The next "build off" idea?

[Joker 53150]

A buddy of mine is talking about building a Kadet Senior kit, which got me thinking about my 150% Senior plan. Since the bench is currently "clean" I decided to see how the engine would fit in the "stock" 150% Kadet Senior fuselage. Well, it'll take some tweaking, but it will fit. Width is no problem as this enlarged fuselage is very wide - even the flywheel will have a lot of space. Depth is the issue, mostly due to the carb being mounted to the rear of the engine instead of the side. The big aluminum square tube the engine is currently mounted to hides the carb, and there is a lot of extra dead space in there, so I may need to modify the setup and use more traditional stand-offs. The cylinder head will stick out a bit for good cooling, and unfortunately the nosewheel steering is going to interfere with the engine so I may change it to a tail-dragger. This is looking more and more like a fun project!

 

[Joker 53150]

Curse you Joe! You've got me so interested in starting the Build Along plane that I ended up with another engine to use for it. The one on the left is the Ryobi conversion engine I fired up a month ago. It was sitting for probably over a decade and just needed a carb rebuild for it to fire right up. The "new" one on the right is the same engine, but more "finished" and ready for use. It's got a better aftermarket Bennett muffler, a better prop shaft that will let me easily install a metal spinner, a better engine mount, and it appears to have less run-time on it. It also had the extra base gasket material and all the extra plastic from the original weed-eater trimmed away for a cleaner look. Instead of rebuilding the carb I may just swap the freshly rebuilt carb onto the new (to me) engine and fire it up to make sure it works well.

These old engines are an addiction for me right now... The one in the background (with the green cover over the flywheel) is older than the Ryobi conversions. It was made sometime around 1983 based on the Model Airplane News review of it. It's a Roush 2.3ci Cobra - an early version of the Zenoah 38cc. It's old enough that it has points and a condenser instead of a magneto! This one has never seen gas or been started, and I'm thinking about building a stand for it and making it a display piece for my desk. It's so uncommon I can't find any good info about it other than the MAN article.

 

[Turbojoe]

Curse you Joe!

LOL. Hey I'm my own worst enemy. Like we were talking in my Q-Tee thread I was thinking about finishing my Telemaster 40 but then I remembered the Mini Telemaster that I just need to build the wing for so I pulled it down. A month or two ago I decided I wanted tricycle gear on it and ripped out the main gear block and moved it rearward. Today I ripped it out again and repaired all the damage in the original area to make it a tail dragger again. Yeah, I can never make up my mind. Or finish anything in a reasonable time frame. I have the attention span of a two year old.

Now with you bringing up the build off again I dug out the Miss America PDF for another look see and I think I'll start looking for a place to get two sets of the plans printed for a decent price. I could tile the PDF and print it but I'd rather have some nice rolled plans. I'll probably print out some tiled parts of the PDF to use for making 3D printed formers and rib templates. If a build off does happen I'll have a kit bundled up and all ready to go.

Joe