longez360

Jack, Congratulations on the cooling success. 5 years of experimentation must have been damned frustrating. Appreciate the reply. Will get back to you for some pictures once you have it all repainted. Cheers, Wayne

That is one heck of a nice E-Racer you have Jack. I managed to battle though a crowd and see it at OSH. What sort of performance (TAS) are you seeing at altitude? Cheers, Wayne Blackler IO-360 Long EZ VH-WEZ Melbourne, AUSTRALIA

I wound up using a theodolite and laser for the wings, winglets, canard, centresection spar because my Civil Engineer mate wanted to get it right. Took us a couple of weekends, and I fly ball centred. For everything else I made 2 steel benches with removeable legs, and screw in feet. i.e. You can level it anywhere with or without the legs. I build wings on the floor, and was able to jig damned near everything by adapting the benches. Lasers are good for toe-in. Cheers, Wayne Blackler IO-360 Long EZ VH-WEZ AUSTRALIA

Jamie, You can get the MGS L285/H285 resin system here in Melbourne through MGS Australia (try 0419 338 112). This system is 'known', but the Huntsman group encapsulate Araldite in Australia, and can provide vastly better epoxy systems like an Epon/TETA equivalent (Tg is 250F). I'd probably roll with MGS 285 for most large layups - it has very good infusion characteristics for wet layup. For small layups I cure at 160F using a box/garbage bag/tub and a hair dryer.. I can cure in 45 minutes, and continue adding to my part... For larger layups, I layup at 80F minimum, bag, cure, debag and step postcure everything ramping to 160F for 8 hours, then ramping down... You need to get the best out of your epoxy system. Styrofoam is around, as is Divinycell. I can get it here in Melbourne, but the size might not be right. I'm certain it's available in Aus, but whether it's cheaper is another story. I'd get all epoxy locally, spend 2 weeks sniffing around looking for local foam alternatives, and then order everything I couldn't find direct from Spruce and Brock. I think you will wind up getting 95% of your materials from Spruce. As for building tips: Keep your cores and fibres absoltuely dead straight, bag or squeegee (per Rutan process) resin for reasonable fibre volume fraction and compaction, and postcure if possible. Use the hotwire to rough cut a core only, and get yourself dead straight aluminium extrusion and apply sandpaper with temporary adhseive to true up your cores. Cheers, Wayne Blackler Long EZ VH-WEZ

Disagree. I adjusted the thrust angle on my 360 powered Long EZ with washers under the mount. The vertical vector component of the original O-235 was used to calculate the new thrust angle. I theoretically gained a fraction of thrust, but vibration did go down. Big surprise was elevator position. Although I never measured speed, my trim drag should be lower. Takeoff roll was essentially unchanged. Prop position changed approx 3/8" from memory. Cheers Wayne Blackler IO-360 Long EZ VH-WEZ (N360WZ) AUSTRALIA