Tiny Trainer nooby do's and don'ts from a noob

MegaMech

New member
On youtube FT uses a tiny 800mah battery. I bought a 2200mah battery from amazon.ca for 30 bucks. This battery does not fit and is too big. I just jammed it into the battery compartment on an angle and electrical taped the power cord to the outside of the plane. Center of gravity too far forward. On my actual okay flight, while I was flying I thought "Lets see how it glides" more like "Lets see how it nose dives".

Actually throwing the airplane is required. Atleast half the can of elbow grease should be used.

After one nose dive the entire power pod was pushed into the plane. I just pulled it out so the prop could barely passby the foam nose, straightened the firewall and threw the plane again.

AAaaannd finally, the BBQ sticks that hold the ailron wing must be long enough for the elastic bands. Josh never specified at that time in the build video, so I just thought "As short as possible" and didn't bother fixing it before I went for my first flight.

I play a lot of flight simulator X, thought "How hard could it be?"... Any tips for a broken tail? One side is still attached, the other side is sheared. (The body, not the elevator wings.)


I don't see any dmg on my battery, so hopefully it doesn't spontaneously combust during the night like most Lipo's tend to do.
battery:
https://www.amazon.ca/gp/product/B00WJN4LG0/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o03_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1
 

rockyboy

Skill Collector
Mentor
Welcome to the forums!

I see you're on your way to learning through the school of hard landings here :black_eyed: - you're on to a good measurement with the 1/2 can of elbow grease on the launch though. That's pretty good for most high wing planes, once you get into mid and low wing ones you'll want to use the whole can. :)

One thing that can help with the nose crunching is to glue in a couple pieces of credit card material to the fuselage where the skewers go through. Don't reinforce the power pod though - let that stay as just foam board. Then if you take a vertical landing, the skewers will only tear up the power pod and your fuselage will be just fine - power pods are much easier to rebuild and fix compared to the fuselage. If you reinforce everything on the nose, then a hard crash is just going to cause damage somewhere else - by designing in the failure point you can be prepared and make it easier on yourself.

For the tail fixin' if I'm picturing it right in my head, I'd recommend squirting a little bit of White Gorilla Glue along the edges of the tear, putting it back in place, and taping over the outside of the joint with packing tape. When the WGG foams up it'll be a little messy, but only on the inside of the fuse because of the tape - just make sure it doesn't grab onto your control rods.

And your battery should be just fine - the most likely time for a battery to flame out is right when it's getting damaged, or when the energy level is changing (charging or discharging). It's always best to store it in something fireproof, or at least fire resistant, but when it's by itself at a 3.8v per cell storage charge it is a pretty safe thing.

So now we need some pictures and video of the repair and relaunch! :applause:
 

nhk750

Aviation Enthusiast
Haha, awesome! I love my TT, but the 800mh 3s battery is more than enough for a 10 minute flight and it will be much more fun to fly too. One thing I am going to do when I build another is to cut the ailerons shorter next to the fuse (give the fuse more room) as the rubber bands will sometimes interfere with the ailerons. Have fun with this little plane, it is one of my favorites and the most flown airplane in my hanger! I love it as I can just grab it and walk down to my local park/field and fly after work.
 

Hai-Lee

Old and Bold RC PILOT
Rockyboy has given you good info.

Just a couple of things I would add. When you reattach the tail use a BBQ skewer to reinforce it. (Dig and glue the skewer into the underside of the tail and it should be fine, (a little extra tail weight might help it fly a little better.

As for the battery it is heat that causes them to catch fire or explode. I keep mine in a refrigerator to keep them very cool and it improves their storage time and reduces their tendency to swell as they get older.

Have fun!
 

MegaMech

New member
Thanks for the tips guys, I may add some photos in the future if I ever have the energy to put in the effort :p
I definitely wish the ailerons were shorter. Less sensitive and then the elastic bands don't dig into the wing as someone else mentioned. (If you're wondering why I don't change the sensitivity in the transceiver... Couldn't be bothered?) I think the tip to reinforce the BBQ holes with credit card is priceless.
I guess for now I'll try sticking with the 2200mah and spending the time to fix the center of gravity. If that doesn't work I think I'll order a 1500 one or something.

I think if you guys saw my battery sticking out you'd say that's a huge 'no no'. Although I was probably descriptive enough with that anyway.

I keep mine in a refrigerator to keep them very cool.
I'm gonna do some more research on this cause it sounds good, but it also sounds like a pretty bad idea. Any Lithium battery that catches on fire is a chemical fire. You could drop the battery in a pond and it will continue its fireworks show because the fuel is still present. One guy on youtube had a lithium laptop battery randomly combust. It was just sitting on a workbench for a year and one day ka-boom. (It was overcharged presumably). The fridge would not stop chemical reactions within the battery but it would slow them down. Lifetime increase would definitely be a plus. But from my understanding, if a battery decided to combust it would still combust if it was in the fridge. Most refrigerators work on passive cooling. (See LinusTechTips video on "can a mini-fridge cool a PC") So if a battery was producing heat, the fridge might not be able to dissipate the heat.
 
Last edited: