BrandonM

Can you pull an banner with an r/c airplane? And if so what kind of material or where can you get designs for a banner, that will actually work.

pd1

The size of the banner will depend on the size of the tow plane.
I used a .60 powered Aeromaster to pull signs and banners.

The signs were up to 10 feet long by 1 foot high. The banners were up to 2 feet high by 6 feet long.
I don't know what the size limit is, this is just what we pulled.

Both the banners and the signs had to have weights added to the bottom, to keep them from "flying" sideways.
Also used dowels between each letter to keep the sign open.
The banners had dowels on the leading edge and trailing edge, and sometimes in the middle as well.

We also used a tail or trailer on the signs and banners, the aft end of the signs would flap vigorously, sometimes wrecking the sign.

The lead, or "towrope" would be abot 10 to 12 feet long.
We would lay the sign on the ground and lay out the towline away from the sign.
The airplane then took off toward the sign, this gave us a ground run of 20 to25 feeet before the sign had to be lifted.

Climb steep, but watch out, the planes forward progress is slows considerably when the sign lifts.

Good luck

simhatus

Hi

If your going to tow a banner, best to make it so you can release it before landing the plane. just overfly the landing area low and drop it. Also would be useful to be able to get rid of it if the engine stops, even just towing a streamer creates a lot of drag i should imagine a banner is far worse.

Have seen banner towing where the tow plane picks up the banner in flight the banner was attached to a large loop of line which is half held up between 2 poles the other half lying on the ground, the plane has a trailing hook flys by and picks up the line. Must get round to trying this myself.

Also tow the banner from the cg of the plane not the back.

Simon

Jimmbbo

When I was building flight time, I flew FS banner towing, and the suggestions here are consistent with my experience ... FWIW, we flew a low time 160 HP Cessna 172, and the max banner we could tow was around 18 letters, depending on air temperature, at full power, flaps 10 with 50-60 kt airspeed... banners generate a LOT of drag....

Pics of how signs are put together - http://www.flysigns.com/equipment.html

Suggest you start with a few letters (12-14), and add them about two at a time till you reach the max capability of the engine.. the drag builds rapidly with additional letters...

We picked them up on a low pass with a hook that snagged the line held between two poles. We found that laying the banner on the ground upwind at an angle minimized tangles when the banner comes off the ground - see drawing.

Cheers!

Jim

BrandonM

Thanks for the help but does anyone have any pics of an model airplane pulling banners. Thanks Brandon

BrandonM

How would you release the banner, did you have a servo conneted on the airplane and where whould your tow lines be connected?

Jimmbbo

Brando,

I'd use a micro servo on the landing gear channel and rig either a sailpane release hook or a simple sliding clevis pin at the tail and activate it via a pushrod from the micro servo..

Cheers!

Jim

da Rock

Think whatever it is, you're going to have a poor handling RC model if the connection is at the tail. You wind up with a model that can't yaw anywhere as well as it could without the "straightening" influence of the banner. And worse, it's not going to have pitch control worth spit.

Whatever drag the banner introduces, that drag is better handled by the towplane if it's effect is at or near the CG or the NP. Place that drag away from the NP and it is amplified by leverage. The farther away the more leverage. Put it aft and both the rudder and elevator are going to be overloaded. Put it near the NP and the airplane simply feels more drag, but drag that isn't also steering.

da Rock

BTW, one thing to consider on this topic.............

A flying buddy showed up last month with a streamer on his fastest airplane. It was a LOOOONNNNNG streamer. The airplane was one of his fastest, and his normal flying is FAST. He also needles his engines close to the edge. He don't mess around none with rich needle settings. So he flies this super long streamer for 3 or 4 flights and two things happen that're pertinent to this thread's topic.

One.... He ruins his engine. Next session he shows up with that engine apart. He wants to know why the head and top of the piston look like they've been sandblasted and have eroded A LOT. All that extra load on an engine that was being flown at what became an overlean needle setting burned out that engine.

Two.... The streamer was tied to the tail. The very last streamer flight as he came in to land, something happened that illustrates why that location isn't in the best interest of the towplane. Another buddy had been trying to cut the streamer all flight long. As the towplane came in to land, the attacker tried one last time. And caught the streamer with his wing from below. (Yeah, the attacker almost hit the ground just before hitting the streamer.) When the streamer stuck to the attacker's wing it didn't come apart right away. And the streamer pulled the towplane's tail up while the towplane was about five feet above the runway. WHAM.....

Two suggestions........
One.... Make sure the towplane's engine is running rich when it's in the air under the extra load. Setting it on the ground doesn't get the job done. You need to pay attention to how it is running in the air, under load.

Two.... Don't attach the towline too far aft.

BrandonM

So how would you connect the banner to the CG, would you suggest putting a metal tube through the fueslage and run the banner lines on both sides of the airplane?

da Rock

Nope. Just get close to where it'd be.

One glider towplane that was very good at the job had the towline basically attached to the two wing hold down bolts of the towplane.

The idea is to mainly keep the attachment point close enough to the NP that the load on the line doesn't steer the airplane or overpower it's ability to steer itself. (and it's a minor point, but the NP is more important than the CG)

pd1

I just came across these pictures.
The pull arraingement we used was pulling from the tail.
As suggested, it might have worked better if we pulled more from the CG.

spinn

Whats an NP please

da Rock

NP
Neutral Point
Location of the point at which the airplane is balanced aerodynamically.