I’m not going to mention the v word or the c word. 2020 presented no chance whatsoever of racing, so I got my (very large) thinking cap on and decided to take on a project or two I had been considering for a while.
My new team mate and pitman, the near legendary Ed Needham had been given the worst possible news, being diagnosed with pancreatic cancer in early 2020. Due to the seriousness of his condition and despite the world pandemic, Ed was rushed in for treatment. This involved a major replumb and the old fella endured a bit of a leaky and tough time recovering. Due to a dry soldered joint (something like that) the replumbing had to be replumbed and given more time to heal. And recovery was by no means a certainty, but thankfully now Ed has been given the green light to get oily once more.
Meanwhile, I decided to use 2020 to catch up on a few outstanding projects, including, in no particular order:
Trying a ‘different’ motor in F2CN
Build a K12 Goodyear model to take on the mighty PAW factory teams
Build a modern design Open Goodyear model that I started years ago!
Scratch build an F2C based on Smiffy’s Wing Fing but with a modern take, I had a few ideas to incorporate
And finish a couple of vintage combat models to mess around with, and a Flite Streak from Tim Hobbins….
Sooooo, lots of balsa bashing then!
The Daddy in British F2CN circles for many year, the Profi F2CN
You know when you have an idea, you park it a while, but it seems like a really good idea that resurfaces? This is one of Ed’s. The Profi F2CN engine is excellent. Most people can make them work, and in the right hands they are quick with great range. But our Ed likes to challenge the norms, and he has this lathe…..
After seeing Ed’s ridiculously fast Fora powered Open Goodyear model we had a discussion about his idea of putting a converted F1C motor (that is the basis of the Fora Goodyear motor) into an F2CN model. I happily volunteered to knock a Fing2CN for the beast. This motor has swept all before it in glow form, but for now three questions remain:
Will it hot start?
Will it have the range?
Will it have the speed?
There’s only one way to find out, Fing2CN #006
Ed had been hard at work, removing the glow head and turning up a a replacement diesel head for the FORA, turning one of these:
Into this:
And then someone in China ate a bat or had a Pangolin party, and the World just stopped. So someday we’ll get to try this. It may go, it may not. But it was fun building it. WTS.
Next time – British Goodyear
CL racing 
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