Scale Build Off - Ryan Navion from 1960's Control Line Plans

[Joker 53150]

Back in the mid 60's my dad was interested in building balsa planes. Life was great, he had a good job, a nice house, plenty of room to work.

And then the kids came into the picture and ruined his fun.

Numerous plans he had purchased went into storage, the house filled with toys, pets, etc and decades passed. As a kid I remember looking at the plans he had, folding and unfolding them and thinking about building the planes myself. The Navion plan was probably unfolded and folded incorrectly hundreds of times.

A few years ago my dad gave me the plans as I was getting deep in to the hobby. Sadly, the Navion plan was in bad shape from being handled and poorly folded so many times. I figured it was a lost cause, but there was no harm in trying to salvage them if I could. At the time I worked for a manufacturing company which had an estimating department with large scanners/printers. I taped up the torn sheet taking care to line things up as best I could. The folds were so bad in areas that the paper was long gone. With it taped and ready I had it scanned as a .pdf and was amazed at how well it worked. The pics below show the taped up original and the newly scanned version.






This was absolutely a plane I wanted to build, even though it was designed for control line and we're in the age of RC. Just over a year ago Model Airplane News held a "Build to Win" contest, where all contestants started with the same generic core design - essentially a low-wing "Stick" - and they created their own masterpiece from there. Searching for design inspiration I pulled out the Navion plan and found it was almost exactly the same size as the Contest Airframe, so I used it for my design. When the contest ended my version of the Navion was awarded Honorable Mention - not too bad for my first real kit bash attempt.






The contest airplane looks a bit like the Navion and it flies well even though it is way too heavy due to the electric retracts and my heavy building techniques. But I still wanted a better version of the Navion, and this contest is giving me the reason to finally build it! It may not be done in time, but it's something I've wanted to do for decades and it's time to pull the trigger.

Some of the engineering to update from C/L to RC I've already done, such as making the rudder operable and building the tail section from stick instead of sheet. The plane was never designed to have ailerons so I'll need to tackle that project, along with determining how to add retracts in a plan that never had them. This should be an interesting project for me, so thanks and curses to Willsonman for starting the contest!

[roversgonemad]

Looks like a great plane to build. Please consider sending an electronic copy of your plane to Steve at Outerzone. Steve has built one of the most amazing collections of plans, all free! I searched on Navion and did not see your particular model. If any of you builders have not found Outerzone yet, it's like crack for builders of flying models!!

[earthsciteach]

Awesome! What's the wingspan?

[Joker 53150]

I was just looking at his site today to find out how to upload the plans and will take care of that soon. You're right, it's like crack!

Wingspan on the Navion is 33". Perfect for the areas I fly.

[jhitesma]

My problem with Outerzone is it's too good of a resource I went there looking for something to build and found too many options, got overwhelmed and put off building anything as a result. I can't just "browse" a site like that safely But it did let me find what I was looking for when I knew what I wanted.

Now to find the time to build these dozen or two sets of plans I couldn't resist downloading the first time I found outerzone....

[Joker 53150]

It's good that I didn't have free access to the big printers at the previous job or I'd have been fired for wasting company resources!

[AkimboGlueGuns]

My problem with Outerzone is it's too good of a resource I went there looking for something to build and found too many options, got overwhelmed and put off building anything as a result. I can't just "browse" a site like that safely But it did let me find what I was looking for when I knew what I wanted.

Now to find the time to build these dozen or two sets of plans I couldn't resist downloading the first time I found outerzone....

I know that feeling.

[Joker 53150]

I'm starting this build off with the fuselage. The formers are a mix of 1/8" and 1/4" light balsa, and the plans call for planking the fuselage with 3/8" x 1/8" balsa planks.






I had some of the 1/8" x 3/8" sticks for another build on-hand and did some test fitting. In my opinion that plank size is jut way too big and wouldn't conform well to the curves of the fuselage. I've got a balsa stripper so I took some 3/32" sheet and made some planks 1/4" wide which work well for much of the planking. When I get to the areas with more curve around the bottom I'll make the planks a little narrower.

Once the glue holding the planking applied so far dries sufficiently I can remove the fuselage from the building board and add the formers for the other side. The tentative plan is to eventually cover the fuselage with fiberglass, my first attempt at doing that on any build.

[Joker 53150]

With some planks attached to the first side I could remove the fuse from the building board and install the fuselage formers on the second side. Then, on with the planks!



Planking of the fuselage seems to go quickly, but it takes some time. I've seen people plank with surgical precision, but that takes a lot more time and skill than I've got, so I'll end up with more clean-up work when it comes time to finish the fuselage. I use a few different widths of planks, and taper them as needed to fit the gaps as well as possible.

Speak of gaps, I certainly have a lot of them! At this point it looks like Pinhead from the Hellraiser movie series...




When the glue dries and the pins are removed I hit the raised edges with the razor-plane which cleans up the look quite a bit.




Some light sanding with a sanding bar refines it a little bit more. At this time I'm not doing a final sanding, but just trying to clean it up a little for my own personal enjoyment. Once the planking is done and the rough sanding is completed I'll break out the filler to take care of all the little gaps. Finish sanding will follow that, along with fiberglassing.

[Joker 53150]

I probably should have posted some pictures when I started this thread, but below are pictures of the Ryan Navion. In my opinion, one of the prettiest planes ever designed. It was used in civilian and military roles as the L-17 so the potential for paint and decal work is endless!