ELECTRIC BLASTER

Electric Blaster under power.

The Electric Blaster (E Blaster) started with a conversation with Barry Kennedy in his living room. I asked him when the Electric Blaster would be available, he showed me a protorype fuse with a hatch and I remarked that I thought the standard fuse with the nose cone would work. The challange was on the table!

The immediate goal was to assemble a variety of parts that might make the project attainable. I started by installing the rudder and elevator servos in the tail fin.

Elevator servo shown. Rudder servo can be seen faintly through the skin of the fin. Servos are Dymond 4.7's. The servo wire is routed through the tail boom. To save weight, a servo wire was made from a twisted three wire with an additional signal wire added. This saved a couple of grams, but more importantly, reduced the wire bulk.

Next followed the selection of the motor, prop, speed control and battery. Space was very limited, but I finally decided on a E-flyte Park Flyer 400 direct dirve motor turning a Graupner 4.7 x 2.4 folding prop. The ESC is a 20 amp (probably overkill) but it was on hand. The battery pictured is a MaxxPower 3S1P of 620 Mah capacity. This has since been replace with an E-Flyte 2S1P 800 Mah unit.

A standard speed 400 motor mount was installed in the truncated nose cone and the forward fuse shortened and modified to accomodate the motor. The 2.4 Ghz, AR6200 receiver is under the ESC. The satellite receiver is in the wing behind the aileron servo.

The AR6200 receiver is taped to the bottom of the forward fuse, with a hole through the floor to permit access to the servo pins. The wire visible below the battery is the lead for the satellite receiver in the wing. Note the orientation of the antenna. The satellite antenna are positioned spanwise in the wing to give a 90 degree orientation. The model has been flown to the limit of visibility with no signal problems.

The finished product. All up weight is 14.9 ounces! The model climbs smartly reaching 500 feet in about 20 seconds. The 800 Mah battery gives about 4 climbs to this altitude. Flight times using a combination of motor and glide usually exceed 30 minutes. Handling qualities are very "Blaster" like with the normal setup for launch and cruise/thermal used in flight. The flaperons are set for about 70 degree deployment and work well for slowing the model both while landing, but also at altitude where the altitude needs to be limited to maintain visual contact.

All the parts and readily available so contact Barry Kennedy today and get started. You could buy just the fuse and tail feathers and use your existing wing.

 

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