59 year old newbie - adding more planes

kilroy07

Legendary member
I have had leads come loose but not the wires from the connector. I do like to give connections a tug and have been known to add a bit of hot glue to take one down.

As to your foamboard question. There are three main types/brands (four of you count the waterproof stuff).

There’s the high quality stuff (Elemors/hobby lobby) it can be three times heavier than the dtfb.
Ironically my tiny trainer is mostly HQ foamboard (a testament to the designs versatility.)

Ross is probably what you found at Walmart. Some people like it, I don’t. It’s what my Xf Viper is made from (avatar pic). I found it inconsistent in thickness. Sometimes a sheet would be 5mm, other times 4 or even 6. Probably not a deal scratch building but can be an issue when laser cutting. I did find the paper less likely to delaminates (and for awhile you could get it for .80)

And finally DTFB. The standard which all others are judged.

The explorer is looking good! I’ve had mixed results with mine. Keep it light and you should be fine.
 

Jimun

Elite member
Repaired and went out flying yesterday. Wind was a little stronger which made for some tougher flying, but crashing seemed to be easier.:ROFLMAO:
Winds did start off calm in the morning, but by the time I got home and replaced a servo the winds had picked up. I was go to fly and the wind was not going to stop.:LOL:


Broke a prop on a 1 second flight and filled the nose with mud. As I look at the video when I was cleaning out the mud I could see that my servo was loose on my left wing, which I didn't see at the time, that might have made some of my flying more difficult:unsure:.:LOL:


Realized now that the servo was loose and had to head home to repair. Actually has a servo loose inside the fuselage to. Got those repaired and headed back to the field. It is only about 5 minutes from my house. So here I go again. The just kept blowing and I kept on trying to keep the plane in the air. The wind was showing about 10 mph on my wind gauge and the gust a few mph's more.


More flying and crashing. I think it was a 4 prop day:LOL:.


I didn't know my battery was missing till I had walked back to my truck. Note to self: Make sure you have all of your parts after a crash. I spent the next 20 minute, give or take a minute. After so many crashes, I had stopped counting by now, I went looking in the wrong area in the weeds. If you look closely at the end of the video you can see the battery as I walk up to the plane about 3 to 4 feet to the right on the dirt. So I guess I walked past that battery about a half a dozen times.:LOL:. So I finally see it and get it back in the plane, I am still on my first battery.


My camera battery died after this flight. I did get it up again and then this happened. So I did not get this on video. But it pretty much looked like all the other crashes of the day.:LOL:

Tiny Trainer 013.JPG

Tiny Trainer 014.JPG


I did get my wing repaired this morning. I will try to get it out again this weekend If it doesn't rain and the wind is a little calmer. Next weekend I am going out of town for the weekend with my wife to celebrate 40 years of marriage. I will be back to fly again.
 

Wildthing

Legendary member
One tough bird and one stubborn pilot :)

One thing just watching the plane it looks super responsive for both roll and pitch, I would dial the rates down a bit and maybe increase the expo. Also on a calmer day go up high and center the sticks and see how level and true it flies.
 

mayan

Legendary member
@Jimun your flying is improving and I am happy to see that. You come very well prepared to the field with spare parts which is great. Might consider getting a battery powered hot glue gun for field repairs. I enjoy watching you push it flying in stronger winds than what you seem to feel comfortable with and that leaves me smiling. I recommend you build a new wing because that wing now has a weak spot and will most likely break again and again and again :(. Keep it up my dear friend :).
 

bracesport

Legendary member
@Jimun - with (or without) a centre dihedral I have been glueing in shaped popsicle sticks, and sometimes bamboo skewers to stiffen the main join - I even glued skewers into a channel cut into the top of a wing after suffering wing bends due to crashing (heaps) - I crossed the skewers passed each other at the wing centre and the wing is still flying - worked for me!
 

jross

Well-known member
I did get my wing repaired this morning.
Run packing tape lengthwise over the top and bottom of the wing. My TT has been crashed ten ways to Sunday and the only wrinkles I have are where the wing is undercambered. Pretty sure a short length of popsicle stick or skewer would fix that. If you want to make it really gnarly, add an extra layer of tape over the leading edge. I hit a fence made of railway ties. Broke a prop. Hit a tree top at full speed and put a small dent in the leading edge. Plane kept flying and I recovered. An old Chevy pickup at half throttle. You get the idea. Tape the wing flat before you fold it, if you can. Bombproof.

I admire your persistence. Reminds me of my days 6 months ago when I crashed and crashed before finally getting a plane airborne for a minute or two. Exhilarating.
 

Jimun

Elite member
One tough bird and one stubborn pilot :)

One thing just watching the plane it looks super responsive for both roll and pitch, I would dial the rates down a bit and maybe increase the expo. Also on a calmer day go up high and center the sticks and see how level and true it flies.
@Wildthing I just realized today that I had the rates set on high. I forgot to set the on low. I will try to remember next time. Thank you
 

Jimun

Elite member
Well I built a new nose and more power pods. I did notice that I was about 1/16" out of square and I think I figured out the problem. When I first printed out my planes and made made templates I should have checked the measurements after taping the plans together. I just didn't think about doing that. After reading a post awhile back I remember reading to make sure you change your printer settings to 100%. Now I know by seeing it for myself. If the printer is not set to print at 100% each printed page can be scaled differently. a 1/16" of an inch is not that noticed easily on the planes but when you start folding and gluing you while have trouble keeping things square like I did. So I did print out the planes again at 100% and measured areas to check and it looks correct. I need to get more poster board to make new templates. I should have done it before I built this new nose. I did make it work and got my Tiny Trainer ready to fly again:D.

Tiny Trainer ready.JPG


Last week I did get the boom and tail done on my FT Explorer.

Explorer boom and tail done.JPG


Thanks to everyone's help, critiquing, and encouragement. You are a great group.

Stayed home this weekend. Next weekend I will be out of town so I will try to get out and fly this weekend or maybe after work since the days are getting longer and the weather is getting warmer. Just need the wind to cooperate and the timing.
 
Last edited:

Jimun

Elite member
Got the new TT templates made last night and double checked measurements to make sure they are more accurate.

Tiny Trainer New Templates.JPG


I checked AMA for a local flying field and it listed one a few miles away. I emailed them and I am going to check them out in a couple of weeks. I would have gone today but yesterday when I talked to my wife about it she reminded me with a stern word that it is our annivesary, oops:oops:. Silly me for letting flying distract me:LOL:.
 

Jimun

Elite member
Wanted to get a second TT built and ready. Only got this far.

Tiny Trainer #2 almost ready.JPG


I am going to the RC club after church tomorrow to meet up with them and maybe do a test flight. If it goes good I might join so I can have access anytime. It is in a canyon about 15 to 20 minutes away. I will let you know how it goes. I need to get more flight time in.
 

mayan

Legendary member
Wanted to get a second TT built and ready. Only got this far.

View attachment 133726

I am going to the RC club after church tomorrow to meet up with them and maybe do a test flight. If it goes good I might join so I can have access anytime. It is in a canyon about 15 to 20 minutes away. I will let you know how it goes. I need to get more flight time in.
Good luck my dear friend :).
 

Jimun

Elite member
Ok, I went to the RC Field and met a few members today. They let me try out the TT, I started with the sport wing and had a couple of crashes. Had some wires pull out again from an aileron servo and a servo came loose in the fuselage. A member had an invertor and a glue gun. I fixed the loose servo and changed to the glide wing. It was a little windy and they instructed me to slow down, I forgot to decrease my throttle again, and to get higher, 2 to 3 mistakes high, just like what you guys told me after seeing my videos. So I took there advice and went up again. I did a pattern around the field, practiced lining up with the runway and some figure 8's. I kept the plane up until the battery was low and brought in down for a smooth landing. I replaced the battery and went up again and did the same routine again and landing smooth again.:D
It was good seeing how they fly around the field, it gave me a better perspective on keeping the plane a little closer and not fly so far out and to physically see how high they were flying helped a lot. They said I did good and looked more settled down. I signed up and now I can use the field anytime. It is only $50 a year and I only had to pay $25 because the year is half over.

I am thinking of using the 9g servos for the ailerons. What do you think?

Sorry no video this time. It was one less thing to think about on my test flight for them.

I did get a picture of the field:

IMG_4494.JPG
 
Last edited:

mayan

Legendary member
Ok, I went to the RC Field and met a few members today. They let me try out the TT, I started with the sport wing and had a couple of crashes. Had some wires pull out again from an aileron servo and a servo came loose in the fuselage. A member had an invertor and a glue gun. I fixed the loose servo and changed to the glide wing. It was a little windy and they instructed me to slow down, I forgot to decrease my throttle again, and to get higher, 2 to 3 mistakes high, just like what you guys told me after seeing my videos. So I took there advice and went up again. I did a pattern around the field, practiced lining up with the runway and some figure 8's. I kept the plane up until the battery was low and brought in down for a smooth landing. I replaced the battery and went up again and did the same routine again and landing smooth again.:D
It was good seeing how they fly around the field, it gave me a better perspective on keeping the plane a little closer and not fly so far out and to physically see how high they were flying helped a lot. They said I did good and looked more settled down. I signed up and now I can use the field anytime. It is only $50 a year and I only had to pay $25 because the year is half over.

I am thinking of using the 9g servos for the ailerons. What do you think?

Sorry no video this time. It was one less thing to think about on my test flight for them.

I did get a picture of the field:

View attachment 133796
Wow, Jimun happy for you. Happy to hear that you got to fly and enjoyed meeting the people there. I say you can use the 9g servos they will work fine.
 

buzzbomb

I know nothing!
It sounds like that club is just right for you, Jimun. That's wonderful! I've a sneaky suspicion you're going to be learning a lot about flying really quickly. Please continue to share your newfound knowledge with us know-nothings! :)

I agree with mayan. The TT is so amazingly forgiving, I doubt the extra weight of a 9g servo will be noticeable at all. I don't know if there'd be any benefit over a 5g, but I can't see that it would hurt anything.
 

Jimun

Elite member
It sounds like that club is just right for you, Jimun. That's wonderful! I've a sneaky suspicion you're going to be learning a lot about flying really quickly. Please continue to share your newfound knowledge with us know-nothings! :)

I agree with mayan. The TT is so amazingly forgiving, I doubt the extra weight of a 9g servo will be noticeable at all. I don't know if there'd be any benefit over a 5g, but I can't see that it would hurt anything.

Thanks @buzzbomb
The reason for 9g is the 5g servo wires keep pulling out of the connector
 

buzzbomb

I know nothing!
Thanks @buzzbomb
The reason for 9g is the 5g servo wires keep pulling out of the connector
I had the same problem with the Y-cable on my 4ch TT. I just wrapped some electrical tape around the connectors. The combined cables are long enough that you can still disassemble the plane and lay the fuselage on the wing for transport.
 

mayan

Legendary member
The 9g will work for sure also with a 4 channel version. I know because my SpiTTT was setup that way :).
 

Jimun

Elite member
Oh by the way last week at the air field I got to see one of those trees jump in front of a plane:eek:. It was a good size plane to, about 7' I think. We were all watching him lining up with the runway and the tree looked like it was behind him and it jumped in front of him and he hit the top. When they retrieved it, it had tumbled all the way to the ground and only had a broken canopy and about 1' of the left wing was damaged pretty good. They might find more on a closer inspection but it looked like it was still in good shape.
I did not see any other FB planes but one of the guys said he learned to fly 4 channel a few months on the Tiny Trainer so they were all familiar with it. :)
 

Gold Max

Member
I have been wanting to fly rc since I was a teenager and I am just getting started now. I have put together a Tiny Trainer from the plans and I got the power pack and a Spektrum DX6 about a month ago. I took it out for the first time last week. My wife threw it down into the ground twice - lol - then I reaIized had the elevator reversed. On the 3rd try it took off and I freaked on the controls and did a cartwheel and broke the prop and damaged the wing.
I tried again today and reset the d/r and expo settings to be safer this time. This time I got it to fly, not in a straight line, and back to the ground on the grass. I did this for about 10 or 12 times. I got it to go straight and land good a few times. Also went into a chainlink fence and a few hard landings, but I kept going. Then I did a hard nose landing on the dirt road and broke my backup prop. So now I waiting for more props to come so I can crash, I mean fly again -lol. The Tiny Trainer looks a little beat up but a little hot glue and it is ready to go again.
I did the same thing lol