I figured I'd start a build thread for my Fledgling Trainer kit. I'll be adding pictures later.

Like I mentioned in the beginner's forum about 15-17 years ago I tried to complete a trainer and the skills were just beyond me. For the last couple of years I've been getting the urge to put an airplane or three together and this winter I decided to go for it. I really want to build and fly warbirds and scale general aviation craft, so I started looking for a kit to build. I found Tom Martin's site where he sells plans and some laser cut short kits, and saw that he had a fledgling kit available.

I ordered the fledgling.

I inventoried the kit and was pretty happy with the looks of everything.

I started by cutting aileron stock into TE/Aileron combinations. I blew one of the cuts giving me a sturdier TE but a skimpy aileron. Chalk one up to experience. I cut some lightening holes in the doublers because they were pretty hefty ply in an otherwise light frame. I left more than some of the electric guys, as I'm probably going to shove my old Royal .46 in the airplane. I also made some sanding blocks out of 2x4, paper, and contact cement.

The vertstab is two pieces of hefty balsa, glued it together.

The horizontal stab is built from parts and sticks and sheeted. I put this together carefully going for perfect wood to wood joints and ended up being pretty happy with it. The pieces for the edges seemed to be 1/8" to 1/16" short, so I cut new pieces to make it more-or-less perfect.

I set up the left wing and found that the lasercut kit isn't perfect according to the plans, the sheer webs end up fitting differently, I think(I'm at work and don't recall my exact complaint). Kit was missing one rib, so I cut a new one. The plans call for building on sheeting. Because I was cutting the LE/TE edges I wasn't sure that I wanted to glue sheeting until I got a better idea of how the completed wing comes together. For the left wing I set everything up with pins and scrap, left it for a couple of hours, looked at it again and glued everything but teh root web. I rushed this step a bit and I'm not 100% happy with the alignment of all the ribs, but not so unhappy as to make a new wing. Cut and installed sheer webs each one individually cut sanded and glued. 95% happy with the outcome.

Fitted the leading edge and shaped. Far and away the toughest aspect of the kit. I'm only 85% happy with the LE, but there's lots of shaping and its a true skill that I need to develop. I will purchase a razor plane before wing 2 is shaped.

For the right wing I set it up the same way, but decided to include the bottom TW sheeting to make everything line up better. The instructions call for 2" of sheeting. The instructions are wrong. I decided to leave the 1/4" gap alone and run with it, next time I'll measure off of the plans and not off of the instructions(on the plans but you know what I mean). This wing framed up much better than the left, I'm 95% happy with the alignment of the wing and all ribs.

I cut the webs for the right wing but haven't continued... I'll shape webs in front of the TV tonight.

I really feel like between reading build threads on here(especially RCKen's LT40) and reading several instruction manuals for other trainers I have got some idea what I'm doing. I think my next kit is going to be GP, just to "pay" for making their manual available online.

I'll get some pics up tonight.

Chris

Ah yes, a neighbor doing a build thread. Keep us in the loop and give a holler if you have any questions, I am just across the river. Good Luck, Dave

I trained a lot of teenagers with that plane. We had a summer 'course' in aviation and included flying R/C. My 'trainer' was the Sterling kit and I enjoyed flying it....my partner had some other plane that WASN'T a trainer and he had lots of problems.

You will enjoy flying this plane....good choice.

Here's some pics of my build as of tonight. Got the sheerwebs in teh right wing...

Wings:


Stabs, still not sheeted.


And the fuse, just showing what it looks like.

WOW...I haven't seen a Fledgling kit in 30 years . One of those was the first trainer I ever flew. She was a great aircraft to learn to fly on. Of course, when I was learning to fly we didn't have the buddy cord system and my dad used to stand over me with his hands on mine while I was moving the sticks.... Looking forward to watching your build progress and definately looking forward to seeing the completed project.

Good luck and smooth flying...

Same here... I learned to fly on them (took two of them) back in the late 60'e if I remember right... Great plane... Had a Veco .40 and Kraft radio... Ah the good old days .. Lots of pictures please...

My plan for today is to start getting the fuselage doublers laminated in. The fuse is going to require another run for balsa and as I start to assemble that I can hopefully purchase the rest of my balsa for sheeting and structure in one trip.

I'm considering cutting the exits for the pushrods before I get the fuse together at all. Do I just cut an oval, or is there a pattern someplace for that?

Everybody has nice things to say about how the plane flies and I hope that's not just the nostalgia talking. I'm thinking about going ahead and getting a OS .25 LA for her. I've got the royal .46 from my first attempt at RC, but I think the fledgling would really benefit from being as light as possible and it should let me run a 6oz tank as well. I'll probably go withconventional landing gear because its some lighter, and I really want to develop skills for warbirds.

Chris

Disaster

I ended up in the midst of a disaster chain that I'm just now ready to work out of, it was bleak enough that I ordered an LT-25 kit because I was pretty frustrated. I ended up damaging the lower leading edge of every rib on the left wing.



I was working too fast, I was getting to the point where the big chunks in the box had started to be reduced to toothpicks and scrap, and my work area was really cluttered. Things were going really well. I had run to the LHS to pick up the sheeting that should have carried me through the build. I sheeted the stab, the top and bottom TE of both wings, and then the rest of the top of the left. I realized I was out of sheeting again. I was really hoping to finish the left wing, and thought that I had enough sheeting to do the LE of the bottom. I glued together a 2" strip to a 1" strip and checked it twice, I don't know how I missed it, I was probably just working too fast and was seeing what I wanted to see because when I glued that sucker down (with CA, working fast) it was about 1/8" short.

Now that's bad, but not catastrophic, I could have added that 1/8" and trimmed. But instead I removed teh sheet and yanked a 1/16 to an 1/8 from each rib. I was frustrated and angry and really didn't want to go to the store for another $20 collection of wood and doohickeys for the plane.

Anyways I'm over that and trying to figure out how to salvage the wing. The way I see it I've got three options:

1) New wing.
2) Cut a bunch of slivers of balsa that fit from the spar to the LE. Remove balsa from each rib and replace.
3) Use those same little widgets alongside of each broken rib(no removal) and just add some weight to the right wing.

What are my options?

Chris

So I decided that a series of balsa widgets that match the airfoil, glued to the broken ribs was the way to go. So I made a pattern, cut the widgets, and here's where I'm at.

Chris