Carleto

I know balsa wings can't be used for quickies, and that I need to make foam wings and sheet them with balsa, but I bave a few questions:

1) What kind of foam do I use?
2) What thickness of balsa doI use for sheeting?
3) Do I make a balsa leading edge, or do I just sheet it with balsa just like the rest of the wing?
4) Can the tail feathers be all balsa or do they have to be sheeted foam?
5) What is the best way to make the fuse? Ply w/ lightening holes, or sheet balsa?
6) In either case, what thickness ply/balsa do I use for the fuse?

Also, to make the quickie faster, would a streamline pipe help?

Are there any suggestions for firmer control? Like bigger control surfaces, or anything else?

Are there any suggestions for making the quickie faster, but not beyond the point of no control or inability to land or the construction not being able to stay together on dives?

I'm going to take my time training my reflexes before I try to build this quickie, so there is plenty of time to discuss this...

daven

My Feedback: (1)

Carleto,

In the old days, they did use built up quickee wings before most went to foam. I buy most of my quickee wings presheeted by Bill Vargas in California for a reasonable price. As to your questions, I'll answer what I can.

2. That standard is pretty much 1/16" top and bottom sheeting. Some will use 3/32" on top and 1/16" on the bottom. I like to use the lightest balsa I can find on the LE and TE and medium weight balsa in the center. I will use 3 pieces of balsa to make the skins, the LE will be 4" light balsa, the center piece will be 3" medium, and the TE will be 4" light.

3. Historically, most people trim the LE flat and glue a piece of 1/4" square stock to the LE and sand to shape. Bill Vargas has developed a neat way of doing it in a vacumm bag with just the sheeting leading right up to the LE with carbon fiber tow at the center.

4. Most people are using 1/4" balsa slabs for the tail feathers that are sanded to shape. Many people inlay about 1/4" deep 1/64" ply into the center of the LE and TE. This allows you to shape the tail to a very sharp edge.

5. I use sheet balsa 3/16" for the fuze sides. I use a 1/64" ply doubler on the inside of the fuse sides for strength. On top and bottom I use primarily 1/8" balsa and light ply.

I have 5 articles of "speed secrets" listed in the Pylon World forums on this site. Many tips for streamlining and making your quickee go faster.

As to surfaces, there is also an article in the pylon forums on skinned hinges that will give you gap free, clean surfaces.

If you want to look at a set of quickee plans, send me a PM with your email, and I will send you a set of my Seeker Q500 plans that I designed.



3.

txaggie08

Scuse the interjection......whatsa quickee? got a pic?........sorry i was just curious

daven

My Feedback: (1)

Looks like this, pretty basic design.

txaggie08

thnks...

huntermax3030

My Feedback: (3)

Could someone post contact information on Bill Vargas? I'm in the market for some Quickie wings at a decent price.

Carleto

Hey everyone, sorry to reply so late, but thanks for all of the advice!

Carleto

Sorry for such a rough sketch, if I can get a primary aprooval, then I will try to make a more detailed version on some kind of 3D designer. I can't really model that well though, I use Ayam right now, and it is a little bit hard to use for me. I run a FreeBSD system, and will gladly take suggestions for any easy-to-use 3D modelers that are either free or pretty cheap. I don't want to use a lot of money on something I might only use once. I don't really think I will gather enough energy to do this again, it just sounds like a long process an I like to just finish things really quickly.

Now for the explanation of the plane I have in mind (fully custom, well, at least I haven't seen anything similar):

***NOTE:The layouts of the servos, the location of the tanks and the location of the engine mount are all independent from one another.

1) The top right image shows the egnine mouns right in front of the wing, as in if its safe, then I might just use the backplate to hold the forward wing dowel in.
2) The top left image has the engine mount right in the wing, this is what I would prefer because of being more compact, but I want to be sure that the wing won't just fall apart. I'm thinking of maybe using thick ply for the engine mount and having a few (2-4) ribs made out of thin ply to glue right onto the engine mount.
3) The two images on the bottom show the possible fuel tank layouts, the top one has only one big tanks, and the second one has two smaller tanks. from the side veiw, they'll either be in the back of the wings, or maybe a little sunken in.
4) The servo layouts are in green and really this just depends on what if more recommended, the top left image show the more standard layout (servo tray and all the servos right in there in one spot) and the other one show the servos on the wings, since I plan to make the tail pretty short, I probably won't ever remove the wing until I seriously crash, have problems with my fuel tank, or problems with my servos. In short, I don't plan to seperate the wing and the fuselage
5) I plan to make the tail as short as possible, but I still want the tail in order to add stability.

Feel free to criticize, comment, and/or ask questions! This is still just a faint idea, and I'm still improvising. My general idea is to make it somewhat of a hybrid between a bulldog (small&ugly) and a cheatah (colorful&fast). It seems to me that the small complection and the extreme speed should go well together, there may have to be some compromises in speed to make it presentable however, not like a beauty contest, but something that won't look embarrassing.

Speaking of improvising, I might want to make a hybrid between a delta wing and a swept back wing...

I just don't want it to look too much like a delta wing either.

Carleto

oops, the images didn't show.... might need some help with the syntax... attached them in there tho
**edit**
tried a few things w/ the previos post instead, sorry for the pollution of the forum with useless posts guys.

Carleto

What do you mean by "Built Up"?

So what do you guys think? will it work? I'm not so sure that the idea about the engine mounted right in a swept back wing will work, but perhaps it might with a hybrid between a swept back wing and a delta wing, but once again, I don't want a delta wing, I think it totally destroys the looks.
What I'm thinking is that the more the wing resembles a delta shaped wing, the shorter the wingspan can be.

I heard of people using fiberglass or carbon fiber to cover the foam, but I think that will make the plane too heavy, and it will look just as rough as the foam is shaped and I have never worked w/ foam before, so I will sheet the wing with balsa, it it need be, maybe on the outside I will add strips of fiberglass to reinforce it.

I'd really enjoy any feedback. I'm thinking of starting to build it as soon as school's out (Thursday is the last day at our school).

And umm.... does anyone know what foam is used for the wings? Or it doesn't matter?

Thanks ahead of time in case I have a delayed response (as always, not that I forget, just don't have time ussually)

pad

Hi Daven,
send me your plan of Seeker please to email adress [email protected]
thanks, Pavel

DamonTX

People may have stopped using built up wings but they still work well. I've built 3 Direct Connection Quickees, one with the foam wing and two others with built up wings. They all had straight wings with a constant chord, a very simple design to build. They were all fully sheeted with a 1/4" strip of carbon running along the bottom spar. The built up wings were lighter, however this may be because I had only sheeted one other foam wing in the past any my techniques weren't fully worked out.

In either case, if cost is an issue, you can build a quickee wing for about $30, fully sheeted.

Carleto

ok, Thanks Damon, do you remeber what kind of foam you used?

daven

My Feedback: (1)

A built up wing is just that, ribs and a spar with sheeting on the leading edge up to the spar.

No foam. All wood.

DamonTX

Carleto...On the Quickee I built that had foam wings, the foam wing cores came with the kit. I didn't like them so I built up my own wings on the following two planes.

Carleto

Oh ok, thanks guys, but I thought that built up wings simply weren't strong enough to have a quickie dive at full speed from way up where, because that's what I'm planning on doing [>:] but if they can hold that then I can use the built up wings, ofcourse, foam wings seem easier to do...

DamonTX

I hope I don't get reamed here but in my opinion built up wings are just as strong if not stronger. That is with regard to the center section which seems to be the most common point of failure as far as Quickees are concerned.

For example, the Direct Connection Quickee (it's actually called a Dodger but it is a quickee plane) has two foam cores sheeted and glued together. They are then reinforced with fiberglass cloth around the center section. ......Now when I built my wing, it was held together at the spars with doublers, the wing halves were glued together, as I mentioned before there was a carbon fiber strip along the bottome spar and the center section was wraped with fiberglass cloth.

I never had a failure with any of them (foam wings included) they flew for about 3 years and the two surviving planes were retired in around 1999.

Whatever you decide to do, post some pics.

I hope this helps...Damon

Carleto

Ok, thanks Damon.

With reguard to the built up wings... Has everyone heard of the conventional constuction methods before the Spitfire and the way the Spitfire was built differently?

Well anyways, the conventional method was a lot of ribs, and thin sheetmetal covering (it was thought to be lighter), and the spitfire method was less ribs but thicker sheet metal... (turned out much lighter than conventional.

Would this reflect on the quickie? Maybe like thin ply ribs, and a balsa sheeting with maybe 3 or 4 hardwood spars, and some kind of carbon fiber/fiber glass/kevlar or whatever other fibers are available?

the main two thing for this quickee are: Speed (less weight, good design) and durability (strong built) beauty can wait, besides, if this thing goes fast enough, people will respect its uglyness

As to the fibers... which is the best choice, as in light but strong? I gues having it strong takes precedence over being light. Also, umm... I'm not so great at using all these fibers, so any tips would do, I'll post in the Tips&Suggestions too, but since this forum is related to building, I guess it kinda includes tips on building too.

DamonTX

As far as strength and lightness go, I'd say use 1/8 in sheeting with the ribs about 2.5" apart with 2 spars in the front and just a training edge in the rear. You could go further (if you want 0 dihedral) by using full length spars and sheeting. This way you'd be making the entire wing in one piece with no absolute need for the fiberglass in the center section or spar doublers for that matter. I'd still think about a carbon fiber strip under the bottom spar under the sheeting though.

In reference to the Spitfire vs. Conventional method you may want to play that one out as you go along. Cut out a bunch of ribs, fit them with different spacing and determine if the sheeting will be properly supported. The last thing you want is any sagging areas...it just looks sloppy.

Damon

daven

My Feedback: (1)

A built up wing can be just as strong (if not stronger) than a foam wing. Personally, a foam wing is about 10x easier for me, so I wouldn't even consider a built up wing.

Carleto

daven: my main dilema with foam wings is that I do not know the foam, and I want to make a plane from complete scratch.

damon: my main dilema with built up wings is my impression of them taking a lot of time to build, I'm afraid I may not be dedicated enough for building one.

So, I may have to wait a while before starting