teddydbest
New member
Hey guys, I wanted to share the experience of designing and scratch building a plane for my first time. I will also share some of the mishaps and lessons I learned along the way to potentially save some other newbies from the making the same mistakes as me.
I wanted a low wing plane with a bit of speed what I ended up with looks a lot like a WWII warbird. Here is the finished product as of now. Hopefully I get some landing gear on soon
I started out by making two separate wings using a similar technique to the armin wing by experimental airlines, only instead of a straight wing I swept the back of the wing forward a bit (You can see the wing width is slightly smaller at the wingtips than at the fuselage).
Then I made a foam-board spar and glued it in place in the fuselage and attached the wings to it. (I found this is an easy way to connect a wing without having to cut the shape of the airfoil out of the fuselage, it looks good but its definitely not as strong as making the entire wing in one piece, using a wooden dowel instead of a foam spar is much better.)
Then I placed my elevator and rudder servos and began to build up the top section of the fuselage. I did not use card-stock to build the curved pieces, just the same dollar tree foam board with the paper taken off of one side. Weight is not an issue with this plane cause the f pack motor has more than enough power, so having some weight is good for penetration through wind.
I also made small compartment for my battery, a "power pod" if you will, but mine is not swappable, just glued in place.
then I made a very simple vertical stabilizer and elevator
Next I began to plug up all my electronics and create my firewall. for my firewall I used 4 thin sheets of birch plywood and glued them together. using a brand new exacto blade I was able to crudely drill some holes for the motor to mount on. I highly recommend not going with birch plywood (unless you don't have access to a saw), just try to find some thicker plywood and it will save you the trouble of cutting out a bunch of pieces and gluing together.
I originally bought power pack A off of flight test's store to power this plane, but the motor I received wasn't working properly, I ordered the same emax motor that comes with power pack F off of amazon and it ended up working really well. Im using 6x3 propellers that were included in the power pack, and I am running 3s 450 mah batteries. I got one from e flight which was pretty expensive and it already stopped working,so I've been using the tattu ones on amazon and have no complaints whatsoever. I think I will upgrade to 1000 mah to get longer flight time and to add more weight in the nose.
Because my wings are so close to the nose, i put two batteries (only one is hooked up) in the nose to move my CG forward but I am still messing with the CG to find the best characteristics.
I also created a friction fit nose piece that slides on and off the nose which holds down the hatch for the battery. This was cool in principle, but you have to take the propeller off every time you want to open the hatch so it may not have been the best idea.
My maiden flight was utter disappointment do to a serious rookie mistake, my elevator channel was reversed so when I pulled up the plane nosedived and snapped the propeller, no damage to the plane was done. My next flight actually went relatively smoothly, needless to say I was elated just to see the thing that I had build fly. It was pretty gusty but it handled the wind fine, I could tell my CG was off a bit so I will have to experiment more. I landed the plane fine, but ended up snapping my other prop. Oh well, just ordered 16 more.
Here are some things I learned along the way:
-Highwing Aircraft are easier to make so starting with that may be a better idea.
-Triple check your channels before you fly, don't be too eager to fly it cause you will forget something
-If the holes in your control horns/servo horns are too small for the pushrods, use a brand new exacto blade as a make shift hand drill, it works great to widen the holes without stressing the plastic.
-Measure 3 times and cut once. (I messed up like 5 wings before I got one that looked nice)
-Buy way more foam board than you think you will need.
-Have patience, its not going to work out the first time, so don't let little issues frustrate you and stop you from finishing. The process is frustrating, but so worth it when the plane actually flies and you built it yourself.
-Don't be afraid to implement ideas from plans that you see online (I really liked the size of the mini mustang so I referred to the plans at times to make my plane).
-Designing the plane makes the DIY process WAY longer, so if you want the fun of building the plane but are eager to get flying just grab a speed build kit and you can be done in less than a day.
Lastly, I am really open to critique and ideas you guys have about my plane, I won't be offended if you don't like something about it, in fact I would prefer you tell me what I can do better so I can improve this plane and future ones as well.
Cheers!
Ted
I wanted a low wing plane with a bit of speed what I ended up with looks a lot like a WWII warbird. Here is the finished product as of now. Hopefully I get some landing gear on soon
I started out by making two separate wings using a similar technique to the armin wing by experimental airlines, only instead of a straight wing I swept the back of the wing forward a bit (You can see the wing width is slightly smaller at the wingtips than at the fuselage).
Then I made a foam-board spar and glued it in place in the fuselage and attached the wings to it. (I found this is an easy way to connect a wing without having to cut the shape of the airfoil out of the fuselage, it looks good but its definitely not as strong as making the entire wing in one piece, using a wooden dowel instead of a foam spar is much better.)
Then I placed my elevator and rudder servos and began to build up the top section of the fuselage. I did not use card-stock to build the curved pieces, just the same dollar tree foam board with the paper taken off of one side. Weight is not an issue with this plane cause the f pack motor has more than enough power, so having some weight is good for penetration through wind.
I also made small compartment for my battery, a "power pod" if you will, but mine is not swappable, just glued in place.
then I made a very simple vertical stabilizer and elevator
Next I began to plug up all my electronics and create my firewall. for my firewall I used 4 thin sheets of birch plywood and glued them together. using a brand new exacto blade I was able to crudely drill some holes for the motor to mount on. I highly recommend not going with birch plywood (unless you don't have access to a saw), just try to find some thicker plywood and it will save you the trouble of cutting out a bunch of pieces and gluing together.
I originally bought power pack A off of flight test's store to power this plane, but the motor I received wasn't working properly, I ordered the same emax motor that comes with power pack F off of amazon and it ended up working really well. Im using 6x3 propellers that were included in the power pack, and I am running 3s 450 mah batteries. I got one from e flight which was pretty expensive and it already stopped working,so I've been using the tattu ones on amazon and have no complaints whatsoever. I think I will upgrade to 1000 mah to get longer flight time and to add more weight in the nose.
Because my wings are so close to the nose, i put two batteries (only one is hooked up) in the nose to move my CG forward but I am still messing with the CG to find the best characteristics.
I also created a friction fit nose piece that slides on and off the nose which holds down the hatch for the battery. This was cool in principle, but you have to take the propeller off every time you want to open the hatch so it may not have been the best idea.
My maiden flight was utter disappointment do to a serious rookie mistake, my elevator channel was reversed so when I pulled up the plane nosedived and snapped the propeller, no damage to the plane was done. My next flight actually went relatively smoothly, needless to say I was elated just to see the thing that I had build fly. It was pretty gusty but it handled the wind fine, I could tell my CG was off a bit so I will have to experiment more. I landed the plane fine, but ended up snapping my other prop. Oh well, just ordered 16 more.
Here are some things I learned along the way:
-Highwing Aircraft are easier to make so starting with that may be a better idea.
-Triple check your channels before you fly, don't be too eager to fly it cause you will forget something
-If the holes in your control horns/servo horns are too small for the pushrods, use a brand new exacto blade as a make shift hand drill, it works great to widen the holes without stressing the plastic.
-Measure 3 times and cut once. (I messed up like 5 wings before I got one that looked nice)
-Buy way more foam board than you think you will need.
-Have patience, its not going to work out the first time, so don't let little issues frustrate you and stop you from finishing. The process is frustrating, but so worth it when the plane actually flies and you built it yourself.
-Don't be afraid to implement ideas from plans that you see online (I really liked the size of the mini mustang so I referred to the plans at times to make my plane).
-Designing the plane makes the DIY process WAY longer, so if you want the fun of building the plane but are eager to get flying just grab a speed build kit and you can be done in less than a day.
Lastly, I am really open to critique and ideas you guys have about my plane, I won't be offended if you don't like something about it, in fact I would prefer you tell me what I can do better so I can improve this plane and future ones as well.
Cheers!
Ted
