ORIGINAL: gnyberg

I finally got my VF 58" Extra in the mail - very nice! I've starting hinging and putting it together beginning at the back.

I have a couple of questions for those of you who've put this baby together that I don't recall having been answered in previous posts ..

1) Did you take off some covering and epoxy in a fillet UNDERNEATH the horix stab on each side of the fuse? I think it would look terrible and be hard to paint/cover to match the stripe it would likely wipe out. I used some tri balsa and put a fillet on top only.

2) They seem to highly recommend wire reinforcement of the tail surfaces. How many people actually did that, and for those that did not, can you still do reasonable IMAC stuff? I don't really plan to do wild things like blenders/etc for quite a while - but need good knifeedge, etc.

3) If you did end up putting wires on the tail, can you describe the parts used? I'm looking at 2-56 threaded rod, metal clevises, and some bolts through the surfaces with maybe little metal landing-gear straps bent 45-deg or so to hook from clevises to bolts. Seem reasonable? Overkill? I wondered if the metal clevises were really meant for tension/load like that.

4) How far out should wire struts be span-wise, and where on the chord of the surface? I'm looking at perhaps 30-40% out spanwise and about 50% of the fixed-surface chord.

5) Finally, when mounting my Saito 91 on its side (head left when looking from front) my throttle arm is on top. Their hole is on the bottom - obviously cant use that. But the corresponding location behind the throttle arm on top is above the "box" they use to extend the fuselage 2 inches. Anyone have a good linkage technique?

Thanks!
-Greg