BIGMIG

I will try and put some pictures on here latter on tonight if I can figure out how to do it.I'm not a computer wizzzzz--------As you know there is a plywood tray inside where the motor mount rails are and also a plywood strip under that on the bottom.I just drilled a 3/16 hole to match the diameter of the front strut and there is a collar on the bottom and top to hold it in place.I had to cut out some of the foam on the bottom of the cock-pit piece for the stearing arm clearance.I'll take a few pictures latter and see if I can get them posted on here-----------

BIGMIG

I just found this guy who ripped me of here on one of the forums ( he is a member of RC UNIVERSE ) If you look up
( re; PROPJET, MIG 27 TARGET Drone---6/10/24 ) there he is telling people he has these planes for sale.I would like to know if anyone else tried to buy any of these from him,and if they did >? did you actually get one from him. His rc user name is ( reel4/4 ) I looked up his profile and he had made about 4 posts and it appears he may belong to a flying club there in Miami Florida.I would love to find someone who has personel knowledge of this guy --------his name is----------------( zane jones --Miami florida )

Waldopepperaxel

Hey Bigmig Thanks,, there is no wood tray in my engine area just 2 aluminum bars going back into the foam,, and the rear wheels are all set and mounted,,, I'm just wondering where to drill into the bottom for the nose wheel.

I hope you can find out who may know him,, I'll poke around in some of my other threads also.

To upload a pic here,,, all you do is,,, when you hit reply to post a thread,,, hit the click here to upload images and files on the bottom of your reply box, then click on browse and find your pic on where ever you store it on your computer, you'll see what to do from there.

BIGMIG

Mabe your's is a newer version mig than mine,or someone has altered it from the original?mine has a 3/8 in. flat piece of plywood inside with the cut-out for the engine.It was inlaid like the piece on the bottom.It made an ideal way,and place to drill and mount the strut.It sets about 5 inches back,from the back of the motor.If I didn't have everything glued and covered I would open it up and take a picture to show you the installation.This may be one thing i regret latter on if I have problems with the fuel tank or steering arem,there is no easy way to access them.It will take a little carefull cutting and some time to get back in there

BIGMIG

I was wondering if you was involved with these drones in the military.I have seen several post on here from guys that had been using,or shooting at these drones.

Waldopepperaxel

No,, a friend of mine just showed up at my office and asked me if I wanted it, knowing I was into the R/C thing,, he said His father didn't really fly anymore and was looking to make some room, I of course accepted the free Huge flying beer cooler.

Waldopepperaxel

and No don't cut back in there just to take a pic,, I have been flying and building for over 35 years now,, I'm sure I'll figure it out, I was just looking for some different ideas....

BIGMIG

THIS IS AN UPDATE ON ( A WORD OF CAUTION--post date 2-28-2007-----on <[email protected]> )
I thought this guy had ripped me off for sure,but I just got a e-mail yesterday with a ups tracking number and he finally did apperently ship my 2 migs.He got a money order from me on Jan.-19 and just now shipped the planes on 3-2-07.I guess we realy didn't talk about how fast he was going to ship them,but I didn't assume it would take a month an a half.He also said I owe him another $73,00 more than we had agreed to because he thought he was shipping by grayhound and he shipped by ups instead.I am an honest guy and I don't like being charged more than we had agreed to,but I will make it right with him.
The original deal I made was $250.00 for 2 migs including shipping.-----------I since have found a guy who has a large supply of these ---bare planes or the whole deal with motors,props,old type servos,and controls.the problem with these is the shipping.I will post this guys number and e-mail address it it is not against the RC UNIVERSE policy.I want to do some deals with this guy first before I post this information.I will post his information by 3-9-07 for all to use----Thanks
BIGMIG

Waldopepperaxel

Glad to hear you received the Migs, Are they the same type as we have already?? the foam Carl Goldberg drones, I also ran into someone here selling them for $30.00 a mig, no engine though. he had crates of them,,, I haven't found it again since that one day.

Anyway its good to hear, thats a bummer about him wanting more money though, people need to find out that kind of thing before they make the deal or they should eat the expense,, it only hurts their name,, or at least say they weren't sure what shipping was going to be and he would get back to you...

Anyway,,,,,, happy mig flights

BIGMIG

Well they are on there way I don't have them yet.That may be the same guy I got hold of.He says he has many crates of them.I'm waiting to post his name because I want to do some possible deals with him before I post the source.

w5kfg

My Feedback: (1)

Larry
Where is reel 4x4 advertising his drones?
Bill

BIGMIG

He was not currently advertising them for sale.But he did post his e-mail address stateing he had them for sale on some of the back posts here in this catagory.That is how I found him.Refer to=(RE:Propjet,mig 27 target drone dated 6/10/2004 and i think page # 3 ) If you read some of the above post it will explain a lot of what took place.They are on the way to me now.I will know friday when they are suppose to arrive.I will up-date. Larry

WHIPLASH45

The FQM117-B Story

I’ve noticed some new posts on some of the threads discussing the FQM117-B or Mig-27 target drones lately. Apparently there are some of the original RS Systems and more recently the Carl Goldberg Models targets available for sale on Ebay as well as other places. In the interest of preserving some of the history of these unique model airplanes (at least four of the major players are now gone) I present this account of the development and production of the first of what the Army designated as FQM-117-B or the RS Mig. What follows is a short history of the first RS MIG-27 airplane No.1 (pictures attached) of which there was only 1 prototype built and over a period of a few days in the Spring of 1983 evolved into what became the FQM-117-B of which RS produced approximately 45K copies between 1983 and 1986.

In the early 80’s RS Systems was the main provider of small expendable aerial targets used for air defense training to the U.S. Army and Marine Corps. The target of choice was a .61 powered flying wing ironically designated as the FQM-117-A (Stealth Fighter) do a Google for more details. The Army was interested in procuring a new target that was more realistic, hence the FQM-117-B was born.

Like anything built to an Army spec everything is a compromise. The basic contract requirements were; had to be 1/9th scale, had to be assembled in the field in 10 minutes or less, hand launched and had to be able to carry a 5 pound payload. Of course there were many other specifications for the radio and field support equipment but that’s another story.

The first and only prototype was built (by myself, Jeff Hickam and Kirk Wicker) nearly to scale with the biggest change being about a 40% increase in wing area (try hand launching an 8 lb .61 powered model with an extra 5 lb dead weight on it sometime). Much later in the program we did some testing to see exactly how much extra weight the airplane could carry and still be hand launch; if memory serves me it was an all up weight of about 18 lbs, what fun! Airplane no.1 also had a flying stab which used a couple of K&B .61 crank bearings (big end) for a pivot and a single servo for actuation.

The all flying stab (pivot was at 40% of root chord) looked cool but it had terrible low speed performance so we went to a conventional stab/elevator arrangement after the first couple of flights. This change later caused some very strange flight characteristics that Steve Stricker and I eventually solved after many wing location and stab incidence changes hence the very crooked wing shown in the head-on picture.

The C.G. of the airframe is near perfect when about ½ a tank of fuel is left. With a full tank the airplane is nose heavy and with an empty tank it is tail heavy. Like I said, it was a compromise. For the RS Mig the C.G. is just about right when it is located at the front edge of the R.S. name plate molded into the bottom of the fuselage.

Some Factoids:
Proto 1 Design&Construction - Me, Steve Stricker, Jeff Hickam, Kirk Wicker (from when I made the drawing to first test flight I believe was about 4 days)

Proto 1 Weight – About 6 ½ lbs (almost no wood was used, it was all hot wired 1 lb EPS)

First Flight Test – Me launching, Kirk Wicker flying. (I think it was on the second flight that the nose broke off the first time, we new we had some trouble) The fix for this problem was to put 3 foot long aluminium 1/8"x1/2" beams in the fuselage. During qualification testing the engine mount area kept bending, the Gov. wasn't happy. Bob McDaniels (sadly gone) of McDaniel's RC came up with the solution. We replaced the flat aluminium with L-beams. What fun, we took 8 or 10 of the hand made Migs we had left and cut them in half on a giant bandsaw and glued the new L-beams in place. No more bent noses. The top beam also provided a handy place to drill and tap holes for mounting the wing.

Subsequent Flight Tests – Steve Stricker and “Bic� Green with me launching and repairing/modifying. Originally when we went to the fixed stab/elevator the airplane went from flying great to practically unflyable. At any speed, when put into a dive the airplane would tuck or diverge into an ever increasing death dive. Uncorrected it would crash itself in a matter of seconds. We eventually fixed the problem by adding about 4 degrees of negative (TE up) incidence in the stab.

No. Article 1’s Built – I think it was 15, these were the hand made examples that we took to contract qualification at the Redstone Arsenal in Huntsville AL. Steve Stricker an I flew hundreds of flights over a 30 day period during the summer of 1983. The most difficult of which was carrying a 5 lb payload. The same airframe had to be launched and recovered without repair 20 times. They made us land on a very rough gravel road. The average temp was always over 90 and most days the humidity was near 100%. The Redstone Arsenal is the location of the early space program and is basiclly built on a swamp. The first thing they said to us when we started test flying there was "don't wander into the woods" because 3 of the 4 most poisonous snakes in North America inhabit the area.

Wood Patterns for Molding – Ed Mitchell R.I.P., One of the most skilled modelers I’ve ever known carved the solid Mahogany plugs for the mold. I laminated the blanks and did the rough carving of the wing. Ed did all the really hard parts (fuselage with all the coarouts being the hardest). Ed was a middle school shop teacher. During his summer break he spent 6 weeks carving the plugs. (Anybody know where these are? A true work of art.)

Army Cost – A box of 3 airframes, 1- engine, hardware, glue, receiver with 3 servos was about $600.00 dollars. What a bargain!

Overall Contract Cost – Approx. $6M. We were making about $6/hr at the time. What can I say we were young and stupid.

Total # Made – Approx 45k for the Army contract, another 5K to the Navy/Marines and 5K for the commercial hobby market.

Molded By – Tuscarora Plastics, Herndon VA.- Was the biggest most complex EPS mold they had made up to that time. When we first approached them the response was, “you want to do what!�. The use of multiple colored EPS beads, insertion of aluminum spars, plastics ailerons and Mylar hinges was way beyond anything they had ever done before.

Mold Cook Time – Took about 3 ½-4 minutes to fuse the EPS beads together. When they came out of the mold the airframes weighed about 10 lbs which included 4 lbs of water.

Most Number of Flights – has to go to Art Pesch – he flew for RS and Goldberg.

Heaviest Ever Flown - ??? AAI Corp. Ron Stahl, Myer Gutman, Steve Stricker – was used as a intermediate trainer for the Navy/Pioneer UAV program. We use to put about a gallon of fuel in tanks under the wing. Average weight had to be over 20 lbs with trike landing gear and extra radio equipment.

Most Flights on Single Airframe - ??? Got to be in the thousands someplace.

Longest Flight – My personal best is a little over an hour on 16 oz of fuel.

Coolest Mig Ever – Goes to Robert Hayes and Richard Peters (Both RS employees in the late 80’s) – it was two Migs joined together like a F-82. Powered by twin SuperTiger 1.4? cu.in. two-stroke. It was “AWSOME�.

Altitude Record – has to be Migs flown at 29 Palms CA, 5000 ft ASL.

Shortest Flight – To many to count. A good gunner on a towed Vulcan can vaporize one of these in seconds.

Most Bullet Holes Ever – One Mig that came back from a shoot at Camp LeJeune NC, I counted 32 separate hits. We took wooden dowels and stuck them through the holes. Alas the photos have vanished. Mostly 5.62mm M-16 rounds, but there were some .50 cal hits too. It was still flyable.[/size]

WD4JKH

My Feedback: (8)

Cool story! Thanks for posting it..

Waldopepperaxel

I agree,, thanks,, that was fun to read

BIGMIG

Great story on the MIGS.You know it is realy strange I just broke in my engine on one of my Migs today,and here I get this e-mail from you.This was some great information on these planes.I just love the look of them.Some people might not think they are that great because they are big and bulky.I now have 2 of them,one is ready to fly and I'm over half way done with the other.I have beefed up the second one a lot more than on the first one.I will be flying the first one soon,but I want a perfect day and I'm going to ask a friend of mine to take me to his flying club where there is a nice strip for takeoff and landing.I am lucky to live in the country and have my own flying field,but my field is not super smooth and I don't want to bust it up on the landings.I may even have someone else make the first flight and trim it out for me.I do a fair amount of flying but I'm not the greatest pilot and still screw up once in a while.I like to fly but I would be boring for most people to watch,I'm not a hot dog just like to fly.Its a bonus to have my own field and can fly whenever and as long as I want.I had three of these migs but sold one to a friend.Again thanks for the interesting facts on the Mig 27 and I hope more people can find and fly these great planes------------Larry----BIGMIG-------

WHIPLASH45

Your Welcome, BIGMIG, WALDOPEPERAXEL AND WD4JKH

A few other RS Mig images attached:

Bob McDaniel, doing what he liked best - tinkering with electronics. This is a Mig equipped with "AIRMILES" flying version of the Army MILES laser system.

Roger Wood, sitting with a bunch of Migs at the Redstone Arsenal

kujo63

I am trying to get a mig air ready. the model i have had no info on the actual location of where the cg is supposed to be. i could guess kinda close but but feel like i need to be more sure of it than that. please help!

BIGMIG

Wish I could help you,I'm in the same boat.I have 2 of them,one ready to fly also.I have seen this same question on several of these threads,but some of the replys were still not clear to me.I have flown a lot of planes but not this style wing,and I'm at the point where it is going into the air with my best guess.I live here in washington and we get lots of rain and I'm waiting for my field to get dried out and no wind and a sunny day.(boy I don't ask for much do I ??)Its going up soon---BIGMIG
Good luck--------------

kujo63

i was trying to decide if goldberg puposely put there logo on top of the wing. it seems to be at aoubt the 1/4 to 1/3 cord. that is usually a good place to start.

BIGMIG

Don't know other than they were the MFG.-company.I'm leaning toward,better too heavy on the nose rather than heavy on the tail.Put a lot of work in mine and don't really want to crash it though.The second one I'm working on now,I really beefed up.Some of the other threads said the nose was prone to breaking off,and some broke back by the trailing edge of the wing.
I'm happy that I think I have taken measures to stop those problems on the second plane.Now I'm getting ready to start on the wing of the second one.Got several ideas but haven't decided for sure yet.Wish I knew more about useing fiber glass,but rulled that out because that can be a real can of worms if you don't know what you are doing. BIGMIG

w5kfg

My Feedback: (1)

It seems somewhere on a thread about the Migs cg is located at 1" back measured at the wing tip
bILL

BIGMIG

Yea it seems like I remember reading that too.It would be a place to start and go from there.Thats about where i'm at and will find out soon. BIGMIG

kujo63

i have found that the fiberglass resin will definitely melt the foam (small test area). what i am doing is on the elevator to give it more surface area i have sheeted the upper and lower surfaces with thinbalsa and filled in the gap in between the points. then i wrapped aruond the edges with masking tape so i could apply fiberglass. i will eventually try to post a pic or two.

BIGMIG

I used 5 min epoxy all over on my migs and did not see any damage.Keep the super glue type products away from it though.They will really start to melt things.I have covered everything so far with low heat film,and it worked great for me.Don't get too hot with the iron though if you go that route. BIGMIG