The Eraser features several changes
from its forerunner, the Eclipse. The wingspan has been reduced a little, the fuselage is
totally new with a much better nosecone and different internal tray (more on this later),
the main panel is shorter and it has longer tips. The joiners having now grown to 11 mm
square carbon and the flaps and ailerons are now both top hinged.
Unfortunately, despite some
thorough testing in early 1999 the first launch in its first competition saw the towline
get caught near the tip when halfway up the climb - helicopter on tow! Not funny...
Two towmen running up the field
with the pulley still felt a good load on the line from the now descending 'helicopter'
until it crunched into the ground. Safe - not yet. The model was in one piece but upside
down and with plenty of line tension left the nose was busy ploughing a trench to put some
seeds in! Then the towers ran out of field and then came back to launch the spare model.
After that substantial battering
one joiner box was split, there was some damage to the main and tip panel leading edges
and one joiner was cracked. I couldn't believe that there was so little damage. Repairs
took a week or so, it didn't look as pretty but it was certainly strong enough and it flew
almost as before. The weight increase was minimal.
As my shiny new model was now
somewhat second-hand a new one was ordered.
The Kit
The new Eraser arrived in March
from Guy at Soarhigh Models http://www.soarhigh.co.uk/
The Eraser range consists of the
Eraser 2000 with flat tips, or the standard Eraser with the nice curly tips. Construction
variants are lightweight, standard (like this one), Carbon 'D' box or full Carbon skins
for F3B.
The new Eraser differs from my old
one slightly, the flaps are now bottom hinged, the fuselage is generally of a lighter
construction and all components have had some weight saving treatment applied. The 'old'
one weighed 2.5 kg when it was new and the current specification model is only 2.1 kg. For
those of us who prefer avoirdupois that's 74 ounces (4 lb 10 oz) or a full 1 lb lighter
than the old one.
Both wing joiners are marked with
your model number and either L or R. These markings are on the end of the joiner, which
fits into the appropriate tip panel, and they will be tight! Wax polish is the correct
method of fitting these not sandpaper!
The wing is in 3 pieces, hollow
with glass/Rohacell/glass skins and carbon spars. The flaps and ailerons are already
hinged with 'living' hinges and nice moulded knuckles so that there is no gap on the side
opposite the hinge.
Both flap and aileron hinges are
very loose, quite often on moulded models I have found them to be stiff and the servo is
working very hard to do very little, not so with the Eraser. The flaps are 595 mm x 60 mm
each side and the ailerons are 760 mm x 50 mm tapering to 40 mm.
Three M4 bolts keep the centre
panel attached to the fuselage and the carbon joiners take the loads from the nicely
moulded and very pretty tip panels.
Of the same moulded construction is
the one-piece V tail that comes complete with the elevator horns fitted. This bolts to the
fuselage with 2 x M2 bolts. The ruddervators are 340 mm x 40 mm tapering to 32 mm.
The fuselage is circular in section
and has a quite large diameter tail boom compared to others in order to help keep the
strength up and the weight down. Pre-fitted are the captive nuts for wing and tail,
ballast tube, pushrods (snakes) for the ruddervators and the adjustable tow hook.
Like all the best moulded models
there is a bag of bits, this time containing wing joiners, bolts, a 9-pin plug and socket,
2 x threaded connectors for the snake ends, servo covers, and 2 allen keys.
The finish on this manufacturer's
model is getting better all the time, and this one is without doubt the best I've seen.
The surface finish is absolutely superb and I found no defects at all.
Construction
Like almost all moulded models
there is little to do.
I always start with the wing
because by the time I've done that there's no space on the workbench for anything bigger
than the fuselage.
Holes need to be cut for the servos
and the pushrod exits for the flaps. Although the recesses on the underside of the wing
for the aileron servos are 'L' shaped I still only make a square hole leaving about a 3-4
mm land in the recess for the cover to sit on. I have not found it necessary to cut away
any more as the pushrod exit for the aileron is through the top wing skin.
You will also need to cut a hole in
the underside centre of the main panel for the supplied 9 pin plug and some holes in the
end of the panel near the joiners for the aileron leads. I have a small template which
goes over the joiner with a hole in so that I can mark all the holes in the same place.
Fit some flap/aileron horns (not
supplied), I use the FVK brass ones available from Brian Anderson, tel. 0191 3887649 or
e-mail Brian.Anderson@onyxnet.co.uk . The flap horns were fitted to be very short to see
how much flap I could get for crow braking. About 75 degrees is the answer to that
question, more on this later!
Make up the pushrods for the wing,
I make these using metal clevises screwed onto unthreaded wire, set the length, and solder
them so that they are not adjustable. To attach the servos I hold the flap or aileron at
neutral with a foam faced bulldog clip, make sure the servo is at neutral and that the
servo arm has its screw in. Once done I sand the side of the servo that's in contact with
the wing skin, apply 5-minute epoxy (the only use I ever found for it) to the servo, put
it in place and attach the pushrod. Repeat for the other three surfaces, or just fit them
anyway you like - so long as they stay where you put them it doesn't matter.
The fuselage is a little trickier
as the ballast tube is at the top and in the middle, meaning the servos need to be low
down. In my old Eraser I used Graupner 3341s, which have the lugs quite high on the case.
This time I used Hi-Tec HS85 MGs, which are a little high for the job. The answer to that
was to make two servo plates to fit inside the inner nose section and lower these below
the surface with a 3 mm packer. That done, the metal clevises were soldered to the snakes,
the battery compartment was cut out and 6 ounces of nose weight were added and it was
ready to go. Or at least mine was anyway as I just copied the transmitter set up from the
other one and reset the sub trims for neutrals.
For those less fortunate here are
the settings I use:
CG 105 mm from L/E
Hook 102 mm from L/E
Launch settings Flaps 11 mm/Ailerons 6 mm
Thermal Flaps 2 mm/Ailerons 1 mm
Speed/Distance Flaps -2 mm/Ailerons -1 mm
Aileron differential 3 to 1
Elevator +/- 10 mm
Rudder +/- 10 mm
Elevator/Crow mix 18% down elevator.
Flying
Saturday came, man with camera was
organised, model and winch charged and horizontal rain all day! Sunday dawned bright and
sunny with 5-10 mph winds and hopefully some lift.
Off to the field after lunch, Pete
Weston with his large bag of cameras, me with my winch and Eraser. A few mandatory
pre-launch photos and then on the line she goes.
A voice in my ear said, "Are
you not test gliding it then?" yes said I, as I stood on the winch pedal. Straight
up, full power all the way, start trim off, good zoom then up and going very fast. A nice
high launch, steadily around the sky followed by a sudden acceleration as it flew into
sink. Don't panic just wait, out of the sink, going up speed coming off, into thermal flap
and start turning, just gentle lift but up is the way to go.
Ten minutes later and it was time
to get the height off with a bit of speed, I like that bit! Height gone, it was time for
an approach and time to apply the crow brakes. I've got 18% down elevator coupled in,
remember the 75 degrees of flap. That stopped it, she just parked about 5 feet high and
landed 10 feet short.
I flew the Eraser all afternoon.
Clearly it wasn't a competition as all flights were 10 minutes and only that because I
wanted to keep landing it to get the crow brakes set up accurately.
I flew it again the following
weekend and that just confirmed what I knew anyway, this model works and is responsive in
light lift as well as strong thermals. Small flap deflections provide considerable changes
to the model's characteristics, which is what MH32 is supposed to be like.
I think Lubos and Petr have got the
weight about right now because it covers acres (should that be hectares?) of sky with
slight reflex on the flaps and it goes up in very light lift. There is also a lightweight
version at around 1.8 kg, but that's too light for me.
The first competition for me was on
6 May. I decided to use the Eraser as my number one model and in winds of about 15-20 mph
no ballast was required. The rules no longer allow the use of a ground stake so I elected
to use a two man straight tow. The model was fast on the line with launch flap and
switching to distance flap for the zoom launch produced a very high climb out. Virtually
no flex was seen in the wing during launch and it was possibly the fastest launch in that
slot, my timekeeper considered that the model was, if not the highest, then at least the
equal of the highest.
Although there were some lift
patches, most of the sky seemed to be sink and re-launches were the order of the day.
Although another fast and high launch was made, and a huge amount of sky was covered, my
flight time only resulted in 850-900 points. I had no difficulty at all in moving the
model around the sky seeking lift, the glide was fast and flat and when some lift was
noted the speed was immediately converted into height.
The second round was much like the
first as far as the model was concerned, but the pilot did not see "the one that got
away", much like all the other pilots in that slot. I think the result was only about
600 points, still not too bad as scores were fairly inconsistent for most competitors.
I still consider my first
impressions to be correct, a nice model, strong and easy to fly with an excellent finish.
Now, all I need is a lot more practise.
More practise was provided at the
York Open event on 13 May. I only used this model for rounds 2 and 3 and it was possibly
the fastest launching model on the field with some excellent climb outs after release.
The use of a different model (but
that's another story entirely) in Round 1 almost cost me a fly-off place, but I just
scraped in and we flew one fly-off round only. The Eraser was first off the line, light
lift was the order of the day and lots of sky was covered during this flight. I was
expecting to find that the slot would be indifferent and about 10-12 minutes would be all
there was available, but no, the Eraser flew very well and still had more than launch
height at the end of the slot. As I've now said that the Eraser was first up and last
down, I'll let you work out who won!
Conclusion
I would definitely recommend this
model. Excellent quality, well finished with very little to be done to get it flying and,
as noted earlier, it is strong. Will I have another? Of course I would, but remember that
all of the many moulded designs fly differently and you need to find the one that suits
you the best. Out of the six different moulded models I have owned and the many more I
have flown, I have found the Eraser to be one of the easiest to get good performance out
of in most conditions whilst also being very easy to fly.
Eraser F3J
Made in the Czech Republic by Lubos Pazderka and Petr Fusek.
Wingspan
3170 mm
Wing area 68 sq. dm
Aerofoil MH 32
Weight 2 - 2.2 Kg
V-tail
8%
thick
Price From £450.00
Call for pricing of other variants.
If you want an Eraser conact:
Soarhigh
6a The Square
Turriff
Aberdeenshire
Scotland
AB53 4AH
Tel +44 (0)1888 560446
Fax +44 (0)1888 563251
E-mail address - guy@soarhigh.co.uk
Web address - http://www.europa-gliders.co.uk
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