reefHawg

Wind Junkie, looks like you have the ARC version,.. so the wheel pants could be different but,.. it looks like you have them mounted incorrectly.
Mine only goes through the side with the ply wood, not through both sides of the pant as I have seen in other planes. I believe you only needed to go through the ply wood side and use the supplied screws to go from the landing gear, into the plywood.
geoff

wind junkie

My Feedback: (1)

Yes, I have the ARC version. My wheels and pants could be much wider then yours. The pants are almost 2.5" wide and the wheels themselves plus 2 wheel collars take up the whole 2" axle. There's no way to stop the far side of the pant from "floating" without making an extension or using a longer axle.

I suppose I could mount the pants with plywood like usual and put the hex nut of the axle inside the pant, but I've been spoiled with adjustable mounts which let the pants slip if I bump them while loading into the car, or accidentally tip the plane so it rests on the pants. The Sullivan clamp mounts grab the axle with as much force as I want and let the whole pant rotate if forced. I won't ever attach a pair of pants with screws through the gear legs again. Having the axle fit into both sides of the pant is key for preventing cracks.

I'm probably the only guy in the US with the ARC version anway. Glad your pants fit your installation.

reefHawg

Well I talked to some other RCers and indeed, your method of mounting wheel pants is better. Guess this plane does not incorporate the longs axle. I hope mine holds. If not I’ll be in the market for longer axles.
Have you picked your colour scheme yet.
This link shows a review of the ARC,..
http://www.rcguys.com/RC%20Guys%20Pi...ane%20News.htm

geoff

wind junkie

My Feedback: (1)

Your wheels should be fine, it's just that I tend to get pretty rough when loading/unloading the car (in the dark) and I've learned to beef up my wheel pants.

I have a pretty small car and the wheel pants always take a beating putting the plane onto the fold down rear seats. If you have a van, truck or SUV, you've already eliminated over half of the abuse I dish out.

Something else I modified on the pants is to install some light 1.0 lb styrofoam to block off the front and rear sections of the pants so they don't fill up with mud at the beginning and end of the flying season at our very swampy field. I cut the foam angled to fit inside, and then squeeze the foam blocks into place and then brush a light film of epoxy/ microballoons to make it waterproof.

I've been looking at that web page ever since the Model Airplane News review came out.

This will be my scheme: (attached)

It's the realflight G3 Pitts as rendered by Mike Badger. It's really a 2C scale scheme, but I've been flying it on the sim for over 3 years now and I can see it in my dreams. I've been thinking of doing a Pitts this way for years, but didn't want to scratch build the whole project. The RC guys ARC kit was well worth the money to me.

reefHawg

that's a cool schema. A Pitts with flames, nice. I've seen that schema on the scale planes (or is it just one plane?). here are a few links to some awesome shots just in case you hadn't seen them before.
http://www.airbum.com/pireps/PirepPittsS2C.html
http://musclebiplane.org/htmlfile/s2csroll.htm

Looking forward to seeing the finish.
geoff

wind junkie

My Feedback: (1)

Thanks for the links!

I'm ready to start covering now. Dont' ask me why I did the wheel pants first. We had a warm spell and I wanted to get primer on the cowl and pants before winter returned again!

Joe

wind junkie

My Feedback: (1)

JtSails,

How's yours coming? I didn't mean to hijack this thread.

kochj

If you are concerned about the weight buy the PSP manf Ti-Aluminum Axles Very light weight! 3- dif sizes too!
http://www.pspmfg.com/

wind junkie

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I actually bought a pair of these, but they're too short overall and the hub is too long so the wheel won't actually fit inside the pant with them.

G159

I want to go 2 stroke glow power and was thing the Super Tiger 3250. Any thoughts on this combo

jtsails

My Feedback: (2)

Hey Guys,
Just a quick update b/c I've been out of town and haven't worked on any planes this past week. I did manage to get the struts bolted in and the wing halves glued up. No pics, the instruction manual is pretty clear on this and I didn't have any problems, just a little light sanding to get things to fit smoothly. Tonight, I glued the ailerons on and started to work on building servo mounts to go in the rear of the fuse for the elevator servos. I'm using 1/4 inch balsa sandwiched between 1/16 ply and sizing the mounts to fit between the stringers. I'll try to get a pic tomorrow, but I think it'll be tough to see. More later.

G159, a two stroke glow on a bipe? Didn't think that was allowed, the Spirits of RC will not be pleased![X(][X(]

Wind, Jump on in

wind junkie

My Feedback: (1)

Glad to hear you're coming along JT. Here are some pics of my elevator servo mounts. (this is non stock of course as the manual shows the use of an elevator joiner with a torque arm in the center and servo up near the rudder at mid fuselage)

With the ARC version, you can see the skeleton so this might help you decide how to build up the supports you need for your install.

There is a 1/8" lite ply platform that joins the right and left sides underneath the servos -- glued to the stringers. I felt it needed some support after I sawed away a portion of the diaginal 1/4 sq support.

I tried to cant the servos inward to keep the arms moving perpendicular to the elevator hinge line. This way I won't need ball links and simple clevis/z-bend can be used.

One other note: The white control arms on the JR 9411 servos are fairly soft plastic. They are Dubro aftermarket arms and have a steel ring around the control arm hub to stop the plastic from deforming on the servo spline-- a very tight fit. I'm using this setup on another large 3D plane with factory supplied 4-40 size Z bends and I'm pleased that the z bends are holding up very well. The soft plastic lets the z bend enter the hole without needing to make the hole too big to clear the corners of the bend, and seems to be wearing fine against the steel after 1 season of heavy use. Vibration and extreme throw haven't introduced any slop. It's just another chance to remove weight when planning to use less hardware (ie ball links). Two clevises would of course be fine and that's what I would have used if I hadn't first tried this.

jtsails

My Feedback: (2)

Wind,
Thanks for the Pics, very helpful. I'm making a one piece mount that will fit between the stringers in the area just above the rudder cable exit which puts them a little farther back than yours.

jtsails

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I got the elevator servo mounts done. I tried to get an inside pic for everyone, tough to see much detail but I made a sandwich of 1/4 inch balsa with 1/16 ply on each side and glued it between the stringers. I also have the inner layer of ply overlapping the stringers for a little extra strength. I also got the wings mounted. those struts were a pain as the holes didn't line up perfectly. I ended up popping out the blind nuts and adjusting the holes with a little round file. I then reinstalled the blind nuts and they work nicely now.
Thinking ahead a little... I noticed that the vertical thrust line is not marked on the firewall or the engine box. I assume that I can measure the center and adjust for the down (and right) thrust from there.
James

wind junkie

My Feedback: (1)

That looks great JT. How'd you get a camera back inside there?

jtsails

My Feedback: (2)

Wind,
I just held the camera down into the fuse through the bottom.
Last night I glued the stab and elevators, no problems using loctite poly glue. It sets faster than gorilla glue and is white instead of that ugly brown. I also finished up the wings. Getting the wing struts aligned was a PIA, I ended up popping out the blind nuts and adjusting the holes with a small round file. Then I reinstalled the blind nuts, got a good tight fit with no play but it took a little while. Next up is finish the linkages for the elevators and motor installation.
James

wind junkie

My Feedback: (1)

My camera doesn't have a very good macro and would get really confused in such a small space. It's pretty old I guess.

How far off was the wing alignment? Did you check each wing alignment zero/zero with the stab? My stab is a very loose fit (needs a 1/16" shim to fit the slot).

You're referring mostly to the cabines just lining up with the center wing rib holes of the top wing, correct?

jtsails

My Feedback: (2)

Wind,
I'm talking about the outboard struts, not the center cabanes (they lined up nicely). They really were not far off, just couldn't adjust accurately with the blind nuts in place. The struts wouldn't slide down onto the tabs far enough to get the bolts thru and threaded into the blind nuts.
My stab fit very nicely, didn't even need to secure it with tape while the glue set.
The camera is a Canon powershot (forgot which model) that is only about a year old.

wind junkie

My Feedback: (1)

I understand now. At least it's not the center cabanes cause they are hard to reach inside the fuselage.

There isn't much wood "meat" in those plywood tab inserts above the screw holes. I'll need to watch out for that when I get to that point.

My camera's a powershot too, but about 8 years old.

jtsails

My Feedback: (2)

Managed to get a little more done yesterday. I glued in the firewall, made some blocks out of 1/4 ply to get the correct down and right thrust. Also put a piece of 1/4 ply on the back side to reinforce and give more surface to glue and pin. Then I put 4- 5/32 dowel pins in each side. I also installed the fuel tank, made a platform for it out of lite ply and used balsa to raise it up about 3/8" to get it up to the height of the carb. Also bolted on the landing gear, no mods required, and the wheel pants. I did put an extra wheel collar on the axle to center the wheels in the pants.
Next up, bolt on engine, install throttle servo and do an initial balance check and decide where radio gear, batteries and rudder servo will need to go.

wind junkie

My Feedback: (1)

I did these mods before I started covering. The top servo mt is of course not the stock configuration.

When I put the wing mounting plate on the bottom wing, the dihedral made it such that there was a significant gap on each end. The belly pan glues to this piece, but it should be straight to fit the cut outs in the pan supports, so it's possible to break the glue joints by overtightening the wing bolts.

Just to be safe I put some balsa under there and sanded it to fit the wing contour. Now I can tighten the bolts without worrying about that belly pan. It would be unlikely that you'd lose the belly pan in flight because it should still be glued to the bottom wing, but the whole bottom wing could wiggle a little bit if the two glue joints broke and the wing got loose in the saddle.

PlaneKrazee

My Feedback: (14)

Wind junkie,

Do you have the two piece sliding canopy in your ark? Is your cowl different than the arf? I have beeb trying to compare the shape of the fuselage of this kit'arf to the Byron and Toni Clark Pitts. Those both had very scale fuselages. The Toni Clark is constructed very similar to full scale but is too much work for a everyday flyer.

wind junkie

My Feedback: (1)

Skypilot,

My ARC didn't come with any special parts for the sliding canopy option, but the web site has these instructions to make it:

http://www.rcguys.com/pittsManual.html

My cowl doesn't have the cheek vents molded into it like the Toni Clark Pitts I see here:

http://www.toni-clark.com/bilder/kits/pitts/s1s_g2x.jpg

jtsails

My Feedback: (2)

I just glued to plate to the wing (using a shim) and then glued the belly hatch over it, seems to work fine. I have mounted the engine (Saito 300 twin) and put everything together to get an initial balance check. Came out pretty nose heavy so I have made another servo mount and moved the rudder servo to the tail just below and forward of the elevator servo. Now it balances nicely with the batteries toward the back of the wing bay. All up weight is 16 lbs with two battery packs and onboard glow. I have a few details to finish up but I am planning to maiden her this Friday.

wind junkie

My Feedback: (1)

That's great news James. Good luck on the maiden. Looking forward to your flight report.