Hallo to everybody!
Please i would like to help me in some questions i have about Sig Kadet Senior.

1. I am ready to buy it because i know that it is the slowest and eysiest to fly.
i would like to put ailerons BUT i don't want to change the flying characteristics of the plane.
I tell you this because i read that if you put ailerons you must change the dihedral.
Is this right or not?

2. Can i cover it with solartex or it is too heavy? i am going to use a Super Custom 46 2 stroke

3. Please give me a link that descripes the method to make ailerons.

Thank you very much for your time.

Regards.

1. I have seen both seniors and senioritas with ailerons with more than recommended dihedral. they dont roll very well, but its doable

2.I have no idea(have to get a little more experienced help on it

3. the way i was shown to do it on the one im working on, is to remove the trailing edge and add a piece of stock in(i used 3/8x1/4 i beleive)to mount hinges to(ie attach were the TE was), then use a wider strip of TE material to form the aileron. That advice comes from an old man thats been flying model planes since....well i dont know whe he started, he was a world champion control line pilot in '46, so that should tell you something......There may be a better way to do it, thats just how i was shown.

Wing dihedral is used to make the plane more roll stable, which is very important if the plane does not have ailerons. High wing dihedral tends to make trainers fly with wings that level themselves. A plane with ailerons does not need the stability of dihedral because the pilot is able to use the ailerons to keep the wings level. Soo ... installing ailerons means you can reduce the dihedral. If you keep in the dihedral, the effectiveness of the ailerons will probably be reduced. If you are learning to fly, use the standard wing with dihedral to learn on, and then build a new wing with no dihedral to put the ailerons in and use that as a second plane. I did that many years ago. I think most high wing planes with ailerons have no, or very little dihedral.

I remember seeing a Senior fly a long time ago, I seem to remember it was very slow and heavy. Addding weight to it may make it even worse. You will probably be better off to buy a 4 channel plane after you learn on the 3 channel Senior. Adding ailerons are easy if you have built a wing or two for 4 channel plane. If you have to ask how to do it, it is not so easy to explain.

I have never used solartex, don't know anything about it.

I have kit bashed a Kadet to make it fully aerobatic. My suggestions is if you want to add ailerons is to ditch most of the dihedral. Considering it is a high wing plane, you can even setup the wing with no dihedral and it will be pretty stable in roll. The dihedral with ailerons produces a lot of coupling issues, which IMO actually makes the plane harder to fly. At first, I built the plane stock, but with ailerons. I didn't liek the way it flew. I cut the wing and set it at zero dihedral, it flew much better. Easier to control, felt more solid with aileron inputs, less control coupling. Granted, I was setting the plane up for full aerobatics, but even as a beginner, I'd think less dihedral than stock would be better. If you are uneasy about removing all the dihedral, consider removing 2/3 of the dihedral.

I made my ailerons by cutting the wing at the rear spar. This is a convient place on that design because it is easy to reinforce the hing line. This does make for 1/3 chord ailerons, which sounds excessive, but it's not. However, with large ailerons so you don't need much movement, so remember that.

Cheers

johnny- The Senior is available as ARF, which already has ailerons installed. Cost somewhat more than the kit, but you'll have that much in it if you build it. I'm not usually a proponent of almost ready to fly airplanes, but you might want to look into that option.
The Senior has a very light wing loading and is a magnificent flyer even on three channels. Jim

Thank you all very much for your time and for your advises.
Please i have an other question.
Do you think that it is ok if i add a tailwheel or not.
It will be easy for me as a tottaly begginer to control the plane with tailwheel?
Thank you again.

If I remember correctly, the Senior has a nose wheel. Changing to tail wheel will change the CG, maybe make the plane too tail heavy. It also changes the angle of attack of the main wing while taking off and landing. That can cause other problems for landing and take offs because it might float from the extra lift before it is going fast enough to actually fly. The final concern I can think of, is the structure strong enough to handle the loads of the tail wheel. In order to make it work you may have to move the wing position backwards and move the main landing gear forward. Nose wheels are generally considered easier to learn on, changing to tail wheel will not be worth the trouble if you are just learning to fly. If you are new to this hobby, I would highly suggest NOT trying to add ailerons and tailwheel until after you are able to fly the plane the way it was originally designed. These changes are fairly complicated, but they can be done. If you do not have the experience to do them correctly, you are more likely to only cause yourself more headaches.

I made mine a taildragger with no problems.
It did make it a little tail heavy but that was adjusted with a little weight in the nose.
The only major change is repositioning the main gear forward. I placed mine so that the center of the wheel was inline with the leading edge of the wing. No need to change anything else.
As for control, I like taildragger better. Tail wheel or nose wheel, you steer with the same stick.

Making it a tail dragger is not difficult at all. It shouldn't change the CG too much. It will shift it aft a little, but not as much as you'd think, because part of the process involves moving the main gear forward--thus offsetting most of the CG shift.

Move the wing position aft? What does that mean?

You won't have to move the wing at all. The AOA of the wing will be the same, once the tail comes up on the takeoff roll. If anything, it might even become less, if the tail comes up higher, and the nose rotates lower than what is allowed with the nose gear installed. All in all, it won't matter anyway--not with this plane. This plane would be darn near impossible to stall, as long as you're providing power. Make the mods, and you'll be glad you did.

Also, add the ailerons. There are post after post after post on RCU involving how to add ailerons to the kit. Not hard at all, and learning on a four channel (IMO) is much better than on a 3 channel. I know some people will disagree with that, but I like four channels (positive roll control).

OK, that is my $.02