Spitfire brushless upgrade.

[Radweld]

Ok, here is the state of my Spitfire at the moment after a few hours tinkering. I recently ordered a cheap 200w motor off the Internet (motor cost £8) so wanted to try and use it on the spitfire. I purchased a great planes motor mount (the small one) and some birch strips of wood. I cut the birch down to 2x 60mm strips and mounted them using the original motor screws. I countersunk the top screws so that the motor mount would fit flush. I then mounted the great planes mount as close to the stock position as possible and this mount allows you to set thrust angles etc. The prop adapter is an E-flite one and the prop is a 10x7 which is waaaayyy too large. It pulls 28a at 297w on a 3s Lipo and the motor is only actually rated at 16a. I have a cheapo 9x4.7 that pulls 16a @ 200w but I wont use that and will nip down the LHS and buy an APC.

Problems yet to solve are as follows.

1: Mounting a spinner, I also bought a cheap spinner but the blades of the APC don't seam to allow it to fit, it needs cutting so will have to look into this.

2: I need to find new or cut down the screws to hold the exhaust stack and cowl in place as the front one hits the motor mount.

That's pretty much where I am right now.

[gavj8]

Looks good and very sturdy. What sort of weight is in the motor mount?

I had exactly the same problem with mounting the stock spitfire spinner as the shape of the APC prop doesnt allow them to sit flush. I rectified it by using a small craft knife and shaping the spinner to the profile of the prop right back to the front edge. I then used the large washer from the prop adaptor as a spacer between the prop and the spinner (which filled the remaining gap) and fastened it all up with normal standard washer and the nut from the prop adaptor. It works fine with no balance issues.
gavj8

[Radweld]

The weight of the stock motor and gearbox is about 135g, this setup is lighter at 110g so I will have to add a little weight to get it to ballance ok.

[ralphp]

Wow....is This Some Sort Of Beast! Your Sirname Isn't Frankinstine Is It?lol
Fair play mate....engineering or what! I do some paint jobs and thats more thanenough!:D:D

[Radweld]

Finally got my APC 9x4.5 prop today and as the weather lifted, I re-maidend the Spitfire, she flew right out of my hands and after a little bit of trimming flew ok. Nice power, not overpowered but nice smooth performance from a motor and ESC that cost less than £20, in fact the motor mount was more expensive than the motor or the ESC lol.

I also bought myself a Flycam and bodged this one with a rubber band :D The video is of the second flight.

Enjoy

Just uploaded the video so it might not be ready just yet, http://www.youtube.com/v/OWMHx5KOYFc

[ralphp]

Mate, have you any stills? My business access has a fire wall blocker for heavily spamming sights (youtub is a MASIVE no no)...hope there are a few shots of yourself on low passes?

[Radweld]

http://www.wattflyer.com/forums/showthread.php?t=37277&page=4

Check out post#80 There are some pics of my plane. Supsequent to this I modified the standard spinner to go over the pop adapter and APC prop. It had three more flights after this. Its since suffered a broken motor shaft and the replacement bent on the very next flight. It seams the motor shaft is made of sausage meat so I don't suggest buying one.

Anyway I decided to go down the LHS and buy another motor and came home with this.

http://www.horizonhobby.co.uk/aeroonline/e2eflite/e2accessories/e2accessfs.html

I think it's a little overkill, what do you think? It's mounted and the planes ready to fly again.

[bullittrob]

i got a e-flite taylorcraft,.lovey lil plane,.it was running a JP 1350rpm outrunner,.,.i had that motor fail this evening,i was running it full bore for around two miniutes,.the plane is fixerble but the windings in the motor are all burnt.,looked the nuts with a big white trail of smoke ./just like a stunt plane,.but lost all power,.any idears? did i run it to fast for to long?,it was turning a 12x6 prop,.with e-flites 40 amp esc,. .,.,have i over reved the motor for two long?,,,

[bullittrob]

radweld.,where did you get that motor mount?,,,i need one.

[Radweld]

Bob, a 12x6 prop on a 1360kv motor is probably too large and it's cooked the motor, I would buy yourself a wattmeter to ensure you don't exceed the max current of the next motor.

When I first converted my Spit, I used a 1200kv motor and it was rated at 16A. Anyway I tried a 10" prop and they drew 26A so I had to reduce the prop to a 9" with half the pitch to get the amps down to 16A.

The motor mount I used is a Great Planes Small motor mount, used two strips of wood (birch) to interface the mount to the fuse.

[bullittrob]

i reckon your right,.too much prop.,i couldnt find the mount on their web site,is there a shop i can get one from you know of ??????????

[Radweld]

http://www3.towerhobbies.com/cgi-bin/wti0001p?&I=LXLCL3&P=ML

This is the one I bought from my local shop, cost £14 so an expensive option, I used strips of birch to interface this to the fuse but in hindsight, a piece of hobby ply would have been easier to work with.

http://www.sussex-model-centre.co.uk/shopexd.asp?id=22146

This is on line in the UK.

I have since changed the motor and re positioned it, I will get some photos up later.

[Radweld]

Here is my Spitfire with the new overpowered motor. The Spits got about 290watts of power now, I better make sure to finish my spare with with the carbon re enforcement.

[bullittrob]

that will go like a bat outa hell.,., can you close the gap between the spinner & cowl?

[gavj8]

Nice motor. What prop did you end up fitting? And how did you get round the APC prop fitting in the stock spinner?

[Radweld]

In order to close the gap, I would need to move the motor back, the mount is all the way back so the only other way will be to get rid of the wood strips and use some thinner ply.

The prop is an APC 10x7, I carved out the stock spinner so that it would go over the APC, Note I had to use a plastic washer to space the spinner off the prop in order to clear the blades, the smaller 9x4.5 fits perfectly.

[bullittrob]

what prop would be a good upgrade from the standard one,.,,.also i guess id need a spacer for the shaft width?

[Radweld]

All depends on the motor you intend to use. The Park 480 is a little heavy so till I fly it I don't know how it's going to react. The original motor I bought maxxed out with a 9x4.5. However, you can usually get away with a 10" prop if you stick to about 1000kv and 25A, a APC 1x7 will then generate about 280watts of power, Thats over double stock power with a Lipo.

I am really worried the airframe can't take it lol, will see when I finally get to fly it.

[bullittrob]

if you dont turn to fast to tight you will be ok,,,"""i think!!

[bullittrob]

"rad,".would you say the e-flite 480 outrunner is a better quality motor than the JP one i used?, i was looking the the specs on the e-flite for prop sizes.,n.,it says it can handle a 12x6 prop.,,.,.mind you i was running mine full bore for well over """2 miniutes""!!! if i was running the e-flite motor rather than the JP one ""do you think"" i would of still lunched the E-FLITE motor running it full bore for that amount of time----------??

[Anthony]

How can you people get away with speeding up the spitfire with posh batteries and brushless motors? After a few flights with standard equiptment my spitfire needed new wings. Surely you wont be able to fly any differently or you will completly rip the wings off when you pull out of a loop or bank sharply?

[Radweld]

"rad,".would you say the e-flite 480 outrunner is a better quality motor than the JP one i used?, i was looking the the specs on the e-flite for prop sizes.,n.,it says it can handle a 12x6 prop.,,.,.mind you i was running mine full bore for well over """2 miniutes""!!! if i was running the e-flite motor rather than the JP one ""do you think"" i would of still lunched the E-FLITE motor running it full bore for that amount of time----------??

This is where a wattmeter comes in, with the 10x7, I measured 24A on the bench, you could probably use a larger prop if you cut back on the pitch, maybe a 12x5 or 12x4 would use the same power as the 10x7. If you used a 12x7 then I think this would exceed the motors capability and your likely to burn it out again, however the Park 480 can cope with about 22A continuous so I should be fine.

[Radweld]

How can you people get away with speeding up the spitfire with posh batteries and brushless motors? After a few flights with standard equiptment my spitfire needed new wings. Surely you wont be able to fly any differently or you will completly rip the wings off when you pull out of a loop or bank sharply?

Well If I fly flat out and over stress the airframe then I expect wings to break etc. However you can fly fast and still be light on the airframe. I think a full power dive and climb out might rip the wings off many models. You just have to fly within the limits.

[Radweld]

Got to fly the Brushless Spitfire this morning as she flew ok, The new Park 480 performed ok but the model is a little nose heavy. Put 4 packs through and did notice the motor is a little hard on my Eflite packs. So far, so good then.

[Radweld]

Changing the CG back to 60mm solved all the handling issues i had, with the addition of a AA battery taped to the rear, off she went again for another few sorties.

Brilliant.

[MalcolmS]

Hi Rad

Love the idea of using an AA battery as a weight!! Might have to do that with my super Spit (the one with the Lipo from my whinge weather post) as it appears to be tail heavy and I am fresh outta lead. Or would that be too much? The c of g is about right according to the manual but she was definetly tail heavy in my windy flight today.

Malcolm

PS presumably somebody else is taking the pics or are you that good with tx in one hand and camera in the other?!!:D

[Radweld]

with the lack of availability of my CG balance, I ended up using my dads chairs and a tape measure, it worked great lol. I set the CG to about 60mm and it flies great. I used to fly mine with Lipo set to 60mm and it was great like this also.

I taped the battery to the fuse in case I wanted to remove it but it flew so nice that I will add some weight properly.

I ended up soaring and flying for about 20 Min's lol, flying and chatting to another flier, I lost track of time lol. The Park480 is a great motor, just a bit of a pain to fit.