F-104 Starfighter -70mm EDF

[MacTuk777]

Zephyr!
here she is in all her glory........Yours is the 2nd 104 I’ve built. Designed my own prototype a couple of years back and was able to get it to fly OK using a 3S 50mm fan at 22oz/ftsq wing loading. She was definitely not aerobatic, but by using full span flapperons and mixing them to an all moving tail plane I was able to get pretty good results. Took me forever to figure out the CG!!!

I worked a similar setup into your design and it works a treat. On 70mm your bird flys WAAAAAY better than mine did on 50mm.
my Frankenstein F-104, followed by your master piece!

Great plans, Mate! I added a little more anhedral to the wings and scale working plain flaps. The flaps are mixed to give upto 15 degrees deflection at full up-stick and they definitely reduce turn radius by a large margin. With the mixing off this baby makes wide turns!! I managed to get 5 very successful flights on it.
Only down side is that this bird barely fit in my wife’s car and doesn’t fit in mine at all..........Unfortunately I bounced this build off the roof of a local church at about 60mph (my depth perception was a little off that day🤬) - It’ll need a complete re-build. I’m thinking of scaling it back down to my 50mm size but using your fuselage and tail templates if that’s OK with you? I have an idea for a removable nose cone and drop tanks and want to take a stab at incorporating the LE flaps.

 

[PoorManRC]

That is AMAZING LOOKING!!! Typically an Aircraft with SUCH high Wing Loading, that they're nearly impossible to fly well...
Chalk one more up for Foam Board!!! 😁👌👍👍

The MiG15/17 and MiG-21 look really good TOO!

 

[Crawford Bros. Aeroplanes]

I've got a wing here

It's really small for how large this plane is.

 

[MacTuk777]

I've got a wing here

View attachment 177474

It's really small for how large this plane is.

Looks good! The wing loading isn’t as high as you’d expect despite the wing looking tiny compared to the fuse. It makes seriously wide turns though😄.

 

[Ryan O.]

Very few fighter jets have managed to create the nearly cult following of the F-104 Starfighter. This manned missile was notoriously hard to fly and control. As such, creating an RC DTFB version was incredibly hard. And truly, I don't quite yet have a 100% working version. I've built 3 variants so far and I'm about to start on a 4th. I'm going to give some background on the three I have made so far and this way I"ll be able to show in real time this last one which I'm fairly certain will work. Additionally, plans will be posted once I get this 4th one to fly well.

View attachment 140697






So first up, the first F-104 that I made! Length of 42 in and wingspan of only 22in, I powered it with a 64mm EDF and it made one successful flight. '
View attachment 129048

However, it needed to work better, so I increased the wingspan by 120% and tried again!
View attachment 129049
Surprisingly, this variation didn't workout too well and I scrapped the project for a little while.

However, I brought it back two weeks ago and decided to change up quite a bit. I increased the roundness of the fuselage, incorporating newer folding techniques. Additionally, I scaled the entire airplane up 120% of the original to a 24in wingspan and a 48 in length. Importantly, I brought the engine up to a 70mm EDF.
View attachment 129054

This version actually worked quite well! The crash was caused by a lack of elevator control and this wasn't the first flight. It made several flights with a 1300mah 4S and a singular flight with a 2300mah 4S. The wingloading for the 2300mah battery was too high and the performance was poor. So for the 4th version of this plane, I have scaled it up even further. To a 30in wingspan and a 60in length. This should increase the handling by decreasing the wingloading and by increasing the area of the of the inlet, creating more thrust. Lastly, I will be fitting a nozzle at the tail to decrease drag further.
A big thanks to everyone who gave me such great feedback on my Facebook post.

V4
View attachment 129055

The full scale has always interested me. The Higher ups at Lockheed really tried to push the West Germans into using it for more than it was designed for, in a process which might not be quite legal today, and killed of them killed lots of their pilots😞 Still a really cool plane though

 

[MacTuk777]

That is AMAZING LOOKING!!! Typically an Aircraft with SUCH high Wing Loading, that they're nearly impossible to fly well...
Chalk one more up for Foam Board!!! 😁👌👍👍

The MiG15/17 and MiG-21 look really good TOO!

Thanks! Full credit to Zephyr1 for the 104/21 designs! They are both good flying birds.....The 104 definitely benefited from the addition of scale flaps mixed to up elevator - really helped tightening turns. (My flying area is in the city and pretty confined.......plus my flying isn’t great😂).

 

[PoorManRC]

Thanks! Full credit to Zephyr1 for the 104/21 designs! They are both good flying birds.....The 104 definitely benefited from the addition of scale flaps mixed to up elevator - really helped tightening turns. (My flying area is in the city and pretty confined.......plus my flying isn’t great😂).

Yeah... I understand. I'm in the middle of an old City, with MANY tall Trees! ANY Flying requires a drive that I can't always afford to do.

 

[Matthew Sanders]

I just stumbled on this thread. I am seriously considering doing this. (I cant decide if I want to do this, Ben’s F-5E, or Chuppster’s F-14. I only have enough space in my hangar for one of these birds.) Its still an amazing plane, great job!

 

[flamingo]

cool jets edf?

 

[MacTuk777]

Still waiting for a donor 50mm fan, but here’s what I have so far. I scaled Zephyr1’s plans down to 65% and altered them to accept my wing (The wing is overly large for the model, but it’s just a proof of concept). The idea was to build a chuck glider that can be used to accurately determine the position of the AC and approximate a safe glide CG that can quickly be converted to a pusher prop parkjet to continue testing the high lift devices.

The model is balanced with quarters taped to the nose and glides fast and straight with leading and trailing edges taped flush and the stabilizer locked at 0 degrees. Because of the use of full span flapperons on my Franken-104 and the use of plain flaps on Zephyr1’s I knew the nose would pitch up with training edges deployed, and I assumed that lowering the droop leading edges would reduce incidence and cause the nose to pitch down. By adjusting the tape to change the angles of the surfaces I was able to confirm my theory. Also, by extending the droops about 15 degrees and the training edges to about the same the glide distance seems to increase slightly.........Thinking this might be the optimal hand launch setting for powered flight.
next step will be to add the motor to the exhaust nozzle and wait for a receiver and ESC to become available (I’m sure I’ll crash something soon😆)

If the pusher works and I can figure out the leading and trailing edges so that they can be mixed to elevator to improve turn radius and landing speeds then I’ll scale the plans up to 75% and keep my wing exactly the same (maybe increase the chord of the DLEs a little) and attempt to get it flying with a 50mm FMS unit.

 

[Noobie123]

Any plans? I’m a bit new

 

[Noobie123]

Any plans? I’m a bit new

I mean any video instructions

 

[Devin boesch]

Very few fighter jets have managed to create the nearly cult following of the F-104 Starfighter. This manned missile was notoriously hard to fly and control. As such, creating an RC DTFB version was incredibly hard. And truly, I don't quite yet have a 100% working version. I've built 3 variants so far and I'm about to start on a 4th. I'm going to give some background on the three I have made so far and this way I"ll be able to show in real time this last one which I'm fairly certain will work. Additionally, plans will be posted once I get this 4th one to fly well.

View attachment 140697






So first up, the first F-104 that I made! Length of 42 in and wingspan of only 22in, I powered it with a 64mm EDF and it made one successful flight. '
View attachment 129048

However, it needed to work better, so I increased the wingspan by 120% and tried again!
View attachment 129049
Surprisingly, this variation didn't workout too well and I scrapped the project for a little while.

However, I brought it back two weeks ago and decided to change up quite a bit. I increased the roundness of the fuselage, incorporating newer folding techniques. Additionally, I scaled the entire airplane up 120% of the original to a 24in wingspan and a 48 in length. Importantly, I brought the engine up to a 70mm EDF.
View attachment 129054

This version actually worked quite well! The crash was caused by a lack of elevator control and this wasn't the first flight. It made several flights with a 1300mah 4S and a singular flight with a 2300mah 4S. The wingloading for the 2300mah battery was too high and the performance was poor. So for the 4th version of this plane, I have scaled it up even further. To a 30in wingspan and a 60in length. This should increase the handling by decreasing the wingloading and by increasing the area of the of the inlet, creating more thrust. Lastly, I will be fitting a nozzle at the tail to decrease drag further.
A big thanks to everyone who gave me such great feedback on my Facebook post.

V4
View attachment 129055

Is there any plans that show how to put this jet together or videos. If so pleassseee lmk. Trying to make one for a 4s 64mm where it's slightly scaled down

 

[Zephyr1]

I figured I should post some more pictures. I built another one of these earlier this year and took it to FF.
I upped the power setup to a 6S 70mm (the same ones that FT sells) and added a rudder for more lateral control on an airplane this long.