E-flite EFL87897 LED Afterburner Ring: F-16 Falcon 80 mm EDF, Grey/Silver

This did not fit my plane so I just gave it a five because I gave it to a friend and it worked for him .

I figured I’d try this LED afterburner ring for my Eflite 80mm F-16 Thunderbirds edf jet seeing as how it’s made specifically for this jet. I’ve always bought the Freewing afterburner cob style kits before this and always love how bright they light up, actually so bright I have to use foil HVAC tape to keep the light from shining through the fuselage and only out of the jet exhaust nozzle. Only negative for the Freewing kits have been lack of longevity for me. I’ve yet to have one that’s lasted more than a couple months before they burn out and quit working. The ring was easy to install and the jet already has a wire run through the fuselage installed by the manufacturer to make installation a 2 minute job in theory…. Assuming you use an 8+ channel transmitter that is… I use a 7 channel NX6 so I had to get creative with my installation. My jet has a Smart Avian ESC which uses a different modulation for throttle input than all other ESC’s so the ring has to be put on a separate channel instead of using a Y harness connector to jump off of the throttle output from the receiver. Seeing as how I programmed my jet for flaperons which splits up the ailerons to two channels and have SAFE enabled through forward programming i was all out of channels to run the afterburner the way Spektrum instructs. Therefore I had to install a second Spektrum receiver that’s not connected to the ESC to run the LED ring’s control plug into powered by the programming port on the AR8360. I chose an AR620 because that’s what I had on hand. You then bind it to the transmitter along with the already bound original receiver and put the LED wire into the throttle output to control the afterburner effects and it works as it should with varying throttle causing variable brightness. This ring’s letdown after doing all that was it’s lack of brightness in my opinion. After seeing Freewings afterburner kits which look like staring into the sun, I was less than impressed with the ring style kit. I wanted to try the ring to keep from having to install the light into the thrust air stream and possibly decreasing the thrust and speed of the jet because it’s a pretty heavy bird to use an 80mm edf to begin with. I then noticed that my flight pack voltage telemetry was going in and out during flight and was really only accurate when SAFE was switched off which I’m assuming was due to the fact that they’re both telemetry capable receivers and are both outputting telemetry and my transmitter can’t stay connected with the flight control receiver’s telemetry output. Forward programming also doesn’t work as long as the second LED ring’s receiver is connected at the same time. All that being said the ring does add an extra bit of realism to the jet and also helps with orientation at dusk and on overcast days so I’ll probably just deal with the telemetry glitches and continue to use the afterburner ring and put up with the inconveniences but if I had to buy the second receiver, replace the Avian ESC, or upgrade transmitters my advice would be to just enjoy the jet in stock form without any kind of simulated afterburner. Hope this helps someone who might use the same equipment as I do.

don't bother to frail to go in my plane. JUNK. DO NOT BUY!

I give it 4 stars. I think that the sensitivity of the afterburner is set to low. Meaning at 5-10 % throttle the afterburner is already turning on. Maybe it’s a setting thing I don’t know.Ignore the tape the glue was drying.