Hello,
I've been building and flying rc planes now for about 5 years, but still consider myself a beginner or novice at best. I have built and flown a Sig Lt-40, Sig Cavalier,Sig 4-Star 40s (3 of them), Sig Hog-Bipe, and a Great Planes 40 size P-51 Mustang. I dont consider myself much of a builder (sheeting and covering especially). The square airplanes are pretty easy to build, but the nicer-looking round fuse planes are tough for me. I am currently looking for a kit for a Magnum .61 2-stroke engine that I had in my Hog-Bipe (which bit the dust). I would really like an Extra-300s, or a nice war-bird, but I want my engine to be at the very top of the power range (if not a little over) for the airframe chosen. You can't go wrong with more power right? I am considering an ARF, but I've see a lot of those that aren't as strong as I would build myself. I also do not want a plane whose engine must be mounted inverted. Wow thats a lot of requirements to suit me huh? I'm very particular when it comes to parting with a couple-hundred of my hard-earned bucks! Well if you can help me I would appreciate any feed-back. Thanks

How about the Great Planes Extra?

They do a very good job of designing kits for easy building. Under its skin, the Extra is basically a box with a turtle deck, but it's a good looking aiplane and the fuselage box structure underneath is all self-aligning tab-and-slot type stuff a la Carl Goldberg. As I recall, the only sheeting parts are the wing leading edges and the turtle deck and foredeck... which if ya gotta do sheeting, at least those are the easiest parts to do it to -- ther only curve with the grain. It'd be good practice (you do want to build a comet or a spitfire some day don't you [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-wink.gif[/img])

If you'd really really like to stay away from sheeting curved surfaces, you could go with a 4* or, better yet, a Venture 60. That's a good plane that's great to build -- the quality of the kit and plans really makes building easy on the Venture.

My old standard was always the Ugly Stik, but for that I don't know if you can even get a kit anymore... of course the only real shaping on the whole thing is the wing ribs... and with its constant-chord wing, those are basically all the same outline, so it's easy to cut a set of ribs. I use the Ugly Stik for teaching people scratch building because it's so easy to cut out, easy to build well, and forgiving once it's built... it just about assures success.

How does the Great Planes Extra 300 engine mount? Not inverted I hope. Sideways or upright is OK with me.

For novice and first time builders, and those who seems to have more thumbs than fingures, I'll always recomend Great planes or Sig kits. their manuals have to be some of the best out there. they are easy, step by step, and gfeature loads of pictures. They also feature 'helpful hints' and 'expert building tips'.

Great Planes manuals are avaliable for download, so you can see what you're getting into. i nice feature from them!

With that, look at the Super Sportser 40 by GP, or the resently re-released Ultra Sport 40. Look at the Enforcer by Sig as well, different... As it's a Delta wing pusher.. The Sig Citabria might be up your alley as well..

The Extra 300 has the engine mounted sideways.

I forgot that the Super Sportster kit has been rereleased... I always liked the look of it. Compared to the Extra, it has more block carving and sanding -- to form the nose and fairings for the wings and tail pieces (I love the way the wing fairing is done on the Extra... foolproof way to get the effect that I really had to work for on the ol' Fun One). The Super Sportster has less sheeting because the turtle deck is covering directly over stringers. (Its engine is mounted upright and not cowled.)

Like Wogz says, it is worth a trip to www.greatplanes.com to check out the instruction manuals -- you can really sees what you're up against. I agree, too, about the instructions: Sig and Great Planes both do a super job on them.

Hey Thanks, I think I'll try that Great Planes 40 size Extra 300. It sounds like it satisfies all my criteria. Do you think the Magnum .61 2-stroke will fit ok with the stock muffler, or any recomendations on a Pitts-style that will fit this engine?

hello,

I am just starting to build a sig citabria,

I noticed you mentioned this as a good first builder.

I would like to mention that I have had some difficulty with the plans and manual for the sig citabria.

There is important information missing and the pictures are from the older version and the plans do not match the manual as even stated on page 2 on the manual.

I have e-mailed sig about this but have not gotten a reply from them.

here is what I have ran accross so far.

the bulsa wood, 90% is not marked and spent a great deal of time measuring them to see what size they were. I had to make sure I was using the right ones.

the lay out for the right side fusalage only, no left side layout and to try and mark all the markings for the bracing is a real pain. I recommend transparent paper and flip it over to get your marking right.

The plans for the wings, left side, right side and center. I pinned down on the line and lined up just the way the marking on the plans were, when I went to put all three together, things were off in places more than 1/4 of a inch. exspecially the center section. which I have to take back apart with out breaking the wing ribs and fix.

They also in the plans did not give the bottom gap for the aileron spar and leading edge for proper up and down movement of the ailerons on the wings.

The same also for the gap between the aileron and the wing itself. I lined up according to the plans and pinned down so I would be on there mark. but ended up having a bigger cab then what it should be, compared on a visual inspection of another citabria already built.

So for a beginner and me being one, this has been some what of a pain to fix and I prefer to do things right the first time then to fix. bad blue prints.

sporty

Wow, this is the kind of stuff that makes me really appreciate it when I get the chance to work directly with a first-time builder... see these aren't really bad things about your choice of airplane, they're almost universal.

Balsa Sizes -- those are virtually never marked. After doing this for a while, your eyeballs calibrate to the nearest 1/16" and you become able to quicly recognize the standard sizes: 1/32, 1/16, 3/32, 1/8, 3/16, and 1/4... 5/16 and 3/8 you don't see much, but they're almost automatic once you recognize the others. When I'm building with similar sizes, I sometimes mark one end of each stick with a highlighter color coded to its size.

Only one side shown on plans -- that's standard drafting procedure and, again, doing more is vitually unheard of. Your method will work, but an easier way with one less chance for error is (for sheet structures) extend marks for the edges of attached parts past the edges of the sheet on the plans, then lay both side pieces over the plans and transfer the markings directly to the edges of the sheets. From there you can open up the two sides book fashion (bottom to bottom or top to top) and pencil the part locations onto the inside of each. (For built-up structures) build the first side over the plan, flat sand that side, then cover with plastic wrap or similar and build the other side directly over the first. Either way, there's no tracing, very little work in transferring measurements, and the sides match exactly.

Separate wings panels that don't match -- that one's a really common problem. It is FAR more expensive to individually plot a set of plans than it is to copy them from a master and, unfortuantely, most copiers have a little error in them -- either they blow things up (or down) by three quarters of a percent (which is over half an inch over the span of a big trainer), or they change the aspect ratio a little, or the paper skids and they curve the lines, or all of the above... and even if none of those things cause problems, your copy is no better than the original hand drawing (believe me, there are some significant errors in the original drawings of some very popular planes). The only way to be sure you don't have a problem is to measure the joining areas for length and squareness before you build.

Control Surface gaps -- yep, that's another one... I've never seen it specified... ever. Again, once you've developed the calibrated eyeball, it'll be a total non-issue. For now, keep them under 1/16" and you're golden, but if you end up with too much, bridging the gap with covering gives an airtight seal that looks good and enhances the plane's performance. Actually, that's true even if your gaps are tight. Allowing enough space for the downward swing should also be a non-issue as long as the leading edge of the control surface has the proper to the upper edge.

So, to summarize, you've got standard blueprints at worst... the problems you've found are even present on very good plans. These are all learning curve items, unless you're lucky enough to find a kit that's so well tuned to the beginning builder that it deals explicitly with these things -- but I've never seen one go to that detail, so if you find one that does, PLEASE let us all know. Meanwhile, looking (in detail) at as many planes as you can will help. And, checking out some of the Harry Higley books offered in the magazines (Master Modeling, Bipes, Mostly Mounting, etc.) should also help speed you up the learning curve. Best, of course, would be to work with a master, but that's often not practical.

BTW, years ago I studied under a master carpenter who taught me two very important things:

1. A master is not somebody who never makes a mistake -- he's somebody who knows how to make it look like he never makes a mistake, even after he DOES make one, and
2. When you're not sure of what you're about to do, you just have to pretend it's some body else's [house, airplane, or whatever...] and go ahead and do it. (Note: this technique helps you build quickly and confidently regardless of whether the subject is somebody else's plane or your own).