LA-5 Rebuild.

[John Rist]

Well I have all of the wood to build a new wing for my LA-5.  So the rebuild process has begun.  The first step was to get rid of the heavy insulated lines required for the throttle control.  I bought a Hobby King car radio and removed the electronics and placed it in a project box.  The project box was then mounted on my LA-5 control handel. I played with the car radio with it's trigger throttle and I did not like it.  An airplane throttle should not be spring loaded. All of my setups in the past have been insulated flight lines with a control module on the handle.  Much the same set up that Clancy Arnold sells.
 Anyway this was the first step of many to get the LA-5 ready for this summer.

[Bill Little]

Hi John,

I missed the reason you are having to rebuild the La-5.  I hate to hear it, the La-5 looked really good!

Bill

[Tim Wescott]

Show us the innards of that project box?  I take it that there's not much radio in that radio!

[John Rist]

Show us the innards of that project box?  I take it that there's not much radio in that radio!

Correct - Not much.  It is all on one PC board.  Pots and case came from Mouser. Batery is a 3 cell 1500 mAh.

[John Rist]

Hi John,

I missed the reason you are having to rebuild the La-5.  I hate to hear it, the La-5 looked really good!

Bill

As Ty said - I did a loop that was 3" low.  Cleaned off the landing gear.  Unfortunately both wings were cut in half.  Was trying to add a loop to the flight pattern.  Made it once.  On the second try I let up too soon and the bottom fell out.  On a heavy ship you need to fly it all the way around and exit the loop high. Or maybe forget the loop.

[John Rist]

Well with step one completed, (new control handle range checked OK), it was time to move onto step two: the actual building of the wing.  As you can see in the picture the Brodak LA-5 wing is not built on a wing jig.  Instead each wing rib has a pair of tabs that does two things, they keep the wing straight and they set the diheadrial.  Its a little tricky but if you follow the instructions in the instruction book it works well. 

[John Rist]

Well It's starting to look like a LA-5 wing. 

[John Rist]

Right now I am using a 4 cell 3.0 Ah battery in my LA-5.  The 3.0 Ah gives me two flights.  To get more HP I am planning to try a 5 cell 2.2 Ah  battery.  I found one that that fits the battery compartment.   Is there a down side to this idea?

[John Rist]

Wing is ready to install.  Photo attached is dry fit of new wing.  Hope to glue it in permanently today.  Beings this is an electric I plan to test fly it with only clear dope on the wing. As an electric it won't get slimed.  If all is OK I will spend the hours it takes to paint and detail.

[Fred Cronenwett]

John - when I test flew the B-29 with electric power it was in primer with no details and did not even have a rudder, the fin was there. It's nice to be able to test fly them before the final work is done to make them look pretty.

Fred