Boy that cowl is huge. Does it have any support midway. Seems like it would break at the mounting screws. Oh and thanks for the pic's.

There are six bolts that hold the cowl on; no supports midway. Keep in mind that while it's a large cowl for a 50cc, there are many cowls on 35%-40% planes that are the same actual size and have no issues. As far as I know, all of the prototypes for this plane have used this mounting method with no problems. The bonded washers that the kits include will significantly reduce vibration-related fatigue on the cowl.

Now we're talking! Here's the No Limitz spinner installed on the plane. Man oh man, I'm never going back to aluminum spinners. The fiberglass was sooooo much easier to cut than Aluminum. Not to mention the weight savings. I remember inventing new swear words when I was cutting the Dave Brown spinner on my Edge for the Menz prop, then going insane having to cut it again at a fly-in to fit a larger prop. The pricing on these No Limitz spinners is very reasonable too; less than some of their aluminum counterparts. I believe the 6" silver fiberglass Ultimate spinner I bought for my 43% Edge costs about the same as the DB aluminum spinner of the same size. This one is a 3.5" white fiberglass spinner and I think the look is just right. By Scott's picture of his full scale, it looks like a 4" would possibly be closer to scale. Tough to tell until I can get the cowl on the plane; then I'll get a side shot and compare it to Scott's shot from earlier.

Nice job on the spinner cut outs, looks all professional like

Actually it was a hack job that ended up turning out pretty well. I just cut small, then checked the fit and trimmed a few times, ending up with doing some hand-sanding with a couple small pieces of varying grit sandpaper. When you do yours, you can describe your method as you're a lot better at explaining that then I am.

Both Herve and I like the 4" spinner on this plane. The previous photos had a 3-1/2" spinner at that time.

Ken

Some progress pictures for the day. The throttle servo and pushrod are installed, switches are mounted, and the batteries and receiver are in place. There is plenty of room to move the gear around if I need to for balancing. I ended up using 48" extensions for the elevator servos. You can get away with less if you won't be removing your elevator servos on a regular basis. I'm going to try transporting this plane in my car though, so I needed a little more slack in the elevator servo wires to pull the stabs off the plane. All that's needed now is cowl mounting, balancing, and radio setup. I also need to seal the control hinges and get some tygon for the vent line. Starting to come together.

That is a very nice looking airplane. I love Sukhoi's (and that actually looks like one!)... can't wait for the flight reports. I have a couple of DA50's in mothballs.

Silly question - when running 2 batteries on seperate switches how do you stop one pack form draining the other should a cell fail or a pack drop? Normally I would just run one battery in a 50cc or use some light weight thing like a Bat-Share.

Using Ryan's setup you can't. The RX bus will drain both batteries if one shorts. I also use the Batt-share in situation like this.

Love the landing gear! Looks better than anyone elses on a 26 right now. The whole plane looks good.

Ran the engine today at the field and did a little taxiing (sans cowl). Be sure to check the wheel collar on the tailwheel bracket, my tailwheel collar came off.

I'm happy to report that the Sukhoi fits in my compact hatchback just fine. Even when I add the cowl, there will be enough clearance on the rear hatch. Because I have a new brand of engine (to me), I decided to get a little run time on it at the field today before installing the cowl. The engine took a little while to start for the first time, but once we got it running it was easy to start again. The MT-57 does shake a bit at idle, even when leaned out. We'll see if it smooths out as it breaks in. I didn't spend much time tuning the high-end needle, and tached the engine at 6150rpm on the PAU 23x8 prop with a warm engine. I taxied the plane around a little bit just for fun, and was having so much fun that I didn't notice the tail wheel came off. Chances are the set screw in the tailwheel bracket wasn't tight enough. Fortunately I found the wheel, so when I get back from my trip I'll pick up another wheel collar and be sure to really wrench it down. The plane looks great all together!

The nylon wing bolts are located in kind of a tough spot, but there really aren't any better spots to locate them at. They are the thumb-style screws, which require no screwdriver, and that is great. I may pick up a set of 1/4-20 nylon screws with the socket insert to see if it's quicker to bolt the wings on that way. The elevators are easier to remove at the field than my Edge because the servos are actually in the stabs and not on the fuse. This way I don't have to remove the elevator pushrod when I pull the stabs off.

Yes, two A123 2400mah packs on this plane might be a little overkill, but it's nice being able to fly all day without having to recharge. My Edge has a single 5200mah Li-Ion and that works great as well.

Oh, it started snowing at the field as I was packing the plane up for the day. I have some house work to do before heading out tomorrow, so I'll get back to work on the Sukhoi when I get back home.

Yes, I did get some video footage today too.

Originally Posted by crhammond

Silly question - when running 2 batteries on seperate switches how do you stop one pack form draining the other should a cell fail or a pack drop? Normally I would just run one battery in a 50cc or use some light weight thing like a Bat-Share.

These 2400 packs are wired two in series and two in parallel. If one cell drops, the battery will retain its voltage. I don't have any system to protect the receiver in the event of a short but I've run this setup for some time now with good results.

Ryan,
Looking good.
I fell in love with this airplane the first time I saw it and watched Ken fly it.
I hoping to have one or two in the hanger before I leave WA and head back to Texas.
Looking forward to seeing all the Sukhoi's in the air this spring.
John

The Sukhoi looks great Ryan! I can't believe you didn't even bolt on the cowl for the pics....