TP Packs Electric Conversion

[tcgliderguy]

I wanted to share my VERY favorable experience with Gary Goodrum's TPpacks.com electric conversion for the Raptor 50. Unfortunately, I don't own a Raptor 50... but I do have my trusty Audacity Models Tiger 50... which is similar.

The last straw with glow power is when the muffler fractured at the welds.... and the Tiger came down in a noisy, flopping heap. So I conferred with Gary, ordered his conversion kit... and the beautifully crafted adapter kit, Hacker A-50-16 motor, and Phoenix 85amp controller arrived two days later.
Gary has very thorough, well photographed instructions (which you can download from his website without buying anything...) The machined parts are beautifully CNC machined, and gloss finished.

The Tiger50 uses a slightly larger diameter, threaded pinion gear than
the Raptor. I was able to drill out Gary's aluminum spindle adapter
slightly (like about .020") on a lathe... and then was able to use the
interrupted thread on the Tiger pinion gear to "self-tap" itself into
the adapter. I did all of this on a lathe, hand turning the chuck, to
maintain alignment. For security, I ran a thin bead of JB Weld around
the joint between the adapter and the pinion with a toothpick, and then
machined that back to "pretty" when it cured.

Gary's machined, round motor adapter had a raised boss that was a touch
too small for the hole in the Tiger frames... so I machined a little
Delrin "adapter ring" to fill the gap. If anybody is really interested, I can e-mail you a scanned image of what that looks like.

Gary's round motor adapter plate was only a 1/16" in diameter larger than
the corresponding round hole in the Tiger frame set.... so using the adapter kit part as a template, I made a new, larger diameter one out of 1/8" aluminum.

The motor shaft on the Hacker A50-16 had to be shortened about 3/16" so
that the motor could be tightened up flush against the bottom of the
motor adapter/frame assembly.

I got all of that accomplished in about an hour (but I cheat... I've got
a lathe and mill). The installation is very clean... and I'm looking
forward to flying it. The two Milwaukee V28 packs that I ordered from eBay came in the same mail delivery as the TPPacks package, so at this point I have the cells removed, hot glued together, and the brass joiner bars are soldered in place. All I have to do now is solder on the balancer wires and main power leads, and add the Deans plugs, etc.

Probably the toughest part of the whole project was lining up holes in the top adapter plate, lower adapter plate, and the Hacker motor. If I had it to do over again, I think I would tack the lower motor plate to the top of the motor with a couple of small dabs of Goop... let those dry... and then do the mechanical assembly with the screws. That would hold most everything in alignment, so that the screws could be poked through and tightened.

I'm really looking forward to flying this machine.... with a whole lot less noise, vibration, slime, and smoke. Oh yes... while staring at it last night, and fantasizing about it in the air... I looked at that big Hacker motor body that will be spinning at something like 12,000 RPM... and am wondering if the gyro effect from that won't help smooth things out as well?

Any Tiger owners out there? This conversion will work for you too!

-Taylor

[AZ ChopperCam]

Probably the toughest part of the whole project was lining up holes in the top adapter plate, lower adapter plate, and the Hacker motor. If I had it to do over again, I think I would tack the lower motor plate to the top of the motor with a couple of small dabs of Goop... let those dry... and then do the mechanical assembly with the screws.

yup I drop 2 small drops of CA on the plate and tack it to the motor. It holds quite well even while I'm banging away trying to stuff the motor up in there. Try that if you ever need to drop that motor again and the reinstall will be a snap.

wish I had a lathe and mill. :roll: :roll:

[GGoodrum]

I found it a bit easier if you put the pinion/pinion adapter up into the the lower starter shaft bearing first, hold the frames upside down, and put in two screws through the motor plate, holding them in place with two fingers. Next place the ring over the two screws, fit the motor into place by guiding the shaft into the pinion adapter and then rotate the motor around to line up with the two screws. If you turn everything back upright, while holding onto the motor and supporting the frames with one hand, you can use the othe to start the two screws into the motor.

Or you can just glue the damn ring to the motor, and be done with it! :D

-- Gary