Gary,
This will be a long reply. I received one of these (76") kits as a gift. What a curse! A $100.00 gift that I spend $400.00 to $500.00 to complete. I would send my ex-wife one out of spite but she would never feel compelled to attempt it.

It is a great airplane and a good kit. This was my first and I finished it this past week. It is beautiful!

I made some changes from the plans. I installed two aileron servos in the wing rather than the single with torque rods. This also gives me flaperons, which may be extraneous on a Cub, don't know yet. If you do this remember to add the servo wire holes in the ribs from the servos to the wing center. I used z-bends on all servos and Sullivan golden clevises with hangar 9 control horns. Used a Sullivan Precision Rod for the throttle (to an Evo .40). The controls are 100%slop-free and positive. Used robart hinge points-they are great and I feel a lot more comfortable with them than ca hinges. After installation the control surfaces would just drop from their own weight when lifted then let go-extremely slick. I added an additional (3rd) hinge point near the bottom of the rudder and reinforced the eyelet which holds the tailwheel steering wire with CA'd nylon fabric. I added backing blocks for the hinge points inside the contol surface framing at the hinge locations. I drilled and tapped the wing mounting blocks for 1/4-20 nylon bolts with nylon washers to do away with the T-nuts and small hex screws for the wing attachment and used black self adhesive wing saddle tape instead of silicone caulk. I replicated the landing gear shock struts on the box photos instead of using tiny dowel rods as the instructions suggest. The instructions indicated this could be done using 3/32 brass tube inside of 5/32 brass tube. Save an unnecessary trip to the LHS- it won't work. I used 1/8" inside 5/32- that works. This is the only place I used the cheesy snap links included in the kit. I also made the struts an airfoil shape instead of just rectangular and covered them instead of painting them. I primed and painted the interior of the cabin and fuel tank/receiver/battery area. The sealing iron will melt the paint though, so plan accordingly where to paint and where to end the covering material. On the advice of the extremely plane-experienced LHS owner, I used Cub Yellow Econokote. I think he suggested it (instead of Ultracote or the Solartex I planned to use) because it is great for first-timer covering jobs. It IS great stuff and I was extremely impressed with it's qualities-especially the low adhesive melt point and how easy it was to work around curves. I took it by for him to critique and he was very impressed and surprised at the end result (I am very meticulous and wouldn't have dreamed of just slapping this project together). That said, I wish I had used the Solartex as it would have looked better than the shiny, plasticky-looking Econokote, which is more translucent than opaque. This plane is a lot of work and I would prefer to put a few more dollars into high quality components than risk it to cheaper quality parts. Heck, I'm almost afraid to try and fly it. I doubt I will build any more kits, as the care and attention I put in make me reluctant to risk crunching it; an ARF would have a lot less of me invested in it.

If you are an experienced kit builder you are probably used to some of the things that caught me by surprise. The directions are good, but not flawless. Read ahead, plan and re-read over and over at every step. I built this plane over the plans, EXACTLY to the plan. I built the wing last instead of first and when it was finished the opening in the front of the wing was 3/16" too narrow to fit over the fuselage. Talk about head scratching (and expletives and throwing things, and cursing Carl Goldberg, whoever he is/was)! I measured both assemblies and measured the plans. Then did it a few more times for laughs. The plans were off. If built exactly according to plans there was no way the wing would fit over the fuselage in the front! The wing tip framing (step 22) should be tilted upward somewhat, but the directions are a bit unclear on this and it isn't super apparent when gluing it up to the ends of the spars. Mine wound up not tipped up as far as they should be, but the underside of the wingtip turns up a little (just less than it should) and I doubt it will affect the flight performance dramatically. The tendency when building the wing on the building board is to put everything flat down on the board, my mistake, which caused this. You may have much more experience than I and may know more of what to look for when building. The instructions suggest washers for right thrust, but I used a wedge of ply strengthened with a soaking in thin CA (I installed the washers but they sank into the epoxied firewall). In step 5, not paying attention, I glued doubler CT to former C and promptly covered up the prepunched dot showing the drilling location you'll need later.

All that being said, I was pleased with the kit and would buy another if I wanted to build another kit. Can't really knock Goldberg as the plan fiasco on the wing/fuselage fit could be due to plan shrinkage or the loose nut between the plans and airframe. It balances exactly on the main spar which puts the balance point square in the middle-rear third of the CG range with an empty tank. I had to add about 3/8 oz. of lead to the left wing on the third rib to totally balance it laterally. That is all the adjusting necessary to balance out the completed airframe,

If I can help give a shout. I am sure given time I could think of a couple more hints, but that is all that comes to mind right now. I second the advice to build it full-sized then order an additional wing kit and build an extra wing clipped- that way you can have the best of both worlds! I tried adding some pictures but that will have to wait for another time.

Hope you enjoy the build and beautiful completed Cub. Use that Solartex!

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