I give up !!! I just put my Cardinal on my new scale.

[Paul Taylor]

OK, I was ready to give up on the F-Twister. I built a Cardinal from plans using a foam wing. I put all the parts on the scale and added up the total.
52.8oz !!!

This plane is not yet put together. So there is more weight to add with epoxy and ball joints for the push rod.

I guess I just build heavy or bought the wrong type of wood.

Maybe I should just give up building, I really sux at it!!!

[Mark Scarborough]

Nah, dont give up, see now you just have an easier task than someone who already knows how to build light,, heck what can they do to build better. Its easy for you,,  now the next one you can tell people, "yeah I built this one 15 oz lighter than the last one and they will be impressed!ll
but serious,, now that you have a scale, you can start using lighter wood because you can actually find out wghat density it is before you use it. Without a scale or soem way to monitor the build progress its pretty hard to build light.

[Balsa Butcher]

I think that you will find that the Cardinal handles the weight better than the Twister - thicker wing, more wing area.  Also...how do they fly?  There have been many airplanes that fly well, even if they are a little heavier than one would like. 

[jim gilmore]

Building light is more an art then it appears. Takes a lot of work. Every plane I build has weighed 10 ounces just like every month has 28 days. 8-)

[Perry Rose]

 Have you calibrated your new scale? Maybe it's not working right. Put a known weight on it and see how close it reads.
Perry Rose

[Bill Gruby]

Paul;

  Your last statement, "Maybe I should just give up building, I sux at this" we have all been there. It is a turning point for you. It's time for you to look around, start picking brains so to speak. You are finding all this out in a time when information is shared. When most of us were finding this stuff out everything was a secret. If you had an edge on the compitition you kept it to yourself.
 Find a good chart that shows you what a particular grain weighs. Get a pocket scale and take it with you when you go to the LHS. You are at a point now where this one looks good is not good enough.
 Above all have complete faith in your abilities even when they fall a little short of your expectations. Enough of this little pep talk, get out there and git er done. We will be watching you.

  "Billy G"  

[Jim Treace]

Paul:
Only way to learn about this is to keep doing it! Just back to C/L after a very.....long time, I am still learning (Smoothie wing warp). But that is the fun part. Anyway, my Cardinal came in at 50 oz.,give or take. Power is LA 46 (perfect power match for the Cardinal), and she flys well, for me anyway.
Normally if a plane is heavy, it will be tail heavy. May need to look at that.
Keep building. You fly too good to hit yourself too hard on the building.
Jim

[jackscott]

           
   Paul, keep working on that cardinal. I just put my cardinal on the
   scale and it came in at 47.2 oz. Its an ARF with a B-40 on it.

[Randy Powell]

I've been building these things for 30 some years. I can still put out a porker every once in awhile. Don't pay attention to this or that, get a little carried away with the finish and before you know it, you have an overweight pig. Sometimes even those end up being pretty good planes.

[Leo Mehl]

OK, I was ready to give up on the F-Twister. I built a Cardinal from plans using a foam wing. I put all the parts on the scale and added up the total.
52.8oz !!!

This plane is not yet put together. So there is more weight to add with epoxy and ball joints for the push rod.

I guess I just build heavy or bought the wrong type of wood.

Maybe I should just give up building, I really sux at it!!!

Like Winston Churchill said, " we will never give up". Or somethin like that. I think this plane will fly pretty good at that wieght. an I think a LA46 is the answer. Don't worry about it. Just fly it and see how it does. I think a builtup wing will fly better and is eisier to keep light but any plane that will do most of the pattern is worth using and seeing you are in the learning stages I would use the heck out of it. I would actually be more concerned about alienment than weight. I have seen this plane fly very well at 45 to 50 ounces. There is nothing wrong with your building. and eventually all of this  stuff will seem like second nature. Keep building buddy!

[Mike Greb]

My Cardinal ARF flies quite well at 50 oz and powered by a Evo36(converted RC)

[Clint Ormosen]

.......or you can purchace a kit from Umland, Windancer, or BlueSky and have to really work to make it heavy. 

[Michael Brooks]

Hey Paul,

I feel your pain! My UnStuntMaster was something like 48ozs and 400 sq in. What a porker that was! Check with Louis or Zuriel. They might have a suggestion or two. Zuriel's pretty good at building lite. His Force was something like 38-42 ozs and 610 sq in. It was hard to have sympathy for him when he said it was too light and my plane was such a pig. 

Seriously, keep at it. The red SkyRay I built next was such an improvement over the UnStuntMaster in weight and performance. 396 sq in and something like 36 oz.


Mike

[Randy Cuberly]

Hey....
Don't worry about it.   I've been flying one (profile Cardinal built from kit) for a lot of years that weighs 51 oz with an LA46 and it flys great....I mean it!   It's actually embarassing because it flys a better pattern than most of the very serious PAMPA airplanes I've built.  LA46 with an 11.5 X 4 APC prop, 64 ft lines center to center, 5.2 second laps.  Great combination.

Randy Cuberly 

[Alan Hahn]

It's a nice looking plane. Stop obsessing, put on the landing gear and fly that puppy!

[Russell Shaffer]

I really have to second the motion to check those scales.  Take something that weighs about 50 ounces on your scale, maybe a can of beans, and then go weigh it at a post office place.  They have really good scales and you can check yours.  Kind of strange that all your planes are that heavy.  You should take something that is in the weight range that you need.  You can pack the whole plane in but it would be easier to substitute. 

[Alan Hahn]

To calibrate, take a gallon container (which had milk in it). Measure in 7 cups of water = 56 fluid ounces= 56 ounces weight. It at least will tell you if you are within a nominal range.

[Pinecone]

56 ounces, plus the weight of the container.   But close enough to see if the scale is way off.

Also 1 pound packages of things like dried beans or other stuff will work.

[Andrew Hathaway]

Weight isn't nearly as critical as straight and in trim.  Don't stress the weight so much, a light plane that isn't straight and/or doesn't survive many flights, isn't worth much. 

[Alan Hahn]

56 ounces, plus the weight of the container.   But close enough to see if the scale is way off.

Also 1 pound packages of things like dried beans or other stuff will work.

Well I was assuming that his scale has a ""tare" function so he can zero out the weight of the jug! But it is a good thing to mention.

[Pinecone]

Probably.

So put empty jug on scale, push tare to 0, then add x liquid ounces of water, with each liquid ounce being 1 ounces weight.

The good thing about this method, is you can quickly and easily check multiple weight points.  Have containers with say 20 ounces of water each, add one at a time and quickly check calibration at 20, 40, 60, 80 ounces.

[Paul Taylor]

This is a brand new postal scale. I put a 10oz box of crackers on it last night and the weight was 11.2oz. Figure the box added weight. So I trust the scale.
Thanks
Paul 

[Tom Perry]

Use common cents to check your scale.   

I asked for help when I first got my scale from harbor freight.  The G-man, AKA Bill Gruby told me a wheat stem penny and pennys from '59 - '81 weighed 3.11 grams.  Pennys from 1982 to present weigh 2.59 grams.  A nickel weighs 5 grams.  These weights turned out to be true on my scale.   

[john e. holliday]

This is a brand new postal scale. I put a 10oz box of crackers on it last night and the weight was 11.2oz. Figure the box added weight. So I trust the scale.
Thanks
Paul 

Now empty the box and then weigh the box.  You didn't say what kind of crackers, but, if chocolate covered I could empty it for you if you send it to me.  Have fun,  DOC Holliday