dieFluggeister

I was paging through the net and fell in love with the graceful lines of the Steve Wooley "Cobra" control line plane. Its a vintage stunter from the 60's and seemed to perform very well in that role.
Of course since I fly mostly RC I started wondering if it could be successfully converted to radio control.

Has anyone out there had experience with this? Pictures anyone?

The stats look pretty good: span 34", length 23", wing area 216sq in, symmetrical airfoil. I'm shooting for a weight of less than 20 oz. Plans power it with an .049 medallion.

My thoughts are up the power (tee dee .10?), make a foam wing with the same airfoil, increase rudder area, and maybe go three channels with no throttle. I would convert to a glass filled contemporary motor mount, beef the firewall to make room for a Fuji tank. Horizontal stabilizer is huge and I think it adds to the style, but I wonder if it would have any negative flight characteristics. Could be cut down. I have measured and components will fit.

Your thoughts on a conversion would be appreciated - as would your thoughts on my sanity and tendencies of masochism.

vauxhall

Great minds think alike, I downloaded the Nobler plan from Dave Fritzke's free plan site, and was thinking about a r/c version. I seem to recall seeing a kit done for this purpose. Should look great in the air. I don't see why such a conversion wouldn't work, with a few changes to the c/l version plan, and ailerons instead of flaps.

dieFluggeister

Yep, the Nobler is very similar and a much larger plane. The original plans I saw are 51" span calling for a Fox .35. Is that the one? Very cool. I think you're right in that Tower Hobbies has the kit.

mclintock

My Feedback: (3)

Hey were'd you get the plan of the cobra with a built up wing? The cobra on Dave Fritzke's site shows skinned foam wings.. and despite using what appears to be the profile of the cobra as the wallpaper, [link=http://uk.geocities.com/[email protected]/_cat001.html]Tony Elmore's site[/link] does not have that plan.

gcb

Some obstacles you will have to overcome:

Rudder: The rudder is only on the top of the fuselage. You can't make it full length unless you move the empennage.

Wing: The Cobra uses an "I" beam construction which uses strip ribs over an I beam. The covering plays an important part for wing rigidity. This will especially be apparent when you use full aileron movement.

Size: Apparently you have scaled down the plans. It was originally about 53" wingspan.

I would say tackle these problems and go for it.

You might consider building one full scale per plans and giving CL a try.

George

jessiej

The cobra is a beautiful example of the "Detroit" style stunter. I suppose Bill Werwige's "Ares" is the most famous of the genre, but they were/are all lovely and fine performers. (The I beam wing and variants of the "mouthy" cowl intake were hallmarks.

Please keep us advised. Sounds like a great project!

jess

dieFluggeister

Mclintock, I found an interesting website RE the build of classic C/L and RC aircraft. These guys do it right and give a visual step by step with materials and techniques from the period. I pulled my posted pic of the built up wing from there. They don't post the original full size plans but I bet you could ask!

http://wooleycobra.homestead.com/Lore2.html

Howard Sullivan made a conversion from the full size to 1/2A C/L and included the foam wing. These are the plans I would like to base an RC version from. Dave Fritzke's free plan site which includes this version are located here.

http://my.pclink.com/~dfritzke/

dieFluggeister

Does anybody know if I need to change incidences or thrust line in a conversion like this? As per C/L plans both are 0 degrees.

I've never had a symmetrical airfoil in such a smal wing. Is that a concern?

50+AirYears

There have been a lot of conversions of CL to RC over the years. With a symetrical airfoil, there should probably be no need to have any thrust offsets.