RC AIRCRAFT BUILDS Gliders The BumbleBee is born again Reply To: The BumbleBee is born again

#7619

Never got around to updating this build thread but if you have been watching our flying day reports you will already know that the BumbleBee flew (and still does) very well after a bit of tuning.

How she looks now I finally got around to painting the tail

A couple of months ago the reduction gearbox (3 to 1) on the drive motor seized so I replaced the motor and gearbox with an FSP 830kV direct drive motor. Using the same 11 x 7 folding prop the new motor is running about 1500rpm slower than the geared drive but it still has more than enough power to quickly launch up to where the thermals are and the much lighter setup in the nose makes BumbleBee an absolute pleasure to fly. TheĀ  HobbyEagle A3-V2 stabiliser is no longer required to keep the plane flying level & there is now even a bit of room to move the battery forward & aft to better suit the flying conditions.

Having learnt to fly at a later age and using a stabiliser/autopilot all the time it has taken a long time to wean myself off them.

It all started with the Eyas Eagle “Little Eagle” as this was very aerobatic but needed the stabiliser either off or in 3D mode to allow it.

Now BumbleBee flies with no stabiliser as does the new Pulse XT 25e so I’m getting more used to it all the time.

Might have to retune the poor old Bixler 2 Sport for bareback flying as currently it is still equipped with the fullblown FY-41AP autopilot as are all my FPV planes.