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Joined: 1/23/2003 From: Oceanport, NJ, USA Status: offline
Many of us at RCU have been watching the announcement of the RC Universe Profile Biplane (Flatout) from Great Planes with great anticipation. Well, it's finally here! I had mine on back-order at Tower Hobbies, and it shipped last Thursday and arrived today! For all the technical details, you can visit this Great Planes webpage.
I've pretty much decided on what hardware I'll be using, but the actual build won't start until tomorrow, so I'll reserve posting the details in case I change my mind! For now, just a few photo "ticklers".
< Message edited by stuk_at_work -- 2/14/2006 5:37:18 AM >
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Moderator Marketplace, Warbirds & Warplanes Jersey Coast Sport Flyers, Exec. Board
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Joined: 1/23/2003 From: Oceanport, NJ, USA Status: offline
Attached are pictures of the "box art", the contents as they are shipped, and the foam parts laid out. A couple of points of interest. All the foam is shipped in protective plastic, and that plastic is taped to the inside of the box to keep it from shifting during shipment (and getting dinged).
If you visited the webpage, you will be told that the plane comes equiped with a 370 motor and gearbox. Not so. Both the box art and the manual have no reference to these items. Most probably the webpage was "templated" from another plane and the description of these items never deleted. I sent an email to Great Planes advising them of this error, so it may be gone by the time you read this post!
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-Stu
Moderator Marketplace, Warbirds & Warplanes Jersey Coast Sport Flyers, Exec. Board
Posts: 1392
Joined: 1/23/2003 From: Oceanport, NJ, USA Status: offline
I almost forgot today was Valentines day, so the workshop was not the place to spend the evening! I did do somewhat of a hardware selection, but, well nothing is ever easy!
The only "no brainer" was the servos. HitecHS-55. Period.
For control, I will be using my JR 652 Tx, and (hopefully) a blue arrow Rx. The gym where we fly after our club meetings has been the undoing of many a simple single conversion receiver, but the .2 oz weight of this Blue Bird Rx. is hard to pass up! Just in case, I will have a JR R700 Rx. waiting in the wings, so to speak. The R700 Rx weights .7 ounces, but taken out of it's plastic case drops to .5 ounces. This is not bad for a full range, full noise rejecting Rx!
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Moderator Marketplace, Warbirds & Warplanes Jersey Coast Sport Flyers, Exec. Board
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Motor and Controller selection is a bit tougher. I have a choice of (2) motors and (2) controllers. For motors, the choice is between a MP JET 22/7-60D outrunner and an ESKAY 400XT outrunner. I've recently used the 400 XT on 2 projects, an older Klein-Aviatek Profile Mustang upgrade from a speed 400 gearbox setup (flown several times) and a Blue Foam "Pogo". The 400XT easily pulls 100 watts, but it weighs 1.5 ounces and requires at least a 1320 3 cell lipo to drive it properly for any length of time. The motor I will try to use is the MP Jet. It weights just .9 ounces and draws 5-8 amps. Although it does not generate as much power as the 400XT, my hope is that I won't need the extra power with the weight savings in the motor, required battery & to some extent controller. One pain with the MP Jet engines is that they do not come with any wires attached, you need to solder your own directly to the motor.
For controllers, I have (2) that I can use. I have a Great Planes ElectriFly 8amp ESC (.4 ounce) and a Castle Creations Thunderbird 18 Amp ESC (.6 ounce, currently on my Pogo). Hopefully the Electrify ESC/MP Jet motor combo will be the one to use, but if not it will be the Thunderbird 18/400XT combo.
< Message edited by stuk_at_work -- 2/15/2006 3:47:10 AM >
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Moderator Marketplace, Warbirds & Warplanes Jersey Coast Sport Flyers, Exec. Board
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OK, tomorrow I'll actualy start building.
Before I do go any further, some of you may notice in my Avatar that I am a moderator on RCU.
For the record, I had to pay and wait for my plane (and all the electronics) just like everyone else, and my posts in this thread are my opinions and independent from RCU. I've build one flatout previously (Flatana), so hopefully my experiences building that one and this RCU Bipe will be useful to some of you, either in your decision to buy one for yourself, and to help you build yours if do.
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-Stu
Moderator Marketplace, Warbirds & Warplanes Jersey Coast Sport Flyers, Exec. Board
Posts: 1392
Joined: 1/23/2003 From: Oceanport, NJ, USA Status: offline
Well, I didn't get home from work at soon as I had hoped ("stuk_at_work" , but I did manage to get a few things done tonight. The hinges are installed in the stabilizer, and the "hinge tube" has been glued to the elevators. The instructions have you not "kick" the CA for the hinge tube on the elevator halves, but have you wait for the CA to set "naturally". We'll see. I'll give it until tomorrow for it to cure on it's own. Attached are two pictures.
The first picture is a detail of the placement of the hinge retainer rings (step 4). The important thing here is that one ring is butted up against the cutout on the left, and that there is enough room for the clip hinge coming from the stabilizer to move freely and provide enough clearance for the control horn to be inserted (at a later step). For reference, the stabilizer is on the top of the picture, the elevator on the bottom.
The second picture is of the hinge tube glued and secured waiting for the CA to cure.
< Message edited by stuk_at_work -- 2/16/2006 3:40:50 AM >
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Moderator Marketplace, Warbirds & Warplanes Jersey Coast Sport Flyers, Exec. Board
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While I was waiting (& still waiting) for the glue on the elevators to dry, I decided to assemble the fuselage. The fuselage consists of four pieces of foam that are glued around a carbon fiber tube. the carbon fiber tube consists of two pieces that must first be glued together, a 3mm and a 5.5 mm tube.
For alignment, there are two fuselage joiners that are slid onto the tube along with two plastic servo mounts. Assembly begins by gluing the fuselage tube to the top half of the fuselage. Alignment is critical here. the thicker part of the tube should match up to the "step" in the notch at the front of the fuselage. The forward fuselage joiner should just about sit where the 5.5 mm tube ends, and the forward servo mount should center on the rectangular cutout in the top half of the fuse. There is a notch cut in the rear of the top fuse half, the rear joiner fits in here.
I glued the fuse tube to the top half of the fuse by running a bead of CA down the foam and then using tape to make sure the tube stayed in place until I could hit the entire length of the joint with kicker. For the other three sides of the fuse, I did something a little different. After first doing a dry fit to make sure everything lined up right, I remove the side I was about to glue in and just put glue in the fuse joiners. The foam was then inserted, fit checked and then the joiners were hit with kicker. To glue this new foam to the fuse tube, I gently pushed the foam away from the joiners and laid a bead of CA on the fuse tube. I then slid the foam back in place, applied a little pressure and then hit the joint with kicker. This allowed me to do a small section at a time, and I feel confident that I have a good glue joint down the entire length of the tube for all four pieces of foam that comprise the fuse.
I've attached a photo of the fuse. Note the yellow circle at the bottom of the photo. Inside the circle, you will see where a piece of foam broke off the fuse as I was applying "light pressure". This is the piece of the fuse. that is under the bottom wing. In retrospect, there was a piece of filler foam that I removed that might have prevented this from happening. The photos in the manual all show this filler piece removed, but there really isn't any reason to remove it until you are ready to install the wings. My suggestion to you is to leave this in until it absolutely needs to be removed!
< Message edited by stuk_at_work -- 2/16/2006 4:04:14 AM >
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-Stu
Moderator Marketplace, Warbirds & Warplanes Jersey Coast Sport Flyers, Exec. Board
Posts: 1392
Joined: 1/23/2003 From: Oceanport, NJ, USA Status: offline
As expected, the hinge tube did not set properly and came out as soon as I pushed the elevator onto the stabilizer. I reglued, this time using kicker and it seems to be holding up now. The manual suggests adding a fillet of CA to the outsides of the tube where it meets the foam, which I did do too (twice).
Finished up the fuselage assembly tonight. This includes finishing the stab/elevator assembly and glueing it to the fuse., hinging and adding the rudder, and adding fuse doublers to the nose of the plane. I've attached a photo of the finished assembly. It is starting to look like a plane!
One of the things you are going to find it is that in some cases, it is really hard to see detail in some of the black & white photos provided in the manual. I understand that it is expensive to print manuals in color, but it would be nice if the manual you can download from the Great Planes website was in color so you could pick up details hidden in the photos.
There is an expert tip on installing the z-bend clevis into the control horn, that describes how to use a #11 hobby knife to remove any flashing inside the hole in the control horn the clevis installs into. What they don't tell you is that you probably will have to remove some flashing from the clevis too! If you don't it will be extremely difficult if not impossible to push the clevis through the hole in the control horn!
Before finishing up for the night, I glued the leading edge stiffening tubes to the upper and lower wings. Instead of using CA though, I used RC-56 canopy glue. My hope was that it would have a cleaner look, and would be just as strong (strong enough?) as a CA joint. I'll know for sure tomorrow! Worse case is that if the joint fails I will glue the tubes again and using a strip of clear tape over the tubes to ensure they stay put!
< Message edited by stuk_at_work -- 2/17/2006 3:30:34 AM >
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-Stu
Moderator Marketplace, Warbirds & Warplanes Jersey Coast Sport Flyers, Exec. Board
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All Forums >> Electric Aircraft Universe >> Foamies! - RC Electric Foam Aircraft >> RC Universe Profile Biplane (Flatout) Build thread 
RC Universe Profile Biplane (Flatout) Build thread - 
, but I did manage to get a few things done tonight. The hinges are installed in the stabilizer, and the "hinge tube" has been glued to the elevators. The instructions have you not "kick" the CA for the hinge tube on the 
