What engine did you have in it? I've seen 5 of these fly locally. All were essentially stock, with a few minor changes. Three were powered with the LA .46 and two were converted to electric. So far I don't know of the firewall failing on any, but one of the "gassers" has seen lots of air time and is getting fuel soaked, so it could happen.

There have been a couple of magazine articles on the Score, where the builders have reworked the front end, in some cases considerably, to stand the forces of heavier and more powerful engines. I've been flying mine with a ST .60 the past season. Obviously the front end has been totally reworked. It added lots of weight, but I still need 2 ounces of nose weight to balance.

I have doubts about the stock firewall's ability to handle anything beyond a .46 (maybe a .51). If I used it, I'd probably peel the covering back 3 or 4 inches and glass the whole front end, then recover it. Of course the more mods you make to these things, the less of an ARF they become.

I've flown all but one of the local Scores. With the LA .46 they come in at 67 ounces, give or take a couple. In mild weather conditions and on 15% nitro, they seem to fly OK. With trimming and practice you can work up to a decent pattern. One of the electrics was upgraded to a much more powerful motor and is a handful (at least for me), but vibration is less and fuel soaking is never a problem.

Mine weights 5 pounds, but with a strong ST .60 it flies much better than you might expect for such a heavy model. Unfortunately, the ST .60 is a gas guzzler and under the new rules I must use .021" dia. lines.

In spite of it's shortcomings I see several pluses for the Score: the price is right, it's take-apart in stock form, it goes together quickly (if you can resist making lots of changes) and is a decent flier. If plans or a construction kit were available, it could be built into a very competitive plane.  Regards, EWP 


   

On Grandpa's Score, he replaced the whole front end with a crutch he made, so we never dealt with that, just the excessive weight in the design (refinshed and weighs 72 ounces)

You guys that are rebuilding the Score nose and taking out the down and right thrust are making a big mistake. You think you are doing right but all you are really doing is waisting time you could be building something that is yours or flying. The RC mounts are fine and work. As I said above the firewall coming out was a defect with that individual airplane.

You don't even need to take my word for what I'm saying, search for Bob Whitely's article, "Things that always work,". Pretty sure he outlines what he believes in a post or two over on SSW. Whoever designed the Score knew exactly what he was doing even if Top Flights implementation is less than desirable the shortcomings like crappy controls are fairly easy to fix.

At the Chehalis WA Air Fair this past summer I saw a fairly new Score lose the firewall. I can't remember who was fling it, but on landing it bounced a couple times and the motor / firewall just fell out the front, and dangled by the fuel lines. It was not running, and the bounces were not that severe, the glue joints just failed, nice clean seperation with no real damage to the wood.

If I had one I would at minimum put some triangle stock on the inside corners and peg the firewall and fuse side to them with small dowells or tooth picks. 

Hi Andy,

The R/C type mounts are great, that isn't the problem. The problem is the structure that the R/C mount is attached to. Please for your safety, reattach something to hold the firewall in place. After thinking about what could have happen, I feel I needed to inform everyone that has this plane. The one I had the firewall glue joints failed. I could have been tacking the engine when this happened and probably wouldn't be able to write about what occurred. I can't stress it enough, PLEASE re-engineer the firewall. Gary

I have had a Score since they first came out. I did beef up the firewall during initial construction by adding triangular bracing inside the tank area to tie the firewall to the ply fuse sides at that critical joint. I sanded away as much of the hot glue as possible to get a good gluing surface. I am using the stock motor mounts. Of course replaced all controls (bellcrank, leadouts, pushrods) to an all ball joint system. I flew it at first with a modified ST51 that was adequate power. For the last year it has had an Enya 61CXS Pro, which is more than plenty of power. Mejzlik 12.5 x 5.2 3-blade prop. No problems of anything coming apart. I did add a metal plate to tie the front of the wing saddle to the fuse at the rear of the tank compartment, which stiffens the whole thing substantially. I don't like the wiggle that is present if just relying on wooden dowels in the LE. Torsion loads are now carried by the bottom as well as top of fuse. Easy to do.