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The nose ring is a very important part of your soft
mount installation. It serves several purposes, including keeping
your painstakingly set thrust settings constant and eliminating
throttle changes when you pull "g"s. They also keep
the engine from thrashing about and banging up your airplane
as much as they would without a nose ring. All in all they're
a must have accessory if you use a soft mount.
There are many ways to install and set up a nose ring. After
having done several such installations over the years I finally
decided to ignore all of the instructions I'd seen and just sit
down and figure out how I'd prefer the thing to work for me.
I want the nose ring to be very stable and firmly installed,
but I also want to be able to install and remove the engine without
needing to be a contortionist or having to carry special tools.
Since removing the engine on most pattern planes requires that
you first remove the nose ring, the nose ring itself needs to
be easily removed. And that was where the other installation
methods had let me down. (Especially if you needed to pull an
engine in a hurry at a contest and the thrust washer had stuck
in place!)
So, here's my method. I've used this on my last 3 planes and
I can't really see any reason to change it. It works great, is
extremely rugged and is easy to install and to remove.
There are three components involved in this installation.
For the actual nose ring I use the CHM drilled nose ring. I've
found these to be a perfect fit for the YS engines and they are
a very long-lasting device. The nose ring is glued, using Zap-a-dap-a-goop,
to an end grain balsa/glass laminate piece that is shaped to
fit inside the nose of the airplane (allowing movement in all
directions to align for installation) with a hole cut in the
center to allow the nose ring to fit inside. (Do seal all edges
of this laminate with CA to keep fuel from seeping in.) This
assembly is "spaced" from the nose using two pieces
of 1/8" ply on each side. See photo
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