SackOHammers

Quick Question:
What is the best way to secure battery wires, servo wires, etc to the inside of the fuse?
The way this plane fits together, the servos and linkages for the ailerons fit into the fuse in the same cavity as the rudder/elevator servos, the ESC, the Receiver, etc. It is cramped and I need to ensure that the wires and such do not interfere with smooth operation of the servos and linkages.

I tried some masking tape but it just doesn't want to hold the wires down... it slowly peels up. What is the recommendation here? I also want to make sure it doesn't cause a fire.

Maybe I should use small dabs of 5 minute epoxy to hold the wires? It is close to the CG so I'm not worried about weight right there.
I'm thinking there has to be some kind of tape you're all using and I just don't know what it is.

Thanks
Hammers

jdetray

A few dabs of hot-melt glue would hold the wires nicely. Plus it is easier than epoxy to remove if that becomes necessary.

- Jeff

SackOHammers

That worked pretty well, thanks for the suggestion.

Ok, plane is together now, just need to add the landing gear. Tested the electronics and everything responds as expected.

I have one more problem. The top wing... how do you make it stay in position? Basically, it sits on top of the pieces of plastic (one on each side of the nose). There are also four wing struts, but they are able to pivot, even with the screws very tight. So, if I lift the plane by the top wing, the wing basically comes free from the two uprights on the nose.
Also, how do you guarantee that the wing struts will not pivot on one side and not on the other during flight. What am I missing here? There has to be something else holding the top wing to the plane... other than just sitting on the two verticle supports and being held by the four struts.
Am I supposed to glue the wing to the verticle supports coming from the sides of the nose?

Please help.

Thanks.
Hammers

cyclops2

SachOHammers.

How did you ever think of the name ?

SackOHammers

Heh, its an old expression. Its been in a few movies... sometimes its said "bag of hammers" instead. Movies I can think of off the top of my head are "Cool Hand Luke" and "Oh Brother Where Art Thou". Probably others, I'm too tired to remember this morning.

Flypaper 2

Yes, the wing is supposed to be epoxied to the struts. Seeings that it's all together, turn the plane upside down on the table Rough up the sides with sandpaper a bit at the top. Run some 5 min. epoxy in the slots. Make sure the plastic struts touch the bottom of the slots as that determines the wing incidence. You may have to put a shim under the wing at the centre to make sure the struts touch the bottom of the slots. Hope this helps.

SackOHammers

Great, thanks for the help. PatnChris also send me a helpful PM with much the same information. I'll rough up those supports with medium grit, clean them off, and use generous 5 minute epoxy to hold the wing there. I'll make sure to seat the supports fully into the slots on the wing and pay attention to the general alignment of the wings as the epoxy sets.

Its getting there, this is the last thing (except for balancing). I'll probably be able to maiden it this weekend, weather permitting.

Thanks for everyone's help.

Hammers

Flypaper 2

Something you may want to fix before you fly it. The landing gear mountis not to strong. Ripped mine out on the second landing and it wasn't that bad.I put a 1/32 ply strip across the bottom of the firewall. Bent up a 1/32 wire brace and soldered it to the main gear with wrapped copper wire, like this.

SackOHammers

Yeah, I'll admit the stock gear, especially the wheels, look pretty sketchy for the weight invovled here.

SackOHammers

Built up a simple CG machine. Threw an ounce of weight on the stick mount.
Ready to maiden. Wind was too bad yesterday... went up anyway with the SuperCub. Rough landing, had fun.. but definitely not the time to maiden the Tiger Moth.

Flypaper 2

Cg they show is a little on the nose heavy side. After you get a handle on it you can take a bit out to suit yourself. Makes it a little more aerobatic. Doesn't show it to well in the pic but I put ailerons on the top wing too for aerobatics.

SackOHammers

Too windy to fly the Tiger Moth again yesterday. Had fun with the Super Cub in the wind. Enough wind that I was able to hover horizontally for long stretches (even taking thumbs off the sticks)...even flew backwards for a few seconds. I kept trying to do a vertical landing... but down near the ground, with all the trees around the air wasn't stable enough.

Yeah, per Patnchris I decided to go a little nose-heavy for the first few flights. This is my "aileron trainer" so-to-speak... I want to keep it on the tame side. I can always change it up later as I get more confident with it.

patnchris

A word of advice on the maiden. Resist the urge to take off and fly straight up. A lot of guys crash on the first attempt because the plane has a very light wing load. It lifts off with very little effort. It is deceiving beacuse once airborn it seems like it is up to speed, but it isn't. Many will pull back on the stick immediately and the plane stalls almost instantly. Get up some airspeed and be gentle on the sticks. The TigerMoth is a ball to fly, but is not as forgiving, in the air, as the Super Cub. Forget the rudder for now. Turn by the "bank and yank" method. Bank the plane and a slight amount of elevator and it turns, nicely.....There's plenty of time to play with the rudder, once you learn to fly the plane. .....Good Luck.....Pat

SackOHammers

Thanks again. I'll let you all know how it turns out. Might be a couple weeks before I can get some daylight and no wind.

SackOHammers

Finally, after several attempts to fly this TigerMoth, I got a day with very little wind.
It was great fun to fly this bright yellow bird. It has so much power with the Park 400 in it... very impressive. Hehe, nice verticle climbing... compared the Super Cub, hehehe.

I had a ball with this plane and flew 3 packs through it. I did rip out the landing gear on my second flight. It drops altitude very quickly when you get it slowed down... I was expecting it to glide a little more... so the landing was a little rough and ripped out the gear. I epoxied it back on and made the same mistake on my 3rd pack. At that point I just hand launched and belly landed it.... I did this about 10 times on that last pack. I got much better at landing it more smoothly... I just had to come in a little faster, with a little less altitude, and chop the throttle for a smooth landing.

What great fun....I was doing loops, stalls, hammerheads, etc on my first flight.

When I took off on the first flight I did have to trim the ailerons quite a bit. In order to fly level I was at about 75% trim. After landing I looked at the ailerons and they were turned up and down about 1/8-1/4 inch to get it to fly level. I must have some type of shift in the wings or a weight problem. I'll look into it after my New Years travels. Regardless... even with it trimmed so heavily I did get several very enjoyable flights.

Thanks again for all your help!

mararra

Grats on the maiden! Mine is ready to go when and if the weather co-operates. Keep hearing about the weak landing gear, maybe I should do the mod? I too, had problems adjusting the ailerons and the starboard wing has a bit of a warp at the root. Hope it doesn't cause too much trouble.

M

SackOHammers

I'll take it out once or twice more and see if my landing practise paid off. If not, I'll do the landing gear mod as suggested above.

Yes, my wings were a little warped as well. This is probably part of the reasons that the ailerons need to be slightly off-plane in order to get level flight.

mararra

[X(]

I tried to maiden my Moth today, what a handful!! Wind was less than 10 mph, thought that wouldn't be a problem, but at 1/3 throttle it hovered facing into the wind ! Any more power and she headed almost straight up. It was the squirreliest flying I have experienced in my short career as a RC pilot. I managed to get it down by cutting power and dead sticking to a controlled belly flop. Sure am glad no one witnessed it. I was very surprised by the erratic way it flew. I must have something out of whack somehow. Didn't have a chance to trim it out cause all my concentration and every bit of the limited flyin skill I posess was used to get it on the deck in one piece, which I'm glad to report I accomplished. Gonna do a recheck of everthing and wait for ZERO wind for my next attempt. I'll keep ya posted.

M

patnchris

mararra
Your plane is tail heavy....Ask me how I know?.....Been there, done that.....A tail heavy Tiger Moth will exibit some very unusual flight characteristics. If you are flying with the stock motor, you will need at least an ounce in the nose. If you've install a brushless Park 400, but did not push the motor forward as I told Sackohammers, you will probably need to add 3 oz or more to get the CG right. Unfortunately, this is useless weight and will affect the flying of the plane.....Pat

mararra

Thanks for the tip Patnchris, you confirmed my suspicions. I kinda figured it might be tail heavy, tho my "looks about right test" liftin it with my fingers under the wing at the reccomended cog appeared to have it close. Moved the little 3S1P 1300 mAh lipo all the way forward today and tried it again. Man was it COLD, but the Moth flew much better. Still wants to climb with anything more than 1/4 throttle. I have the stock motor and will try it next with a 2S Lipo. I had to do some serious trimming of both the elevator and aileron/rudder to get it to go straight and level. I believe that to be necessary because of the warp in the wing and a slightly misaligned rudder. This was my first build. That's my excuse AND I'm stickin to it! Gonna hang this one up for the winter and start on my Mountain Models J-3 Cub build. Too dang cold to be outside flyin.

Happy New Year, all !!

M

SackOHammers

As you can see from my pictures I added an ounce of weight to the stick mount for the motor... even with the motor extended out. I never would have done this had patnchris not given me the advice. Building the CG machine was simple and it helped me figure out how much weight to add.

I don't have the problem you're experiencing. My plane flies straight and true anywhere from 1/4 to 3/4 throttle with elevator and rudder trimmed even with the stabilizer. The only trim I had to add was to the ailerons.

I have the motor mounted forward, 1 ounce of weight, and the 3S battery is always pushed as far forward as possible. Also, I was very careful about glue when building this. I used epoxy very sparingly so as not to add weight to the tail.

mararra

Hi Hammers,

I think I have a multitude of little problems that are all contributors to the unstable flyin characteristics of my Moth. I was very careful keepin the weight down, but had trouble attaching the rudder/elevator/ailerons (first time usin ca hinges). I just don't like the crude molding of the flyin surfaces. It could be I just got a bad kit, I've heard the GWS models vary vastly in quality from kit to kit. Don't think it's a lost cause, just gonna take a bit of fiddlin, but I'm really takin a liking to the balsa kits. My Stevens Stik is sooo smooooth, and I've got two balsa Cub kits to build this winter; Gonna be hard to find time for the Moth. []
M

RickVB

My Feedback: (24)

Late to the party, but I have a couple questions. What are you guys using for wheels (other than Hammer, who's using the stock ones)? I'm going to do Gord's landing gear mod, and I thought I'd get better wheels too while I'm at it. I know that three years ago when I did my last GWS kit, folks universally dumped the wheels and the glue.

Speaking of the glue, has that changed in the last three years? I know back then using the GWS glue was frowned apon due to it's questionable strength and slow curing. Any other opinions?

jdetray

Rick -

I think the GWS glue remains the same. What many folks don't understand is that the GWS glue is a contact cement. The proper way to use it is to apply a thin coating to both surfaces, stick them together briefly, then pull apart. Let dry until barely tacky, then press the parts together. You need to be sure you align the parts carefully when finally bringing them together, since they will bond instantly. For this reason, I don't use it because I prefer some working time when gluing parts, but it does work if used properly.

As for wheels, a nice lightweight option is [link=http://www.shopatron.com/index/101.0.5161.5187.0.0.0]Du-Bro Super Light Wheels[/link] in the size of your choice.

- Jeff

mararra

Hi Rick

I like the wheels I got from unitedhobbies.com . They are similar in appearance to stock but wider and have a nice foam tread. Couldn't bring myself to use those nasty plstic tread toy wheels that came with the kit.
M