spyder0069

Finished my Herr Aquastar last weekend. This was strickley going to be flown off the water at our local lake so I built the chines (spray rails) in. Mine start from the back of the noseblock and extend all the way to the step in a sweeping motion and are about 50 degrees from the fuselage. I built the wing with the stock dihedral and added strip ailerons which required me to cut about 1/8" off the trailing edge stock. There is a sub-micro servo (hs-55 equiv) for each aileron and I have flapperons programmed in. This gives me a little more wing area and more lift with the flapperons (however I haven't pushed these yet to see how well they work). I am power with a throttled Norvel Big Mig .061 and a 2oz slim tank that was built into the engine pylon. The pylon was hollowed out and another hs-55 is built into it with the servo wire running through the top of the wing making it a easy setup. A 4 cel 370ma NiMh receiver pack was put in the nose compartment in the very front and the block that they used for a battery cover was discarded and I just built a former and sheeted to save weight. All up weight minus fuel (including 5 sub-micro servos) was 19.5 oz (only .5 over box weight). Unfortunately I then had to add .5 oz of lead to the nose (hollowed the nose block and dropped it in) to balance. This may come out and I will put in a 600ma pack in the nose instead. Ok now the good stuff!

Flight:
The .061 pulls it off the water fast!!! I read many articles with special instruction on water take offs and with my plane you can through all those rules out the window. I have low rates set to 70% of reccomended throws and I can pull back, throttle up, and the plane usually flys before I expect (and this is without the flapperons). Super light wing loading. Just level off once it gets airborne. I'd say by the time I hit full throttle and go for it the plane is up in under 25 feet. The norvel is set up with 3 head shims and a 6x2 prop running 25% nitro which is a perfect combo. I run a little rich on take off to make sure I can taxi back in at the end. I had to make sure my prop was balanced because the tank is built into the pylon without foam and with one prop I was getting bubbles in the fuel line. After balancing that went away. Also KEEP THE SCREEN IN on the norvel carb. Otherwise it goes lean on extended idle. I am guessing it probably also disperses any water that does reach the carb and helps to keep it from stalling. Taxing works great and I get minimal water in the prop (usually never unless I hit a wave). Landing is as easy as belly landing your favorite hand lanch warbird or electric. Bring it in with a little power until your ready to settle in. Tip floats work great and I had NO tendency's to do a water loop like the pontoon float planes I've tried. Kit was only $42 at my local hobby store. Money well spent! Here is some video links! I'll get close up pics when I get a chance including the aileron mods.

http://www.spyderrobotics.com/planes...ar_takeoff.avi

http://www.spyderrobotics.com/planes...ar_landing.avi

http://www.spyderrobotics.com/planes...star_flyby.avi

http://www.spyderrobotics.com/planes...tar_flyby2.avi

Dion

Strykaas

Thanks for these videos !

Do u know any good other videod of seaplanes ?

Invertedflyby

My Feedback: (15)

Thanks for posting that, nice plane!

spyder0069

Ok, here are the pics and some building tips. The chines were 1/32 plywood and when sheeting the bottom of the fuse in the front I left about 3mm of overlap sheeting. This made for a great angle between the fuse and the chines and added support. I didn't like the idea of "slotting" the fuse so I went this route. The chines were glued in and some balsa wood putty was used to make a nice fit. This did make it harder to cover but it was more time consuming than difficult.

spyder0069

After the ailerons were mounted I drilled a small elongated hole in the trailing edge and used thin ca to strengthen the hole and surrounding area. This is were the rubberbands go through instead of around the back of the wing like the 3 channel version.
I took the plywood tops of the tip floats and sanded them down to fit between the hole and the leading edge. The dowel was notched (probably not necessary) so that it held the rubber band tightly. The rear dowel must be short so that it doesn't get pushed back into the aileron. If pushed back the rubberband binds with the top plywood of the tip floats and won't interfere with the ailerons. The front of the tip floats is done pretty much stock. I wanted to fly quicker so intead of covering the bottoms of the tip floats they were painted. The tops are covered to avoid scracthes to the underside of the wing.

Inside the fuse the servos were moved forward to help balance. The on/off switch is on the inside because I didn't want any extra holes for water to get in. Instead of using the windshield I build a balsa one to also help with this. The engine pylon has the tanked glue to the main support and is sheeted with 1/32 balsa. Then rounded. Servo is in there too. Throttle servo has a z bend on its side of the linkage and I put a dubro ez connect on the engine throttle arm so that I could still make adjustments.

spyder0069

Ailerons:

The trailing edge was cut back about 1/4" (I said 1/8" in a earlier post but this time I got the ruler out) so that I had a thicker amount of balsa to hinge to. I then got some flat stock 1/16" (maybe its 1/8") balsa from the hardware store (was convienient). Of course it was a heavier balsa than you find at a hobby store which worked out great because it would not flex. It was cut down into strips about 3/4" wide and sanded to shape. A notch was cut out for the torque rods. The torque rods were made with music wire (.047 I believe) and golden rod was used for a plastic bushing. The golden rod was about the same height of the newly cut trailing edge so 1/32 balsa was glued on the bottom and top of the trailing edge to surround the bushings. Then balsa was glued in the back of that and it was sanded to fit the fuselage. No modifications were necessary to the fuselage. Torque rods holes were predrilled in the ailerons and they were hinged but not glued. This adds wing area so the weight of the extra micro servos (about .8oz for both with arms and ez connects) is offset and the wingloading actually goes down a touch. Wing chord (width) is now 6.5 inches which brings wing area to around 263sq. inches instead of the stock 245. Wing loading is only about .75oz more. Videos prove it flys great!

By the way the box states "Big 42.5 inch wingspan". This is a error. Plans are for a 40.5" wingspan and even state that on the plans. Not that you couldn't add a spar but I found it unnecessary. So far the flaperons seem unnessary to so I may pull one of the servos in the wing.

spyder0069

One more thing. The tail linkage was moved to the top side of the fuse. The plane initially sits low in the water and the waves of a lake will pour into those pushrod exits. This mod can be done after covering. I ran out of fuel on a windy day and missed the dock by 10 feet. My R/C boat couldn't push it and I tied fishing line to the boat and tried to snare it. That failed too as the wind rapidly pushed it father away from the dock. So after a 30 minute walk around to the other side of the lake and lots of praying my plane washed ashore about 1hr 15 minutes after landing. Pulled the wing and there was no water in the fuselage. Now I have to get a inflatable boat :^)

MrMulligan

My Feedback: (314)

Thanks for all the pictures and the great flight and building report. You did a great job.

bill2796

i have a thunder tiger gp .10 would this work on the aquastar?

alasdair

A 10 would be too big, too heavy and too powerful.
My Aqua Star flew fine with a Norvel 61
Even a good 049 would be fine (a Norvel or a Cox TD)
Alasdair

mustang4me

I have the videos, but can not play them on Media Player or other players I downloaded. I'm using XP, and MP says "ERROR GETTING CODEC". Real Player says "Can't find DIV Decompressor" so I searched for Div3 etc and downloaded XVid and GDiVX player. The best I get is sound only. MP just shows Windows MP logo. The others are blank screen.
It looks like I'll be trying water flying for the first time over the hols with a Seamaster, so all tips appreciated!
Thanks,
Adrian.

mustang4me

OK now! Problem solved by divx.com.
Very helpful fo a newbie......hoping to get my feet wet soon.
Adrian.