this short kit<\/a> at the very end of December without my “obligatory” 20-second-minimum test flight.\u00a0 But I knew it would fly.<\/p>\nI drew up this model\/kit after being inspired my fellow Cloudbuster, Chris Boehm.\u00a0 Chris has a habit of building the same model over and over.\u00a0 Recently, he published a Peanut BD-4 plan in the Cloudbusters’ newsletter and built two of them.\u00a0 He might have used Bill Hannan’s plan, I don’t recall.\u00a0 I don’t have any particular love for the BD-4 – it is very plain in design (intentionally), but I thought I would build one just for fun.\u00a0 I drew up the tail-dragger version and used the simplest color and markings I could find to produce an all-white model with black registration.\u00a0 Build it quick, cover it simply, get some flights, and move on.<\/p>\n
At the Cloudbusters’ January Indoor Contest, I was finally able to put some power on the model and give it a test.\u00a0 I tried my 10″ test motor – yup, still flies the model – nothing spectacular, but trim is still good (had to add some tail weight).\u00a0\u00a0 I made a 20″ motor – a loop of 1\/16″.\u00a0 The model weighs 7 grams, so it should fly on 1\/16″ rubber (more on my logic here in a different article).\u00a0 And the long motor might help with the needed tail weight.\u00a0 I tried flying right and it wasn’t the best performance. So I dialed in left thrust instead of right and the model perked right up.\u00a0 I did a flight and it was over 70 seconds!<\/p>\n
I added a little bit more tail weight and wound in about 2000 turns (a 20″ motor has room for more) and filmed this spectacular 84-second flight!\u00a0 I think it is still a bit nose heavy (see the last 10 seconds of the flight) and I think there is still more duration to be had on this little model!\u00a0 Needless to say, I am feeling a bit better about the BD-4.\u00a0 I’ll probably be losing this outdoors this year.<\/p>\n