For Howard and The Duke ...

may he rest in peace.

This is about a Fox Combat Special Mk III, but also about CL people in general. Thanks to Howard, Model Aviation, and Duke Fox, I could fly fast and turn tight - and not blow up the engine. At the time, we always got brand new engines in return for brokens from The Duke, but I wanted to solve the problem. Crankshafts were separating all over the place. Howard offered a suggestion in his MA column, and it worked. We soon had brand new Foxes all over the NAS Memphis hobby shop, and the crankshafts held together. (still bought a LOT of plugs)

It's kind of a light scan, but the download is really small. I actually made the lab report several years later, and got an "A." (For those with discerning eyes, yes - I did make some goofs on the crankshaft threads.)

http://home.comcast.net/~thomas.blanchard/cl/FoxCombatSpecialMK3.pdf

Thanks.

Tom, when you were flying combat, did you ever get the porcelin stuff from Bill "Moose" Allen to keep the plugs from blowing the element out through the top of the plug?

>Tom, when you were flying combat, did you ever get the
>porcelin stuff from Bill "Moose" Allen to keep the plugs
>from blowing the element out through the top of the plug?

Never heard of it.

I used some strain gauge cement recommended by John Kilsdonk to seal Fireball plugs. It worked better than the epoxy I had been using. We sure have better glow plugs now than we did then.

It was a white and a gray powder that came in two tiny cans, about a 1/2 teaspoon each. Mixed with water and the runny goop was placed on top of the plug around the little thingy that sticks up! Then it was baked at 250 degrees in the oven for about 1/2 hour and allowed to cool. Used mainly on Fireball brand plugs. It seemed to work more often than not. Some of us were using 50% nitro, Fox Blast, and that really destoyed plugs. 25% seemed fine and plugs lasted longer. One flight, maybe two. Standard practice was to toss a plug after each match. I think this came from stock holders in the Fireball Co.LOL:7

I never went for more than 25% nitro (Missile Mist). As you say, the plugs only went 1 or 2 flights anyway. What's this signature code stuff with the number "7"? Others have used it, too.

I tried some of it as well as sending him some plugs to treat, and they all still blew.
I don't know why some of the guys got it to hold and it wouldn't hold for others. I wasn't running too much nitro, but was running a heavier load propwise, (9 X 7)s.

Bigiron

Thanks. Somebody must have told me about it, and I passed it along. I don't remember doing that, although my kitchen oven has been abused by various modeling projects. I got some Brasher-McFadden shafts a few years later. I still use them.

When racing, we used various GloBees and ran one per race, even after we went to 10% nitro fuel. We wwould reuse plugs in practice. The 7 thing is one of the smiley faces which doesn't work.

>The 7 thing is one of the smiley faces which
>doesn't work.
>
>Jim

Of course, the reason it doesn't work, is that there's no space between the text or signature and the smiley face. I think Scott does it on purpose, probably to appease Dirty Dan, who hates the Smiley Face icons. Just guessing, tho. Steve

PS: I used a lot of Fireball glowplugs in speed, combat and racing engines. Had a lot of seal failures. After awhile, I came to realize that most my best results came from K&B glowplugs...Ohlsson made, by the way. That's one reason I'm still a fan of Ohlsson made glowplugs, and they still work well. Thunderbolt, Zinger and K&B plugs. I think also RO-Jett glowplugs.