smwalter

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Long time reader - first contribution. LT-40 - 40 flights or so. Took off from work this afternoon to fly - it's about 85 degrees here. First flight - very strange - couldn't trim the plane - hit the limits.

Landed OK and another guy at the field mentioned that plastic expands in the heat. So... disconnected the connecting rods and adjusted to reset trims elevator and rudder.

2nd flight - much better - trimmed and flew acrobatics for about 6 minutes - then after one pass - no elevator control - had the other 3 axis - about 100 feet up. I throttled back - the plane was in a 30 degree dive - put it in the field. Pictures show the damage.

The elevator connector came off at the servo. I wasn't using anything to lock them down and probably didn't fully click it closed after adjusting. I won't do that again.

Looks fixable - Hope to have it back for visitors on July 4th weekend.

daveopam

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Sorry for your loss. Your right it does look fixable. A little fuel tubing on those clevises will go a long way.


David

Dr1Driver

The elevator connector came off at the servo. I wasn't using anything to lock them down and probably didn't fully click it closed after adjusting. I won't do that again.

Use Z bends instead.

Sorry for the loss.

Dr.1

onlyb

Sorry to hear about your loss. I fly an LT-40 myself, and I love it. Hope you get it back flying soon. Just curious, where do you have the CG set, forward of aft? And if you've tried the different CG points, how does it change performance?

CGRetired

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I lost my very first airplane several years ago and by the same problem.. only I had the tubing on the clevis originally, made the adjustments, forgot to slide the tubing back on the clevis.. result? Skylark 56 hit pavement (not grass) and totally destroyed this airplane. Sad sight indeed.

I now remember to put the tubing back on. Learned the hard way, as I am sure you have too.

I use L bends and the Dubro Quick Links with tubing on the servo arms and standard clevis with tubing on the torque arm end. They don't come apart any more.

DS.

ryanpilot

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Hey there. Something else you may want to take into consideration.... After making sure you have the G/C set correctly and all your hardware has retainers and what ever to make sure they don't come off, look at the following things.

I would guess the humidity where you live was high and that coupled with the temperature changes the air density. It actually called Density Altitude when flying full scale. Our little planes fly the same and if marginal on power and a little heavy will give a bird that does not fly well at all.

Is your fual tank the size called for in the plane or bigger? What is the weight of your plane? I can not see that much expansion in yur plastic clevises that could not be overcome with moderate trim.

I don't know what you are powering your plane with or what fuel you are using etc. But I do know that if you had a fine flying plane and then took it out on a very warm and humid day there was more to the problem than warm plastic pieces. I would bet you plane flew very sluggish until it found the ground.

Hope you get it back together and flying. Just remember in really hot and humid days you may not get good flight.

There have been times I have seen full scale birds not be able to fly because of temperature and humidity. They had to wait until early morning or late evening to fly.

smwalter

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My 2nd crash -
Friday and Saturday - fixed the damage from the original crash - see first note - mainly straighten and glue back together. The key repair - the front of the wing extension that hooks into the frame of the fuselage. I was even able to do my first mono-cote application without too much trouble.

Today (Thursday) had a chance to get to the field to try it out. First flight - poorly trimmed. Landed and retrimed the elevator. Then 2 great flights - no problems. 4th flight (the planned last of the day) coming down after going over the top of a loop - the wing separated and fluttered away - the main body - straight into the ground. (relatively soft field). Front end of plane destroyed - broke the carb of the thunder tiger 46 pro - looks like the rest of the engine is good. 2 servos busted, 2 maybe ok, receiver is questionable. Wing in good shape other than the attachment points. Anyone need a LT-40 wing and wants to use rubber bands to hold it down?

Lessons learned - epoxy is not as strong a wood - at least at critical points.

Now to either get an arf or to rush the completion of my 4*40 kit that is mostly framed already.

After reading this forum for 6 months - I'm not too upset over losing the plane - I did get > 40 flights and a couple of good lessons learned.

Crash - rebuild - crash - build .......

ryanpilot

My Feedback: (4)

Only thing I can say besides tough break...doh no pun intended.... Don't rush the 4*40, get an arf and finish the 4*40 finished correctly.

You will have a beautiful flyer when you are done with the 4*

hogflyer

Epoxy should be much stronger than the wood. If the joint failed with the epoxy giving, not sticking to the wood, then either the epoxy was bad from the start, not mixed properly, or applied to a contaminated area. I've never had an epoxy joint fail, it's always been the wood (usually caused by testing the strength of the joint with an unmovable object like the ground or tearing out a piece of wood that belongs someplace other than where I decided to glue it).

bubbagates

My Feedback: (32)

The plastic he is reffering too is actually the nylon control rods that most all SIG 40 size planes come with. They do expand quite a bit. I did use then on a 4* for about 2 weeks last year and then swiched to Sullivan Goldenrods.

The nylon can definitely change that much to where you actually have to remove the clevis and readjust it. Switching to metal or CF rods cure that problem really fast.

Since he had 40 plus flights up to this point it's safe to say the CG, engine and all else was in pretty good shape. LT-40's can take a lot and have a pretty good range for the CG.

When I had mine, before I ever flew it I replaced the main gear with the Dubro fiberglass gear and the nose gear with the Fult's twin strut setup. Ended up with 2 inches more ground clearance, not having to rebend the gear after every flight.

After about 50 flights, I changed it to a taildragger using the same main gear and used a freewheeling tailwheel at first then I ran a CF rod to the tailwheel all the way from the rudder servo and rebalanced it. It became a whole new plane

Sorry for the accident, it's the little things that will bite you quick...

CGRetired

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Hey Bill.

Regarding the Fults gear, I have a Tiger 60, set up with tricycle gear as per the original build instructions and ARF setup.

That nose gear sure takes a beating, well, it had been, but my landings have improved considerably. Anyway, I was thinking of putting on the Fults system with dual struts, but they are quite heavy compared to the original wire setup.

The other alternative, I know, is tail dragger, however, my landings with my other tail dragger (the Four Star 40) are bouncy, to say the least. I have yet had a smooth landing with it. No broken plane, but, what seems to be a nice approach and smooth landing ends up with two or three bounces. So, I don't want to put tail dragger on THIS Tiger 60.

I was thinking of building another Tiger 60, though, and this one with tail dragger setup.

I guess my question is regarding the weight of the Fults, and of course, how you got it in there. The mounting system is quite big and I am using a Sullivan soft mount system with the Super Tigre 75 engine.

DS.

bubbagates

My Feedback: (32)

DS,

I only ever used it the one time and all I have to do is remove the stock nose wheel and strut and slide in the Fults. The wire was the same diamter, biut I did have to cut a couple of inches of the Fults gear from the top of the single wire. I could have left it the length it came in but I would have had to dremel a small section at the top of the firewall to get the clearance so cutting it off took off some weight and made it look better.

The weight was really not that much more. I did change the nose wheel to a foam wheel as I had H9 3 inch wheels all the way around. When I went to balance it it was right where it was before because the Dubro main gear was heavier than the stock wire gear. I never weighed the plane so I cannot tell you what the difference were. This was before the time I became concerned with keeping everything lite as p[ossible

On yours, you will probably getaway with moving the battery backwards. Hopefully someone else can chime in here on the stock gear setup on the Tiger since I am not really familiar with it.