tahustvedt

The plane arrived on wednesday in the biggest cardboard box I have ever seen for an RC plane, and with a shipping price to match. I was pleasantly surprised when I opened the box though. Everything was undamaged and the smoothness of the finish was very good. I was surprised at how light it felt compared to my ESM Spitfire XIV.

Things I will change:
-Move the landing closer together to the scale location.
-Change the shape of the elevator counterweights.
-Move the chin louvres forwards to a more scale location.
-Flaps probably.


I cut out the wing and made new landing gear mounting beams. This was pretty easy becasue the scale location ended up between plywood reinforced ribs and immediately outside the wing joiner tube. The whole modification took a couple of evenings of work. That mod is jsut about done. I added a 6 mm plywood doubler between the beams where I cut the wing beams to allow the strut to retract. Ideally the strut should lie outside the wing surface but there's not enough room in the fibreglass covers for the retracts.

The elevator mod was probably thre easiest to do. It took just a few minutes with my table-saw to cut after marking the lines based on a 3-view.

I cut away the original cooling flaps behind the chin because they just looked weird and were in the wrong location. I'll probably make the new ones semi-functional because I think that will look better. The belly-pan will be filled in and smoothed at the front. The power system should have more than enough cooling in the nose.

I havent' started on the flaps yet. This looks like it's going to be the biggest job to do.

LDM

My Feedback: (15)

excellant work , I still have mine in the box , have everything I need but the retracts .
I have a suggestion for you , on the flaps , use Flight skin , I just bought some and made Flaps for a Seafury , the Flight skin is light , thin and very scale after painted and much better then PLY for split flaps .
I will also be adding an interior to mine .

I noticed you are useing robart 615 retracts , becareful , they may not be able to hold the weight of this plane .

Can you also tell me where did you buy your spinner ?

LDM

My Feedback: (15)

One more suggestion on the flaps , I have studied my idea and basicly want to use the flap design of the VQ P40 .
How i will proceed is as follows , one draw out your flap , I will leave a 1/4 on the bottom trailing edge sheeting in place -so I will cut 1/4 from the trailing edge . Why ? this is make the bottom wing more ridgid , the flap will still appear scale from eye perception but actually go into the wing as opposed to be flush with the trailing edge , same will happen where the flap meets the airleron , I will leave aprox 1/8 " sheeting between the two , only visable from the bottom . I will sheet the inside of the wing with flight skin for strength , make my flap from flight skin and carbon fiber rods , all ribs will be wood but long strips for vertical support will be carbon fiber -hope this helps .
Engine for me is a saito 180 , already broken in just need to finish some projects and get this one .
also looking for either Sierra gear , century or new Robart heavy duty , question what size wheels did you use

tahustvedt

I bought 4.5" dubro threaded light wheels. Ideally they should have been 4.8" to be scale I think but they're close enough.

Good idea on leaving the trailing edge on the flaps!, I was going to use balsa sheeting with carbon fiber strands, balsa ribs and a carbon fibre tube at the leading edge of the flap.

The 615 do look flimsy but they were the only ones I could find. They operate perfectly smoothly and unrestricted. I hope the weight will end up below 12 lbs and I'm optimistic about that since the plane felt lighter than the Spit, which weighed 13 lbs and has 1.5 lbs of noseweight.

LDM

My Feedback: (15)

I agree I do feel the plane feels very light , I was surprised at the suggested 140 to 180 size 4 stroke , I was thinking it could actuially fly on a 120 .

Robart now has a new set of gear that hold 12 to 20 pound planes , dont know the cost but they look like sierra gear and should fit your struts .

Thanks for the info on the wheels , how about the spinner do you have a good source , so far my plan is to purchase from Gene Barton .

tahustvedt

I was a little annoyed when I saw that Robart came out with improved retracts just a couple of days after I had bought mine, but I'll give them a shot. I only fly from tarmac so landings should be relatively easy on the gear. The aluminium spinner in my pictures is a 4.5" Dave Brown that I got from Tower Hobbies. It's a little small so I'm going to make my own from fibreglass eventually.

I started making the wheel doors now. Hopefully I can get them to operate smoothly.

bosssman

My Feedback: (35)

are you leaving the wings as is? for some reason, CMP used an open structured wing without full sheating. As is typical here in Southern California, the covering on my CMP P-40 has already wrinkled and I have decided to rip it off. I will also have to sheet the remainder of the wings and add the flaps. its odd that CMP chose this plane to not fully sheet the wings....

randy

tahustvedt

I plan to leave the wing as it is for now except for adding flaps.

LDM

My Feedback: (15)

I thought my wing was fully sheeted , I will have to cjeck again

tahustvedt

I made working gear doors. They are linked to the retracts with 1.5 mm carbon fibre rods and heatshrink tubing. Works fine and operates effortlessly, however the edges don't line up perfectly. I'm happy with it though.

Short clip of the doors while the gear retracts: http://www.enrarot.net/videos/p40/test.wmv

LDM

My Feedback: (15)

Great work , can you give more detail please

tahustvedt

It's very simple. I just cut out the hatches with sharp scissors and a dremel where I thought it would look right. The covers supplied by CMP aren't very scale so it's just guesswork from looking at pictures. I used a single heavy duty hinge on the large hatch and custom made the hinge for the small door by glueng a carbon fibre rod to the underside with plastic tubes on each side to swivel in. Once the hatches were opening and closing well I connected everything together with carbon rods using heatshrink tubing as joints. I measured and tested to find the right connecting points on the hatch. It was much easier to do than it sounds.

LDM

My Feedback: (15)

Thanks , great job I plan on trying that method , the doors make a big differance when they are on the gear leg .

tahustvedt

Here's what it looks like with all the bits on. I think I'll start on the flaps tomorrow.

AC2

My Feedback: (34)

Looking very good! Did you keep the 615's in?

tahustvedt

I will use the 615's. Too expensive to replace them.

tahustvedt

Here's how I modified the bellypan. I extended the front with a lip that goes under the cowl flaps.

Adding flaps won't be too difficult after all. The wing section is thick so it's stiff enought after cutting, carving and sanding to shape.

tahustvedt

Added flaps, and my 18" and 20" soloprops arrived.

AC2

My Feedback: (34)

Please pass info on the prop, looks great!! Flaps looking good as well!!

Finally got mine in. I must say that I am very impressed with the build of this arf (not perfect but no complaints here). Glass fuse with panel lines and panels/hatches. Adding flaps and some of the extra stuff that has been done by others as well is still a WHOLE lot faster than building from a kit! Think I'll try the 615's first before I invest in CJ's. Robostruts should help the 615's out I would think?

Going gas on mine, Evra with EI.




BTW, I also have the Hellcat & P-47.

tahustvedt

Another thing I think would help the 615's is making a curl in the wire over the robostruts. That way they have impact protection both up/down and forward/back. I have straight wires into the robostruts on mine though.

The prop is very heavy so I hope the plane needs a little noseweight. First I'm going to fly it on a 17x10 prop though and a faster motor. The Soloprop needs a reductiondrive or a slower motor. I'm going electric on my model.

I'm interested in the CMP P-51 too but it looks like the wing has a negative incidence, and the shape of the scoop is a little wrong.

AC2

My Feedback: (34)

I'll have to look closer then at that area as I'm not quite sure where to "curl" the wire, thanks!
The P-51 will be added as well soon..... Looks like another nice "canvas" to work with. I'm sure you can fix any issues it may have. Your work is great!

vasek

My Feedback: (4)

WOW! i like this setup

can you post some pics (closeups) & little more info PLS?

i think this would be pefect for a tailwheel gear door as well

thanks, Vasek

LDM

My Feedback: (15)

Nice job on the flaps , espacially with them going under the fuse -very scale , are they closing flat for you ? can you also elaborate on how you got the sheeting off without disturbing the top sheeting wing ribs , thanks
Lou

tahustvedt

There's a 1 mm gap in one end when the flaps are up but they were flat before covering so I'll just twist them slightly with heat. I cut the sheeting off with a knife and then carved the trailing edge stock down to half the thickness before sanding. It wasn't difficult at all.

I attached a picture of the gear while I was assembling it. It's very simple to make and can be adjusted by sliding the rod in or out of the heatshrink tubing. I plan on doing something similar with the tailgear.

I will actuate the flaps internally so I made a plywood rib to mount the servo on for each wing.

WYDAH

Hi,

The flaps look great. I've been considering doing this on my CMP Zero. What did you use for the actual flap? Light ply, or balsa, did you glass it? Does it seem rigid enough? Do you have more pics? Maybe some closeups? I'm not too worried about the covering since I will be stripping and glassing since the paint is just not holding up.

Thanks,