speedbirdted
Legendary member
I recently got this little guy for $5. A club guy was cleaning out his garage and found it. From the little placard inside it's a Pacific Ace and it's ~36 years old (build date says 1984) though I'm guessing at some point it was modernized a little since it came with a motor (still a very old motor, but at least it's brushless 
) It also came with a big nicad which I might use just for giggle factor but I don't know if it even works. I'll cycle it tonight.
Other than that, it came with pretty much nothing. There is pull-pull control set up for both elevator and rudder, but there's mounts for only one servo inside. My guess is the control wires for the elevator connected to a servo horn which was just screwed into a piece of wood - that way the elevator angle could be changed but only on the ground, and it was set up in such a way that altitude changes could be achieved with throttle control, enabling it to be flown on just 2 channels. I can imagine with 1980s era RC gear, this was about the maximum number of channels you could get into this thing before the receiver became too bulky.
Did I mention it didn't come with a wing? I'll need to build one. Not too hard, I checked the plans and it looks pretty simple and it's materials I've already got anyway.
The covering was pretty baggy when I got it. I tried to shrink it up a little but I think it's just too old, and this is probably as good as it's going to get. It also looked like it had never been cleaned in its entire life.
You can really notice the degree of slack in the covering in this picture. The tail surfaces appear to have held up quite nicely though. Speaking of them, there's my first major dilemma. I don't know what covering material was used on the tail, and would like to use the same covering for the wing. It's clearly not monokote or ultracote - the wing in the background is from another airplane and it's covered with transparent yellow monokote and it's clearly much more opaque than the covering material. The bad news here is if the tail covering is original to 1984 it's very unlikely that it's still manufactured with exactly the same properties - so I will need to find an alternative. Anyone got any ideas?
The guy also appears to have used tape to hinge the control surfaces which seems to have worked? There's not a lot of lateral movement to them, so I see no need to replace it.
) It also came with a big nicad which I might use just for giggle factor but I don't know if it even works. I'll cycle it tonight.Other than that, it came with pretty much nothing. There is pull-pull control set up for both elevator and rudder, but there's mounts for only one servo inside. My guess is the control wires for the elevator connected to a servo horn which was just screwed into a piece of wood - that way the elevator angle could be changed but only on the ground, and it was set up in such a way that altitude changes could be achieved with throttle control, enabling it to be flown on just 2 channels. I can imagine with 1980s era RC gear, this was about the maximum number of channels you could get into this thing before the receiver became too bulky.
Did I mention it didn't come with a wing? I'll need to build one. Not too hard, I checked the plans and it looks pretty simple and it's materials I've already got anyway.
The covering was pretty baggy when I got it. I tried to shrink it up a little but I think it's just too old, and this is probably as good as it's going to get. It also looked like it had never been cleaned in its entire life.
You can really notice the degree of slack in the covering in this picture. The tail surfaces appear to have held up quite nicely though. Speaking of them, there's my first major dilemma. I don't know what covering material was used on the tail, and would like to use the same covering for the wing. It's clearly not monokote or ultracote - the wing in the background is from another airplane and it's covered with transparent yellow monokote and it's clearly much more opaque than the covering material. The bad news here is if the tail covering is original to 1984 it's very unlikely that it's still manufactured with exactly the same properties - so I will need to find an alternative. Anyone got any ideas?
The guy also appears to have used tape to hinge the control surfaces which seems to have worked? There's not a lot of lateral movement to them, so I see no need to replace it.
