BMatthews

This is a concept I've toyed with in my mind for a few years now. A call for something unusual in the 1/2A forum prompted me to sketch it up finally. As you can see it's sort of a missle style model intended for some unusual flying. Being totally symetrical it will not require any sort of bank to turn. Just rudder and it'll "fly" around the turn. Similarly knife edge flight for those that are keen on that form of flying will now be a breeze. Knife edge loops? Also not a problem. Cloverleafs of inside loop, left loop, outside loop and right loop is now a new maneuver only possible with the new Which Way? design. Ball wheels on the wingtips in conjunction with 4 tail wheels allows for not only upright takeoff but also inverted and knife edge landings. To get the best out of this concept the balance point should be right back on the neutral point and don't try to fly too fast.

And as you can all imagine the use of 4 very stark and easy to discern primary colors on all 4 sides is HIGHLY recomended. I suggest white upper, black lower and red on the right and green on the left for you boaters out there to help with orientation....

From the way Dick Hanson has been talking about his little fun fly models I think this should be right up his alley....

cwrr5

My Feedback: (32)

Bruce, that's a pretty neat idea.... I think even I could land of of those!


(btw - what started all the unusual stuff recently? )

Hotrodkid

loks like a fun plane man, ive ben thinking of what it would take to build something like one of the famous "x planes" for a while and something like this ould be a great first step in learning to properly fly something w/ a non-standard configuration

now for my thoughts on the design:

skip the wheels on the top 2 wingtips and then u can leave 3 of the tail whels off

landing it on its side seams like it would be a great way to dumb thumb it and wind up stearing it towards yourself / the crowd while trying to work the elevator when u should be using the rudder for up/down imputs @ that moment

not to mention that adjusting the landing gear to be toe in so that it self corrects on the runway wouldnt be posible

SST

My Feedback: (2)

If you want a REAL challenge, why not get a pair of those coroplast coke bottles from the local stop-n-rob, slit one at the front half, the other at the back half, X them together and hang an engine on the front, and then try to find the 'top' side to fly it?

starcad

My Feedback: (7)

Gee Bruce that is really different?? Are those small Balls for the landing gear? or am I looking at that wrong.

SoCal GliderGuider

Ping-pong balls.

cwrr5

My Feedback: (32)

Guy, those would be "landing balls"... I see you're lurking again, how's stuff?

pingpong balls might be somewhat fragile, they tend to dent easily. Foam "nerf" balls might be better if you can find 'em.

SoCal GliderGuider

I just want to know how you get a centered hole in the "landing balls".

BMatthews

Yep, they are balls of some form. Why balls? Simple, balls as shown work as wheels to either side of the axle better than standard wheels in line with the wing would do. Not sure what at this point but they should be about 1 1/2 to 2 inches in diameter to roll on grass with ease. Given the long effective length of the gear nose overs would be too easy if the balls are too small. Obviously there's some new skills to learn to keep this one safe but that's part of the fun. Taking off two of the wheels and three of the tail wheels is possible but then you loose out on half the fun of this one with the knifeedge and inverted landings.

I wonder if this design is capable of snap rolling?

SoCal GliderGuider

Bet with one of the reversable props (elelctric) you could fly in backwards! Have to switch the controls via fully programmable transmitter.

SoCal GliderGuider

Could build this with extra wings. Yes take off and land vertically!!!

BMatthews

I havent seen that one done as a model but there's a guy that did a depron foamy of the dealta winged Convair Pogo tail sitter. From what I saw of the online videos it's a darn sight more successful than the original.

Tall Paul

Aero genius Don Incoll did a VTOL down in Oz in 1999. He used a Futaba "autopilot" for the vertical phases.
If I could get some Depron, I'd whip out that X-plane with a GWS 350 G or H gearing..

Ebola0001

could you do it so the plane knew which direction gravity was and modified its controls so that it was always "right side up" no mater which side was up in reality? it would require more computing power than is commonly available, but you could "set" an accelerometer on the ground and it could keep track of where the plane is roll wise and feed that to the control mixer

BMatthews

Where's the fun in that? Half of the fun with this type of model would be doing touch and goes from knife edge and inverted as well as upright. Picking a color scheme that aids the pilot in ID'ing the attitude is essential but it's the challenge of such a model that is intruiging.

Of course lots of new maneuvers would be possible with such a planform.

Ebola, I know you're a relatively short time pilot so I can understand how you can't appreciate the need for something new and titilating when you've got a lot of hours behind you with other more or less normal types of models. That is a large part of why I chose to finally learn to fly rudder only a couple of years back. Nothing to bail me out, just a snarling Cox 049, a single movable surface and some foresight in my flying to put the model where and when I wanted it.

For example a few years back I attended a winter fun fly in the snow with an electric model that had a belly scoop for cooling air. I was worried about filling the model with snow so I chose to land inverted onto the canopy. This worked like a treat and was fun to boot as it was quite different. The first time I did it a few folks thought I had crashed....

SoCal GliderGuider

I still want to know how to drill a centered hole through a sphere/ball.

cwrr5

My Feedback: (32)

Just build a "half-box" drill guide from scrap wood, with the same inside size as the ball's diameter. Center drill the guide hole in the box, insert ball, then drill the ball.

Might be interesting to have the ball free to rotate in any direction, and use the control surfaces to "steer" while on the ground. Sideways landing anyone?

BMatthews

Now that's just SILLY! ! ! ! !

But it may be fun!...

Sort of like flying off an ice rink.

Weldman

This plane you are making looks like the Pogo but has the same set up of a Focke-Wulf Triebflugel

BMatthews

Except my wings won't rotate for lift.

Salto

Bruce,
I just came across this thread. Have you seen the similar X wing model I built a while back? Here's a link, look from post #22 onwards: http://www.rcgroups.com/forums/showt...ht=flat+turns+

I usually fly it orthogonally, but it will fly diagonally like your sketch shows.

Graham.

BMatthews

That's GREAT Graham! Now I'll have a better idea of what to expect.

Mine has the wing oriented as shown because in my mind I was going to make the wings with fairly strong spars and a 36 inch span each and put them on the diagonal as shown so I could at least START with normal takeoffs and landings. Mine was going to be powered with an OS 25FP so it would have true vertical power. But at that power and size handlaunching would be a bear. I didn't show them but the idea was to make the tail surfaces hardy enough to support tail legs on them for VTOL. So I'd be able to take off and land in any of 4 "conventional" positions or use the tail sitter mode. The X wing setup was just a natural if you're thinking landing gear. But the tails were set at the normal ortho lines so I'd avoid the need for mixing and to allow for steering tailwheels without being silly.... like wiffle balls on the tips isn't silly!?!?!?