Okay, so I'm minding my own business a couple weeks ago, not bothering a soul. At work, bored, nothing really going on. Get an email from a buddy I grew up with asking about a deal on some used helis. His son is 14 or so, and interested in helicopters and he has come upon a deal for a few flybarred, out of production helis for what he thinks is a good price. I tell him to stay away, and just go buy something like a Blade 450X, Forza 450, Align 450, etc... whatever he thinks he can maintain and his kid will like, don't bother with the old stuff no matter what kind of "deal" he thinks it is.

We trade emails back and forth, and I let him know that I am selling my JR 11X for a pretty good price, and ask him to let me know if he's interested. Then he comes back with an offer that will haunt me for years to come, that I am sure.

"Okay, I'll take the 11X for that, but if you give me $XXX more, I will give you a Boomerang XL jet, plug and play, just add your Rx and you are ready to go. Engine, support equipment, everything. You just have to promise me that you won't sell it for a year. If you don't fly it, or don't like it, after that time fine, get rid of it. But give me one year"

Ouch. That hurt. Anybody ever make you a deal that is so good, you HAVE to take it against better judgment? So good, that you spend more time thinking about how you can sell it to your significant other rather than think about if you ACTUALLY want it?

So I drove up today to get it...

I get there, and my friend says, "Okay, so I know I told you I would sell you the JetCat 120, but I wanted to give you other options..." This is the first indication that I knew I had been hosed.

"That's a good engine. Runs well, will power the plane very well. But you might be limited in other planes down the road. You see, I have a few other planes that I will need to get rid of down the road, and the JetCat Titan, might be a better choice. I could sell you that instead... for just a little more..." At this point, I knew it was over.

Now I am leaving out prices for a reason. Jets are expensive for sure. Prohibitively expensive for most, including me. I have turned down several "deals" from this friend over the years for just that reason. I just could not justify the expense, no matter how good the initial price was.

I went to high school with this friend, worked my first job with this friend, had dinner at his parents house during holidays... We have shared a LOT of good and some really bad times together. He has always tried to get me into jets, even offering payment plans at times! I could just never afford it.

I won't disclose the terms of the deal, but let me say this... it's about as close to giving it away as it can get. Basically, I couldn't put a top end 700 class heli together for this, so I just had to take the plunge.

We spent the afternoon getting it all switched over to my JR XG14. We did do a start up and run up to confirm all was in working order. I have flown my friend's jets in the past for a few passes, and attended a lot of jet events as a spectator/spotter but never a participant. There is something different about running up your own turbine, I have to say. I was a little surprised that I was as excited as I was. I might have squealed, maybe, just a little bit. The sound of this thing at full power was awesome!

There was only one issue with the gear, I'll have to sort that out in the coming weeks and get everything else set up. Need ECU batts and a Rx battery, route and secure wires, etc. My friend bought this used, taught his son to fly turbines with this jet, so it's got some wear and tear but overall, it's in pretty good shape.

But, because I'm the way I am, I will, at some point, have to go through the entire thing and replace the wiring. I didn't wire it, so it can't be right.

Hey, I was honest, I said I was insane!

Tom M

Yep, you're insane!

fantastic..

so jealous.. even if I could afford one/ sneak it past the wife, I just don't have anywhere within a couple of hours driving to fly it.

stick a mobius on it when you fly it and give us some top gun tower passes!

Cheers
Steve

I am pretty lucky with flying sites. My home club hosts a fun fly for jets every year, think the runway is 75'x700' or there abouts. It's big and wide open. Plus, there is a former Navy Auxilliary field about an hour and a half away that is now controlled by NASA that people use. Isolated, 7 or 8000' runways... space is not a problem. I'll meet my friend there and do the shakeout flights there.

I hope to dig into it a little this week. Would like to clean up the wiring a bit, label it more clearly as well. Left main gear is not retracting, probably a pinched line, so I have to get into that as well. Hope to get together next month and get up to speed on operations. I started it up at his house, but I was just following instruction at that point. I need a better handle on how it all works. It's simple, I just haven't dug into it yet.

As far as the camera goes... I don't have anything I can really put i it, but I do believe I can rig a GoPro to mount in the canopy for a pilot's POV. Would like to play with that a bit I think.

Tom M

I've always wanted a Comp ARF Rookie. As Chris points out, there is no way to justify one purchase over another as long as you have the funds.

I think it's cool you're doing a turbine!

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A.K.A. ben_beyer

Thanks Ben, the Rookie is a good airplane, one that I have always liked too. I almost pulled the trigger years ago on the Eurosport. I have flown one a little bit, and it is a very big, but also very forgiving airplane. Again, it just wasn't the right time, but it would have been a good first jet.

I dug into the Boomerang a little bit today. As I said before the left main gear was hanging up and it turned out to be nothing. Pumped up the system and cycled it a few times, fiddled with the gear, and it started working. Likely was just lack of use as to why it was misbehaving.

The plane is far from a show piece. It's in decent condition from a few feet back, but it's pretty rough when you get in close and start looking closely. I would call it, without a trace of shame, a beater. The wiring and plumbing, while functional, is a bit of a mess. i tried to clean it up a little bit, but I'm at LEAST the third owner, and probably beyond that, so there is a little work to do. My plan is to get it flying. Get a feel for it, and if I decide that this is for me, I'll put the time and dollars into it to tidy it up. Until then, I just want to get some time on it...

Which brings up another discovery. When my friend "sold me up" to the Titan over the P-120, he mentioned that the motor was basically brand new. Well Jim is a salesman. A VERY successful one at that, so I pretty much ignore such statements and figure it's him trying to get me to bite. I plugged in the GSU to read how much time the engine had on it and apparently, Jim was not exaggerating at all. The engine had two runs on it, and just less than 5 minutes run time on it. Roughly 3 minutes of that time was when we test ran it at his house. Though it's an engine that is out of production, it is actually brand new. Apparently the previous owner liked to build models and would get them all set up, test run the engines and then just relegate it to static duty. Jim took this engine out of a cherry F-4 that he bought a couple years ago but never flew... Turned out to be a better deal than I thought.

I ended up labeling the connections to the receiver with a label maker I bought today (electronic Brother label maker from Office Max for $10 on sale!!!). Tomorrow I'll label the wing connections. Maybe I'll get a couple pictures.

Of course, it was a BEAUTIFUL day here today, I should have spent the time practicing for the upcoming pattern season. I still haven't flown the entire sequence yet...

Tom M

Got the rest of the labeling done today. My spare room is too small so I moved everything outside.



The wiring and plumbing is like a rat's nest but it will have to do for now.




The engine installation itself is really simple.



With all the wires, extensions, and such clear labels are a must. For $10 this thing was a bargain. I don't need it for most if my models, but with my larger planes it's going to come in handy.



After I finished the wiring and some servo adjustments I put it all together for some pictures.

With my JR XG14 (shameless plug)



Couple with my daughters, Cora and Dinah to show scale. Oh and our Mastiff, Bocephus joined in too!




Lastly, the plane breaks down into six pieces and two tubes making transport a snap.



The batteries have been ordered and aside from a little setup, my work is done until they arrive.

I'll post more pics and maybe a video once I fly it next month.

Tom M.

Dude that is so cool, i am not envious in the least.......much.....

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Home of Burntwood RC

Holy s...

I found myself geeking out at the Kevlar fuel tank.

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Chris Boultinghouse