RC Jets
THE 2005 HEART of Ohio Jet Scramble will take place! The dedicated group from The Ohio Radio Kontrol Society (TORKS) has signed up again.
The meet has been moved to the Fayette County Airport located near Washington Court House, Ohio. This is south of Columbus and not far from the TORKS club field. It will be held August 26-28.
Heart of Ohio has been held at the Darby Dan Airport for many years, but last year a source of radio interference was so great that we could not safely fly models and the meet had to be canceled. But the TORKS club did not roll over and quit. The committed crew found another site and is ready for a bigger and better jet meet.
The Fayette County Airport will shut down for the duration of the event. The overfly area is an open field and the runway is long and wide. The local sponsors are back, including Big Dog Motorcycles, and guess what? The F-100 flyby is sponsored, so it will take place again. Terry Nitsch will serve as the event director and all is in place to continue the grand tradition of the Heart of Ohio Jet Scramble.
For additional information, check out the TORKS Web site at www.torks.com or E-mail the club at [email protected].
Now I'll push a second jet meet in Ohio. I belong to the Flying Aeros club, which is hosting a gathering at the Ashtabula County Airport, in the northeast part of the state near Jefferson, Ohio, the weekend of July 9-10. The Flying Aeros have hosted fun-flys and other events at its home field for many years—make that decades—and this year the club is taking on a jet fly.
Flying will be from the taxiway adjacent to the 5,000-foot runway, and the pits will be between the runway and the taxiway. This airport has been an active model-jet site for nearly 10 years. It promises to be a great flying event.
For additional information, check out the Flying Aeros Web site at www.flyingaeros.com.
The World Jet Master Team USA is ready to represent the United States in Hungary. One of the major fund-raisers in place for our
RC Jets
team is a raffle for a kit, complete with radio and engine. Other prizes include a couple of quality piston engines.
All tickets sold will help raise funds to support our team. The drawing for these items will take place at the Windy City Jet Meet in Saint Charles, Illinois, July 16-17.
I had a chance to run a JetCat P60 turbine last week, and I did it in cold weather! The 40° temperatures are not the California-style weather the people from JetCat USA are used to.
Dave Rigotti had the P60 installed in a Bruce Tharpe Reaction 54. It proved to be another user-friendly turbine from JetCat. Start-up in the cold weather was typical of all autostart turbines and presented no special problems.
The P60, as do all of the small-class turbines, exhibited incredibly quick acceleration and deceleration. Its thrust was good, pushing Dave Rigotti’s 18-pound Reaction 54 with authority.
The P60 is rated at 13 pounds of thrust at 165,000 rpm. It comes complete with all accessories, including the latest Version 5 ECU. This was the first time I have had a chance to run this version of ECU, and it does offer some nice features. The JetCat ECU and ground-support display unit have easy-to-use menus. Although I haven’t had one in my hands in almost a year, it came back quickly and I was able to monitor engine performance and start-up parameters, confirm the RC link, and use many other features.
Larry Wolfe of Jet Hangar Hobbies brought out the new Wren SuperSport at the Weak Signals’ annual Toledo Show. This is the latest MW-54-size turbine from Wren, and it promises to raise the bar. The SuperSport is the same small size and weight as the original Wren MW-54 and is rated at 18 pounds of thrust with similar rpm.
At this time, it is only available as an assembled turbine. After the factory gains experience with this first run of SuperSports, it hopes to follow with kit versions. Wren is again taking a conservative route to introducing a new turbine to the modeler.
Available only in the full-autostart version at this time, the SuperSport uses the Full Authority Digital Engine Control (FADEC) ECU control. A nice improvement to the electronics of this unit is a new hand data terminal for ground monitoring of the turbine operation. The new data terminal has the same programming and monitoring features, but is now packaged in a hard plastic box.
I believe that this much power from such a light engine is the highest power-to-weight ratio of any of the turbines currently available on the market. The SuperSport is still small enough to fit many old ducted-fan models, but be careful! Its power will push those airframes beyond any dreams we ever had for them with ducted-fan engines.
For additional information and availability of the Wren SuperSport or any of the Wren turbines, visit the Jet Hangar Hobbies Web site at www.jethangar.com or call (562) 467-0260.
Continuing with turbine news, the Artes turbines of Felipe Nieto will now be distributed by Eric Clapp of Jet Artes Gulf Coast. The company’s Web site is www.jetartes.com.
I spoke with Eric about his business plans and the Artes turbines. He is committed to supporting his customers and expanding the distribution network for Artes turbines. Talking to Eric was refreshing—especially when we realized we had flown together many years ago when we both lived in the Baltimore, Maryland, area.
I wish Eric well in this business endeavor, and I expect he will provide good customer support for the Artes turbine customers.
The Artes family of turbines continues to grow, with the introduction of the 22-pound-thrust Falcon. The turbine is only 3.9 inches in diameter, which is slightly smaller than most of the 18-pound-thrust turbines now on the market. The Falcon’s rated thrust is 22,000 rpm and idle is at 32,000 rpm. Idle thrust is rated at 0.7 pound—a good residual thrust.
As I am writing this, the Falcons are in stock and available for delivery.
Another turbine from Artes that is making its presence known is the Rhino. This is a 36-pound-thrust turbine, yet it is only 4.3 inches in diameter. Maximum thrust is attained at only 116,000 rpm, with an idle of 30,000 rpm providing only 1.3 pounds of residual thrust.
You pay the price for this powerhouse when it comes to fuel consumption; it burns almost 18 ounces of kerosene per minute. It’s not excessive, but it takes quantities of fuel to make this much power.
All of the Artes turbines utilize the FADEC systems for power management. As are so many of our turbines, they are available only with the autostart feature, which makes running them a simple process.
The Artes turbines now cover a wide range of power, from the 14-pound-thrust Super Bee, to the Falcon, to the Super Eagle at 30 pounds of thrust, to the Rhino. These are proving to be solid, reliable turbines for the modeler. I have more than 30 hours on my Eagle in less than one year, and I am quite happy with its performance.
The Artes turbines will still be serviced at the Mexico City factory. When you are shipping from the United States, coordinate with Eric Clapp and he will advise you of the best shipping methods to ensure timely repairs and trouble-free international shipping. I sent my Eagle to Mexico City for some upgrades and the shipping process was not a problem, so call first.
Transcribed from original scans by AI. Minor OCR errors may remain.
