Whew! I'm still recovering from a little flight testing today. When I left the field today, it was 106°! I mean I was so dry, I came home and drank water and Gatorade instead of beer!

The Wren ran great. I mustered the energy to log 4 flights. I noticed that the acceleration on take-off was good, but it took little more runway. I expected longer takeoff runs but I wasn't sure about the thrust. In the air, the Reaper seemed a little soft on elevator so I flew with high rate.

I've been using YS four-stroke plugs in the MW54 with good results. I picked them up from Central Hobbies for $5.39. I like to keep trying "different" things.

Tailwinds (on the way home),


John

Do you like the way the Reaper flies? How about the landings? Did you mix in elevons so you would have more elevator for landings? I am just finishing my reaper. It has a Ram 750F on it ( 18 pounds of thrust).

geneh,

I like the way my Reaper flies for the most part. I had some "issues" originally with the landings. I guess that I had the CG too far aft. The airplane flew fine until you got slow for landing then it became almost uncontrollable in pitch if a gust of wind upset it. Then when it finally "arrived" on the runway, it would bounce and hop. I moved the CG forward and put a weaker spring in the nose strut. Now it is a dream to land...real slow. Also, if you do smack it on, the nose doesn't bounce back up...the airplane just "sticks" to the runway.

I modified the elevators. There are no balance tabs anywhere on my Reaper. I widened the elevator 1" at the root so that the trailing edge is now perpendicular to the fuselage side. I don't think that this is necessary for landing since I land on low rate (80%) elevator and never run out of control. I made the inner portion of the trailing edge of the wing movable. I have a condition set on my Futaba 9Z to give me "crow". This gives me "up" aileron on both ailerons with down flaps on the inner portions. I haven't landed with this yet. The last few times that I've been to the field, there has been a good headwind and crow was not needed. I can also mix the flaps with elvevator, but I haven't played with that much. The Reaper is a very smooth flying airplane.

Regards,


John

My first few landing were a little tricky because the plane will just glide and glide after you chop the engine.So then I took the plane way out and let it slow down and try-ed to make the turn back to the field for a long approach landing.The ailerons did not have enough control to turn the plane to line up for landing and I had lost lot's of speed.(OH $H?T)So what I did was mix in some rudder for take offs and landings and now have control at all times no matter how slow the landing approach turn is.

John,
about how much did you move the CG forward from the recommended 530-535mm and where are your mains located from the CG?
Thanks, MB

Man....that is dry.

CONDOE _WON,

I've got to go flying this morning, the big ones that is, but when I get back tomorrow I'll put the Reaper together and take some measurements. I know that I started with the CG at 530mm from the trailing edge as suggested. I moved a 5cell 1700 mah NiCad pack from just behind the front wing tube to just behind the canards. This was done at the field at my peak of frustration. I didn't re-check the CG. I flew and it worked great.

Regards,

John

CONDOE _WON,

I just measured the Reaper and the centerline of the axle is 4.125" forward of the centerline of the rear wing tube. The CG is now set at 550mm forward of the trailing edge of the wing. I think that this puts the axles somewhere around 2" behind the CG. With this set-up, it rotates fine and once in the air, you just slowly bleed off the back pressure on the elevator as the speed builds...just right. I have found that if you are a little high or fast in the traffic pattern, just set up a fairly "hard" turn to final. This will bleed lots of speed. If it get's too slow, the nose just drops a little and then I set the approach speed with the elevator... I have never run out of aileron authority on landing. I mostly land on low rate Elevator and aileron unless it's gust, then I go to high rate on aileron...just in case.


Gear down, flaps 3, landing check.........


John

Thanks John,
I had to ask as I am in the process of gluing on the main gear mount and don't want to re-do it.