Vintage RC Helicopters - Joe's collection - Thunder Tiger

Joe's Thunder Tiger Collection Joe William Richardson

Mini Titan (2007)

In Oct 07 I pickup some heavily discounted 'combo's with motor and ESC so built one for myself with 401 and high speed tail servo plus metal gear servo's.  Exceptionally stable compared to my other small electric helicopters and then sold the other two kits to a couple of people I was teaching so that they would have something better than E-sky Honeybee King's to learn with.  First loop nearly drove it into the ground as I had not properly set it up for negative pitch.  Once set up correctly and much increased cyclic throws then it looped, rolled and flipped though acts like a much larger helicopter.  I was going to fit the green paddles but instead was tempted by the Cobra fuselage conversion.

In Nov 08 converted to a Cobra fuselage but it did need a lot of nose weight for balance making it very heavy (for a 450).  Tested and Lipo light came on at six minutes so limited to 5 minute flights.  However, in Jul 09 it started playing up and motor starting was erratic; tested the ESC on another motor and it worked perfectly indicating the fitted motor was at fault.

Replacement motor fitted in July 10 and now goes well, deliberately kept its head speed down for a more scale look and flying feel.

Raptor 30V2 (2008)

Purchase at a swap meet in Mar 09 and it had only had a bit of hovering by a 'tyro'.  Test hovered and tried a few things I could do and I was very impressed even with 'woodies'.  Unfortunately, lost power whilst going inverted during stationary flips and didn't figure it out (thought I had got the pitch input wrong) until it had rotated nearly upright and despite full positive pitch was falling to the ground.  Managed to continue the rotation until level and in it went; with the ground being soft very little damage was done and the engine was still idling?.  Reason for power loss?  Near enough run out of fuel and the flipping caused the engine to be starved and thus slow down but not quite stop it; doh!!!!.  That's what comes with doing more electric flying than glow; you forget about the need for fuel.

Rebuilt very cheaply and upgraded with CF blades however this seemed to bog the motor down badly when pitching up so engine replaced with an OS37; that should do the job nicely; put into storage pending future use.

MD500 (Raptor 50titan) (2007)

Bought in Dec 07 as a 'Christmas' present and as I did not have suitable mechanics, a new Titan50 SE combo plus radio gear also to be bought (what a shame.............).  In Feb 08 the build was completed and then test hovered to run the engine in; looked the biz in the air and low level nose in hovering made it look quite 'menacing'.

In May 08 it suffered an engine power drop due to the fuel tubing splitting off the silencer nipple and though managed a crude auto it caught a bit of long grass with the skids.  Tail went up and one boom strike later it span viciously round and the engine raced away.  By the time I reach it the engine had sped right up indicating the clutch had burnt out and I stopped it by cutting off the fuel.  The battery had been dislodged after the tail strike and pulled the lead out so as I still had 'idle 1' selected the engine of course tried to keep going.  Body very badly damaged so mechanics stripped out and put into storage for future use.

Augusta 109 Power (Raptor 60) (2008)

Build finished in Mar 09 using an earlier model Raptor 60 that has just about every 'Bling' on the market.  Kit built as the instructions and also included were working navigation lights, strobes plus landing lights that come on when the gear is lowered.  On attempting to run up a very severe vibration occurred that required rapid shutting down to prevent the model from possibly 'flipping' over.  Stripped again and no reason could be found as all shafts were straight and the head fully balanced.  It was not the blades as a 'tremor' could be seen when the head slowed down without blades fitted so more investigation required however in Jan 10 when checking it over for testing again the tail servo stopped working.  So once again put into storage pending further investigation.

NOT DOING TOO WELL WITH THUNDER TIGERS...........................................

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