converted pylon racer

bracesport

Legendary member
Some of you already know I have had this second hand 1.6m pylon racer, warm liner, powered glider (not really sure what it is) on the wall for 15+ years) - recently I decided to resurrect it and convert it for the slope - it is full fibreglass beast weighing in at about 450g - actually, it is in pretty good nick, but the V tail controls have next to no movement and one side is out of alignment, plus the ailerons have mechanical differential which I want to change to TX dif - otherwise apart from a couple of dings it is pretty tidy! :D

204229_55cf36a1dee337ef96733ca37159c5e5.jpeg
 
Last edited:

bracesport

Legendary member
I stripped the wing and V tail - the wing was just screwed on, but the V tail was glued and took a bit more work to remove it - I 3D printed a couple of nose cones recently, and one of them is a perfect fit! :D

Screen Shot 2019-11-25 at 6.07.27 PM.png
 

bracesport

Legendary member
the V tail is a bank and yank setup and I think I will keep it that way (my hybrid sailplane has yaw control). The V tail needs a bit of tweaking with one of the control arms being out of alignment - you can see n the picture what I mean - I have already removed the miss-aligned control arm and will reset it in some way - actually both of them were mounted quite poorly so I might as well redo both of them! :D

IMG_7890.JPG
IMG_7892.JPG
 

bracesport

Legendary member
I have already removed and refitted the aileron servos now with the 'as moulded' aileron position centred on the servo - this gives me the option to run the ailerons with Tx differential - I am thinking this ship was flown at speed and the aileron throws were pretty small, so I have tweaked them for better throws if I need it - the ailerons are top hinged so possibly they were used as spoilerons too - this will be an interesting option for slowing the ship down!

IMG_7894.JPG
 
Last edited:

Piotrsko

Master member
No the ailerons are top hinged so they dont flutter as bad. The gap is a flutter causer on the upper surface because the air goes turbulent in the gap lifting the following surface sporadically. on the bottom it's high pressure (relatively) and more laminar. Top hinges also tend to be stronger mechanically and servos are more typically set up for pull instead of (flex) push.
 

BATTLEAXE

Legendary member
In the first vid he is heavy on the down elevator using the flaps, so much so that you can physically see it, counter intuitive for me. I was feathering the elevator down slightly and with no success, just a power up plane habit from not using flaps ever. I am going to try that up high and see if I can bring it down in a controlled decent. Thanks for the vids bud
 

bracesport

Legendary member
@BATTLEAXE - the first one is with 'crow' (ailerons up and the flaps down with elevator compensation). It seems that with this method you can dive down at a slow rate vs the 'spoilers' (flaps flat and ailerons flat) where you have to come in more flat and bleed the speed with the spoilers - Yes, the braking uses a lot of throw - I will start with 30% compensation of the elevator of the flaps/spoilers! :D
 
Last edited:

bracesport

Legendary member
Here is some work to renovate the control arms.

With both arms removed and cleaned I drilled out some new pilot holes - I used a couple of 4.5mm rivet heads to make the standoff sleeves - with the bottoms of the sleeves angled and the control surfaces taped, in went the epoxy and now we wait!

Looking good I think - :D

IMG_7913.JPG
IMG_7914.JPG
IMG_7915.JPG
IMG_7916.JPG
IMG_7917.JPG
IMG_7918.JPG
IMG_7919.JPG
 

Jackson T

Elite member
I was kinda hoping you'd put a crazy motor on it and pylon race it :p. Oh well, the slope is a worthy cause too, I guess :ROFLMAO:. Great work so far!
 

bracesport

Legendary member
I am just printing some adaptors to convert the ball socket mounts (which have a 3mm female thread) to accept 0.8mm pushrod wires - my plan is for the 0.8mm wires to be about 100mm long terminating into the existing CF push rod but allowing some sideways flex when in action.

IMG_7944.JPG
 

bracesport

Legendary member
everything is going well in the assembly of the new pushrod connectors - the wires are held in by the threaded bar whis is now glueing with high strength epoxy - I wanted to retain the blue parts as they have thread adjustment for fine-tuning. :D

IMG_7963.JPG
IMG_7964.JPG
IMG_7965.JPG
IMG_7966.JPG