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News:
Precious Patty has gone Electric!
Welcome! For
the last few years, I've been designing my own plans to
build a scale B-25 Mitchell bomber.
The design was completed using SolidWorks, a 3D
modeling
program, and WinFoil. Construction of the first
prototype began on Sunday, March 6, 2005 and our first flight took place on August 11, 2007.
Despite a few "pilot errors", Precious Patty continues to fly.
Every winter, she comes back into the shop for
some design improvements.
Here's the latest news:
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October 5, 2011 |
With the exception
of one bent nose wheel at the Fond du Lac
Warbirds show in August, Precious patty
continues to fly. She has 11 flights this
season, an all time best. We've
updated the Gallery with some great B-25
Mitchell photos, so check it out!
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July
13, 2011 |
Summer is here and Precious Patty is flying
electric. She has six successful flights
this year with the electric conversion.
Click here to get the the
Electric Conversion
page or use the links to the left.
Oh,
almost forgot -
Precious Patty won
"Best Scale Scratch-Built" at the Flying
Electrons Scale Festival - again. Tom didn't want to enter her as to
give someone else a chance to win, but the
judges insisted he enter.
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March 2, 2011 |
That's right, Precious Patty is going electric!
We have been working with
Aero-model.com to provide us with the right
setup, and the parts arrived yesterday.
Watch for a new section documenting the
conversion from nitro to electric on our bomber! |
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November 28, 2010 |
Well, here's a first. This will be the
first season Precious Patty gets retired for the
season
without us having to fix something. Guess
Tom's flying is getting better (ha ha). We
have
just finished new molds for glass parts, and are
making pieces as needed. We will be
working again with Custom Model Products to do
the "production work" in a few weeks.
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October 1, 2010 |
We've put several flights on the B25 this
summer, and other than Tom's stupid landing at
the
Astro Wings Charity event, the aircraft is
flying very well. However, right now,
Precious Patty
is "grounded" as we will be attending the
SolidWorks Convention in Delevan Wisconsin on
October 6, 2010 - and we don't want Tom breaking
the bomber before the show!
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July 13, 2010 |
Receiving new
replacement parts for the broken nose gear,
Precious Patty flew at the 2010 Flying
Electron's Scale Festival in Milwaukee.
Tom had two great flights and get this -
no nose wheel issues! And to end
the day with a bang, Precious Patty won "Best
Scale Scratch-Built".
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June 26, 2010 |
Tom was conducting
flight testing June 25th and ran into control
problems as we tested the idea of mounting the
engines with a 2 degree outward thrust (bad
idea). Almost lost the aircraft all
together, and on top of that, Tom broke the nose
gear (again) while he completed an emergency
landing.
The broken nose
gear was temporarily fixed for the June 26th Air
Show, and Tom had two good flights. Check
out the pictures in the Photo Gallery (click
here). Also, watch the first minute of
this video done by Joe Fisher to see Precious
Patty flying (click
here).
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June 23, 2010 |
Precious Patty is
out of the shop and we are doing engine testing
this week. Talk about cutting it short!
The Sky Ranch Flyers Remote-Controlled Air Show
is just a few days away!
Tom told the boys
"we're gonna be safe on this rollout - no sense
in rushing it and loosing the bird". We
have new pictures of the plane.
Click here for a fast link to the Photo Gallery
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May 20, 2010 |
Welcome to flying
season! We have a number of updates to
report:
- The bomb
bay design is done, and on the bomb bay page
for a free download.
- Cockpit
and Nose Glass production is on hold again
as we have worn out the old
balsa molds. We are creating new ones
with Repro from Freeman Manufacturing,
a resin based product that should stand up
to the pressures of vacuum forming.
- And to
throw off everyone, a new paint scheme.
With some of the later repairs we
made, we did not use the proper paint, and
some of it was gumming off. So,
Precious Patty is being repainted with a
scheme from the 1943 Torch Landings.

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February 8, 2010 |
Work is almost
done on the re-design for the bomb bay area.
Check out the Bomb
Bay Design area. Just pictures for
now, but we should have the plans available for
a free download soon.
We have cockpit, nose, and cowling parts for
sale. Click here!
A few upgrades to the bomber this winter include
a Smart-Fly power extender (as we really don't
like Y harnesses), replacing the 4.8 volt
batteries with 6.0 volt sets, a new top turret,
and a few cosmetic repairs to the starboard
wing.
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October 19, 2009 |
Well, we are going
to call an end to the flying season here in
Wisconsin. A few updates:
The new glass molds are progressing a well as
can be expected for
us rookies. Smooth molds
mean everything,
so I've sent some
more time sanding.
The Nose gear has been rebuilt with help from
the guys at
Robart.com, and it now has a 1/4 steel shear pin
compared to a
3/16 aluminum shear pin. We were concerned
about the added
strength to the gear and what it would do to the
mounting blocks
the gear sat on, so the plane went into the shop
for a bit of "beefing
up".
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August 28, 2009 |
We
have added a new feature to the website for you
to download the plans directly from our website!
See the Plans/Drawings
page for details.
Still working on the canopies for re-sale.
We are creating new
molds that will hold up to the extreme forces of
the vacuum
machines at
http://www.custommodelworks.com.
Last, we are working on a design for the
bomb-bay for a working
system. We've got the idea sketched on
paper, and next step is
to put it into Solidworks.
Those of you that have already purchased plans
will receive the free updated
drawings/electronic files.
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August 6, 2009 |
A few more flights
have taken place, and again we broke the nose
wheel. We contacted
Robart.com on the nose gear issue, and they
are sending parts to upgrade the nose gear from
a 3/16" steering (shear) pin to a 1/4"
pin.
Also
took out too much weight on the nose, and it
wasn't flying right,
so added 3 ounces back in.
Lado-tech.net retrofit kit for the Robart
retracts are working very well.
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July
24, 2009 |
Put
two flights on the bomber last night, the second
of which on
landing broke the nose gear - again! We
are convinced the bird is
nose-heavy still, so we're going to take out a
few more ounces of
lead (which is strange, because it balances
tail-heavy).
I do want to compliment the folks at
ElectroDymanics for a great
product, called GlowLite, a glow plug driver
system. We've tried
other brands in the past, but this one,
"hands-down" is the best
we've seen. Had over a dozen starts, per
engine and still had
power to spare!
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