*********I wasn't going to do a build thread but i had some free time last night so typed it up in case anybody was interested.
Last week i finished building another plane and wanted something to do and i got inspired to do a "quick" hot cut wing. This is in comparison to the over year it took to do my last big build ha! Hoping to have this done in a month time total so kind of hurrying and trying not to let my anxiety and "is it perfect" get in the way.
www.zagi.com
I want to move my hot cutting away from the home depot white rigid insulation foam, which is kinda squishy, to the pink foam which is very rigid and easy to sand. So my thought process was "how do i get rid of all this foam at once?". I didn't want to do a 16' as it would be pretty hard to reinforce this already flimsy foam and that would be really hard to fit in my jeep. So that meant the other side of the foam was my size limit (4x8 sheets), so 4ft wing cores it was, for a total of 8 ft, as i know that will fit in my jeep even if i make a one piece wing. Plus i was wanting to do a hand cut wing which i hadn't done in a while.
One thing i decided to do different this time was try galvanized flashing instead of my usual aluminium flashing for my templates. It worked out great. It is more rigid than the aluminium and keeps it shape much better as its getting moved around on the workbench, but it is still easy to cut with desk scissors. I also moved to my banggood adjustable bench power supply. Previously i had used either a 3s(12v) or 4s(14v) battery. Being able to crank it up to 30v made a noticeable difference on the steel fishing wire i was using. Plus it was very nice to reach over to a dial and adjust it as needed. Since i was in a hurry i temporarily mounted the other end of my hot wire to a shelf bracket screwed into studs. Worked great, would do again. I also had to laminate two sheets together to get the needed thickness. I used super77 spray adhesive.
After the cores have been fiberglassed i am going to add some carbon fiber rods that interlock on each other at CG. This will be the only internal spar and what takes all the G load. There will be "something" in the nose and tail that keys into eachother to stop the cores from rotating on that spar. Some wooden blocks or dowels or something simple. I need a way to center the hole for the carbon so i traced out and cut some matching balsa templates and glued them to the root of each wing.
I realized that i will need the wingtip stabilizers to also be removable so i added some balsa dowels to the wingtips as a point to screw into later.
This morning i applied DAP light weight spackle to the entire bottom surface. This will create a more even surface and act as a sealer for the epoxy so it doesn't soak into the foam (get heavy).
Next steps are to apply one layer of 6oz S-glass fiberglass to the bottom of the wing cores. This will be cut flush, no overhang/overlap. I will squeegee out as much of the epoxy as i can. The weave will be filled in later with epoxy and phenolic filler. The top will also be cut flush where it wont wrap around the curve well. Later i will come back with a thin strip of fiberglass to connect the two pieces.
Also finalized the art for one side...probably the top.
oh yeah, i also made a custom sticker for it lol
Last week i finished building another plane and wanted something to do and i got inspired to do a "quick" hot cut wing. This is in comparison to the over year it took to do my last big build ha! Hoping to have this done in a month time total so kind of hurrying and trying not to let my anxiety and "is it perfect" get in the way.
www.zagi.com
I want to move my hot cutting away from the home depot white rigid insulation foam, which is kinda squishy, to the pink foam which is very rigid and easy to sand. So my thought process was "how do i get rid of all this foam at once?". I didn't want to do a 16' as it would be pretty hard to reinforce this already flimsy foam and that would be really hard to fit in my jeep. So that meant the other side of the foam was my size limit (4x8 sheets), so 4ft wing cores it was, for a total of 8 ft, as i know that will fit in my jeep even if i make a one piece wing. Plus i was wanting to do a hand cut wing which i hadn't done in a while.
One thing i decided to do different this time was try galvanized flashing instead of my usual aluminium flashing for my templates. It worked out great. It is more rigid than the aluminium and keeps it shape much better as its getting moved around on the workbench, but it is still easy to cut with desk scissors. I also moved to my banggood adjustable bench power supply. Previously i had used either a 3s(12v) or 4s(14v) battery. Being able to crank it up to 30v made a noticeable difference on the steel fishing wire i was using. Plus it was very nice to reach over to a dial and adjust it as needed. Since i was in a hurry i temporarily mounted the other end of my hot wire to a shelf bracket screwed into studs. Worked great, would do again. I also had to laminate two sheets together to get the needed thickness. I used super77 spray adhesive.
After the cores have been fiberglassed i am going to add some carbon fiber rods that interlock on each other at CG. This will be the only internal spar and what takes all the G load. There will be "something" in the nose and tail that keys into eachother to stop the cores from rotating on that spar. Some wooden blocks or dowels or something simple. I need a way to center the hole for the carbon so i traced out and cut some matching balsa templates and glued them to the root of each wing.
I realized that i will need the wingtip stabilizers to also be removable so i added some balsa dowels to the wingtips as a point to screw into later.
This morning i applied DAP light weight spackle to the entire bottom surface. This will create a more even surface and act as a sealer for the epoxy so it doesn't soak into the foam (get heavy).
Next steps are to apply one layer of 6oz S-glass fiberglass to the bottom of the wing cores. This will be cut flush, no overhang/overlap. I will squeegee out as much of the epoxy as i can. The weave will be filled in later with epoxy and phenolic filler. The top will also be cut flush where it wont wrap around the curve well. Later i will come back with a thin strip of fiberglass to connect the two pieces.
Also finalized the art for one side...probably the top.
oh yeah, i also made a custom sticker for it lol
!
