S Hangar-8

Funtanna No.1 (My first Funtanna S40)

I acquired this Hangar 9 Funtanna S40 ARF from a member at the Denton club in 2005. It was in excellent condition, and I installed an ASP .61 on it. It quickly became the best flying model I had ever own. I also soon

In 2010, repaired and outfitted with my old Saito .80 it flew again nicely until I treed it in a strong crosswind in the only tree tall enough on my daughter’s 8 acres. That hackberry tree held it tightly - even through a powerful storm front - until I poked it out with 40’ of PVC - with significant damage.

Reconstitution completed 1/04/2012. I call it reconstituted not restored - when you look closely you’ll understand my differentiation. The 20 year old Saito .80 threw a rod on the test stand and I replaced it with a SuperTiger .61 from my swap meet inventory. Since the ST.61 weighed about the same as the Saito, re-balancing was avoided. The ST.61 had been removed form my SuperHots because it would stall out during vertical climbs. I added an oscillating pump that was on the Saito thinking this might solve that issue. Also installed was my new FlSky 2.4ghz receiver. This would be a test of the reconstituted Funtanna #1, the ST.61 with Robart oscillating pump, and the new FlySky FS-TH9X 2.4 ghz radio system. During the first flight 1/06/2012 the Funtanna took off true and straight. In fact no trim was required-hardly one click. The radio system worked perfectly; however, the ST.61 quit a couple of minutes into the flight. After needle valve adjustments the ST.61 showed good vertical climb performance but then again quit abruptly on a downwind at half throttle. Another good dead stick landing and two more before I finally made a landing under power and called it quits for the day. I changed the glow pug and adjusted the pump output without improvement. The next time at the JCF field a club member familiar with the Supertiger adjusted the carburetor perfectly eliminating the pump. The model was later transferred to a member of the WAMAC club, who installed his own radio equipment. On his first flight the elevator control rod came loose and the model crashed with major fuseladge damage.

The wing was used in a reconstruction project named Funtanna No.1.3.

Funtanna No.1.3.

The fix is to replace the Hanger 9 bottom landing gear panel of 1/4 lite ply and 3/4 balsa with 100% aircraft plywood and dial in a little aileron anti-droop (up). This eliminates the low speed snap tendency and bullet-proofs the landing gear.

discovered its main two weaknesses at the same time. During landing, if you rounded out a few feet too high, as it stalled it would snap violently uncontrolled and hit hard on the landing gear folding them rearward with the wheel pants punching holes in each of the wing panels.