DH Mosquito returns to Canadian skies after 65 years! BH Mosquito after 3 years!

[Wingnutz]

DH (De Havilland) Mosquito KA114 (one of 1100+ built here in Canada during WWII) will return to Canadian skies for the first time since 1948 at this year's Hamilton Airshow. www.hamiltonairshow.com/It is the only Mosquito in the world currently listed as airworthy.
BH (Black Horse) Mosquito is a 1/10.3ish (63") semi scale balsa/ply ARF. It'll hopefully make it into the sky when I finally finish it. (another in a series of three year ARF builds for me) I hope to get it done in time for TEMAC's Warbirds Day to celebrate the return of the real KA114 almost exactly one month later. Andre Laurent (new TEMACer) built one of these, posted his build on RCCanada and has patiently mentored and inspired me to finally build mine.
Followed Andre's lead and chose Turnigy NTM4240 750kv motors, Plush 60A ESCs and counter-rotating MA11x7 3 bladed props...necessitating building new firewalls to match the mounting bolt spacing for the Turnigys.
Battery will be a single 5000mah 4S.
In spite of what I learned at Ed's talk, the ESCs will live (or die) in the nacelles necessitating lengthening the
battery to ESC leads. Planning a separate RX battery...just in case.
Next challenge is selecting LG and retracts. Retracts are eFlite which meant new plates to mount properly. The BH landing gear completely misses the character of the real Mossie's which is double oleo struts with cross bracing similar to the Lancaster's. Other builders have soldered or brazed a scale LG but I wussed out and ordered scale oleos and Fults double strut nose gears as backups...my Mossie's gonna have H gear!

The BH plastic crew has been retired...they belong in a little kid's toy...this is a big kid's toy!

[Bigstik]

Great! What is the date for the Ham Air Show?

Bigstik

[Wingnutz]

John,
June 15, 16. www.hamiltonairshow.com/

[Wingnutz]

Wow! This thread had sunk almost as far as Colin's Hawker! How's it coming Colin?
Anyway between being caregiver at home and trying to do enough on the Norseman to keep Jack off my back, I have managed to get a little done on the Mozzie.
The BH ARF misses capturing the character of the real aircraft in two or three areas including LG (ARF includes manual retracts and lollipop style single strut LG). The real Mozzie had double oleo struts and a mild version of tundra tires (including mud flaps!) for grass field operations.
So with the help of Andre Laurents (new TEMACer and electric twin and Mosquito buff) I have constructed one and partially completed a second LG design.
LG1 is from the Freewing Mosquito. It has sprung oleos which should help on bumpy fields but is designed for a 1400mm model so it looks small. Adapting it to the BH model meant increasing the strut length between retract and LG to give prop clearance. As with most tasks you haven't tried before, it wasn't as simple as it sounded but they're on and as long as they survive the taxi tests at ROGO, the model will have its maiden on these.
LG2 is simply Fults double strut nose gear adapted to eflite  retracts...that didn't turn out to be really simple either. The wheels on LG2 are bigger and closer to scale with wide shouldered knobby DuBro wheels but there's no shock absorbing in the struts themselves.
Supplied spinners would look fine on a Mustang or Spitfire but are way too pointy for a Mozzie and they're two bladed!
At Andre's suggestion, went to the Freewing parts bin again and ordered a set of spinners. Although the shape looked pretty good there was no way they were going to fit the bigger 11x7x3 MA counter rotating props for the BH model. I ended up reversing the spinner plates, and used the drill press with a Dremel plastic cutting wheel to cut off the flange and almost all of the webbing from the backplate and some of the webbing inside the spinner itself.
After roughly four hours on each spinner (i completely messed up the first set!) I was really frustrated to find I couldn't tighten the propellor nuts! The spinner plate now lacked the teeth which bite into the prop and allow the prop nut to tighten. RCGroups to the rescue this time. Made two friction washers for each side out of drywall sanding screen and...yahoo! Tight prop nuts!
Anyway, pictures are below.
BTW Graphics arrived from Callie. My Mozzie will be "Black Rufe", from RCAF Squadron 418 an intruder squadron which flew under German radar, deep into occupied territory, destroyed whatever they found at the target and escaped again under radar height ...50'!

[wollins]

Wow! This thread had sunk almost as far as Colin's Hawker! How's it coming Colin?

Waiting on batteries to start taxi tests.
Colin

[Wingnutz]

Successful maiden yesterday! Thanks mainly to Andre (Mr. Warbird) Laurents who has encouraged, guided and mentored this build, my Mozzie flew successfully yesterday!
Andre flew his Mozzie (featured in TEMACS Warbirds gallery) so I could watch...very scary...he flys and lands way faster than I'm comfortable.
We check balance, tx settings, control throws on my model.
I negotiate his services as test pilot as I've chickened out on the maiden.
A whir of twin motors and TH-M's off...climbing a bit steeply, first turn...no problem, a couple of clicks of down and she's manageable! I get to fly for a while until we're showing one minute left on the battery. Andre lands...mygawd the thing comes in fast! Gentle kiss on the grass, rollout and done!
Second flight is even better and I get nervy and take-off!...but leave the landing to the pro. Maybe sometime when the wind is straight down the runway I'll try to land it...after my landing skills with my less fragile warbirds have improved.
Thanks Andre!

[battlestu]

Way to go Bill!

[sihinch]

Nice one Bill. I'm very jealous!

[bfeist]

Gorgeous photo! Congrats!

[Wingnutz]

Ben,
Thanks for the compliment. It was taken with my dumb phone. Here's a link to more photos. Sorry...no flying photos yet.
http://www.rcgroups.com/forums/showthread.php?t=798698&page=101

[Bobmic]

Congrats Bill, gorgeous plane. After this much effort in building it I don't blame you chickening out a bit - I am sure you'll land it like a Pro.

Bobby