FT Swappable Firewall Review

I'm basically new to RC planes.  I've been building and flying planes for years..but only rubber and free flight.  I've also been building RC things for years...but never planes.  Always wanted to and finally with the budget friendly options availalbe I decided to give it a try.  My interest happened to come back just as the swappable nutball plans were published.  I was already thinking about building a nutball to start with so I figured it was a sign and did it.

Making the firewall was the hardest part and even that really wasn't very hard.  But as a new flyer I was crashing a lot.  And the cheap ply I was able to source locally didn't seem to hold up very well to it.  I was going through firewalls faster than batteries.  Yeah - a lot of that is due to me also just learning how to fly...but  it seemed like any hit even into nice soft muddy ground resulted in a broken firewall.  

So when I saw FT had their laser cut firewalls up and they were only $5 for a 5 pack I had to give them a try.  Had a little hiccup ordering but it was worked out and somewhere between making and shipping full swappable kits the guys found time to get my little order in :D  Just in time too as I had smashed another firewall.  

They arrived very well packed.  Sealed in plastic, then wrapped in bubble wrap, then placed into a heavy pastic mailer doubled over on itself.  Even my crazy mailservice didn't stand a chance of damaging them before I got them.  The firewalls themselves are very well made.  They match each other exactly - super accurate.  However they don't quite match the printed plans from the FT website - the wire pass is different (not that it matters but being larger is nice!) and the holes for mounting to the skewers in the airframe are slightly different, this created a little difficulty for me but not much.  On the upside the starter holes for two different motor mounting options made it super quick and easy to get the motor mount installed.  Or maybe it just seemed easy because one of the tabs on my motor mount gave out after the last crash and it really was 1/4 less work to install.  Nah, I think the starter holes made the bigger difference.

The skewer holes didn't quite fit the skewers I've been using.  My dollar store was out of skewers when I originaly went shopping but I found a pack of 1 foot long 1/4" rods at walmart for $.97 that are actually really nice.  Better than the dowels I can get at the lumber stores in town and way nicer than BBQ skewers.  But a tiny bit bigger.  So I had to enlarge the holes in the firewall just slightly.  And I really mean slightly - the drill bit I used almost went through by itself.  I kind of wonder if it was just the char from the laser cutting that made the fit seem too tight.  My next build I can use different skewers to get a better match since I don't see myself going back to my own homemade firewalls now.

The ply these are made out of is way better than the ply I was able to find locally.  Much desner and better laminations.  With the laser cutting there's no tearout and the pieces are just perfect.  So not only are the stronger to begin with than what I could find locally they're also stronger after being cut because the material holds up better.  Love them!

But how do they fly?  Well I woke up to a perfectly still day today so I was excited to find out!  Ran up to the local desert and gave the new firewall a try.  Within less than a minute I had my answer as I had a fast powered nosedive into the desert sand.  Oops.  I figured the firewall and motor mount would be goners as I'd seen far less of a hit take them out already for me.  But they were fine!  In fact the sand filling the motor was a bigger problem - the firewall and mount had no damage to them at all this time!  I was able to get the motor cleaned and even flew for an entire battery without doing any further firewall testing making this my best day of flying yet (only lost 1 prop too!)  

I did have some other hard hits after that and the firewall still shows no sign of damage.  For $1 these are way better than what I can make from the materials available to me locally and a lot quicker.  Extremely worth the low low price!

I'd like to say back to the desert to put them back in the air - but on my next battery the motor suddenly cut out after just a minute or so, then came back...then cut out again and didn't come back.  Don't even get any beeps out of the ECU.  Maybe that sand in the motor took a heavier tole than it initially seemed.

But the firewalls?  Love em!  I'd order more of them but honestly they seem to take so much abuse I expect this initial 5 pack will last me awhile since I'm thinking the laser cut airframe swappable kits sound very tempting and since they also include their own firewall I'll only need these as spares.