1fasthitman

I have just built Kyosho's f-16 ducted fan powered model. It seems like I'm not getting enough thrust to get off the ground.
The engine is tuned pretty well and giving me good rpm. I noticed in the directions that there is a round piece of wood with a
hole in the center that is described as not needed in the directions. It is originally shown in the tail of the plane where the "forced"
air exits. Is this piece not meant to pressurize the air and create more thrust? If anyone is familiar with ducted fan design, please
help!

John Redman

My Feedback: (8)

Not too sure about what you are talking about on a piece of wood with a hole in it. There should be a full length thrust tube to direct the thrust out of the aircraft.

The Kyosho ducted fan models were not known for their performance by any means, and if memory serves me correctly, the only way the F-16 ever flew or got into the air was by a bungie launch. At least from a regular sucess standpoint.

dragonpilot

My Feedback: (38)

I had one, there isn't a piece of wood in the tail cone. It is a straight thru fuselage tapered design. Here is some advice.
1. Make sure you are using the highest recommend nitro you can in the engine, (40%). 2. Eliminate as much weight as you can (batt, recvr, mini servos, etc..) and even landing gear/steering (for serious hand launch or bungee). 3. If you keep the landing gear, you'll need at least a decent headwind to get the lift, then hold on and fight the tip stalls, there is barely enough power to take off and rotation takes the whole runway. The airplane is underpowered with the .15 engine, see if you can upgrade to a .25, there are some upgrade parts out there. I got the plane to fly and it looks good in the air but anything under full throttle or loss of power while flying and you are in big trouble.
Hope this helps.