My rc planes "JU-52 by Hobbyking" -crashed-

"JU-52 by Hobbyking"
and  a complete mod log of my attempts to be flyable

 The  Ju-52 was purhased by Hobbyking nearly  2.5 years ago. The packing was really good  and  leaves a feeling that  you may have purchased a fine model . Not really... 

It comes  with  one middle brushless motor  which is rather high powered and capable to fly the model easily . It was also easy to balance the model using a 1300mah lipo battery . The other opion was to use a 1600mah  lipo  but I wanted to conserve some weight... I was true...  .

The model comes  already colored with the lufthansa colorscheme  but my plan was to  repaint it  to a Luftwaffe camo . First  I wanted to be sure  that it is capable to fly  and then to start painting . 

    Here is the photo  from the hobbyking website. The  side motors  and propellers are dummies . The propellers can spin freelly . One good thing I saw was that the wheel system is trully robust  and stiff . On the other hand, it doeas not have any kind of "suspension" but who cares  for a model of 1 kg  how hard it might touch the tarmac? The tail wheel is rotating  together with the  rudder  which is very helpful even for such a small model .

First Flight 

   My instructor  just said that the model is really insane !  Let me explain. I  tried three or four times to  fly it straight . No way to do so. It constantly  tried to flip over . In detail it was tip stalling . It was  awful to have such a nice plane in the air  and not be able to  fly it  nicely. So I  gave it to my old instructor with much experience who  replied the the model is INSANE ! Trully bad. the only solytion he gave is that I could try to turn using  some rudder  and trying to keep it level using the ailerons. This was a little better  but  not something  even ok !  

Back to the bench

    I   came back on the bench   for some changes . I  made a more secure  battery mount system , removed  some  weight  and certfied  then that the best solution is to use the 1300mah battery . Less weight means less wing load  and less wing load means  less likely to tip stall . I also did some aerodynamic changes   . One was to  remove 1 cm from each tip  of each aileron .  the other was to make a change  on the servo horns that move the ailerons in order to have less   travel  when moving down and more  travel when moving up . This was not a big  change but made me feel that when  turning  it could provide less drag in the inner wing.  A final change was to add some  wash near the tips . I put some weight  on the wings (roots and tips ) and  I used a hot air gun to  put some  heat on the foam . Be careful  , minur heat is needed to do that  and  in case you insist more than some seconds the result will be  total wrapping of the wing ! 

Back to the field...

   I was trully curious  what the result would be . I tried it some times  and the result... 

 the same ! 

Be sure that I tried with many different  balancing solutions  with no significant change . Maybe a more  front balance  could be more  right  but  then  it  could not fly straight! 

Back to  the  bench  

    I wanted to remove the self spinning  effect  that accurs  due to the single motorr installation  and of the massive middle propeller . I have already tried to  remove this effect  by cutting of the edges of the propeller with no result . Also  I tried smaller propellers  but  there was no thrust ... . My  idea was to  try to convert it to a three motor. I made some tests and saw  that  a two motor (side ones) would be more effective as  there would be more than enough power and  less weight . So I  did it . 

   I removed the dummy motor mounts and  the dummy propellers .  I  found out that  the whole model is already designed for such an installation .  There are inner motor mount fitting locations  and (the most important)  inner tubes in the  wings for the wires .  Afer about an hour , it was ready . I made a bench test  and saw that  the power was very good ! 

   After  all that  shit , I re-balanced it  and then I ...

painted it  

This was a  true  silly idea as I did not know  if  the result would be flyable.  Anyway I used  acrylic paints  to paint it  with my airbrush . Not really funny as a work  as I do not like to use these paints. But  they are the only solution as  they to not attack  on the foam . As  the result was likeely to be a disaster  I did not try mo do any detailing . I only did  my effort  and installed a tail gunner installation . The Lufthansa one did not have such  things . 

    Overall , the weight was the same .

I was counting on some benefits here regarding the two motor conversion :

-no self spinning effect from the single big propeller.

-more wing air flow from the side motors

-less  useless  drag from the side motors that we dummies  before the converion.

-the luftwaffe camo made me feel  nicer !!!! 

Back to the field 

     

 Here are  the last photos  of the model. The first one is togeether  the my beloved  Fw-190 . Behind them , is the  tarmac. You may see how narrrow it is .

Nice view here . Excuse mee for not painting teh Balkenkreutz   but  I had a feeling that it would be useless....

 Here is another one . Lets suppose  that it is in the Malemee Airfield  just after the  battle of Krete . 

The  end :  

     Some  throttle  and the model  starrted to  run. Some  more  stable  thrust and the model  took some  height  (1m) . With  a blinkof the eyes , the Ju-52 left tip stalled  and hit thee ground . Many parts were cut off , broken . 

I took my razor knife  removed all interesting parts  and put the  hull and wings in the bin. 

 I was finally free !!! 

Do not  buy it  even if it is  beautiful  !  Better  find some plans  that have  a positive feedback(that have good characteristics ) and build a bigger one by your own ! Much better   ,be sure.