Together again.

I flew the Legacy with the .52 engine. The conbo didn't work as I hoped. The fasteners I used to hold the engine inplace would stay tight and the added movement screwed things up. I put the engine back into the Ringmaster and the screws came loose in that plane. A dab of thread locker fixed that problem. I may not be able to remove the engine as I use "T" nuts that are not accessable and they like to rotate if used in the wrong way. I'm testing other planes to figure out which ones to take to the Dallas contest. The newest one is coming along well. My fuel supply is running low and I tried to find a gallon of Klotz Original synthetic oil and could only find quarts at Summit Racing. I ordered four and plan to mix the next batch 50/50 with castor oil to stretch the oil. It's a favorite mix for this kind of flying. I saw a battery at the El Dorado contest and found it and ordered 3. I charged them today and may fly them tomorrow if the weather holds out. They are 5 cell 3000 mAh and weigh less than a 4 cell 3300 mAh battery. Plentyof power in the plane at the contest and they were barely warm after a flight.

Spare engines.

The engine I used for the Legacy 40 came out of the Ringmaster Excel. I have a spare engine even larger from the P40-Q that is getting re finished. Since the .52 I put in the Legacy and the .60 I took off the P40 are made from the same crankcase/block by the same manufacturer I figured I would put the larger engine in the Ringmaster. The engine is a bolt in swap but I'm using the tank in the Legacy so I had to produce a suitable fuel tank for the Ringmaster. That took several hours as there isn't much room in the tank compartment. It's finally ready for a test flight. Except it's been raining most of the day so far and the forecast isn't good for two more days. The next contest is in Dallas in early June. I plan to use the Jamison in the Old Time Stunt event and the Classic Stunt event. I've never did the new pattern of maneuvers with it just the Old Time pattern so I need to try that along wiht trim flights on the others.

The old is new again.

I built the Legacy 40 from plans enlarged from a magazine in the early part of 2014. I didn't know it but the plans gave the plane a too long nose. It didn't fly that well but I kept it anyway. After several years I found out about the nose and shortened it. It flew much better so I re painted it which came out better than my previous attempts. I got a kit of the same plane and started building it. I plan to use a larger engine as the one I have in the first one isn't quite enough. Today I flew the first copy and once home I removed the engine and re fit the larger engine so I can see how it will fly with more power. It took several hours to get the engine to fit and come up with a larger fuel tank. It's finally ready for a test flight.

After many flights with my own design Hound Dog I figured I should build another. I built the first one In 2012 and had many podium finishes with it at contests. I have 4 short trimming flights with it now and it flys quite well. I'm working on calming the turns down as they are too sharp.