I building what amounts to my first full size stunter.
As a kid I played with the cox stuff and Carl Goldberg Planes. Mainly a Lil' Jumpin Bean a Swordsman 18 and a Lil' satan.
Lately I've been flying a lot of Brodak arfs and a couple others. I always wanted to build one from the ground up but always had other projects etc..... So this is my shot at building a Sig Banshee.
Now having had a personal resurgence in this part of the hobby I've been reading Stunt Hanger, Stuka Stunt and Brotherhood Of The Ring websites trying to acquaint myself as to the proper way to try and do things. Although I may not do it that way Lol!
So I thought I would ask that you point out my mistakes and give me viable suggestions on the way to proceed through this bash! I know that will be hard to do but give it a try anyway
As far as the power plant is concerned I'm starting out with the Fox 35 just to expirence the whole fox love that the world has to offer then probably removing it after I do that. Im going to run some engines I have just to get the expirence of doing so and to see what I like or don't like. This is all in good fun of course as I think I know what I'd really like but can't buy them anymore. PA. I have some Brodak 40's (3) of which run awesome right out of the box after break in of course. Frankly when I see people say they have a hard time with them I can't understand why I think there awesome. (thats in my Inexperienced world of course)
I have a couple EVO .36's and a 60. Some electric stuff E-flight 25 and 32 etc....
After I finish the B-bash I bought an Cardinal 92 off ebay and I also have a couple Brodak kits. But before I build those I wanted something to make mistakes on so I didn't ruin those kits.
I have thought about it in the ways of Vintage vs Modern and have come up with what I think will be a cool Hybrid and have progressed quite a way through the build already but figure If I did something really dumb I could still fix it before painting it. Kinda where you guys come in.
I built the stab ,elevators, vertical fin and Rudder first in there normal fashion. Then I laminated the fuse doublers and prepared the cutout for a Fox .35. I also have read where moving the wing up 1" is a good idea to for heavier engines so i did that too. I also cut about 3/8" off the nose to use a 2" spinner instead of a 1 3/4"
To use the other engines I have I'll have to increase the length of the cutout for the other motors by about 1" to accommodate the longer engines. My fuse was warped so I thinned it carefully to remove the warp and it looks pretty good now.
The wing now is a whole different story and where I look for advice if need be.
The wing I rebuilt as a D-tube style wing with caps strips shear webbing and an adjustable lead out from an old airplane modified of course.
So I started by making a rib template that had been cut for sheeting all the way around the rib as the original only had it in the center section and made a whole new set of ribs.
I built the wing on my table which very flat and I have a piece of 1/2" glass thats 2'x4' I tack glued the main spar to the glass in several places with zap so I could pop it off later.
I added shear webbing and an extra light ply rib in the center to transfer loads to the fuse, Lightened somewhat of course. I used a bell crank from a crashed Vector I think or maybe my Hanger9 PT-19 and made new lead outs and modified the adj lead out to more match the spacing on the plans. I also built up the tips to accommodate the adj. L.O. and to make them just a little beefier and also give something for the covering to adhere to. I also replace all the pushrods with 4-40 ball links and carbon rods. Right now the wing with flaps is 206.8 grams. Thats no hinges or pushrod to flaps from BC. 7.2 oz's?
So I guess my comments/questions are;
A: Did I do myself any favors or did I just make the plane heavy? I see some kits with these additions but maybe there bigger and can handle the weight better.
B: I'd like to try silk and dope as I have 5 yards of K&S silk and have never done it before and would like to try it "The Old Fashioned Way". I also have some Polyspan coming and a couple packages of medium silkspan from brodak. And some old yellow dingy stuff that came with the kit. I also bought some Nitrate Dope from Brodak as I understand this is how you start having read the Instructions posted in the finish section.
C: Is silk a bad way to do it as I see many doing it anyway but silk?
D: Is Butyrate dope a necessary evil in that it keeps shrinking or should at least the last one or two coats should be Buty?
I plan to paint the airplane with auto paints, primers, clears etc.. PPG.
Here are some pictures if I can get them to load after writing all this.....