Originally Posted by
vertical grimmace
After reading all of the info in this thread, I think that when I build my Akromaster, I may scratch the whole thing from new wood. I think it might be a good idea to truss build the fuselage with sticks and just sheet it over with thin balsa to save weight. All of the wood in my kit feels like a brick. I bet I could cut half of the weight out of it by scratching the whole thing.
The last Akromaster I built has extended wings. The kit LE and TE have about half a rib extra that you are supposed to trim off...I opted to take advantage of the extra length to add a few square inches of wing area. It necessitated making some extra parts, but since you are building from scratch, no problem. If I do it again, I will relocate the ribs so that only one new rib on each side is needed. I would also suggest you use a 3" bellcrank. Mine is powered by a Thunder Tiger .10 (CL).
Since I originally posted the changes, others have also had success with this mod.
One of the things I do not like about some of the old CL kits, is that they do not have full sized plans. I know you can just copy the existing parts, but it is always nice to have good accurate full sized plans, to use for duplicating the parts.
I understand that isometric assembly drawings are used so you will buy more kits. I just traced the full-size parts on back of the plans so I can recreate them when needed.
Good luck with your Akromaster.
George