heliraptor

Hi

Just picked up this plane in need of a few repairs. The rest are done, just trying to work out the best way to sort this out.

Basically the holes have been drilled slightly off (both off centre) to start with, the plane has had a bad landing and one side has taken a fair bit of pressure from the fuse and split. The split has been repaired pretty well by soaking thin CA in with a capillary tube but the new holes need to pe pretty close to the old ones.

Shall I simply cut it out and laminate several layers of balsa together to make up a new piece or is there a sturdier way. After the balsa inserts I was planning on putting a larger section of 1/8" ply to tighten the wing boltsa down onto and help spread the load.

Any thoughts on a simpler / stronger way?????

BTW the plane is a Seagul lEdge 540 (120 size) 78" span.

Cheers

Lee

davidfee

It looks like you have done a great job so far. As you suggest, you can fill the existing holes with balsa "dowels" and then add the plywood plate. The result should be quite sturdy and is how I would finish the repair, myself.

-David

heliraptor

Hi David

Thanks for your reply.

Went ahead today firstly cutting out the sheeting in the area and seeing what it was like deeper in. Wasn't too bad so after a generous helping of CA soaked into the cracks, then filling them with epoxy and micro balloons I carved out some new hard balsa dowels and epoxied them in.

Once dry trimmed up and replaced the sheeting, sanded, filled and driled new holes in the correct place

When you first look you think its a big job but in all its quite simple.

Cheers

Lee

davidfee

Great work there, Lee. I'm glad to see you aren't afraid to "dive right in" and make repairs like this. So many people today would just bin the thing and buy another. It's sad.

-David

TT2

My Feedback: (13)

heliraptor: What does this have to do with composites? I can't speak for everyone, but I'm getting tired of seeing these 'I need to fix my Chinese ARF because the wood broke' posts. If it's not about COMPOSITES then it doesn't belong in the COMPOSITES FORUM.

Nothing personal heliraptor, you just happened to be the straw that broke the camel's back.

-Tom

heliraptor

Hi Tom

Nothing personal...............but you have the choice not to click on a specific thread too you know.

Unfortunately there are no other "repair" threads available to post such a query so I opted for the closest one maybe having misread the title a little.

With thanks from davidfee I have completed the repair and the thread had come to an end and would slide down off the front page unless someone wanted to add something constructive of course.

On this occasion they didn't........................ maybe a message to the moderator would have been more constructive with a suggestion that my thread was moved to a more appropriate place seems you feel that strongly about it.

I'm sorry to have lured you to look at my thread, maybe its that deep down desire for a chinese ARTF model, you know you want one ........................and anyway, what has your post got to do with composites

Take it easy, no harm meant and I'm sorry for upsetting you.

Best wishes

Lee

jeffk464

Hey you could always fiberglass that section top and bottom, and then it would fit in this forum.