scalebirdman

My Feedback: (6)

After the short and exciting maiden flight of my first Zero (lost due to reversed ailerons as a result of miss programming when adding a new plane to my radio after having ground checked the Zero) I was left with undamaged engine, retracts and radio system less one aileron servo that is MIA. Being somewhat of a hammerhead I ordered a replacement and after finishing up a couple of other odds and ends it's time to get busy. Naturaly I received an e-mail notice yesterday thru RCU that Ultra-rc was running a sale, and the Zero is currently $70 off the normal list price [sm=punching.gif]. So if any of you are tempted, now is the time to act.

Having done this once, I anticipate this assembly to go much faster this time around. For those of you who did not follow the first thread I am using Robart #154 retracts and 160 tailwheel unit, which this plane is designed to accept, and a G62 with a torquemaster belt drive (which the plane is NOT designed to accept!) The engine installation is the major modification, and will take the bulk of the time to do. The assembly sequence basicaly starts at the tail and moves forward, which is how I will proceed. My idea with this thread is to fill in the blanks in the manual and give you benefit of my experience from the first plane.

The plane arrives in a 6' by 20" by 18" box inside an outter shipping box. Contents are well packed, and despite some wear and tear on the shipping box, the contents are undamaged. Even though this my 2nd plane, the fuse and wing panels are still impressive as I unwrap them. Compared to the first example this fuse has a better fit and finish, as on the first one the center seam was noticable in some locations, but not so here. Also the paint job is done better where the top and bottom colors blend.

IFLYRC-RCU

My Feedback: (28)

Great !

Good job on keeping the chin up in tough times.

Will watch with some interest.. have been "helping" a buddy put his together. Of course his could go so much faster if he was working on one plane instead of 3 !

Have fun !

edgeman55

My Feedback: (25)

Glad to see you getting #2 on the bench.I am slowly getting mine together between other projects.I just ordered the sullivan carbon pushrods to put the elevator servos up front.Figure if you had to add weight up front with that belt drive my EI converted G62 would need a lot of weight up front to CG right.Going with NiMH batts so putting them up front will help too.

rrudytoo

My Feedback: (27)

Scalebirdman,

Contact the seller/manufacturer if you bought the kit within the past thirty days. Most retailers will extend the discount to you even though the sale was not in effect at the time of the purchase. Remind them that this is your second Zero, too. If they are a decent bunch, and I'm sure they are, you will probably be pleasantly surprised. Good luck!

Al

scalebirdman

My Feedback: (6)

Thanks for the encourgement guys. I have the tail surfaces hinged. with removable hinge pins. I did this on the elevators so that could attach the pushrod to the modified strip aileron linkage outside of the fuse, then feed it thru a slot I cut in the stab mounting face. I needed to elevator to be free of the stab to do that. once I line everything up, then I just slide the hinge rod in place and everything is tied together. I was concerned that the 34" Dave Brown fiberglass pushrods wouldn't be long enough to reach the servo tray under the cockpit, so I spliced an additional 4" of rod, and inserted a 1/4" dowel thru the legnth of the push rod to add rigidity. This will allow me to move the elevator servo up near the cg. I may before final assembly, replace this with a pair of Central Hobbies 38" carbon fiber pushrods, which would be somewhat lighter than my first attempt. With the elevators detachable, I will be able to do this anytime. Next up will be the tail wheel/rear bulkhead install.

scalebirdman

My Feedback: (6)

Finished the back of the fuse tonight with the tail wheel install. The manual isn't very helpful there. If you assemble the unit to the rear bulkhead and mounting block assembly as shown you won't be able to get it into the rear of the fuse either thru the tail wheel opening, or down the fuse past the fiberglass tube that carries the stab joiner tube. However if you remove the tail wheel yoke and shaft, you can then fiddle it back down the fuse and into position. Next will be elevator and rudder servo mounts and then I'll shift over to the wing.

Ichy

Are we done yet!


Sorry, had to give you a bad time! Watching from the peanut gallery!

scalebirdman

My Feedback: (6)

No, not done quite yet. I switched over to the wing before hitting the work on the front of the fuse. Once again it's a guessing game on the location of the hinge points. In this case, I have a portion of the destroyed wing #1 to reference. I stripped the covering off the aileron to reveal the inner structure. The core is a laser cut ply over which half ribs are added with a thick leading edge. With roughly 1/2" of balsa on the leading edge, there is no need for hinge doublers. However the trailing edge of the wing is another story. It has small hinge double blocks. The problem is the dimensioned picture in the instruction manuel is completely unreadable. Using the portion of the 1st wing, I determined the outter hing points should be 2" in from the ends of the aileron. then center the remaining hinge points (approx 5 5/8" spacing) This corresponds to the hinge doublers on the remaining piece of the #1 wing.


BTW as you drill into the wing, drill slowly, and let the bit do the work. I popped one of the hinge doubler blocks loose drilling into the wing.

edgeman55

My Feedback: (25)

Thanks for the heads up on the hinge blocking positions.Hope mine are near the same places.While I like the plane some of these type things I think should be covered better for the builder.Kinda irks me that one has to move the elevator servos foward to not have to add 5lbs more to the front of this bird or do major beefing up for the main gear not to rip out.Lot easier to do this stuff on a uncovered plane.Oh well at least I feel better now that I got that off my chest.Back to the garage for some more work.

scalebirdman

My Feedback: (6)

Yeah Edge, the hinge blocks in the wing are skimpy. Here's another little bit of problem: Because the aileron ends are not 90 to the leading edge(see attached picture), you cannot feed the ailerons straight in, but need to come in at an angle, which can't be done with the hinge point holes drilled at 90 to the leading edge, which they need to be for them to work. To solve this I drilled the hinge point holes into the wing oblong to allow me to insert the points into the aileron, then work it into position in the wing. position the aileron with the minimum gap at the outboard end as needed for bind free operation. You need as much clearance between the aileron and flap as can be gotten so that they don't bind when the flap is partially deployed, and the aileron is fully deflected.

scalebirdman

My Feedback: (6)

Ailerons and flaps are hung by the chimney with care.... Actually hung on the wing. Again Space the aileron and flap as far apart from each other without causing binding on the other ends as possible so they do not interfere with each other as they move. Since the ailerons have an offset bevel and the flaps are split flaps you cannot use a robart hingepoint drilling guide on these. I fabed a drilling jig out of 2 pieces of 1/2" ply and drilled a pair of holes for drilling the ailerons, and a center hole for the flaps. It wasn't really necessary to drill duplicate holes for the ailerons; just wanted to be symetrical I guess. Another tip I learned from the 1st build: I taped a 1/32 ply strip on the upper surface of the flap near the leading edge to space the flap at the leading edge off the surface of the flap cove. This keeps the flap from binding at the leading edge as it closes, otherwise you could have a flap that won't completely close without putting a load on the servo.

scalebirdman

My Feedback: (6)

This wing half is just about done. I sealed the wheel wells with balsarite and then painted with rustoleum bare metal primer, which is a dead match for the underside color of the Zero. Installing the servo horn on the flap isn't as easy as the aileron. Unlike the aileron which has material built up where the horn goes to be able to screw into, the flap does not. To fix this I drilled 3/16" holes in the flap sheeting and epoxied in 3/16" dowels for additional meat to screw into. The front pair of dowles sung up against the flap leading edge material, and the rear dowl lies against one of the diagonal flap ribs, so they just don't depend on being glued to the sheeting material.

scalebirdman

My Feedback: (6)

With the wing done, it's back to the fuse, and the firewall mod. Just like #1, I chopped off the mounting box about 1/4" ahead of the firewall, and routed the top to about 1/2" away from the edge to allow the engine to mount higher than would be necessary on a straight drive applicaton. I fabed new tank box sides keyed in the recessed firewall to allow the engine/belt drive to fit. It's recessed about 1" behind the scale firewall. I simplified it somewhat this time, and did not include a "floor" keyed into the sides. Prior to assembley I took measurements off the remains of #1, and installed the 1/4-20 blind nuts. Slathered everything up with 30 min epoxy, and clamped it up to dry.

scalebirdman

My Feedback: (6)

Down to the final bits. Last time I scratch built a cockpit interior, using some bits of the Balsa USA Zero cockpit kit. Rather than go to all that trouble this time around, I was going to install the "cockpit" provided, which is a vacuformed sheet that you are supposed to cut out and fold up like a box, or in this case the inside of a box, but after giving it a look see, I decided against it. The plastic is very brittle, and could not be folded without cracking in to many pieces, besides witch the pieces, aside from the floor, don't begin to match the dimensions of the front/back/sides. After deciding that if I was going to go with a black interior this time around (yes, I know it's not prototypical) any detail would be lost, therefore I just cut out the front/back/floor from 1/64" ply and super glued them into place, and then painted the whole tub flat black, including the rough fiberglass cockpit sides. I'll use the supplied instrument panel, which looks nice, if not to scale, and my pilot figure and seat from Zero #1. One of the smartest moves I made this time was to leave the horizontal tail off until the very end; makes moving the fuse around a breeze. Expect to be ready to maiden in a couple of weeks. One week if I'm lucky, but things always have a way of taking longer than you expect.

Ichy

"Expect to be ready to maiden in a couple of weeks. One week if I'm lucky, but things always have a way of taking longer than you expect."

Good deal! Ran into Edgeman at the field yesterday. Finally some days with no wind and fairly warm. He says his may be ready this spring.

edgeman55

My Feedback: (25)

Good luck with your soon to be maiden,I know you will be double checking those ailerons!!I am back to work on my Zero as I was busy this winter building for others who wanted to pay me to build.Sure won't get rich doing it but it padded the hobby fund and kept me out of trouble.
Good to see you Sunday Dan.It was nice to see some warmth around here-look foward to a good year at the field.

scalebirdman

My Feedback: (6)

'bout time edge! Either of you two going to make it down to Chowchilla (ex-castle) this year? We are making plans to pick up an RV in Reno and driving on to Chowchilla, then spending a couple of days at Tahoe on the way back.

Planted the pilot in the office last night, and the instrument panel. The panel has a very sticky adhesive on the back, but no way I'd trust that to hold it in place for long. I added a couple of screws to make sure it stays in place. Expect to have everything done by the end of the weekend, but not in time for a maiden. Had my friendly neighborhood machinest add a 3rd pipe to the Bennett muffler, which is good for another 400 rpm over the stock 2 pipe.

edgeman55

My Feedback: (25)

Yes I plan on going down to Castle again on Saturday.Did not know they moved it further south to Chowchilla but I will still be there.What airfield will it be at in Chowchilla?And also make sure you fire up a video camera for that maiden.

scalebirdman

My Feedback: (6)

Don't worry about the video. My flying partner doesn't miss a chance to get the evidence on film! The IMAA rally will be at the full scale Chowchilla airport. Similar set up to what we had at Castle. Just about 1 good weekend away from having her done. Just need to mount the canopy; make the cut-outs in the cowl for the engine exhaust and fuel fill valve, and a few other odds and ends. We are going to wait until things dry out and take it out to the dry lake south of town to maiden. Lots more room to get used to a brand new bird.

Got to take a break this weekend and jet out to Omaha to pick me up one of them there Are-Vee's don't you know. Gonna be style'n this year for sure.

kochj

Reading you about your #2 zero....
Interesting that you really don't know about the structure of a plane( or what it's weak points are during the china assembly)
until someone cracks one up or recovers it and or resheeting.
I will say that My Top flite p-51 is built quite well. I thought that all manufactures built things the same way....( a year ago)
I have learned otherwise

Video would be awsome.....
I would pm you my andress and even pay you for some good video... consider it a help to pay off that RV and busted up plane!1

stuka

My Feedback: (62)

I do know about the structure of the airframe and the wing is very poor.I cracked up the first wing I had and ordered a new one.The first wing was opened up {what was left} and I found that the sheer webs were installed with the wood grain in the wrong direction.The wing is built way to light for a warbird.The landing gear mount wood is not even aircraft ply,it is pine wood.The ribs are overly lightened with holes that are not needed in a warbird.The second wing is identical to the first except that it had ribs that were broken at the factory along with the servo mounts for the aileron and flap one each.The ribs were just stuck back together without any kind of doubler.I contacted Ultra Rc via phone and email with no responses.After a few attempts I gave up.This is just my personal experience.

kochj

yikes
what did you end up doing with the plane? Have you flown it?

Other q'
How do you feal about the overall size of the plane....
The wingspan is slightly larger than the common 85" 50cc ARF warbird, and also the length.
If you were to put a 100cc in this like the specs say? It sounds like the wings would rip off and then RC support would no call you back about it!
I had thought about bying the corsair when it comes out, but now I am not so sure, if the quality control is not looking to well?

What do you think about it scale bird?

You must think that the plane is alreight being you just bought another one??

Justin

scalebirdman

My Feedback: (6)

Regarding the video.... Lets just wait for the maiden of #2, and hopefuly it will be a longer video with a happy ending. I feel the overall quality of the plane is good. The landing gear mounts need to be dealt with, as they are an accident waiting to happen. I added 1/32 ply doublers to all 3 ribs that attach to the gear blocks; 1 layer of ply on each side; 2 plys on the outter rib, as you cannot get to the back side. The other issue is this bird is too tail heavy. The stabs are sheeted foam core, and the vertical fin is also filled with foam. This adds unnecessary weight in the wost place. Coupled with the short nose moment means lots of nose weight. Have to say the fellow's Zero in the video on Ultra's web site flies very nicely on a DA-50. I didn't think to ask him how much nose weight he needed, or what his plane weighed in at. Have my friend cutting out a new aluminum mounting plate for the motor so that I can reach the bottom mounting bolts easier, and also to raise the motor about 3/8" on the plate, as it sits a bit low now. All that's left is to re-mount the motor, mount the center and aft canopy sections, and go fly.

stuka

My Feedback: (62)

The plane is of good size,comparable to Ziroli.It flew well until someone at the local field turned on[at least this is what we think].It is now just a memory. I am just really concerned about the integrity of the wing.As stated before I have seen the inside of the wing and have concerns of the workmanship.One thing you have to remember is with the size of these warbirds most crashes leave little to salvage no matter what manufacture they are.The fuse is nice without any concerns except what was stated about the tail heaviness.I would have to say that the landing gear mounts without some type of mod will not hold up to too many rough landings.

scalebirdman

My Feedback: (6)

I got the windscreen mounted the other day, and was about to mount the rear and center sections this weekend, but when I unwrapped them, I discovered they had been deformed. I shot an e-mail to ultra-rc this morning with the attached picture, and within 3 hours I had a UPS tracking number on the replacement canopy. Now THAT is customer service!