Kyosho Majestic 1400 ARF

Designed by Christophe PaysantLe Roux, winner of the 2000 Tournament of Champions, the Kyosho Majestic 1400 ARF is a beautifully made airplane. I was pleased to be given the chance to fly and review a plane designed by a champion, and as I expected, the Majestic turned out to be quite a champion itself. In fact, representatives of the world's leading model publications named the Kyosho Majestic 2001 Model Airplane of the Year, and from what I've seen, it certainly lives up to its title.

Award-winning pattern plane

The kit includes an engine mount, wheels, a fuel tank, all of the necessary hardware anti decals. In other words, the Majestic comes with just about everything you need to get flying except the radio, engine, propeller, spinner and fuel tubing (you may also want to add a pilot figure).

The fuselage is built up. The wing is also built up and the tail feathers are sheet fossil. The cowl and wheel pants are painted, fiberglass-reinforced plastic, and the finish on the cowl is flawless.

Kyosho also includes a 16-page instruction manual to guide you through assembly, there by eliminating the need for a fullsize plan. It includes alot of symbols and drwings but very few words. It is written in Japanese and English, and all of the dimensions are in millimeters.

ASSEMBLY

Assembly begins with the wing. The ailerons come already installed on the wing panels, but the hinges must be glued with a few drops of instant glue. The hinges are circles, which makes them very easy to install in the slots. They are unique, but be careful; the hinges have slits cut into them to allow better glue penetration, so you must make sure that the slits are perpendicular to the hinge line before gluing.

The next step is to remove the covering from the aileron servo cutouts and the holes for the aileron servo extensions that exit the wing's top side. A die-cut hardwood wing joiner slides into pockets in the wing panels to join the wings. I aligned the panels and glued them together with 30minute epoxy. I installed two Futaba 3003 standard servos and connected them to the ailerons with the linkage hardware provided. The completed wing has very slight dihedral.

I attached the wheels and wheel pants to the aluminum landing gear and bolted the assembly to the fuselage. Contrary to what you would expect, the slanted edge of the gear goes in front. Though the quality of the wheel pants is very good, both the wheels and the pants seemed a bit small; they are only about 2 inches in diameter.

The instructions call for the engine and the fuel tank to be installed next, but I chose to put that off until later. This turned out to be a good decision because the rudder and elevator pushrods are too long to be installed through the wing saddle. Without the engine and tank in place, I was able to pass the pushrods through the tank opening in the firewall.

I temporarily attached the wing to the fuselage and glued the belly pan into place. Then I glued on the stab and fin with 30-minute epoxy and bolted the tailwheel assembly into place. Once the epoxy had cured, I attached the elevator halves and rudder using the provided hinges.

I mounted two Futaba 3003 servos and one Futaba 148 servo (elevator) on the factory-installed servo tray and made up the rudder and elevator pushrods using the dowels and wires provided. The elevator pushrod has two threaded wires at the elevator end (one for each elevator half) and is a little difficult to install. I bent the wires to the approximate angle and then wrapped a rubber band about 1/2 inch from the end to hold them about Ih inch apart. I then inserted the pushrod through the opening in the firewall and into the fuselage and fed one of the wires through one of the slots at the rear of the fuselage. Next, I placed a brass tube over the protruding end to prevent it from snapping back into the fuselage. I cut the rubber band and slid the brass tube further onto the first wire. This released the other wire, permitting me to feed it through the slot on the other side of the fuselage. The brass tube held the first wire in line while the second was inserted through its slot. I then removed the brass tube and attached the devises.

I was then ready to install the engine and the fuel tank. I mounted an O.S. FS-52S 4-stroke engine inverted on the composite engine mount provided. I attached the engine mount to the firewall with four 4x2Omm bolts that go into blind nuts.

I then assembled and installed the fuel tank and cowl. The cowl matches the film covering on the fuselage very well. It is also deep enough so that only the engine's valve cover and muffler protrude.

With the inverted engine, the muffler sticks out through the lower left side of the cowl pointing downward. I used a 2 1/4-inch Great Planes aluminum spinner.

I wrapped the receiver and battery in foam and installed them in front of the servo tray. The CG came out 4.9 inches behind the leading edge of the wing, which is what the instructions recommend. Last, I attached the canopy with four small screws and applied the decals.