Redshift; Used Purchase

[Konrad]

No in flight sounds. I know with me as the pilot, it is hard to believe but the landing was feather light. The stab looked fine prior to launch and the crack was found after landing. There was no shock from landing (If done right we land on redwood bark at the SLoT) and there was no contact with the ground or weeds on landing.

 

[Konrad]

Please allow me to brag a bit.

At the last F3F race I slammed my Redshift hard into the backside of the hill as a result of some poor judgement calls. (Read I botched the landing)!
The carnage looked horrible as the wings were skewed almost 45° to the fuselage and the wing LE was delaminated for at least 600mm. I knew the ship was a write off! I cleaned up the crash site and threw the carcass in the back of the car. Grabbed my back ups (the shame of it all, these are RCRCM Stregas) and finished out the race.

I've learned not to throw out my models at the field. Rather it is best to wait a day or two then assess the damage. Ok, I waited 3 months! I'm so happy I didn't strip and throw away the aircraft as it is looking like the damage really was light!

So what am I bragging about? Well, it is that my previous wing box repairs have held. Normally this kind of high speed nose in crash would have resulted in the wing boxes tearing out as the wings slid forward. Earlier in the life of this Redshift I had the same kind of crash and the OEM installed wing boxes did rip out. This time with the well bonded wing boxes and the reinforced fuselage (properly installed servo tray and ballast tube) the wing joiner just cut cleanly through the fuselage side as the wing slid forward.

Last night I literally used a hammer and some bucking bars to reshape the pulverized lay up and realign the flaps (pieces of the fuse). I re-saturated the fibers with a very low viscosity epoxy. I also re-stressed the area to open up the other cracks and again flowed low viscosity epoxy in to them. The area will now hold the wing joiner in proper orientation. Next step is to add some layup to the inside to give the belt and suspender effect to the wing root.

Now to deal with the delaminated wings.

From out of the ashes of defeat a Pheonix might arise! It is looking like I might have an F3F racer ready for the start of this racing season.

 

[Wayne]

That poor plane..

Back from the ashes.

 

[Konrad]

LOL,
Funny how your concerns are for the plane and not the owner!

 

[Wayne]

You might hit a lot of things, but figure you will not hit yourself.

(Perhaps the "back from the ashes" comment was not about the plane.) ?(Is it lunchtime yet?)

 

[Konrad]

Oh, I've done that more than once!

Ah, there's that interpretation.
Not likely, as I'm just bored here in the bosom of the wife's family.

 

[Doc James Hammond]

What's all this about boring in the Wife's bosom?

Should'nt be allowed!

Shockdoc.

 

[Konrad]

Doc I see you and I have about the same reading comprehension!

 

[Doc James Hammond]

Doc I see you and I have about the same reading comprehension!

Wot, me? Reeding?

Knever bin Known.

Doc.

 

[Konrad]

That poor plane..

Back from the ashes.

I think we all can agree that this Redshift has been ridden hard and put away wet, read abused a bit! But most folks would have shot this horse long ago.

Now we are concerned for another light weight glass, green Redshift. This one appears to be suffering from neglect as she hasn’t had any exercise or fresh sea air in over four years!

 

[Doc James Hammond]

I we all can agree that this Redshift has been ridden hard and put away wet, read abused a bit! But most folks would have shot this horse long ago. Now we are concerned for another light weight glass green Redshift. This one appears to be suffering from neglect as she hasn’t had any exercise or fresh sea air in over four years!

Glass gleen...sounds like a nice colour...

Doc.

 

[Konrad]

Yep, I’m an old artist. That’s spelled with a “F”! I should have added some punctuation.

I’m using a new Device with a new M-1 Chip and new iOS. I’m sure my writing will be more discombobulated than normal!

 

[Konrad]

She is airworthy!!!
I'm actually a bit surprised at how well she went back together as I don't have any fixturing made up for this model.

Gotta love 10 foot Victorian ceilings. I've just moved out of my 1886 Victorian to allow me to start the renovation. Now don't tell the wife that I'm actually just using it as an extended workshop!

 

[Wayne]

Looks good and clean, well done.

If you are interested in the green plane, I'll make a special deal for you. (not anyone else) Otherwise I will keep her. I have neglected her, but on the plus side I can't crash her this way.. LOL

 

[Konrad]

We'll have to talk the next time I'm up there. But yes I need a light lift version of the Redshift. I'm sure those long wings will really show their efficiency turning in light lift.

 

[Konrad]

I’m sitting here with some mixed feelings. On one hand I’m ecstatic I just picked up my third Redshift. (Thanks Wayne for the more than generous deal) This was built to a high standard. And she has my tail flip mod. On the other hand it means that there is one less guy flying the Redshift. I’m really sorry to see this. While the Redshift Mk1 does have some issues the strong points really do outshine the few design limitations. I must own 3 of the 5 total Redshifts legally imported into the states.

 

[Konrad]

With the double cusp airfoil like those used on the Redshift I've always been concerned that the wing surfaces might bind on the nice wipers. I can see how the thin cross section could allow wiper to bottom out on the inner skin. I had suspected that some of my slow aileron response might be because the tip of the aileron was bottomed out while the root side was still free to move upwards. I noticed that the servos were straining a bit towards the last part of the ailerons upward movement. I thought it might be the hinge. So on this repair I took the opportunity to cut back the aileron wipers.

Wow, at the race yesterday was I in for a few surprises. One of the biggest was how fast the Redshift can roll! I honestly thought that the slow roll rate was because I wasn't flying the Redshift fast enough and that the high aspect ratio wings just had a slower roll rate. For the most part the latest repair had the Redshift flying in very much the same trim as before my last crash. In race trim I normally don't use the full throw of my control. I was flying a Strega in the early part of the race and switch to the Redshift using the race heat as my post crash test and trim flight (not a good practice if you want to win races). Because of the added speed from the Redshift I often came up on the pylons way too early (this actually is a good thing)! This forced me to use full aileron throw to get her up into knife edge flight. More than once I found myself inverted rather than in knife edge making a diving turn.

So the takeaway here is test for aileron binding along the full span of the control surface. And with the thin trailing edges of airfoils like those used in the Redshift give the small tips close attention. Don't be afraid to cut back the wipers if they are binding the control surface prematurely. I used a vibrating sander, like the Fein sander with cutting saw attachment. Others might find a piece of sandpaper glued to the back of a credit card practical if they can get it between the wing and wiper.

 

[purview]

The opportunity to fly, as I've decided on yesterdays beautiful high pressure system above near all of europe, lead to the next fixing issue session of my used Redshift. Weather was way better then the prediction and I managed to fly with round 2.5kg@4m/s slope conditions. And yes it was a bit on the too heavy side during the turns although the climb away task was extraordinary gooood. Well, the flying ended after half n hour because of a crackled rear stab mounting of the elevator (the glue broke).

The repair should be easy and not much time consuming. As I've improved the performance of the clearence with a glass sheeting of the root section it was obvious to get this result. But everything better than broken stabs or a broken elevator. After some grease on the stabs to position it with the ... inclination, I fixed them with electrical tape to finish the epoxy session.

I've checked V-tail angle: from 109° up to 115°. I decided, since the response was crispy and wiggling indicated bad air, I choosed the lower angle for the future. But pls be quiet, because I do not want to jump into a discussion which projected/wetted area is correct. I like how it flies. Hopefully next sessions with some more weight on the run....

 

[purview]

Used components: long curing epoxy, glass and grease. Some tools and tape to fix this angle.

 

[purview]

At least I want to show some issues on my elevator. I have one problem of a dent on the top surface. This may happen due to improper storage and transportation. This buckle gets worse, but should I fill it with some material or don't care about?

The second issue are some lines also on the top surface. It must be the visibility of the spar and it's detectable with fingers. the surface isn't smooth. So here also should I fix this, how?

Nice Regards
Christian