I have a 60 size hangar 9 super stick that has never been flown. It was purchased for my grandson. It has a magnum 91 4s on it. We took it to the field the other day and had it secured by the tail while he was doing his range check. When he throttle up the fuselage broke in two where the 4 slots for the pushrods exit. 2 slots on the top and 1 on each side all in the same area. The only thing holding the plane from taking off was the pushrods connected to the rudder and elevator. Contacted Horizon Hobby but no joy at this point. When I started examining the fuselage where it broke, the stringers going on the inside stopped at the slots. Grandson is sick over this. I talked with Horizon Hobby at the Toledo Show and both people that I talked with said it sounded like bad balsa. They did say that was probably not the way to secure the plane when starting it up, but that they do it themselves. I hope Horizon hobby will replace this for us.

That's a bad break, but it's not too hard to fix either. Truth be told, it wouldn't be much more work to glue up the break and recover than it would be to take everything out and rebuild the airplane.

That's true, but it is no longer a new plane. He picked that stick because of the covering. I can recover the fuselage but not in the design that it was.

Now that is an interesting failure and certainly unusual. Oh man that conjures up visions of the movie American Graffiti when the kids chained up the axle of a lurking police car and then raced by


Might be interesting how horizon handles this one, I hope they send a new fuselage for the grandson.

John

John that is about what it looked like. That really is a weak point on that plane. The bottom of the stab butts up to the bottom sheeting on the fuselage. So with that, the 4 slots all in the same area makes it very weak.

goirish sorry to hear about your grandson's plane. I started with a 40 ultra stick with a saito 82 on it and it broke in the same spot, mid-flight. The hangar 9 sticks are really fun flying planes, but need to be reinforced in a few spots. The areas I had problems with was: rear of the fuse, right were your's broke, firewall, were the landing gear attachs to the fuse and the dowels that hold the wing on. Sounds like a lot, huh? Even with all that it was one of my favorite go-to planes ever. It does almost every aerobatic manuver, it's good in the wind and it taught and gave me confidence flying inverted. I ended up moving my elevator servo to the back of plane to balance out the 82 in the nose. When I did, I re-enforced the whole back end with some ply.<div></div><div>By the end, my plane had about an extra pound of epoxy, but it still flew great. I just wanted to use the 82 on a new project. If Hangar 9 does nothing, the fix is not hard and you will not notice any difference.</div>

I would certainly be requesting a new plane from Hanger 9. The method you used to restrain you plane is something that is a standard practice in the hobby. If Hanger 9 does not give you a new plane, I would repeat this story on every RC forum site I could find. So, let us know what happens. I will definitely support you by contacting them and telling them how I feel about it. I'm other would do the same.

talked with Horizon Hobby today and they said that plane was discontinued but they would send me a new fuselage and tail feathers. I am happy with that. Now my grandson will still have a new plane. Thanks Horizon.

Thats first class customer service that the bottom dollar resellers are just not able to do.

John

Just in case drip CA into the areas you cannot reach before putting the plane together, fuel proof the rest to add strength.

The CA adds almost NO weight while strengthening and hardening the wood ( it's "aromatic" ).... while the epoxy tends to give up most of the liquid during drying, dropping the weight.

Mine failed Sunday but for another reason. We were flying in 14-15 mph winds when a side gust hit during take off flipping it inverted and violently into the ground, I was at full power on a Mag 91 FS but it was not enough as the wind was behind at that point and I was going downwind inverted at 6 feet.
The sad part is I can't replace the plane....rip.

Sorry to hear that. The plane is no longer being made, but Horizon Hobby does have all the parts.

Thanks, I would need about everything, so........it's a write off

Goirish,
I am rebuilding my 60 size ultra stick. Broke in the same spot. It has a lot of but joints there and it is a weak spot. Your not the first to have this problem to be sure.
There is a topic about mods to do on this plane if you do a search here on RCU. Basically reinforce firewall, landing gear, wing mounts and the wood between the elevator halves.
Even with all the stuff that needs reinforced I love the plane. They fly SO WELL that I can overlook the reinforcing stuff.
Good on you for flying with your grandkid by the way!

Securing by the tail wheel is generally frowned on though...done often, but now you know the hazzard of it. We had a gentleman fly a similar plane into his belly wide open a year or so ago. He escaped with a bad case of welts and bruises. Several of us needed a change of shorts after that one.

My Hangar 9 Super Stick 40 has about 13 inches of the rear fuselage completely missing. Just broke off.
Any help appreciated.
Ivan.

It should be a simple glue up job to fix it if you still have the tail.

Actually, The last 13/14 (A guess) inches of fuselage is gone, as in not there. It has to be built, then connected/glued. I just don't know original length of the fuselage, and don't want to guess at it.
Thanks fior the reply.

You know if you can guess down to fractions such as that then it is not going to make a hill of beans differance in flying. Actually an inch or so either way will not be a problem. Slightly longer will of course move the CG aft slightly but nothing you can,t handle with placement of other components. But if anything the slightly longer will improve on pitch stability.

So just go ahead and make your guess and build a new aft fuselage with box section fuses thats usually pretty easy to do. I would recommend that since you need so much of the aft section that you not try to splice any remains of the fuse at the tail. Instead build the aft fuse from tail post to the rear wing saddle area. just strip off any portions of the fuse from the tail feathers and install then on the newly repaired fuse just as it they were an arf.


John

Your reply is just the kind of straight up, no nonsense answer to my question, John. A few people I talked with about this made me feel like the rank amateur I am, suggesting that I aquire a PhD.in Aeronautics before attempting to fix this fuselage.
Thanks. I'm getting on it right away.
Here's what it looks like now:-

Gene, what did they say the correct way to hold the plane down was?? Other then the way most everyone does it. Just wondering.

I'm with GrayBeard. The only way I ever saw a plane secured prior to take off is with a soft rope around the tail feathers except for the few times someone was holding the plane and let go when the pilot said to. How did they tell you it should be done?

They told me that was not the preferred way to secure the plane but they knew that it was probably a general practice. They did not offer any suggestions as to the proper way to hold the plane. I normally use a flight stand and secure it by the wings. BTW, I did a repair on it and used a wing from an old ultra stick and the planes flies great. I have not flown the new super stick yet. I ended up putting a 75 ASP 2 stroke on it. Didn't have anymore spare 4 strokes not mounted. The repaired stick has a 91 4s Magnum. Here is a couple of pictures of the reworked Super Stick

You gotta love the relatively easy to fix nature of Stiks!

Last season I lawn darted my .60 Stik during a fun fly try to purposely crash into other planes on the field ( yes that was part of the contest ).

The fuse broke into four pieces. The wing mount sheared off at the wing root. The gear area ripped out, the firewall was smashed, the fuselage behind the wing broke and the tail came off completely looking much like yours.

I collected all of the pieces after the crash and stuck them in a box.

I was going to toss the plane, but instead I pulled the covering off and started glueing and re-inforcing.

A couple of hours of work later, the plane looks BETTER than new and is now much stronger than before with only a small weight penalty.

I already have 30 flights on it this season...