plane in the sun. It didn't exit the other side as expected. Turns out it was circling in the sun for about 5 seconds. I didn't know 5 seconds was so long... Panic stricken I finally caught sight of it and finished the flight. All smiles now.

 

T-Richard

Active member
ok so the mini FT-18 is dead. Receiver signal loss while flying fpv. Was silly fun tho. I am inspired, I'll build a full size one with black core foam and DTFB.

I'll add ailerons tho as I found the roll was a touch lagging in the ft-18. This will also allow me to use a spoileron mix to land in tight spaces. I intend to use this for FPV as I found it to be a pretty nice platform for that.

Thanks HilldaFlyer! Picture to follow shortly
 

T-Richard

Active member
Ft-18.jpg

Just maidened the Ft-18 aileron elevator version. A bit of adverse yaw so I'll put in mechanical differential. Otherwise great! So much nicer to the Ft-22 in my opinion
 

HilldaFlyer

Well-known member
That is so cool... Thanks for sharing. Looks like you had a lot of fun with it. Sure takes a beating...

Just a comment... I like the flight characteristics of the FT-18 much better than the FT-22 too. The one I built with fiberglass skin #4 is still flying and I've been letting a lot of others fly it.

How sturdy do you find the wings of the FT-18?
 

pilotofnothing

Junior Member
Great Flyer!

Took mine on a maiden flight today, 2-3 clicks of trim to fly straight and true. :) After the flight while waiting for the battery to recharge I painted it. Then went and proceeded to fly for about 4-5 minutes before I got cocky and tried to thread the needle under a playground shade cover (It was vacant at the time of flight) Gunned the throttle and realized that I was going to hit the metal pole at 30+ MPH, tried to pull away to abort too late and went nose first into the pole LOL. The only damage was the tip of the nose came unglued!:D

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Excellent design! Great flyer! Very durable! 12/10 Stars!

My Setup is as follows:
Hillda Flyer F/A 18E Super Hornet v2 (FT Style)

Motor - emax CF-2812 1534KV
ESC - Hobbywing Skywalker 20A
Prop - 7x5
Servos - 2x 7.5g
RX - Spektrum micro park flyer (not sure of the model)
TX - Spektrum DX6i

Thank you for such a GREAT plane!!

-pilotofnothing
 

HilldaFlyer

Well-known member
Thanks.... I'm so happy that you're enjoying it.
By the way, My nose... correction, the nose on my FT-18 looks the same way... but I didn't do anything crazy, just hit the ground.
Cheers!
 

T-Richard

Active member
That is so cool... Thanks for sharing. Looks like you had a lot of fun with it. Sure takes a beating...

Just a comment... I like the flight characteristics of the FT-18 much better than the FT-22 too. The one I built with fiberglass skin #4 is still flying and I've been letting a lot of others fly it.

How sturdy do you find the wings of the FT-18?

I do find the wing a tad weak. This is why i used blackcore foam and a 1x5 cf strip in the wing. I think the 40 inch or just a bit larger than this scale may help. regardless it works fine.

Flew it on 4 cells with a 5045 prop and it screams
 

HilldaFlyer

Well-known member
First Flight 2017 - Fantastic

Just got done with the first flight. After sitting all winter, it was still in pretty good trim, just needed a little left roll. Still flies really well for a small easy-to-build plane.