Pilot 40% 330 Recover and Build

[HRRC Flyer]

Hey Rob,

Did I read somewhere that Hitec has finally come out with their own SBUS system? If it is like Futaba's SBUS or JR's XBUS, you won't need a receiver to plug a dozen servo's into. So you keep on truckin' with your Aurora 9 and save the dough for another red head. . . . .

 

[stangflyer]

Hey Rob,

Did I read somewhere that Hitec has finally come out with their own SBUS system? If it is like Futaba's SBUS or JR's XBUS, you won't need a receiver to plug a dozen servo's into. So you keep on truckin' with your Aurora 9 and save the dough for another red head. . . . .

I may have to just deal with it as is. I am just too particular with what I want. And until someone comes out with a radio that does what my A9x does with all the programming features, I will just stay where I am at with my trusty Hitec. The DX 20 is the only radio I would bail on Hitec for.

 

[stangflyer]

Well gents, It is time to start stripping the 330 in preparation of her new set of clothes. With the covering contest behind us, we can now look forward to months on end of sleepless nights of pondering just how in the hell am I going to get that awesome scheme posted by @Luchnia onto this well deserving airship. I need to have my head examined. LOL. Is it not enough to want a scheme with so many curves and natural swirls of beauty? Oh nooooo! .....we just have to select one that has colors that change in different angles and sunlight. Add to that, the hypnotizing effect of the bottom not just sparsely and scantly ridden with some weird obscure design. Oh no! Lets select one that has maddening twisting and contorted swooping arches of bent checkers that run themselves into distorted diamonds.
UGH!

One upside will be this. Natural swirls of beauty and curves are definitely associated with gorgeous red heads. LOL.

The 330 "WILL" make it out to the "disrobing" area today. How much work I do on her however is yet to be decided. My eldest daughters furnace took a yesterday and five little grandbabies are chilly. Grand pa needs to figure out what is wrong with the furnace. Is there a furnace doctor in the house? LOL

 

[Luchnia]

Well gents, It is time to start stripping the 330 in preparation of her new set of clothes. With the covering contest behind us, we can now look forward to months on end of sleepless nights of pondering just how in the hell am I going to get that awesome scheme posted by @Luchnia onto this well deserving airship. I need to have my head examined. LOL. Is it not enough to want a scheme with so many curves and natural swirls of beauty? Oh nooooo! .....we just have to select one that has colors that change in different angles and sunlight. Add to that, the hypnotizing effect of the bottom not just sparsely and scantly ridden with some weird obscure design. Oh no! Lets select one that has maddening twisting and contorted swooping arches of bent checkers that run themselves into distorted diamonds.
UGH! View attachment 101054

One upside will be this. Natural swirls of beauty and curves are definitely associated with gorgeous red heads. LOL.

The 330 "WILL" make it out to the "disrobing" area today. How much work I do on her however is yet to be decided. My eldest daughters furnace took a View attachment 101055 yesterday and five little grandbabies are chilly. Grand pa needs to figure out what is wrong with the furnace. Is there a furnace doctor in the house? LOL

I hate it the way furnaces just sit there all the time and then when you use them they break. Oh wait, a lot of things do that! I hope it is not a big job for you and something really simple.

 

[stangflyer]

I hate it the way furnaces just sit there all the time and then when you use them they break. Oh wait, a lot of things do that! I hope it is not a big job for you and something really simple.

Well after pretty much two full days of testing components with my multimeter, checking this and trying that...it was still failing with a code 33. F.R.S. (Flame Rollout Switch) Indicating either the flames from the burners are rolling out the front of the burners due to a blockage. Or indicating the switches are bad. Neither of course being the cause. Yesterday I did a massive disassembly of the entire furnace and it's systems. Cleaned the fan motor, squirrel cage, interior, burner towers..."AND"...that dang evaporative cooler, (some refer to it as a heat exchanger). Which to me is completely 100% inaccurate. This system is absolutely mirror, (except size) of what is in our modern day automobiles for a/c. Anyway, cleaned all the fins, put the while furnace back together and what do you know? Warmth!!!...aaaaahhh!!! My daughter won't have to...wait a darn minute here. Daddy won't have to take 4k dollars from the rc fund for a new furnace.

 

[stangflyer]

See? I bet you fellas thought I was blowin' smoke. The 330 is poised and primed for the removal of her covering.

I'm going to go burn some electrons as soon as my last 3s Lipo is done baking. But until then, we're going to get this party started by removing her legs.

 

[stangflyer]

Sweet....with her belly vents and main gear removed, we can now cominse to removing the original covering.

Uh...hark, what is this I hear in the plane room? That would be the beep beep beep of my Hitec X4 charger. Alerting me that this can wait. Last Lipo charged. I'm going flying fellas!

 

[stangflyer]

I goofed fellas. I accidently put this photo in the covering contest thread. It really should have been here. Sorry for the confusion. I now have the fuse stripped. Not too much residue left behind. A couple of spots of yellow like when I recovered the Behemoth Yak (1). But not a problem. I think it must just be the yellow pigment that comes off. As not other color seems to bleed quite so badly. But like I said, not so bad. I will get a couple of scraps of covering and heat the wood then lay the scraps over the spots. I discovered this helps pull up the residue. And any left after that, I will just break out the trim solvent.

With my eldest daughters furnace working properly and my youngest daughters house now ready for carpet, I can now relax a little and start attending to some of my projects I wanted to get to the last couple of holiday weekends. However it is back to work tomorrow for me so I probably won't get much done on either the Velox build or the 330 covering until this coming weekend.

 

[stangflyer]

Hey everyone, I got off work early today and looked up at the skies and thought to myself, "Now why ain't I flyin'?" Umm, couldn't be because I have nothing charged right? Oh well, think I will take a little well deserved weekend nappy-nap.

I went downstairs and noticed the 330 just sitting there on the stands all naked and cold and stuff. "So, are ya just gonna look at me or are ya going to do something with me?" Oh alright.... After looking over the airframe really well, I came to the conclusion that as thought before, she is in pretty good shape for a used airframe. Nothing like what I had to address with the Behemoth Yak (1). Pretty clean inside. However I did notice I have two balsa stringers that need to be replaced. Obviously from someone picking it up in the wrong spot. No big deal.



I also noticed that I will need to more than likely remove the firewall and reset it for my kind of flying. I measured the down thrust and the right thrust as I was curious why there was a 3/16" ply wafer around the top of the "F1 former. Apparently to offset the cowl seating. This I am sure was done because originally this plane was flown IMAC. Turns out the firewall has just over 2.6 degrees down thrust and about 2.5 degrees right thrust. I know for a fact that Tony sets all his planes up to have "0" down thrust and about 1.5 degrees right thrust.



Plus, I really don't like the way it was put together. I like to have my firewalls including the motor box sides and top pretty much flush. Too many times in the past I have had to "notch" the motor box sides to accommodate the offset of the engine cylinders. So I will remove this firewall and cut a brand new one and install it as per Pilot R/C design.

There was one other area of concern that I need to address. The vertical fin has a small area that looks as though it was "pinched" when someone grabbed hold of the plane to move it or or....??? So I will need to repair this small area.



The new fuel tank arrived from TDRC yesterday. I need to get this thing done. I have too many parts arriving without a home for them to reside in. LOL



As a side note, as mentioned in the Covering Scheme Contest thread, I will not be using the scheme from Brad Wurstens MXS-R. I really do want something on this plane that no one else has. So bare with me fellas while I figure out what will be on this 170CS red head powered beast. I hope it will not disappoint anyone.

 

[49dimes]

Well after pretty much two full days of testing components with my multimeter, checking this and trying that...it was still failing with a code 33. F.R.S. (Flame Rollout Switch) Indicating either the flames from the burners are rolling out the front of the burners due to a blockage. Or indicating the switches are bad. Neither of course being the cause. Yesterday I did a massive disassembly of the entire furnace and it's systems. Cleaned the fan motor, squirrel cage, interior, burner towers..."AND"...that dang evaporative cooler, (some refer to it as a heat exchanger). Which to me is completely 100% inaccurate. This system is absolutely mirror, (except size) of what is in our modern day automobiles for a/c. Anyway, cleaned all the fins, put the while furnace back together and what do you know? Warmth!!!...aaaaahhh!!! My daughter won't have to...wait a darn minute here. Daddy won't have to take 4k dollars from the rc fund for a new furnace.
View attachment 101084

Its an inner condenser that utilizes the waste heat from the induction system giving the furnace its 90+AFUE rating. They drain condensate usually in to the same drain line as the air conditioner evaporator. They have an internal P trap built in as to keep a certain amount of condensate "level" in the condenser so hot air wont burn through the tube walls at the bottom. This P trap is different than the one installed for the entire heating cooling system drainage. It has sensors that are looped in series with all other safety sensors (roll out, limit, high limit switches) so when a diagnostic code reads (like 33.F.R.S.) all components in that loop need to be checked. Most likely it was this trap or a blockage in the drain line that the trap dumps to that caused the problem. You need to re prime it with tap water after servicing so the condenser does not suffer excessive thermal shock on start up. If you did not don't worry because it will eventually fill itself but in the future you should know to do this because it will (condenser) fail from excessive thermal shock.

And yes I used to be a Board Certified Heating and air Doctor amongst other things as well .