Mpizpilot

My Feedback: (45)

I'm elbows deep in a AMR 35% decathalon, and it was strange to be building without plans but I gotta tell you this has been the most enjoyable kit I've ever built. It's almost like putting together a 3d puzzle.

Bob Paris

My Feedback: (13)

Hay Mpixpilot,
That is nice to know and to be honest...I'm really looking forward to begin my build. It will also be my first build with out plans...but if what your saying is the same with my airframe...all is good. I just wish plans did come with the kit...needed or not.

I put my assembly manual that comes with the kit in a binder with plastic covers today (it will last longer this way)...and the glue is drying on my building board cork. With any luck, I should be on the job tomorrow with the fuselage assembly.

My New Spectrum 18 channel Tx arrived to day, with the 18 channel Rx's for this model. Since I have electric start, I will need seven channels alone for the two electric start EME 35's.

Soft Landings Always,
Bobby of Maui

Bob Paris

My Feedback: (13)

Aloha,

Fuselage construction,

The first thing I needed to do was pull out the parts to begin assembly, per the manual. This turned into an interesting bit of work. These first parts will be for the fuselage and all are made out of light ply wood. You will need to pull all the wood out of the kit and locate the marked parts. All the parts are marked, but there are so many parts to look through...you will need a bit of time to locate them all. There are 16 parts to locate for the first nine (9) steps. You will need to laminate formers #1 (four pieces), former #2 has two pieces as well as former #3 and former #8. FF1 & FF2 appear to be floor pieces, or the bottom of the fuselage and these need to be glued together. The parts fit for FF1 & FF2 was tight and easy to do. I am using Tightbond III for most of this work. This is going to be a big model... : )

Soft Landings Always,
Bobby of Maui

3136

Hey Bob did your EME 35's come with the starters fitted?
When I fitted mine they were a little tricky to get the gears running smoothly, there should be fairly little resistance when lined up properly.

Bob Paris

My Feedback: (13)

Aloha 3136,
I had my EME35's fitted for me by Magnum R/C-the folks I bought the engines from. I was told that they need to be set up properly and these gentleman did it for $10.00/engine. It was cheap insurance, to make sure I had the engines electric start gears properly meshed. I could have done it myself, I'm sure...but Magnum has the special equipment to do it right.

What are you going to use for batteries, for your electric start, on your EME engine? LiPo, or Nickel batteries. I was told to use a 40C 1800 ma. 3S Lipo for my electric start, on each engine. I've not purchased my starting batteries yet, but do have my two controllers for my engines. I purchased the controllers that Magnum sells for the EME35, and not the EME controllers.

Soft Landings Always,
Bobby of Maui

Bob Paris

My Feedback: (13)

Aloha,
Well today I actually started gluing my formers together and started the assembly.

Your fire wall "F1" will have four pieces to be glued together, with one having cross hairs imprinted. This one, with the cross hairs, is to face forward-with the rest unmarked formers, glued aft, behind this one.

"F2" has two identical pieces and you are asked to glue these with Epoxy.

"F3" has two bulkheads to be glued together...but are not identical, for there is a slight difference.

"F8" has two identical pieces to be glued together, but again, your requested to use Epoxy glue on these two formers.

All the parts were a good match and the only rework I did was cut off the little wood tets left off from the main piece of wood they were cut from. I used lead weights, tile and small steel plates to hold pressure while the glue was drying. To hold the wood pieces from moving once set, I used just a pinch of fine beach sand between the wood pieces.

Every thing is setting up and will continue more tomorrow. My work bench needs to be double the size to really work on this size airframe... : )...and since I'm not using CA glue...takes time to dry. I've been so used to using CA, that when I reverted back to how I built things many years ago...I was...lets say, a bit impatient. But I'm working on this patience thing.

Soft Landings Always,
Bobby of Maui

3136

There's no special equipment required, after you have fitted one you could do 10 in a row perfectly, you just need to understand how all the parts fit and how to align them all so the gears run smooth.
Don't forget to grease the gears and check every now and then.
With the starter fitted you cant adjust the timing without taking it off, so I hope they set your timing before fitting the starters.

Cool project BTW.

Bob Paris

My Feedback: (13)

Aloha 3136,
The engines came to me with the timing set and the starter installed. I understood it took a special attachments to get a perfect alignment of the gears. Ok...it most probably was a simple mechanical chore to do, but if I do have an issue with my timing...I'll have to remove the electric starter. I had no idea you had to remove the starter to reset the timing...I do pray mine is ok on both my engines. I wont know until I fire them up after the build is complete. I will grease my gears...simple to do with them out in the open. I'll just clean them after each flying session and re-grease then.

What batteries and system are you going to use for your electric start?

Soft Landings Always,
Bobby of Maui

3136

You can test and set your timing on the bench have a look here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GBXFpxWg7vY
Print the degree wheel out and stick it to some plywood or cardboard.

If you have any problems go to the gas engine section.

I got the rcexel controller for mine which is made for the eme starters http://www.sdshobby.com/special-elec...r-p-11772.html
I was going to use a 2100 30c lipo 3 cell

Bob Paris

My Feedback: (13)

Aloha 3136,
Thank you for the information and when I get to the point where I'm ready to mount my engines, I'll be checking the timing of both my EME 35's.

I managed to get to step # 13 in the manual last night and all my bulkheads are drying. Today I will be getting the sides of the fuselage joined to step # 17. There are nearly 200 steps to building this model and the manual ends with you ready to cover the model. I am using scuba weights, ceramic tile and metal plates to weight down the parts I'm gluing together. Most wood glues need a bit of compression of the wood pieces to get a really good bond. I like using Tightbond III, but waiting for the glue to dry is the issue...I'm spoiled using CA glue.

There are a lot of parts to this kit...but its a big model. One of the nice things in building a larger kit is that the parts are larger and more easy to handle...until the model is built. Then you have a rather large collection of a model to handle. Now that I've had to dig into the box to pull out my bits and pieces, I came to the realization, that there is no way I could get this kit all back into the box it came in. There is a lot of wood here and with a 80" long fuselage...it just barely will fit onto my building board. My building board is 80.25" long...I wish it was just a bit longer, but will do for this build.

Soft Landings Always,
Bobby of Maui

Bob Paris

My Feedback: (13)

Aloha,
I managed to get my fuselage side pieces glued together, Parts No. FF2 & FF3.

I also ran into a minor issue with the instruction manual, with steps numbered 16 & 17.

These two steps call out for you to find nose fuselage inside doubler FF3 and laminate it onto (now glued together parts) FF2 & FF3.

I was not able to locate the part doubler they call out for part number FF3.

What I was able to find is part number FS1.

Part number FS1 and part number FF3 appear to be the same part. So I sent an e-mail to AMR to clarify the issue.

Part numbers FF2 & FF3 are now being glued together and after they dry, I'll glue doubler FS1 onto parts number FF2 and FF3.

Soft Landings Always,
Bobby of Maui

Mpizpilot

My Feedback: (45)

I'm having a couple similar issues with my AMR build as well, I've actually redlined the issues as I find them in the manual and email them to AMR. I'm not doing this to complain, just to help make an excellent product even better.

Bob Paris

My Feedback: (13)

Hay Mpizpilot,
I am doing the same thing. What I feel and believe is that over the years this kit has been produced, they have made modifications to make the kit better. The construction manual has yet to catch up and even though I believe all is good with my kit, I would like to make the instructions more clear to anyone that comes behind me and builds the kit. So far I'm impressed with the complexity of the build and how straight forward it is. No complaints really, just looking for more charity. The build is moving right along and the only frustrations I am dealing with is the wait time for the glue to dry... : ( ... I got used to the instant CA glues, and reverting back to waiting for things to dry is the thing. But I will survive... : ) .

Soft Landings Always,
Bobby of Maui

Bob Paris

My Feedback: (13)

Aloha,
What I am really pleased with, is that when I send an e-mail to AMR, and have a question about the kit...so far...I've received an answer within 24 hours or less. I just received an e-mail telling me I was correct in my assumption and to continue on with the build. I was told if the parts match up in the picture, to continue...FS1 & FF3 are one in the same part.

Soft Landings Always,
Bobby of Maui

Bob Paris

My Feedback: (13)

Aloha,
I came to another small issue with my assembly. You are requested to in step #11 to laminate two wood floor pieces FF4 together. The floor pieces FF4 in my kit do not have the six (6) rectangular holes cut in them-the instructions show them to have...(do I have two miss cut pieces or was this part changed and not noted in the instructions). I did laminate the two pieces that were marked FF4, but I will not glue them onto the floor pieces FF1 & FF2 that were glued together in Step #9 until I receive clarification from AMR.

In Step #21 you are told to glue/laminate a piece of wood, 1/4" x 5" x 6-5/8" (called a "Plate" in the instructions) onto the floor of pieces FF1 & FF2 (these two pieces were glued together in Step #9). What I am not told in the instructions, is if this plate is made out of light ply or balsa wood.

I sent an e-mail to AMR tonight for clarification.

This is why I like a good set of plans with any kit I build.

Soft Landings Always,
Bobby of Maui

Bob Paris

My Feedback: (13)

Aloha,
I went through the kit parts looking for the Landing Gear Plate that the instructions call out for, and I came across three pieces of good quality plywood that fit the description of what I need in my assembly. The three pieces of cut 1/4" plywood are taped together and from what I can assume, is a change in the kit landing gear floor area. If you look at Step # 28 you will see that the landing gear plate had three stringers about 5" long, that were glued in Longitudinally. This is the old placement of these parts in the kit.

If you look at Step #23, you will see two pieces of support ply wood, called "Binding Rails", that are glued in with epoxy, Laterally. This must be the new way to build up the landing gear plate assembly.

The larger plywood plate is called "Gear Plate 1" and the two lateral stringers are labeled "Gear Plate 2."

I then glued the two laminated FF4 floor structure pieces, onto the main floor FF1 and FF2, as called out for in Step #19 in the assembly instructions.

Like Mpizpilot, I'm voicing the anomalies in the instructions I find, and forwarding them to AMR. Otherwise...this is an excellent kit, with a parts fit that is outstanding. This is a well thought out kit and its built to handle the flight and landing loads of a heavier model. Its one tough airframe so far and very pleased with what I see. The landing gear area is quite stout and built to take your less then perfect landings.

The other thing I came to realize as this is going to be a floater. I built a .60 ~ .90 size Big Stick ARF, and installed a RCG 20cc gas engine onto that model. The weight of that model came out to 10.2 lbs and had a 1000 square inches of wing. That model had a power off glide that was amazing...and from what I have been told, this kit will hit the scales @ around 32~35 lbs. With 2700 square inches of wing...it may very well have a better glide then my 20cc gas Big Stick... : ) There is one thing that I have to say about Ugly Stick models...they fly well and very predictable in the air. Easy to land, glide for ever and fun, relaxing and a blast to fly.

@ 32 lbs Gross Weight, w/2700 sq. in. A wing loading of 27.31 oz./sq. ft.
@ 35 lbs Gross Weight, w/2700 sq. in. A wing loading of 29.87 oz./sq. ft.

These are light wing loading stats for a model of this size...and like I said earlier, its going to have a really sweet glide.

Soft Landings Always,
Bobby of Maui

Bob Paris

My Feedback: (13)

Aloha,
A rainy day...so back to the assembly.

The next step they ask you to get the fuselage floor ready to epoxy the landing gear floor plate (L.G.F.P.) onto, the bottom floor of the fuselage FF1 & FF2. To properly epoxy the L.G.F.P. onto the fuse bottom, you will need to do step 20 and to do step 20, you have to get the fuse floor 3/8"sq. side rails in placed-glued in. The instructions do not ask you to glue the side rails into place until step 38. The object of the path way in construction is to get the floor assembly ready to accept all the formers...from F1 to F8. Then the fuse side pieces and sub flooring, with the top of the fuse last.

So to do step 22, to epoxy in the L.G.F.P. in, I first glued in the two side railing 3/8"sq. balsa, on each side of the floor bottom. I used Tight Bond III and this will give me 10 minutes of working time, before the glue begins to take a set. I used small pins to go through the wood, down into my building board. I needed to clean up the excess glue, then set in formers F4 to F8 into their floor slots and then readjusted the 3/8" sq. balsa, so that all formers sat up snug to all the 3/8" sq. side rails. There was just a little resetting of the 3/8" sq. railings to the formers. The parts fit is very good, but I did manage to get everything snug. DO NOT GLUE IN THE FORMERS F1 TO F8.

You will have to install 3/8" sq. balsa on the forward part of the fuse floor to, and there will be two shorter pieces here to glue in.

After all my 3/8" sq. balsa set up, I did step 20, sand 1-7/8" off of the 3/8" sq. side railings next to where the L.G.F.P. is to sit. Remember...we started this out to epoxy this piece in, and now after doing the sanding mod, called out for in step 20, we are ready to glue in the L.G.F.P.

After the sanding mod I glued in the L.G.F.P. A bit of caution is needed here. The forward L.G.F.P. edge, sets just forward of the landing gear hold down screw holes. There is not a lot of wiggle room here, so make sure you go past the holes a wee bit, and if you look closely at the pictures in the manual, you will see that they ground down the 10/32 blind nuts flush to the edge of the L.G.F.P. forward edge. They do not leave a lot of room here for the blind nuts shaft to sit clean, and you don't want to grind down any of the screw body/shaft, of the blind nuts. They sanded the blind nuts almost flush to the body/shaft of the 10/32 blind nuts. Look at picture 22 and 23 in your build manual.

After the 3/8" sq. side railings glue set up,I removed all the formers. You do not permanently begin to glue in the formers until step 27.

Disregard step 24, you did it in step 3.

Soft Landings Always,
Bobby of Maui

Mpizpilot

My Feedback: (45)

I'm still finding a few anomalies myself, but find that the drawings are correct so it's usually just a matter of finding the pieces that match the drawings. I stopped emailing AMR, I haven't gotten much feedback. Still really enjoying the build though. Can't wait to see. How yours turns out.

Bob Paris

My Feedback: (13)

Hay Mpizpilot,

I did send an e-mail to AMR today and told them that it was a shame, that with such a good engineered kit, good wood and accessories, that the building instructions and pictures in the build manual, is less then it should be. Since they didn't include a good set of plans, I felt they should have near perfect building instructions and pictures in their manual. I do get replies from my enquiries about the building instruction anomalies I find and they do their best to answer me within one day. I can't fault them there, but I also feel they are aware of what my feelings about their kit I'm building. I take it your no beginner and like me, able to work it out and get the project done. Its a bit of a challenge, but fun too.
__________________________________________________ _____________

Today I drilled out my floor landing gear holes per step 22. If you look at my pictures you will see that the forward holes to the landing gear floor plate, where the 10/32 blind nuts are to be set, are right up against the forward edge of the Landing Gear Floor Plate (L.G.F.P.). I used thick CA glue under the flanges of the aft blind nuts to hold them in place, and set them into the wood. If you notice in the third picture, you can see I filed off the forward half, of the forward 10/32 blind nut flanges. You will see this also in the build manual (and why I did it-before I really looked at things), but if you look at picture #6, you will notice that Fuselage Former #2, has four rounded groves on the bottom half of the former. This is to give you room-or justice to the blind nut flanges, so you don't have to grind the forward edges of the blind nuts. I didn't notice this until after I made the modification to the blind nuts, but you no longer have to grind the blind nut flanges to epoxy Former #2, to the fuselage floor. I then used thick CA glue under the forward 10/32 blind nut flanges and set them into place.

After I finished this, I epoxied in, the two cross brace landing gear support rails. See pictures #'s 4,5,7 &8.

Next I epoxied in the fire wall.

Prior to epoxying any bulkhead formers in, I took all the fuselage formers, 1 ~ 8, the fuselage floor and both port and starboard fuselage sides, cleaned all the notches, and trial fit everything to everything as much as I could. I trial fit all the bulkhead formers, and both fuselage sides, to the floor and to each other, and made sure I had no glue anywhere that would interfere with the final assembly. The last thing I want is to find a poor fit after I have started gluing the fuselage sides into place. It took some time, but will worth the effort. I found several spots where I missed the glue, that had bled out onto the face of a connecting joint area. After I did this-with a little sanding for better fit of parts, I epoxied in the fire wall (bulkhead former #1), and bulkhead former #2


Soft Landings Always,
Bobby of Maui

Bob Paris

My Feedback: (13)

Aloha,
Today I set in place all of my bulkhead formers, to fuselage floor FF1 & FF2. I used 30 minute epoxy for these bulkheads and that's done. Before epoxying in bulkhead F3, make sure its facing the right way. Take a good look at step 29 and step 30 in your build manual...take a good look at picture #3 down below and you will see what I am talking about. You need to make sure the thin upper open side rail of bulkhead F3 is facing forward.

I added a light hard wood brace against the forward part of fuselage bulkhead F3. This was added at my discretion, to add a bit of strength to the forward part of the landing gear floor plate & F3 bulkhead-but mostly to hide the forward part of the landing gear 10/32 blind nuts, that I didn't need to grind down.

Today I started to modify the kit from stock. Since I am adding a 32 oz. fuel/smoke oil tank into the center fuselage and I'm using a Roto fuel tank, I need to modify sub-floor plate FT6. The 32oz. Roto fuel tank is just to darn big and I had to modify this sub floor to get this tank into a usable place in the center of the fuselage. This piece sets between bulkhead F3 and F4 about half way up from the fuselage floor, to the wing saddle. I needed a larger space for this size Roto tank, so I modified FT6, by cutting a 4" x 4-7/8" rectangle hole into the sub floor. I feel this sup floor gives some rigidity to the center part of the fuse and since I managed to cut a large hole into FT6, I added three light hard wood 3/8" sq. cross pieces-latterly. I also glued the rudder servo doubler plate onto the bottom side of sub floor FT6. I'm not sure exactly where I will place my rudder servos, but I added the doubler just in case. I used Slow thick CA glue for the modifications to sub floor FT6.

I'm not done modifying sub floor FT6, I need to cut four more holes into the sub floor parallel to the Roto fuel tank, for servo-mass plug, bulkhead mounts. These plugs hold up to three servo connections and the female part will screw down to the sub flooring. The male plug is held up into the wing, so when you mount your wing onto the fuselage, you have four mass plug connectors to connect, connecting five servo functions from each wing and one to the electronic rpm sensor connector wire. I will need four of these plugs, two for each wing. I will connect the aileron, flap and engine speed control to one plug. The second plug for each wing will have the engine kill switch, engine choke servo and engine RPM sensor wire connections. Instead of twelve separate servo connections to make, when mating the wing to the fuselage, I'll just have four connections to make. Tail Dragger RC sells the plug connectors.

I plan on mounting my receiver, receiver batteries and Turnigy Yellow Mini Power Station up in the nose of the fuselage. I am using two 3300 ma. Nickel batteries for my power station, and the Turnigy power station on/off switch w/ volt meter. The on/off switch will mount up forward in the nose on the port side, along with two digital RPM gauges. My reasoning for mounting everything on the port side, is that at one glance, from one side of the model, I will have all the information I need, to engine RPM and receiver voltage. I will have one fuel/smoke fill fuel dot on the port side too, but aft more near where the fuel tank is.

This is the beauty of building your own airframe...you can do a lot of work, prior to covering the model and figure things out. With an ARF...I end up doing so many modifications, that I might as well build a kit. Its much easier to build a kit...then modify an ARF.


Soft Landings Always,
Bobby of Maui

Bob Paris

My Feedback: (13)

Aloha,
I managed to get sub floor FT6 ready and cut four rectangular holes for instillation of the 20 AWG Triple Servo Wing Harness's, that I purchased from Tail Dragger RC. These little gizmos kind of clean up a real head ache when assembling a model. I will have four color coated plugs to install, and no longer will I have to deal with 12 connections to connect the wing to the Rx.

After I cut and fit the holes to the wing harness, I cut small light hard wood blocks to set on the bottom side of each of the four holes. When I screw in the retaining screws, the screws will have something to bight into. There will be a bit of vibration with this model and I want to keep things in their place.

http://www.taildraggerrc.com/20-awg-...wing-harnesss/

After this, I installed the paper tube into the aft portion of the fuselage. Your instructed to cut the tube into one length, 25 inches long, and insert the tube into bulkhead formers F4~F7.

Next I will coat and seal the forward bay, landing gear bay and central wing bay floors, with water based Polyurethane. After I install the Port and Starboard fuselage sides, I'll coat these too, with water based Polyurethane. Both sub floors will get coated too, on both sides (FT5 & FT6). I will coat everything forward of the aft wing trailing edge in the fuselage and I do this on all my models. It makes for easy clean up and gives a bit more strength to the wood. It goes on really easy, dries quite fast and weighs next to nothing.


I'm pulling all my radio gear I'm going to use on this airframe...and I will test it all on the bench, prior to installing it into the airframe. I want no surprises. Eleven servo's in all, plus my electric engine start system and electronic engine kill switches.

Soft Landings Always,
Bobby of Maui

Bob Paris

My Feedback: (13)

Aloha,
I managed to get my sub floors, the forward fuel tank, landing gear, and center wing bay, sealed with water based polyurethane. Next I assembled parts WA1, WA2 and WA6, in step 35 and 36 and I also located WA5, for future assembly. Step 37~step 40 were done earlier. Next I set up the two fuselage sides and test them for fit, against the fuselage floor.

After the test fit, I used slow cure epoxy and affixed the left side. Caution here...if you don't have a good selection of clamps...your going to have trouble, keeping the assembly together. I used 30 minute epoxy here, but with 85 deg. weather today, the epoxy set up in less then 30 minutes. So you will need to work fast and clamp as you go. I started with the fire wall and moved aft. It took a little persuasion to get everything to line up, but I managed to get the work done.

Do have the forward top, fuel tank cover and access panel (FT2 & FT3) handy (these have been laminated together in step 12), and make sure these fit properly between bulkhead F2 and firewall F1. You will need to make sure this forward piece fits properly and set up, when gluing, both the left and right side fuselage pieces. You will not glue FT2 and FT3 laminated pieces onto the forward part of the model yet...that will be done latter in step 67.

From fuselage bulkhead F4 aft, I elected to use Tight Bond III. The epoxy set up so fast that I didn't have the time to do all the formers and floor with epoxy and get the assembly together, before the epoxy set up. From what happened to me with the epoxy, I felt I needed to use Tight Bond. I was concerned that if I managed to get only part of the floor and fuselage together and the epoxy set up...I would have a real problem on my hands. I did use a good amount of wood glue and I had glue everywhere with the work here. But I used waxed paper on the bottom of the work bench under the assembly and had a wet towel handy and wiped up all the excess glue as I went. After the left had side was clamped, I went over the wood glued areas with more glue. the lack of glue will not be an issue with this airframe.

After all my clamps were set, I weighted down the floor to make sure I had a flat square fuselage. A flat square building table is mandatory here.

I let the fuse set for the night, and tomorrow I will glue the right side onto the fuselage floor.

Soft Landing Always,
Bobby of Maui

Bob Paris

My Feedback: (13)

Aloha,
I managed to get my right fuselage side epoxied onto the airframe floor and with the left side in-placed, it was a snap to do...literally. I needed to massage the right side a bit, to get everything aligned and all the tabs lined up. Once this was done...the right side just snapped into place... : ) Neater then snot, and it appeared to be perfectly aligned and square. I'm really getting to love the parts fit on this kit and just how easy it all comes together.

Before you epoxy the right fuselage side on to the fuselage floor, make sure you have the sub floor FT6, as outlined in step 53, fit & adjusted to fit between fuselage bulkhead F3 and F4. You will need to get your epoxy where you need it, and also make sure you get sub floor FT6 into its place...while you are also getting the right side fuselage into its proper tabs and slots, on the fuselage floor. Once this is done, its time to clamp every thing down. Do not use to much clamp pressure on bulkhead F4 to F7, until you get the top aft fuselage wood FT1 into place, in step 65. These bulkheads are not as strong as bulkheads F2 & F3 and the bulkheads can be bowed if to much clamp pressure is used.

After I did this, I made sure my fuselage floor was on a flat surface and weighted down, to insure a square fuselage, while every thing dries.

Soft Landings Always,
Bobby of Maui

thailazer

jbarnes .... What nose gear assembly are you using?

Bob Paris

My Feedback: (13)

Aloha,
Today I epoxied in the aft part of the right fuselage side, and finished step 54.

If you look at step 57, your told to fit FF6, with two 8/32 blind nuts, and FF6 is the very aft floor piece of the fuselage floor. This piece (aft floor piece FF6) is actually the roof of where the horizontal stab sits up against. In step 58 you are told to fit this part onto the fuselage and epoxy in place. But if you look closely at step 58, both left and right fuselage sides are not epoxied into place. In step 54 you were instructed to finish epoxying both left and right fuselage sides into place, on the fuselage floor.

If you epoxy both the left and right side fuselage pieces into place...you will not be able to emplace the aft fuselage floor FF6 on to the fuselage.

The shape of FF6 is like a wedge and the widest part of FF6 goes into and ahead of bulkhead #8, and there is no way you can get FF6 in...with out doing a little sanding on FF6. I followed the instructions and didn't see the issue at hand, until I had the right side fuselage epoxied in place. I had to sand FF6 and I made it fit, so it was fixed.

I suggest that when you are epoxying in the right side fuselage per the instructions, that you also epoxy in aft floor FF6. Install your 8/32 blind nuts as your instructed in step 57, prior to epoxying FF6 in place and make sure it has a good fit. Then with FF6 ready to install, epoxy the right side aft fuselage on to the fuselage floor...and at the same time, set FF6 into place.

I am making my elevator removable. I've already figured it out and it will not be that difficult. FF6 has two 8/32 screws that go through tail wheel assembly, through the stabilizer, and hold the hole thing together. I am adding two doublers in front of bulkhead #8 where the forward parts of FF6 rest. I will then install two more 8/32 screws and blind nuts in line and forward with the two tail wheel assembly's 8/32 screws hold down the landing gear assembly. These two will be just forward of the original two 8/32 screw holes, and a 10/32 screw in the forward part of FF6, just ahead of bulkhead #8 and on top of forward piece of FF6 that sticks through bulkhead #8. If you don't have the instructions...I know...you don't have a clue at what I'm stating here, but in the next few installments, I'll explain it all and show you in pictures. I'll also install a sanded triangle piece of hard blasa 3/4" wide, up against the aft fuselage sides-next to the stab, to help support the elevator assembly. I feel it will work ok...but time will tell.

In step 48 and 49 your told to laminate four pieces FS4, into two pieces. Then install one 10/32 blind nut into each pieces. After, to epoxy into both left and right fuselage sides, between bulkhead #2 and #3.

I'm planning on modifying my rudder and stab, and its still a work in progress. I've some idea's and I need to get some balsa in house to make the change. I will be looking at what I can get from AMR and BalsaUSA.

I've made up three servo leads of 60" long, to control the rudder and both elevator servo's. My rudder servo will go aft between bulkhead #7 & #8. It will sit inside and between the bulkheads and I'll make a cover plate for it, for access. I don't like having such a long pushrod as it calls out for in the plans. I've never used such long servo leads before, but all three will reach to the nose section where my power box and Rx will be set. I will also have two 3300mha batteries up forward to, near the Rx and I do pray this helps out C.G. for me.

Its moving along...

Soft Landings Always,
Bobby of Maui