Twinstar II

[My Local I.T Guy]

Hi Guys

Thought I might as well post up my build of my Twinstar II here, give you some bedtime reading if your really bored, and give me a little place for you lot to tell me if/what I'm doping wrong instead of whacking posts all over the shop....

So, I bought a Twinstar II back in November, and now 4 months later, its "almost" looking lie a plane, but, I'll show you all some pretty pictures anyway of the story so far, just in case anybody is interested.

The pretty box:


Well, the packaging it comes in is not brilliant, everything sits loose in the box, no bubble wrap or cardboard to keep it all from flapping around, although the amount of stuff in the box anyway, it doesnt flap about too much, but nothing is really protected from the box taking a prod from anything pointy...

So, on with the build, and 4 months later, I've managed to install FAA lights into the wing:
The wing is currently upside down, and also has flashing strobes on the trailing edges which unless timing is perfect, cant be photographed and all the wiring for the lights have been buried into channels cut into the foam, glued in place with zacki, then filled over with lightweight model filler (Still yet to finsih the filling but its soo boring filling those little gaps... but it does look better.



The slow red flashing lights are to the outside of each motor with the landing lights on the inside, in total, 8 lights in the wing, and I've just got to bury the light circuit board into the wing recess just in front of where the wing bolt goes, as all wires were extended to reach on this wing as this lighting kit from robot birds, the wires were not long enough to reach the ends of the wing tips

Looks great so far, for 4 months of pratting about with it, and now the 2 wing halves have also been glued together with white model silicone and the GRP spar is also glued into place, but I prefered using model silicone purely to allow a little flex in the wing as I didnt want it to be totally rigid as I think that might fracture something should it ever see a loopy loop

[My Local I.T Guy]

right chaps, one thing I have a horrible sinking feeling about is how I put the wiring together....

As you can see from the wiring channel in each side of the wing, there are a mass of wires making there way from edge to centre, getting bigger and bigger the closer it gets to the middle:



Well, after 4 months of endless reading, asking all you guys and asking many more, it was decided to fit the 30A ESC's right in behind the brushless motors (2 x JP480's) which should also keep them nice and cold



Also, expanding on what Darren did with his, I totally turned the motor mounts round backwards, fitted the motor mount plate on the wrong side deliberately and pushed the 4mm spinning bar thingy out through the other side of the motor so that the wires for it woudnt run under the moving part of the outrunner, and allowing me to bolt the motor into place further back into the motor mount on the wing leaving only enough of the spinning bar/rod poking out for the prop to fit with 5mm clearance.

Should look great with this pair of counter rotating props on it, and I even managed to wire up and correctly colour code the ESC=>motor cables so they both spin the right way, on my first attempt which was lucky.

My only concern now is, with all that wiring going down the middle of the wing, which is all glued together, and glued in place, I have the Aileron servo cables glued into the top half, along with the lighting wires, and on the bottom half are the ESC power cables, ESC servo cables, and a few more lighting cables, all glued together with Zacki

I did realise however that it would be a good idea to actually test it all and make sure the motors work before going any further, although I should have done that months ago before fitting anything at all, but I didnt have a clue then, so better late than never, and luckily, everything fired up brilliantly, motors and ESC's all work as they should (Thanks for that wiring diag Darren, it made sense after a lot more reading up)

(The post it notes are just so I dont forget which motor is going in what direction)