Hangar 9/Horizon Hobby F6F Hellcat 15cc ARF
Classic warbird that’s easy to build and fly
While outmatched F4F Wildcats were holding the line in the Pacific theater, Grumman was hard at work on a replacement that could equal the abilities of the vaunted Japanese Zero. Taking only an astonishing 18 months from design to operational deployment, the answer was the F6F Hellcat. With armor plating in critical areas, the Hellcat was tough, easy to maintain, and—despite not having the top speed of the Corsair— more suitable to operate off aircraft carriers.
Her pilots nicknamed the Hellcat the “Ace Maker,” and indeed, 305 pilots attained ace status flying Hellcats—claiming 5,163 victories, with only
270 aircraft lost in combat.
Navy leading ace Capt. David McCampbell scored 34 aerial victories, all of them in an F6F.
The Hangar 9 Hellcat is a fully built-up sport-scale model of the famous warbird. It is constructed out of laser-cut balsa and light plywood and is covered in dark blue UltraCote with white trim. The Hellcat can be assembled and flown as a simple 4-channel sport aircraft with fixed landing gear or equipped with optional rotating retracts and scale struts. In the spirit of simplicity, there are no flaps and no provisions included to add them.
Power can be a 15cc gas engine or equivalent glow or electric power. An intermediate builder would have no problem with the Hellcat assembly as
the manual is excellent and carefully documents installation of the various options. Likewise, flying the Hellcat isn’t for beginners, but anyone with some tail-dragger experience will have success with this sport-flying warbird.
UNIQUE FEATURES
In the spirit of keeping things simple, the Hellcat comes equipped with a basic 4-channel control system and fixed landing gear. Rearward-sweeping, 95-degree rotating retractable main landing gear are available as are functional Oleo-scale landing-gear struts. I’m sure that, like me, most of our warbird-loving readers will consider flying such a plane with fixed landing gear base treachery and will equip their Hellcat accordingly. The E-flite electric retracts are a drop-in fit, but you need to prepare and install the plastic wheel-well liners. It requires some extra
work, but it is well worth the time invested.
Power choices abound for the Hellcat. The Evolution gas engines fit well, and you can use the recommended 15cc or even the 20cc if you want a little extra power. I went for clean and quiet, and installed an E-flite Power 60 with a Castle Creations Talon 90 speed control swinging an APC 15x8 propeller. This setup provides a hearty 140 watts per pound. The provided laseretched drill template is marked with the proper mounting-bolt locations for several of the popular power choices.
The power system is encased in a molded fiberglass cowl that appears robust without being heavy. The main landing-gear doors are also fiberglass. Inside the cowl, a plastic dummy radial can be judiciously cut out for cooling air. A small kit is included to detail the engine with lifter rods, and if you add some scrap wire, you can have a prettygood-looking front end. I added RTL Fasteners bonded washers to the cowl screws to protect the fiberglass. A clear plastic canopy, pilot, and instrument-panel decal add those extra touches, which finish off the Hellcat nicely.
The Hellcat uses CA style hinges on all the control surfaces and all the surfaces need to be hinged during assembly. We used Zap brand thin CA to hinge the surfaces on the review model. A full hardware kit with metric fasteners is included with the Hellcat. I secured all metal-to-metal fasteners with Z-42 Thread Locker from Zap. The decal sheet provided includes numbers for two versions including the stars, numbers, and kill flags. The decals need to be applied by the builder, leaving a blank slate if you want to customize. I would prefer a latch on the canopy for quickly changing batteries, but the Hellcat came with nylon thumb screws, so battery swaps can be done without tools.
IN THE AIR
Despite the narrow-track landing gear, the Hellcat is easy to taxi on both paved and grass surfaces. The Power 60 had the Hellcat airborne in less than 100 feet on our paved runway, with a little right rudder to help keep things going straight. This combination also works on well-kept grass or textile runways albeit with slightly longer takeoff distances.
Due to the large frontal area of the radialengine fighters, like the Hellcat and Corsair, they have a lot of drag, and consequently
you need to carefully manage the power to land. If you establish the descent rate properly using the throttle and keep it level using the elevator, the Hellcat will come in nicely and land on the main gear. If you try to flare or three-point land, it will bounce down the runway.
GENERAL FLIGHT PERFORMANCE
Stability: The Hellcat is both fast and stable, and the AS3X receiver I used kept things comfortable even in the wind.
Tracking: The Hellcat tracks well both upright and inverted. Inverted flight requires a bit of down-elevator but nothing more than expected, given the airfoil and slightly noseheavy balance point.
Aerobatics: Like its full-scale brother, the Hellcat is quite nimble. All the scale maneuvers can be done, including loops, rolls, stall turns, Immelmanns, and Cuban-8s. Spins are tight, and recovery consists of relaxing the controls and letting the airspeed build. There’s some coupling during knifeedge maneuvers, but it’s manageable.
Glide and stall performance: The frontal area means that the Hellcat won’t glide very far, but keeping the nose down, it goes farther than I thought it would without power. Forced into a stall, the Hellcat will mush forward without dropping a wing, with recovery requiring nothing more than adding power. It comes down fast, but it doesn’t snap.
PILOT DEBRIEFING
The Hellcat is a real performer with the Power 60 setup. The 7000mAh battery I used meant that no additional weight was required, with the added bonus of long flight times. The Hellcat requires only a 4-channel radio if you want to keep things simple or 5 channels if you opt for the retractable landing gear. I also had the opportunity during flight testing to do a maiden and get several flights on an Evolution 20cc– equipped Hellcat. If gas is your thing, this makes a great combination of speed, sound, and long flight times.