“EasyJet” - simple depron 64mm EDF

[The Fopster]

Hello folks. Thought I’d share this - it’s a simple EDF jet made from 6mm foam (sold for home insulation). As I’m in the UK that’s the best build material I can get hold of currently. Decent foamboard is very hard to find…
The design steals ideas from a few places - notably looking at Ben Harber’s jet designs, and also Jetworks online planes. Those things are beautiful (take a look at the ones ShadeyB has done - he does the build videos on YT and posts on these forums) but take a lot of work to build. I decided to design something similar but much easier to build that I could use to get used to flying these things, then once it’s had one too many crashes graduate to a Jetworks scale beauty!
Design is basically a box with a flat plate wing, and some minimal concessions to aerodynamic reality and a bit of “scale” shape. Currently it’s flying off 3s and it’s easy to handle - and easy to hand launch. Next steps are to add some cheater holes to increase the fan throughput and upgrade to a 4s battery.
Quite pleased with how well it turned out considering how basic it is!
A few build photos below to give you the idea of how it goes together.
Fan is a QX-Motor 64mm with a 3800kv motor. Servos are cheap 9g metal geared. Very cheap 60A ESC and currently 2200 3s battery. Flight times about 3 and a half minutes of not very aggressive flying.

 

[Merv]

Great looking plane

 

[The Fopster]

Well it flies - and pretty well! Inverted flight is very easy, and knife edge is also quite easy although there is some "roll coupling" (which means you need to keep some aileron applied as well as rudder to hold the knife edge).

It isn't super fast - which was expected. It has a lot of frontal area due to the simple box shape. I had planned a version two to reduce the frontal area by making the front half of the fuselage narrower - which also has the benefit of increasing the potential size of the air intakes. However, it flies so well I'm not sure now whether to bother as it would make it a bit more complex to build.

Anyway - some basic prof of flight video here. I propped my phone on a rock (using the deport stand you can see in front of the plane) and flew in and out of camera shot just to get some passes filmed - the "panning camera" effect was done in iMovie using the "Ken Burns" moving crop. It worked quite well - good to know!

 

[L Edge]

Well it flies - and pretty well! Inverted flight is very easy, and knife edge is also quite easy although there is some "roll coupling" (which means you need to keep some aileron applied as well as rudder to hold the knife edge).

It isn't super fast - which was expected. It has a lot of frontal area due to the simple box shape. I had planned a version two to reduce the frontal area by making the front half of the fuselage narrower - which also has the benefit of increasing the potential size of the air intakes. However, it flies so well I'm not sure now whether to bother as it would make it a bit more complex to build.

Anyway - some basic prof of flight video here. I propped my phone on a rock (using the deport stand you can see in front of the plane) and flew in and out of camera shot just to get some passes filmed - the "panning camera" effect was done in iMovie using the "Ken Burns" moving crop. It worked quite well - good to know!

Your intake for the EDF starts over the wing, the video shows extra cheater holes in the fuse. Did it show an improvement?

 

[The Fopster]

Your intake for the EDF starts over the wing, the video shows extra cheater holes in the fuse. Did it show an improvement?

It did - significantly. Static thrust was 540g without the extra vents and about 720g with them (running only on 3s). Hand launches are now very stress free, even on 3s. On a borrowed 4s it had lots of power - hoping to get some video tomorrow.

 

[The Fopster]

Had a 4s flight today with a (borrowed!) 4s battery. A club mate (thanks Jeff!) filmed the flight on my phone, and I've edited it to make it less of a chore to watch!

 

[Lizzie99]

Great model are plans going to be available?

 

[usaserres]

Yes. Would love to see plans.

 

[The Fopster]

Great model are plans going to be available?

Yes - should finalise plans in the next few days. I charge a very small amount to fund the hobby (I was made redundant so the hobby needs to pay for itself!). My last design paid for this EDF unit...

 

[Goudbeekje]

How are the plans?

Still planned to be released?

 

[The Fopster]

How are the plans?

Still planned to be released?

Yes - but got delayed building the second version (to test the accuracy of the plans) due to delayed arrival of the electronics parts. I’ll get there eventually! Was flying the first prototype yesterday - now with 4s batteries. On a 4s 2200mAh it has unlimited vertical. So much fun to fly…

 

[ADRIAN KOWALSKI]

It did - significantly. Static thrust was 540g without the extra vents and about 720g with them (running only on 3s). Hand launches are now very stress free, even on 3s. On a borrowed 4s it had lots of power - hoping to get some video tomorrow.

Hi.
Do you have plans yet???

Adrian

 

[The Fopster]

Hi.
Do you have plans yet???

Adrian

I am halfway through filming the build video and making amendments to the plans. Nearly there - possibly a week or so.

 

[The Fopster]

Second prototype of the "EasyJet" is done - and I've filmed and edited a build video, and got a whole new admiration for the Flitetest crew in the process! I've printed out some simple graphics for this one in a cartoon Navy Goshawk style - should be easy enough to see!

 

[Goudbeekje]

Realy nice. I like the design with seperate nose. With my flying skills they get hurt a lot. Easy to rebuild now. If you reinforce the the fuselage and make the nose a bit weaker. The damage will mostly be a bent nose as it is the weakest point.


As a first time edf jet on 3s how are launch and slower flight to grow into the jet?

 

[Goudbeekje]

Is is defenitly on the shortlist for my first edf.

As are the l39, f22 en grunjet from grifflyer.

 

[The Fopster]

Realy nice. I like the design with seperate nose. With my flying skills they get hurt a lot. Easy to rebuild now. If you reinforce the the fuselage and make the nose a bit weaker. The damage will mostly be a bent nose as it is the weakest point.


As a first time edf jet on 3s how are launch and slower flight to grow into the jet?

I flew it on 3s for the first ten flights. It was no easier to fly - just slower. It’s really not hard to fly at all - if the control surface movements aren’t too high it’s very tame as it’s pretty light, so it slows down OK.

 

[The Fopster]

Is is defenitly on the shortlist for my first edf.

As are the l39, f22 en grunjet from grifflyer.

Those Grifflyer jets are brilliant - and if you can get foamboard I’d build one if I were you. If you can’t, then my design might be an easier option.

 

[Goudbeekje]

Those Grifflyer jets are brilliant - and if you can get foamboard I’d build one if I were you. If you can’t, then my design might be an easier option.

I build in 6mm en 3mm depron. Sometimes scale to 128% sometimes just as is.

 

[The Fopster]

I build in 6mm en 3mm depron. Sometimes scale to 128% sometimes just as is.

In that case this is a very easy build - 6mm deport sheet. The design is deliberately made mainly of straight lines, so cutting out the parts is very easy using a straight metal ruler to guide your knife.