Does anyone know any tricks or rules to making a scratch-built?  
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All Forums >> RC Airplanes >> Scratch Building, Aircraft Design, 3D/CAD >> Does anyone know any tricks or rules to making a scratch-built? Page: [1]

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Does anyone know any tricks or rules to making a scratc... - 4/3/2002 7:27:01 PM   
simsrc89



Posts: 101
Joined: 4/3/2002
From: Glendale, AZ, USA
Status: offline 		I need help!
       Post #: 1

Scratch building techniques - 4/3/2002 8:50:47 PM   
Ollie


 

Posts: 958
Joined: 12/8/2001
From: Punta Gorda, FL
Status: offline 		It's best to first get some kit building experience by building a variety of kits from a variety of designers and a variety of suppliers. Then graduate to semi-kits and kit bashing (modification). When you can successfully build a kit without refering to the instructions, you may be ready to try scratch building.

Here are some of the skills you need to be a scratch builder:
1. Have the ability to assemble supplies and tools from a variety of sources.
2. Be expert at reading and interpreting plans.
3. Be able to develop your own building sequence without getting your self into trouble.
4. Be able to visualize a long building sequence in order to test it for practicality.
5. Have enough versitility to be able to use alternative methods when your sequence runs into problems.
6. Have a variey of ways of achieving the same results.
7. Have sufficient tools and know how to use them to do the things kit manufacturers do.

Others on the forum can easily add to the skills list.

_____________________________

Regards, Ollie

(in reply to simsrc89)
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Does anyone know any tricks or rules to making a scratc... - 4/3/2002 10:01:58 PM   
majortom-RCU


 

Posts: 1583
Joined: 12/11/2001
From: Merrimack, NH, USA
Status: offline 		Ollie, that's a pretty good answer--comprehensive for sure. I would add a couple things that I find myself doing all the time:

1. Get lots of practice with drawing pad, drafting board, CAD/3D or whatever method you like for visualizing structure, laying out structural ideas, checking geometry.

2. Fool around with simple balsa structures, simple frames, simple boxes, simple polygons/polyhedrals and mush them with your hands to see how things take stress, where they bend, how they break, how one stick of balsa or piece of sheeting or little gusset in the right place will make a structure stronger. Learn how stresses arise, how they propagate through vectors, how to absorb and distribute them from dangerous concentrations. Play with tension, compression, shear, torsion so it becomes second nature to anticipate stress and make provision against it with economy of weight and structure.

3. Design and build the simplest possible models, then fly them to destruction. Don't think you are going to scratch up a masterpiece before you have intimate experience with every mode of failure. Look at every structural failure as a successful experiment in how things break.

(in reply to simsrc89)
       Post #: 3

Does anyone know any tricks or rules to making a scratc... - 4/4/2002 12:12:35 AM   
seafury_fb11



Posts: 236
Joined: 2/22/2002
From: Los Angeles
Status: offline 		Or...

Stick you tongue in your cheek and just start building!!!

Russ.

< Message edited by seafury_fb11 -- Apr 3 2002 8:55PM >


_____________________________

You're just jealous because the voices don't talk to you.

(in reply to simsrc89)
       Post #: 4

Does anyone know any tricks or rules to making a scratc... - 4/4/2002 6:27:00 AM   
Seth



Posts: 109
Joined: 3/17/2002
From: Bellevue, WA, USA
Status: offline 		What I did is I got a lot of building experence from building kits then chose to build an airplane from scrach that I new my friend had built in case I needed help building it.
Seth

(in reply to simsrc89)
       Post #: 5

Does anyone know any tricks or rules to making a scratc... - 4/4/2002 10:38:31 AM   
mselby



Posts: 374
Joined: 12/29/2001
From: Bangkok, THAILAND
Status: offline 		There is a good video tape series put out by Dave Platt called "scratch this" it is a pretty comprehensive approach to scratch building. You may find it helpful. I believe it is advertised in Scale International, and must also be available through some of the American publications or direct from Dave.
Mike

(in reply to simsrc89)
       Post #: 6

is it itchin? - 4/4/2002 9:39:58 PM   
Johng



Posts: 1821
Joined: 1/24/2002
From: Deland, FL, USA
Status: offline 		OK, if you were in a hurry - you wouldn't be trying to scratch build something in the first place. If you try to do too much too fast, it will just end up costing you more time and money to get to whatever you had in mind in the first place.

Assuming you have built a kit or two, you can get started on something scratch built, but don't bite off some big scale or multi-engine project for the first one. Design something out of your own head that is similar to what you have already flown. Try an ugly stick or glider of some sort.

You need to train your mind to put the aerodynamic necessities together with the structural requirements and think it all out before you start gluing pieces together. Try to do this without looking at similar plans. Draw some stuff up. Make cardboard cutouts of the pieces you think you want. Fit them together. Once you think you have a solid design, then go compare to other plans and see how they look.

Sometimes you just have to sit down and give it a try, to figure out what it is that you DONT know - so you can go learn it. Book learning and building experience are invaluable - but actually training your mind to think like a designer is where it's at.

_____________________________

John

(in reply to simsrc89)
       Post #: 7

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All Forums >> RC Airplanes >> Scratch Building, Aircraft Design, 3D/CAD >> Does anyone know any tricks or rules to making a scratch-built?
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