How much does it really weigh?

[Crist Rigotti]

Here's proof:

[RC Storick]

I need your scale!!

[PatRobinson]

Hi Crist,
Could we see a side of your airplane holding rig?- How much does it weigh?
I have never really had a good way to hold a plane on the scales to weigh it so your rig caught my eye.  Neat idea!

                                                                Pat Robinson

[Crist Rigotti]

Sparky,
I'll bring my scale to the NATS and we will weight them at the same time on my scale.  Of course bring yours too and we will do the same thing. OK?

[Andrew Borgogna]

Just purchased a scale much like that for about $30 this past weekend at the local hardware store.  (Ace I think)  The box says it is accurate enough to weight stuff for the post office.  It can't be accurate because of what it says my new Profile Nobler weighs....
Andy

[minnesotamodeler]

Oh sure, Crist, you could have set that dial at anything!

Andrew, adjust the dial to what you think it ought to weigh, and take a picture...

--Ray

[Crist Rigotti]

OK Ray, you caught me.  What you don't see is the wing tips.  Attached to each wing tip are 8 helium filled 14 inch mylar balloons from the local grocery store.   

[frank carlisle]

Crist that is a mighty fine looking plane you built. It's always amazed me how concerned modelers are about weight. It's like we all have Jenny Craig Syndrome.
I've always just lied about the weight. Me sunters (same plane every time-different color) wind up weighing 58 or 59 oz. by the time their weighted for trim. When someone asks I just say 56oz. It's kinda like women lying about their age.

Some day we should all show up at the circle with our scales and see what the variance is. I'll be interested in how yours and Sparky's scales compare.

[Bradley Walker]

Sparky,
I'll bring my scale to the NATS and we will weight them at the same time on my scale.  Of course bring yours too and we will do the same thing. OK?

Somebody let me know who wins!!!

Hey Crist, I think I will be doing the same power package.  PA 65 and no pipe.  I think I will try the good old PA, and just drop the pipe so the run is just a standard 4-2 break.  I really had no idea how well the PA runs without the pipe myself, even though I had always heard it performed great that way.  Bob G has been running a PA 51 on a muffler, and it runs like a ST 60 at a slightly higher RPM and with a little less pitch.  The break is just like a big Fox 35.

So, you do not have the pipe to mess with, not to mention you just dropped about 3 oz of pipe weight.

What kind of muffler are you using on the header?  I plan to get some of Randy's new rear exhaust mufflers.  My Valk has an Eather muffler.  I guess I will see how that works this weekend.

Did you find that you needed more pitch than the pipe setup?

[Crist Rigotti]

Brad,
I'm using a PA 75 with a header muffler.  No external muffler.  I watched Mike McHenry Zero fly with a PA 65 and header muffler fly at last years NATS and was impressed.  It just tooled around very slowly even in the bad conditions.  I'm running a Bolly 13.75 X 4.5 3 bladed prop repitched to 4.3.  I'm launching at 9200 to 9500 depending on the conditions and the amount of nitro I'm using.  Usually 7 1/2 or 10%.

[minnesotamodeler]

That's a spectacular looking ship, what we can see of it.  Don't know why you won't show us the whole thing! We'll promise to ignore the balloons...

--Ray

[Bradley Walker]

Brad,
I'm using a PA 75 with a header muffler.  No external muffler.  I watched Mike McHenry Zero fly with a PA 65 and header muffler fly at last years NATS and was impressed.  It just tooled around very slowly even in the bad conditions.  I'm running a Bolly 13.75 X 4.5 3 bladed prop repitched to 4.3.  I'm launching at 9200 to 9500 depending on the conditions and the amount of nitro I'm using.  Usually 7 1/2 or 10%.

I like that.

Steve told me the same thing about the Zero.

Where do you get that muffler?

[Crist Rigotti]

I got the muffler from Randy Smith.  I did shorten the header about 1 inch to fit the nose.  It is a bit loud compared to a tube muffler.  I fly around mostly in a 4-stroke so it just sorta growls.

[Allen Brickhaus]

I flew the US Nationals one year in Contrtol Line Team Scale with Walter Brownell and watched the tech judges weigh the large scale radio controlled models.  They placed the nose of the model on the scales and balanced the model until a maximum weight was reveiled.  They were putting no pressure on the model in a downward fashion and only held the rear portion of the fuselage until the scale stopped moving.  I also watched Roy Trantham do the same thing with his models at his shop in Stuart, Florida.  Thus I have been doing the same and my weights seem to match, within less than an ounce, the weights shown by other methods.  Thus nothing is needed but a delicate pair of hands and a digital scale.

Allen Brickhaus

[Bradley Walker]

I got the muffler from Randy Smith.  I did shorten the header about 1 inch to fit the nose.  It is a bit loud compared to a tube muffler.  I fly around mostly in a 4-stroke so it just sorta growls.

Sweet.

Growl.  I love growl.  Growl kicks ass.

[don Burke]

Just a note about using a lot of scales.  TO paraphrase a saying; A man with one scale knows how much something weighs, a man with two or more is never sure!

OBTW, the nose down technique works very well.

[phil c]

if you have two scales, put the mains on one and the tail wheel on the other.  Balancing the plane on its nose only works if you are just trying to make sure it doesn't exceed some limit, like the FAI 5kg. limit.  If may be the best you can do under the circumstances, but it isn't good.

[Paul Smith]

I bought a similar unit at Sam's Club.

It has the "TARE" button to compensate for the fixture, or in my case, the cardboard box that you need to support the airplane.

Mine also has a "HOLD" button that enables the scale to hold its reading, so you can remove a subject that covers the readout.

[Doug Moon]

I would think a good digital fishing scale that you can hang the plane from would be good.  Make a hook to hang it from the prop.  That would be the easiest way at a contest.

Also on the scales with tare, most of them, you can put the plane on there and hit tare.  Then when you remove it it will show the -whatever the plane weighs.