After getting back into the hobby I was surprised to see that Hobby Lobby was still advertising the Sr Telemaster with the same old photo I remembered from the 80's. The chick in the pasture shot. I had to build one for old times sake. My wife gave me the kit for Christmas and my Mom and Dad gave me a Saito 82 to power it. As you can see the project is moving right along! I plan to install a candy "bomb bay" and a glider tow hook. Dual aileron servos installed in the wing so I can mix flaps. 4" tires for soft field landings! Thinking about moving the rudder and elevator servos to the tail.

Looks really nice. Well Done!

Don

You forgot to build the tail

Isn't that the other 1/2 of a foot? Looks really great, keep posting updates.

I built one of these two years ago and it turned out just as nice as your. It was a lot of fun putting together and the 95" of wing was fun navigating it through the house without adding haner rash. Also did the same as you and used dual aileron servo's. With all that wood work I had to let it show and covered it with transparent orange Monokote. Looked really nice on a bright sunny day. You're going to love the way that this thing flies too. Very majestic to say the least. I put a Tower .61 on mine (money was tight at the time) which pulled it very nicely. Spent most of the time flying at 1/3 to 1/2 throttle.

Very nice work. So let it show....

Cheers,

Tail is on the work schedule for next week. I fly a CRJ all weekend and then come home and model all week! I would like to use nylon wing bolts instead of rubber bands. Anyone have any suggestions on how to engineer a proper front and rear attach point on the wing.

Looks Good!, You can have a lot of fun with covering this airplane. I built one several years ago and had a bunch of olive drab covering left from another project. This is what I ended up with
I was kinda going for that Fiesler Storch look.

I'm a newbie, so I'm not real familiar with the Tele, but why not just steal the method other manufacturers use? Install a hardwood block in the fuse at the center of the leading edge. Drill a quarter inch hole for a dowel to slide into. Install a quarter inch dowel in the leading edge of the wing, making sure that it's anchored to something solid (a forward spar perhaps?). On the trailing edge, install a hardwood bolt plate in the fuse and plywood (3/16") on the top of the trailing edge. Place the wing on the fuse, making sure of proper alignment, and drill the bolt holes throough the wing and bolt plate using a 3/16" bit. Enlarge the holes in the wing ONLY to 1/4". Tap the holes in the bolt plate, apply several drops of CA to the holes and after it has cured fully, retap. (I wish there was a blindnut that could replace this method)

Problem with the above method is that the Telemaster didn't have much of a structure at the point where the trailing edge meets with the fuselage and the leading edge of the wing sits pretty much on top of the fuselage former up front. Probably the best way to handle this is to glue two 1/4" plates in (one near the leading edge and one near the trailing edge of the wing) the fuselage and use 4 1/4"-20 nylon screws. Be sure to beef up the structure in the area's of the fuselage to adequately support the blocks from the pulling stresses. Then cut some balsa block material to glue into the leading edge of the wing that conforms to the shape of the ribs to keep you from crushing the structure when tightening down the 1/4"-20 nylon screws. Then add some 1/16" ply on top of the wing to keep it from crushing the balsa and evenly distribute the load. It'll take some work, but in the long run will save you a lot of headaches from dealing with the poor quality of rubbers bands being sold these days.

Cheers,

TSCHUY,

You described the problem accurately. There is not much structure in the Telemaster wing. I have been envisioning something like you described. I believe I am going to create a "center section" out of light ply and balsa. I am trying to decide how far out this structure should extend to adequately spread the stress to the spar. At the moment I believe I will extend it to the next rib which is about 4". This will cover all the area that the rubber bands would have been in contact with. The last thing I want is to have the wing fold due to a bad attach point. I don't believe weight will be a factor since I have heard the airplane flies better with a little extra weight on board.

CCRC1,

I like the covering job. I was planning to cover mine like a liaison aircraft also. Except, I will represent the allies. Maybe we will meat on the "field of battle" one day.

As it would happen, there's a Sr. Telemaster for sale on RCU with bolt on wings. A simple message to the seller got me some pic's of how he did it, so let me see if I can attach them here.

The Sr. Telemaster is a great flying plane, I've had three of them. I took all the dihedral out of the second two and it was a great improvement in how it flew. I also added quite a bit of area to the rudder on the last two which made it much more fun. Without the dihedral and with the larger rudder, it would do some very nice but slow aerobatics.

Forgot to give thanks to stickmaster for the pics. I had hoped that he would come join us in the forum. I also notice that the pics don't show the trailing edge, but I think you guys have a pretty good handle on that

Thanks for the info. I have already joined my winghalves and enclosed the area of the fuselage in front of the leading edge (windshield area). However, with a little tinkering I can probably create the same type design as his.

I got the tail finished! I spent all day converting the wing and fuselage so I can do away with the rubber bands. For the front of the wing I used a design as seen in a previous post to this thread (thanks guys). I beefed up the rear attach point on the fuselage with Birch plywood and installed 1/4" blind nuts and nylon bolts. I had to shim the fuselage sides to keep the wing from rocking due to the diehedral. The fuselage still has a lot of twist when you rock the wing tips but I believe this can not be avoided unless I install wing struts. Leading and trailing edges of stabalizer took a lot of sanding to shape as you start out with square stock. Saito looks nice sticking up proudly! All I need now is $100 worth of Olive Drab Monokote.

Hi PortCityFlier,

Your Tely is looking good. But in my own opinion it's ashame that you are going to cover all that fine wood work with a solid color and not transparent Monokote. Been trying to upload pictures but the dang site keeps erring out on me.

A little advice as you complete the tail feathers...Add an additional 2" to your rudder so that it'll be effective enough to prevent the airframe from veering off the runway with the slightest of crosswinds. I learned the hard way and had to cut my rudder off and add the two additional inches of surface length. It made a world of difference for me and the rudder was controllable clear down to a stop. With the additional torque that the Saito will introduce to the airframe during takeoff, you'll need it.

Cheers,

I got the control surfaces built and installed last night. Coughing today from all of the balsa dust! The GP Slot Machine was worth its weight in gold last night. I honestly will never cut another hinge slot by hand. I set the ailerons up for dual servos. I am going to rig this beast for flaps. You never know when you might have to set your airplane down on some unimproved landing strip!

Here's a thought for covering, take a look at Balsa USA's solartex. It is a fabric covering, unlike Monokote. It comes in olive drab and once you put it on and tighten it stays. it's great for around curves. I covered my 1/4 Scale Cub in that fabric when I built it 4 years ago and I have not had to tighten it up anywhere, and it sits in a basement all year long.
Check it out, you can get a 5 meter roll for $35.00, you'll probably need 2 rolls.
Thanks Tom

That's a great idea. I am going to check out the Solartex. I go to work on Saturday, so no more progress until Tuesday night.

Just about finished the wing today. It took me about three hours to cover it last night! One whole hour of shrinking with heat gun! I used about 17' of monokote. The covering looks great except for some bubbles under the invasion stripes. How do you put monokote on top of itself without getting those darn bubbles? I thought I would finish the wing today but the control horn screws were not long enough to go through the aileron stock. I ordered some longer screws from micro fasteners. If you are not familiar with micro fasteners you should be. You can buy twenty screws from them for the price of six from Tower. Tonight I am going to put the wing away and start concentrating on the fuselage. Candy bomb bay doors are the project of the night.

To keep the bubbles out all you need to do is lower the temp of your iron just to the point were it will make the layers stick, then when you get everything down the way you want it turn the iron back up to it's normal temp. and just iron down the outside edges, about 1/4 inch around the outsides. If you get A bubble just poke it with A sharp pin A few times and iron it back down at A lower temp.

Portcityflyer, I have the plane you want yours to be, except mine is wraped with stars and bars...I customized mine also with a 11" bombay with side door, glider tow, two piece bolt on wing, rear mounted servo's, flaperons, 2X rudder, and a smoke system... This is my new favorite plane, she flies great with a OS 120 FS, with power to spare...I can't remember how to post pics so look in my gallory for a pic...Thanks Kneesaknocken
PS I figured it out...

Ugh, I hate to tell you, but the star is upside down.

Ugh is correct. I am trying to not stress over the star problem. I only look at the airplane when I am standing on my head.

Who cares, as long as it looks good in the air, RIGHT!!!