Banana Hobby FMS P-38 Lightning Review & Build Guide!

At August 13, 2012
By Rich Baker
In Electric Prop, Foam Planes, Multi-Engine Airplanes, Propeller Driven, Scale, Warbirds
10

This video demonstrates how to repair the Landing Gear Door Hinge Pin on the FMS P-38 Lightning…

FMS P-38 nose gear unit….

The spring at the top of the nose strut is a centering spring that is intended to make that steering pin on the strut travel into the “V” shaped horn on the steering servo when the gear is extending down for landing…. when taking off or landing on grass the strut tends to flex or bend back and the pin comes out of the “V” and the strut turns sideways. If your grass is to rough for the strut, it may continue to disonnect that mechanism frequently…also, check that your strut is not bent backwards to much, occassionally i need to bend the nose strut forward so the pin stays engaged in the “V”. If your grass surface is very rough, it may be very difficult to keep the steering pin in the “V” notch…

One technique to use is to hold the elevator fully aft at the start of your takeoff roll.. this keeps pressure off the nose strut and will help prevent the steering pin from disengaging. as the plane begins to liftoff be prepaired to ease the elevator forward so you do not over rotate the plane and stall it…. this is called a “Soft Field” takeoff technique which is used in the real world of flying for taking off on rough surfaces…

Also, when performing this “soft field” takeoff… use a small amount of flaps… this also gets the weight of the nose and because the flaps allow the plane to fly at a slower Airspeed, the plane should rotate in a shorter distance ….

Hope this all helps out! Feel free to post this info if it will help someone out… I have trained many pilots in the real world how to perform these takeoffs and this is how i takeoff on grass with my P-38….