Possible fun fly event brewing
03-30-2013, 02:16 PM
#1
Thread Starter
Possible fun fly event brewing
Our club needs a kick of excitement and a talk with some of the group today received a favorable reception to a new fun fly type event. Using the common ubiquitous foam 54" glider available at Walmart or Hobby Lobby, convert it to two ch RC and carry or tow aloft to a prescribed altitude and compete for longest duration glide.
The advent of altimeter telemetry for a common release, light weight and cheap receivers, servos and batteries and a cheap air frame should make the project fairly easy for all to embrace. The conversion time would not be very high. There would be disciplines involved, one of which is strengthening the structure enough to sustain the carry aloft as well as normal trim and balance. There would also be some choice involved of configuration given a simple requirement for two ch pitch and roll. That might be accomplished by aileron and elevator, rudder and elevator or elevons.
The tractor would have to be slow and I'm thinking an Ultra Stick Lite with piggy back launch platform using crow mode for maximum lift and slow speed.
At any given event, the pilots draw for launch sequence and each launched as quick as tractor can be recycled and each pilot having a spotter responsible for watching the altimeter on launch platform radio and signaling the launch and timing the flight.
I've built a piggy back platform and will be starting conversion on a glider soon to test the concept and present it to the guys as something worthy of their time and energy. The foam glider seems certain to require some wing modification such as packing tape spars, carbon strip spars, saw cut groove spars or perhaps even sawing the wings and full chord balsa spars. If any one has any experience sparing these gliders... I'd like to hear about what worked.
We have two fun fly events a year and probably would be lucky to get weather suitable for such an event, but acknowledged that this might be a great activity for the Tues or Thurs afternoon fossil fliers who seem to enjoy a building project that doesn't require major time and money.
If this works out... I'll report and perhaps even provide a video.
The advent of altimeter telemetry for a common release, light weight and cheap receivers, servos and batteries and a cheap air frame should make the project fairly easy for all to embrace. The conversion time would not be very high. There would be disciplines involved, one of which is strengthening the structure enough to sustain the carry aloft as well as normal trim and balance. There would also be some choice involved of configuration given a simple requirement for two ch pitch and roll. That might be accomplished by aileron and elevator, rudder and elevator or elevons.
The tractor would have to be slow and I'm thinking an Ultra Stick Lite with piggy back launch platform using crow mode for maximum lift and slow speed.
At any given event, the pilots draw for launch sequence and each launched as quick as tractor can be recycled and each pilot having a spotter responsible for watching the altimeter on launch platform radio and signaling the launch and timing the flight.
I've built a piggy back platform and will be starting conversion on a glider soon to test the concept and present it to the guys as something worthy of their time and energy. The foam glider seems certain to require some wing modification such as packing tape spars, carbon strip spars, saw cut groove spars or perhaps even sawing the wings and full chord balsa spars. If any one has any experience sparing these gliders... I'd like to hear about what worked.
We have two fun fly events a year and probably would be lucky to get weather suitable for such an event, but acknowledged that this might be a great activity for the Tues or Thurs afternoon fossil fliers who seem to enjoy a building project that doesn't require major time and money.
If this works out... I'll report and perhaps even provide a video.
03-30-2013, 05:01 PM
#5
Thread Starter
RE: Possible fun fly event brewing
My first thoughts were as a fun fly event... but given that light winds will be needed and they rarely coincide with two funfly days a year, we talked about it today and more likely if it goes, it will start as a Tues and Thursday Fossil Flyer activity.
