Greenacres MAC YT Fledgling Rebuild

[Jim (Chairman)]

Hi all!

Reg gave me the clubs YT Fledgling Electric Trainer to rebuild at the May Fun Fly event.

It apparently had suffered a nose under during taken and removed its motor mounting from the nose section.

On close inspection it would appear that the front bulkhead had been trying to "unglue" itself for some time.

So I dismantled the original nose, maintaining all the distances and angles and have rebuilt a new nose section. The underside sheet was only 1mm balsa skin. The top panel (removable) was made from very soft balsa also.

Summary of the work:

• New 3mm ply front bulkhead / motor mount
• New 3mm ply underside panel
• New 2 x 3mm ply top panel
• Strip down, clean, tighten up the motor
• New Solarfilm covering all over repaired section
• New yellow trims to original design
• Respray of the mechanical components in matching yellow
• Tidy up internals / servos etc
• General clean
• Final reassembly

Things I've learnt:

• Solarfilm is a nightmare! Never used it before
• Really sharp craft knives are good!
• Balsa is very soft and light ply is much better

I've added four new corner spars to the nose section to give it more strength. Also beefed up the bolts and screws on the motor mount. All told I calculate I've added about 12 grams to the overall weight.

I will take the aircraft to the flying field on Friday evening and spin the motor up for final checks.

Here are some photos of the finished model:

[Jim (Chairman)]

More photos of the YT Fledgling nose rebuild...

[Jim (Chairman)]

Even more photos...

[Chairman]

Hi Jim

That's all looking very good indeed. Nice to see someone posting on the forum. Thanks.

Just wondering, would all the pics be better just following on in a single thread?
I might be able to move the posts to the first thread you started if you wish? (Not absolutely sure I can though!)

Cheers
Chris

[Jim (Chairman)]

@Chris

Yes, I would like to have the photos all on one post, but the forum rules wouldn't let me.

The maximum total attachment size is like 192kb, which is tiny.

I understand have a maximum individual attachment size of 128kb, which is more than enough for a photo, but the max total means that you can only put two reasonable resolution photos on a post.

Please move to first post if possible...

BTW, a modern Smartphone (mines an Iphone) takes photos that are 1.72 MEGABYTES in size! That's the default....

Cheers!

Jim

[Chairman]

Hi Jim

I'm afraid there will always be restrictions on filesizes, we only have limited space.
I've just increased the filesize limit to 1Mb though. The max pics per posts is still 4.

I've also moved your posts into a single thread. If you keep replying to that, they will follow on one after another.

If you wish to post larger sized photos, then they can be hosted elsewhere, such as photobucket, flikr etc etc.
Then, you click the photo button above, and pop the URL in, inbetween the two sets of square brackets that appear.

For example, this picture is actually on my modelflying.co.uk account:-

[Jim (Chairman)]

Chris,

Great!

So have you increased the TOTAL attachment size for a post to 1Mb...?

1Mb total over four attachments..?

I have a bunch of photos from the Long Marston Model Show last weekend, but I don't know if I should post them to this forum. Not really GMAC stuff.

What do you think?

Jim

[Chairman]

Hi Jim

Each photo can be 1Mb now.

Yes why not start a new topic and post the photos.
I'm just wondering about the best way to remind members that there's a forum here, and to try to get it active again.
I think any activity like that will help.

PS, if you did put the pics on a photo sharing site (check that the one you choose works here) then i think you'll be able to add many more than 4 to one post.

[Jim (Chairman)]

Chris,

I've just setup a gallery section on my own website.

I will post a link to that because there's many megabytes of photos....

Cheers!

Jim

[Jim (Chairman)]

All,

Here's a gallery of photos of the finished rebuild:

http://www.eight33n.com/gallery2/v/Greenacres_MAC_YT_Fledgling_Rebuild/

Just need to re-unite it with its battery and transmitter at the field tonight (6th June 17:30) and see if it flys...

Flown by a competent pilot, not me!

A few more photos to follow...

Cheers!

Jim

[Jim (Chairman)]

All,

Last few photos of the Club YT Fledgling in its carrier:





Big thanks to the Lektronix Motor Boys for letting me use their spray booth!

Cheers!

Jim

[Cirus]

Looks brilliant lets hope you can fly it this weekend.

[Chairman]

Has it flown again yet Jim?

Hope you'll have it with you at the weekend?

[Jim (Chairman)]

Chris,

Not flown yet.

It's round at Regs' place right now but I think he will be bringing both club trainers at the weekend.

He said I can have a flight on Friday afternoon after we set the show / tents up etc.

Apparently it's a "low wind" aircraft so let's hope...

Jim

[Chairman]

The forecast look fine for a Fledgeling Jim.

I'm a mode 2 instructor so if that suits whatever Tx setup it has, I can give you a hand on Friday