how hard would it be to make my kadet senior arf a tail dragger. i have now mastered how to fly it with tricycle wheels now i owuld like to make it a tial dragger. and help or links would be great

thanks

Hmmm, due to the fact that it is not easy to get inside the fuse to reinforce the bottom, and that you cannot run a wire to the rudder, it may be a little difficult...I was going to attempt it on mine, then thought it was more trouble than it is worth. There is a guy on here who did it with a pull/pull setup, and it looks really nice, but I am sure how easy it would be for a beginner...

Hard? No. But, time consuming; YES.

It's actually pretty simple. Just cut the covering off the bottom of the tail and install a piece of aircraft plywood. That's your mounting block.

There are several different ways to control the tailwheel. You can use one of the simple ones that has a wire which is epoxied into the rudder. Not very robust, but it works, and the Kadet SR isn't really all that heavy anyway.

You can also use a Klett or OhioRC tailwheel. Mount a couple of blind nuts to the plywood BEFORE you epoxy it in the tail. You can prefab the tailwheel assembly with bolts and blindnuts and then glue the whole thing into the tail section at once.

For a pushrod, you can run a small 2-56 nyrod back to the tailwheel and install a small servo (HS-81 or an HS 55) or any small servo. Install the servo in the fuselage and connect it to your rudder servo with a Y-harness or you can mix it into another port if you have a computer radio.

I've done this on more than one trainer. The extra servo adds only a tiny bit of weight, but you have absolutly positive tailwheel control. It's really a nice setup. Add a couple of small balsa braces in the fuselage to keep the 2-56 nyrod from flexing. Don't over build the system. You can build it light and strong with only a couple of pushrod braces and a light ply servo mount.

You will need to move your main gear forward. The center of the main wheels should be about even with the leading edge of the wings. Just add a 1/4" plywood block in the appropriate place and epoxy it in. Use some triangle stock for bracing here. Mount your gear with blind nuts and bolts.

Leave the original mount in place where the main gear was. This can serve as the rear mount for your floats or skis in the future. Just cover the bolt holes with a piece of monokote and you're all set for the floats when you need them.

The process for converting the plane to a taildragger is NOT HARD. It just takes a bit of planning and some time. You could probably do this modification in a weekend if you just take your time and dink around with it for a few hours here and there.

Good luck. Hope this helps.

Remember to BALANCE the plane after you make the modification.

I did this similar thing to my Kadet arf, and i love it. I fly a lot of giant scale craft but the Kadet is fun just to go out and have fun with without worrying about crashing a 3,000 dollar plane. The landing gear i did exactly as stated in previous post, the tail wheel i just made mine free rotating but it would be nicer if i did as described above. Bruce

Actually, you cannot use a wire to the rudder type tailwheel. The rudder does not extend beyond the elevator, and unless you hack the elevator into two pieces, you won't be able to get one of the springs/wires up to it..

Mounting the servo is an option, but where woud you put it? You don't have access to the back end of the fuse, unless you want to start cutting covering, and putting the servo in the center of the fuse (where the rest are) would be a trick to get a pushrod back that would work... The only option is the pull pull, and to tell you the truth, unless you have a ton of time to fiddle with it versus fly it, forget about it, it's not really worth the trouble..

Now, free floating, there is a good idea..

Yup; I forgot about the rudder position on this plane. I still think it's VERY easy to do the mod. If you don't mind cutting a bit of covering off the bottom of the fuse, it's a piece of cake.

You can mount a mini servo about anywhere. It's doable, but time consuming.

Building a Kadet Sr ARF right now, as a taildragger from the getgo. I'm about 20hrs into this thing and have maybe another 5 hrs to finish.

For the tailwheel, I drilled a hole down the rudder hinge line, and inserted an "L"-shaped music wire down through it to act as a torque rod. Up top, it is tied to the bottom of the rudder. Below, I have a lever arm driving an Ohio tailwheel assembly via pull-pull springs. BTW, I cut a piece of one of the spare pushrod tubes included with the kit to act as a guide tube in the hole. This way, it wouldn't interfere with the elevator pushrod.

Overall, the conversion is not difficult. Tedious, I guess, since I spent half of the time staring at the fuselage trying to visualize how I'd do it. Good planning does pay off, though.

Oh, one important note: if your Kadet was tail-heavy before, the taildragger will likely make it worse. I'm using a somewhat heavy ASP .75 2stroke and it is still slightly tail heavy.

I will try to post pics when I finish.

I did this this summer by using a long .010 ( I think, it was thin) wire with a 90 degree bend at each end , resembling a 3 inch u bend. First I made a hole in the covering just behind the fin and another directly below in the bottom of the fuse through which the wire was threaded.
Next I made a groove in the front of the rudder at the bottom and attached one end of the wire with epoxy and glass cloth. The other end I attached to a Sullivan large tail wheel assembly. This took the place of the spring wire in the sullivan tail wheel. Also, I epoxied a 3/16 piece of plywood to the bottom of the fuse to mount the tail wheel assembly. It is not that comlpicated and works great. But, as mentioned above, you need to pre plan what you are going to do.
Sam

One correction. The wire had a z shape not a u shape. One end inserted into the front of the rudder, the other inserted into the sullivan assembly which was by a forward bend in the wire. This wire was thin enough to do the job and flexible enough to not place a great deal of strain on the rudder. The wire was one I bought to use in hinges. I don't think I stated the correct diameter. I do know it was a little thicker than the Sullivan spring wire as I had to drill a larger hole in the tail wheel bracket to insert the wire.
Sam

Finally got my Kadet Sr ARF finished up. Took a little longer because of my adding the wheel pants, but I really wanted them on this airplane. For your reference:

Main gear: modified GP 1/4 scale Giles 202
Tailwheel: Ohio small 6-12lbs
Wheelpants: ABS plastic, from a Lanier 35% Giles I upgrade to aftermarket fiberglass ones

The Kadet, as shown, balances right on the main spar (~4" back from LE) with the flight battery pack just ahead of the wing LE. Perfect. The ASP .75 is way more power than it needs. A .60 would have been ideal but I don't have one, so I put on the mildest .75 I got. All up weight is 7 lbs 10 Oz. I could have easily kept it below 7lbs by removing the wheel pants and using a lighter tailwheel assembly, but with such a big wing, weight is not a concern. As is, the wing loading is only 14.9 Oz per sq.ft.

The tailwheel mounting area is reinforced with a liteply plate cut to fit inside the fuse. I could have added the ply plate on the outside of the fuse, as I have done on other planes, but this plane has easy access to the inside. This way I didn't have to mess with recovering.

The main gear mounting area is reinforced with double ply plates, as well as ply stiffener braces on the fuselage sides. I also replace a section of the balsa fuselage bottom, as I didn't want the gears to sit on soft balsa. Six 8-32 bolts and blind nuts secure the main gears to the fuse.

I went somewhat farther with mine. I cut about 2 inches off the rear of the fuse, put a ply plate on the bottom to mount a Sullivan tail wheel. I moved the horizontal stab forward so the rudder and elevator hinge line were the same. Then using balsa sheet the same thickness as the rudder and elevator I built a split elevator, and extended the rudder to the bottom of the fuse. I re-routed the push rods so the exited on the fuse sides. A little more work, but with a set of wheel pants you have a late 30,s early 40's looking plane. I used a 4* 120 gear for the main. Removing the rear fuse portion had no effect on the planes flight.

I have done other tail dragger conversion that were a lot more extensive. Here's an example of one that had reshaped rudder and split elevators. It started out life as a Wolrd Models Super Stunt 60, shown in the first picture. I prefer spring pull-pull setup because I fly mostly off grass and the tail wheel steering connection needs to have some "give". Otherwise the rudder servo will take a real beating.

What did you have to do to modify the Giles 1/4 scale gear?

Your modification to a tail dragger looks great.

I had been meaning to convert mine to a taildragger for a while now and after a recent snow had a real desire to do some ski plane flying. I covered 2 birds at the same time. Converted to tail dragger and ski plane. The mods took about 3 hours and minor thinking to accomplish. I added a re-enforcement plate of 3/16 lite ply with triangle stock to the fuse directly behind the former that forms the rear of the tank compartment and used the gear from an old trainer. I added a 3/32 lite ply plate to the bottom of the fuse in the rear of the plane and attached the rear ski there. It is controlled by a standard servo, Futaba 3004. Piece of cake and flies well and ground handling is probably better then it was with the nose wheel. When the snow is gone I will just replace the skis with wheels.

fwthomas, I just noticed a reply I wrote for you here got lost somehow. Here goes again:

Mods to the GP 1/4 Giles 202 ARF gear:

1. Trim the upper mounting tabs to fit Kadet fuselage.
2. Drill additional hole as required to mount gears to fuselage.
3. Spread the bowed legs out a bit, both to widen the stance and to lower the nose.
4. Bend the lower wheel mounting tabs to be veritcal again.

I really like these Giles 202 gears. They come two-piece and are very versatile. Very reasonably priced too. I have used them on two other taildragger conversions.

I just finished building a kadet lt 25 and it has a pull pull system in it . maybe you can find a set of plans to fabricate a set for the senior .looks like it would be easy to fabricate

Just wanted to let everyone know that there are still people out there converting Kadet Seniors to taildraggers. Mine's about done.

I actually removed all the covering from the bottom of the fuselage, glued in a structure of lite-ply and tri-stock for the mains, and a lite-ply plate for the tailwheel. I used pull-pull cables for the tailwheel steering. Not a hard mod to do at all. Mounting the Saito .72 inverted was a bigger challenge than the tailwheel mod!

I have a kadet senior that was built in 1986 my first plane. It flys today as a taildragger with main gear moved one former forward and a free caster tail wheel. The senior has so much rudder that TO's aren't a problem. Ground handling is poor without direct tail wheel control, but if plane is placed on the runway TO with full up elevator, full throttle, ease off up elevator as speed builds then rotate for TO. Stearing on roll out is not a problem. Satio 65 for power and standard 3 channel

I have the Electric Kadet and the larger arf also. I plan on making the large one a taildragger.

The small one is set up as a taildragger, but with a skid in the rear instead of a stearable wheel. I used the same method described above to add a stearable tail wheel to mine. Only difference is that I mounted the wheel directly on the rudder controlled wire at the bottom of the plane. Took about one minute to make the mod when building it.

The same thing could be done on the senior, but the pull pull set-up may work better on that size.

yes, I am sure you can mount the wheel directly to the "torque rod", even on the 80" ARF. It would be a lighter setup that way. I prefer a setup where everything can be disassembled. I would recommend shortening the springs I have shown in the pics above. The long springs tend to make ground handling a bit wobbly on tarmac. On grass it's no big deal.

When I did my Kadet Sr. tail dragger conversion, I decided it would be easeir to mount a micro servo in the tail than to rig up some sort of long linkage from the cabin area, and I wasn't excited about hacking up the tail to connect the tail wheel to the rudder somehow.

I connected the servo arms to the tail wheel with springs so I could easily use a low torque micro servo without worrying about shreding the gears.

Both rudder and tail wheel servos are driven by the rudder channel using a "Y" harness. You may notice from the pictures that I reinforced the servo and tail wheel mount area with some light ply. This has held up well with the exception of the one day I was out in 20+ mph winds. The rocking action on the ground from the wind gusts worked the tail wheel mounts loose. I put in blind nuts and haven't had a problem since.

The only down side to this is that it came out pretty tail heavy and I had to put a fair bit of lead up front. On the plus side, the Kadet is already so light that it doesn't even really notice this extra weight. With my 61-FS at idle, I can barely lose altitude unless I slip or force a dive. I flew this winter and in the sub freezing temps, I literally could not land until I killed the engine. This is the most stable, gentle, predictable aircraft I have ever flown.

Just as an aside, I really love flying the Kadet Sr. in high winds. You might have to walk it to the take off starting point, but it is fun to need to put it in a 1/2 throttle dive just to fly a landing approach and not get blown backwards! I've flown a vertical approach matching my airspeed with wind speed and touching down with almost no forward motion. (Usually the wind is lighter right at ground level so it will surge forward a bit right as you are flaring and touching down.)

I have as much fun with the Kadet as I do with any of my hot-dog airplanes.

Curt.

I converted mine a few years ago. Added a small chunk of light ply to the bottom of the fuse. Bolted on a Sullivan tailwheel mount. I had to melt the solder on the button of the Sullivan mount and turn it 90 degrees. Bend a piece of the spring wire into the shape of control horn with a small hole to accept a clevice. Solder this into the hole of the button. Build a control rod, one end to the rudder servo and the other to the tailwheel. That looked easiest with the plane built. If the plane is not built, I would go another way.

MikeB

I put a tail wheel on my kadet sr by putting a 1/8th plywood doubler on the bottom end of the fuse & mounted a du bro tail wheel assembly & put the steering arm at a 90 angle to the rudder & put a ezjust connector on the rudder horn next to the existing one & cut the covering on the stab next to the fuse & put a 1/4" piece of hard balsa about 1/2" wide with a 1/8" slot cut into the balsa & run the wire (2-56) down thru it to the steering arm. It works well & is very easy to set up & adjust.
We have 7 or 8 kadets in our club & most have brakes on the front wheel that works off the elevator servo arm.....when you use down elevator it puts the brake on...you can set it up easy but if you set it (adjust) too tight you will loose some down elevator. Use a cable to pull on the brake on...you don't need to push because when you let up on the elevator the brake relaxes. The attach point (pivot) is by installing a bolt thru the nose gear coil. Use a 1/16th piece of aluminum about 1/2" wide by 3" long with a twist in it just below the coil....drill a small hole near the top for a clevis & when you pull (down elev) the brake comes on. KADETS are fun airplanes...........pilgrim

Kadet sr.............you guys drop stuff? I have my kadet sr set up so I can drop 48 8 oz soda cans....MT....it is really something to see all that stuff coming down, it's hard to keep flying the airplane. I put a dowel thru the fuse forward of the le of the wing on the bottom, extending about 10 or 12" out each side of the fuse & attach 4 dowels, each with 12 soda cans, put 1/2" holes in the cans & slide them on the dowels. The dowels go back under the stab with a mount on the bottom of the fuse holding the dowels with #64 rubber bands , & a servo mounted on the bottom of the fuse just back of the nose wheel. When you pull the servo arm forward it releases the rubber bands under the tail & the back of the dowels drop away & it chucks the cans off.
4 decks of cards look good coming down too............. pilgrim

That is one fine KADET.........wish mine looked that good....I have 2 & they are both beaters.........crashed & rebuilt several times........