Lynn S

Lasted about 50ft. It was a hand launch, but looked more like a brick toss. This is what I think could be the problem.

A. the black widow was just not enough
B. it was nose heavy
C. A and B
D. the wing is upside down
E. it has a pusher prop?
F. all of the above

I can say the plane held up well to be bashed into loose gravel twice.

EDIT: OK gang, The Problem was "D".... the wing is upside down, as bad as I hate to admit it.
Easy to fix ...I used silicone sealer to hold the wing, it came loose with the help of a screwdriver blade between the wing and fuse. I'm ready to go back together with it.
Will update when ready to fly again

Lynn S

flyinrog

My Feedback: (1)

sorry to hear that Lynn, I actually bought the td to put on mine but think I'll go with the norvel when I get ready to finish building the extra....Rog

Lynn S

It needs plenty of power. I may try a .15 next time.
The wing (airfoil)sure looks funny to me, it looks flat on top and curved on the bottom. But the plans said the flat side was the top and I'm sure that is correct.
Usually a plane feels like it has some pull going and is ready to fly when I'm ready to hand launch. It just didn't feel like the engine was pulling any. (Could this be a pusher prop?)
The first launch I just threw it...flew right into the ground. The second time I ran and gave it a throw with some up trim....it stalled and came in nose down
It never had that feel that it was ready to fly. I had spent some time breaking in the engine and thought it was pretty strong. I had a feeling the CG is too far forward, but I didn't want to have it tail heavy so I went along with what was given on the plans.

Clean

I had one and it needed the TeeDee. At that, it used a pretty good toss with a gentle pull out. But once on step it was a blast. I don't think I had a controlled flight with mine that I didn't snap the heck out of it. It'd do a violent snap and just as soon as you released the controls it would come right back out of it. A Norvel on it would be a dream and I think when I get a chance I'll try that, no throttle on that teedee by the way, didn't need it.

A Black Widow with the Teedee cylinder and head might actually pull it off, but your fuel feed needs to be just fine. You might try one of those back plates that the product engines have and stick an ounce or two clunk tank behind the firewall.

One night, after the club meeting and about a gajillion flights on my simple extra, I came down show center, pulled verticle, hit the snap and watched till it stopped verticle, started to descend and let go of the controls, it went into a slightly different snap, first time that happenend. I couldn't get it to recover so I put the controls back over hard and let it snap all the way down. The center wing, as seen on the way down, was broken at the root. As I had already begun regluing the oil soaked plane almost every evening, I retired the plane and went on to other projects, but when I look back, not many were quite as fun. Oh hell, I was still new in my second coming to RC so it didn't take much to thrill me, but aren't those the memories we constantly strain to attain?

JasonRP

Just curious,

What prop did you use with your BlackWidow? I use a 6x3 on my BW equipped Whizard, and it hauls the plane with authority.. There is no need to let it get up on step, as it pulls as soon as I give it the hand push.. I don't feel that it is so powerful that it will fly out of my hand, but it will start moving out as soon as I throw it.. My plane has a 42" span, 6" chord, and weighs 20-21 oz.. Maybe a 5" prop would make it faster? If this is the case, and I wanted the plane to fly a little slower, should I put a 7" prop on it??

Jason

WINANS

Sorry, but the flat section of an airfoil will never be oriented 'up', or to the top of the aircraft (talking about the crossection of the airfoil itself). Perhaps, and this is just a guess, what was indicated was that the dihedral for the wing overall should be created from the thickness taper of the wing panels. Said another way; if you viewed the plane from the front, head-on, the body line formed by the upper surface of the wing panels would be flat. The lower body line of each wing panel would be rising, visually, as you move outward from the fuselage towards either wingtip. Thus, the thickness taper of each wing panel is providing a very small amount of dihedral. This is a common assembly format for that type of aricraft so that you get a little bit of effective dihedral with no odd looking upsweep of the wing panels.

Prop: Tractor or pusher does not matter, as long as you are rotating it in the proper direction. A reed valve engine like the Cox will run equally well in either direction. Just look at the prop and imagine how it is 'biting' into the air in the direction that you were running it. If you were running either a tractor or a pusher prop in the wrong direction, you would know it by the blast of air moving forward rather than rearward.

Tough choice for a plane to learn on ... good luck.

Scott

Lynn S

Winnas-

" The lower body line of each wing panel would be rising, visually, as you move outward from the fuselage towards either wingtip. Thus, the thickness taper of each wing panel is providing a very small amount of dihedral. This is a common assembly format for that type of aricraft so that you get a little bit of effective dihedral with no odd looking upsweep of the wing panels. "

Yes this is how the wing is made. Viewed from the end of the wing the bottom if the wing has more thickness to it. It is made this way to form a dihedral.
I was just kidding about the pusher prop, it was beating the air the right direction.
I'm kind of a old learner...for about 35yrs. Heck, I can fly a Littlest Stick..... I can fly anything.
I guess I should have done a TEST GLIDE to check out the balance. I was so sure it was going to fly I didn't want to risk damaging a wing.

Lynn S

Jason,
I had a 6x3 on it. It doesn't seem to scream with that prop. It seems to stay in the high 4 cycle range. The 6x3 is what everbody said to use. It just doesn't get up and scream like the little 0.010 TD does. I know...... It's a TD.
I have a baby bee that I'm going to use on my 150% Littlest Stick, I going to try a 5x3 first.
The plane never acted like it wanted to fly. Just too nose heavy I guess, but even at that it should have flown just a little bit.
I have never seen such a flop of a hand launch.
Next time it will have a bigger engine.

I think your plane would fly slower with a 5x3, I had a large plane once with a 18x6 prop on it. I changed to an 18x10 and the plane was a lot faster.
Too big of a prop may make your BW overheat. The 6x3 seems to lug the engine pretty good. I noticed my engine would overheat quickly if it was a little too lean.

Bipe Flyer

I'm a little confused about whether you might have gotten the dihedral wrong or the airfoil upside down. They say a picture is worth a thousand words, so I drew the 4 possible ways you could have assembled the wing.

Lynn S

The wing has a V shape (dihedrel)on the bottom viewed from the front of the plane but is flat across the top wingtip to wingtip. If you put the inverted V on top (turn the wing upside down)it sure looks strange
You end up with a airfoil that is more curved on the bottom than on the top.
...........I'll post some pictures.

Lynn S

I know it looks upside down......

Lynn S

here is another view, and I am ashamed to show it......BUT
this what the plans say:

"Epoxy wing panels together over waxed paper, UPSIDE DOWN, AND FLAT SIDE on the table. DIHEDRAL ON THE UNDERSIDE OF THE WING ONLY."

??

Lynn S

Ok, read the plans yourself.
What do you think this means?

I guess they didn't want to waste a lot of space on TOO MUCH instruction.

Bipe Flyer

Actually the plans say

"Epoxy the wing panels together over wax paper, upside down, and flat on the table. Dihedral on the underside of the wing only."

Your wing is definitely upside down.

You'll either have to break the wing and re-do it, or get new wing panels.

Clean

On the other hand, should fly inverted well.

Mavericman

LOL he would fly upside down well, and by dihedral they mean angle of the wing, not the airfoil.

JasonRP

I'm certainly no expert, so when I broke in my BW, I probably errored on the side of cautious.. I must have ran 7 tanks through it, at various stages of rich, eventually leaning it out..

If your motor is sounding like it's 4 stroking, and overheating, it might not be fully broken in yet.. With the 6x3 prop I use, my motor certainly doesn't sound like a norvel, but it isn't 4 stroking either, it just sounds like a really angry bee!

My motor starts at around 3 turns out from closed on the needle.. Maybe as much as 3.5.. I'll fine tune it from there, leaning it out until it slows down, then richen back up for max RPM, and then a teeny-tiny bit more rich..

Jason

LOONY BOY

I have the simple extra also but don't like it so much, takeoff and landings on our bad strip makes it nose over very easily.
As for your wing it is UPSIDE DOWN as you have just realised but should not be a problem to fix. Put C of G where the plan says and you won't have a problem mine was set too nose heavy on the first flight and it flew like crap.
I was running a ap .09 on it with a 7x4 it was quick but I only flew it about 20 times then removed the motor for another model

good luck
LOONY BOY

Lynn S

The part about the dihedral is what threw me off. I thought the dihedral was formed by the shape of the wing, not like most wings. I think I can pull the wing out and turn it over. I used silicone to hold it in place.
Thanks, Lynn

EDIT: Yep, the wing came out easily. I used a screwdriver blade between the wing and fuse to break the seal. Just pulling would have broken the wing.

Bipe Flyer

Oh well, easy mistake and it shouldn't be too hard to fix.

I've flown a friends ACE Simple Extra and it didn't fly that well. Very heavy.

Here's a picture of my own design.

wild fred

My Feedback: (3)

my simple extra did well, but it had the wing right side up, and a norvel 15 in it!

if wing siliconed in, it should be not too bad a fix. i epoxy/microballooned mine in, was PERMANENT! it should do ok on the b.w., but speed on the ace wings is critical, that's what i meant by a draggy airfoil on them; they do great on norvels, but you can slow up quick on a b.w., and that causes a LOT of trouble mostly a sudden snap roll. watch your speed. and a practice i use is do not touch the sticks for the first few seconds after the handlaunch. better to pancake than to snap in!

Lynn S

I really feel like a dumb arse on the www, but at least I didn't wreck the plane and I know what my problem was.
Sorry to blame the BW. I will give it another try and let everyone know how it does with the wing on RIGHT SIDE UP!

EDIT: Part I, The plane flew fine once I moved the CG back about 3/4 inch. It didn't want to fly with the CG where shown on the plans. The Black Widow is very marginal to get it flying. I have to run and hand launch. It flys great after speed has built up. It flys like a much larger plane.

EDIT: Part II, I have installed a Norvel .074 and a 3 ch. radio system. All I had to do was change the elevator servo to operate the throttle, and I put a mini servo on the rear left side of the plane(outside the fuse) to operate the elevator.
It should have plenty of power now.
I will post a new thread after I try it out with the new engine.

Bipe Flyer

At least you had the foresight to silicone the wing in. I suspect you'll still need a little more power than a BW. Let us know how it turns out.