Due to the overwhelming generosity of Al Gutkin I will be up and flying in a month or so. I decided to start ANOTHER Telemaster thread to highlight the modifications I will be making.

1. Make new main wing spars to get rid of the dihedral. I'm going to need some input on the strongest wood I can get. I went to the local Lowe’s and they had solid oak, would that work?

2. Mount the rudder and elevator servos in the tail. I'm going to need to beef things up a bit but it shouldn't be too hard.

3. Bolt on wing modification. I'm not sure how I'm going to go about this on yet but I have some ideas.

4. Modify the cabin for another bomb drop.

5. Make another rudder with about 3x the surface area.

I had planned on recovering the model but the yellow is starting to grow on me. I'm going to have to try and match the color with some ultracote.
Thanks again Al for the gift. I had to keep my son from getting into the box on the drive home.

Great lookin kids there Mike
Hats off to Al Gutkin for his generosity.
Sounds like you've got some great ideas for your new Telemaster...looking forward to following your build thread, as I just might be buying myself another Telemaster.

George

Just an FYI suggestion. If your going glow power, it would be a good idea to seal the covering seams with CA or something where any fuel will be getting on it. I have the same ARF. I don't know if they still use the same covering now as they did when I got mine in the early '90's. The covering on mine eventually suffered from terrible fuel creep, getting in between the clear outer layer and the yellow adhesive. I ended up stripping the whole plane and recovered it with Ultracote. It is a nice plane to cover with all the big flat surfaces. Good luck on your project. It should be a lot of fun.

I'm transfering all me electric gear over to her....except the battery R.I.P.

LOL. Nevermind. [sm=thumbup.gif]

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Why would you want to get rid of the dihedral? Are you planning on flying Masters Class Pattern with this model?

Some dihedral is your friend. This model isn't going to do decent knife-edge or point rolls regardless of how much dihedral it doesn't have, but dihedral makes for nice, smooth, straight ahead landings. Rudder to roll coupling can be your friend, especially when performing airborne tasks other than aerobatics.

I like your other mods suggestions.

Ed has a good point there. I never gave that any thought before, but I also think taking the dihedral out of a Telemaster would likely take away some of the "nicenest" (spelling) of its flying characteristics. There were times when I just liked trimming it out to fly steady circles by itself and I could take my hands off the sticks for a time. That would be hard to do without dihedral. I love to touch and go this plane on one wheel and running the length of the runway that way. The dihedral I think makes that a lot easier plus the extra clearance helps. Also, when carring gliders on the glider launcher, I think the dihedral would give it extra stability. I does get a little squirrely with another plane attached to it. Being a flat bottom wing, it seems like little gain in aerobatics making it straight for this plane. It may fly inverted a little better without wanting to roll out, but it still needs more power to do that with the flat bottom. An interesting thought; do you think it would feel more like a Piper Cub with a straight wing? I guess it all depends on what feel you want in its handling characteristics.

I may try it stock then. How would you suggest I attach it to the fusalage then? I put the wing half's together and noticed that there is a gap between them which I don't like much. I'm going to have to rethink things now. My first real step in building is cleaning the garage!

LOL. I know what you mean. I finally just started my basement renovation into a hobby workshop that I have been putting off for 10 years. [sm=stupid.gif]

You could glue on a layer of balsa at the root chord and sand the angle in for a nice custom flush fit.

A friend of mine getting back in after 20 years built his TM kit so strong, it's unnatural. He wanted to make sure he could still fly, but his old habits never died. He took out the dihedral, and reinforced so much of the airframe. It now has a Saito 100 in it, and he routinley performs 3D manouvers with it. Yes, I said 3D. Last year, the servo arm snapped off the throttle servo, and the engine went to full power. He suddenly began to regret that 24 ounce fuel tank as he performed flat spins and vertical climbing moves for about 30 minutes to burn off the fuel. Yet, on low rates, it's still a trainer.

I guess its an abomination right?
[sm=RAINFRO.gif]
Bob

Progress on the ARF is nonexistant at this point. I did make it to the hobby store to pick up some wood to make the needed modifacations. I also cut out the bottom sheeting in the fusalage right behind the gear reinforcement plate. I'm still not 100 percent sure how I'm going to modify the forward half of the wing to make it a bolt on. I may carefully cut out the forward most inner rib on each side and fab up a hardwood piece with a tongue like my other design. I'm almost sure the servos are going in the tail but that will require some more work. I'm on travle next week so nothing will get done. When I get home I'm going to hit it hard to get back in the air.

Got some time to work on the bird last night and today. I decided to mount the servos in the tail which required some minor modifications and beefing of the tail. I used two small pieces of balsa the same thickness as the sides to frame in the servo holes and allow me to fold over the covering. I then reinforced the inner top and bottom with some light ply running between the last two formers to give the servo screws something to bite to. I think I must be crazy for trying new wing mount designs considering how the last Telemaster died. I carefully cut out the forward part of the inner wing rib and removed it. I used this as a template and cut a new rib with an extension out of solid oak 1/2!QUOT! thick. I'm going to use the original forward rib and sandwich both together along with a 6 or 7!QUOT! 3/4 dowel that will help distribute the load over several ribs. I surely hope this will be strong enough to hold the forward half of the wing on. I'm going to use the struts also so this thing should be bullet proof. My bomb bay door is going to be more simple then the last one and it's only going to be a single door. I didn't get much done on this part but did start to frame it in with 1/4!QUOT! square hardwood. I hope to get more done this week after work.

It's amazing how just a few hours of work can make such a big mess!

You do nice work, Mike.

Looks better with dihedral..

I'm keeping the diehedral. Others have added an extra rib between the wing half's but I wanted to be different. My next step is to get the holes drilled for the rear of the wing and then figure out where I need to notch and reinforce the forward former. How did you work the forward wing mounting?

Mike; Just a false center rib that hangs way down and notched into the front bulkhead. There is not a whole lot of windshield heighth and of course the bulkhead is doubled with thirtysecond ply. The spars fit too loosly and needs both shimmed. I used ply to give a snug sliding fit. Originally the rubber bands kept the wings from moving up and down. Personally I think in this day and age the designer should have made it bolt on from the start. It IS a nice cheap plane tho. It looks like you are doing fine......

doing fine pulling all my tools out and getting saw dust all over. I'm going to have to clean up a bit to do the wing this weekend. I need to make sure that it is perfect before I drill the rear holes. I should have it close to being done this weekend. I still have to fab up the bomb bay door and servo. More pictures to come!

I got some time this weekend to work on the TM. I'm coming along nicely with it. I got the wing mount figured out and it fits well. I still have to epoxy everything in but I will do that last. I got the bomb bay roughed in, tail surfaces and servos mounted and I made a new rudder. I still have a few nights work to do but the first step is to clean up my mess. I seem to have lost one of the two blind nuts I bought for the wing mount.

MikeFreas;

Will you show the wing mod when you get a chance??? I now see in in a previous post. Sorry..

You still want to see it?

Thanks Mike. Previous picture OK. What you done looks good to me. (I tried editing my last post, but didn,t do too good a job).

More progress tonight. I got the port half of the forward wing mount done and epoxied. I would have done both half's but I only have one large clamp. As you can see in the pictures I used the original rib as a doubler. I drilled and sanded a 3/4!QUOT! hole to accept a dowel that runs to the 4th rib. I wanted to add the dowel to help distribute the load better. With this set up both forward wing half's would have to tear away for the wing mount to fail. I also got some more work in on the rudder. One thing I didn't like about the hardware included in the kit is the tail wheel mount. I'm not sure why but the didn't install some kind of wheel collar to prevent the forces and bumps being absorbed by the rudder and hinges. I unbent the wire at the top and slid a collar that I will tighten just under the bracket. I'm not sure how much I will get done the rest of the week. Saturday is a big electric event and Sunday is RCX

Hi Mike.

How is your Telemaster coming along? no reports on progress lately.
Calixto

It's done all but drilling holes for the strut mounts and mounting the motor. I have been distracted playing with my new Slow Stick. I will get it done but I have family coming in the next two weekends so progress will be slow. I noticed today that TrueR/C is once again sold out of packs so I will have to wait until mid June to order it.