First hand launch attempt fail

[RandomChaos]

So, tried flying my Versa Wing blunt nose today for the first time. I was going to use a prop-saver, but it caused some nasty vibrations at anything over 1/4 throttle. I ended up hard mounting the prop with a standard collar, and took her for a spin!

The good, it responded to my inputs.

The bad, I guess a 4000 mah battery was too much weight for the plane? Using a 1300kv hextronic with an 8x3.8 prop seemed to give it some thrust at full throttle, enough I thought for a hand launch. After 3 tries though, I am guessing its not, as it would just nose dive at full throttle, lots of up elevator, and even a little tail heavy. Was going to switch to my 2200 mah battery and try to get it balanced to see if it did any better, but ran into a big issue...

The really bad, the pusher firewall I created out of 3/32 balsa wood snapped. Now I'm kind of at a loss on how to fix it. Its glued down REAL good, so not sure I can even get the mount out to try a new one without destroying the blunt nose.

Attached is a photo of whats left, any suggestions? I am thinking maybe cutting out 2 square pieces of balsa wood and bolting the motor to them, while sandwiching whats left of the mount to hold it in place, and some glue?

 

[makattack]

Sorry to hear about bad launches and broken firewall... If that is the blue wonder motor, it does sound like the 4000mAh battery may be a bit heavy for that motor -- I personally haven't flown anything over 1000mAh with that motor on a fixed wing platform. I think the firewall fix may be pretty straight forward... I would cut out some of the splinters / sand it down a bit, then maybe insert a double ply (with perpendicular grains) wall right behind where your old wall was and use epoxy (5 minute?) to both double the firewall, and to secure it to the side walls...

You'd want to make sure the thrust line is still either straight back or slightly up... but I think that should do it. You may also want to think about a bigger motor even for a 2200mAh battery...

I use the emax 2210/11 motor with a 2600mAh pack, 8x4 props and get great flight times of 15-20 mins with moderate throttle leaving the pack at storage level at the end of 20 minutes. With a 9x5, I get less flight time, and the motor is warm to the touch on landing. It's all I have left after breaking all my 8x4's on that wing. Waiting for restock on props.

 

[RandomChaos]

After a bit of looking at it, I came up with the simple plan to just epoxy another piece of balsa to the mount, and it is working perfectly. I also realized why the motor didn't seem to be giving out much thrust at full throttle. Been so long since I built my quadcopter... I forgot to set the high and low of my throttle on the ESC! Sometimes I worry about myself lol. Now the motor spins up real nice.

But like they say, when it rains, it pours! Pulled the 2200mah battery out to charge it up from storage, to only discover my cheap iMax B6 charger isn't working right anymore. Bleh, guess its time to spend some money on a good quality charger.

*EDIT* - Looks like it was just the line from my spare computer PSU I was using to power the battery charger. Switched lines, and the charger is working fantastic again!