First Balsa Build, Kadet Senior

[Turbojoe]

Electric is a good option for the Senior, and a 4S setup should work well. My other Senior is electric and is running on a big 5,000mAh 5S. Once airborne it cruises at well under 1/2 throttle and will easily fly for over 12 minutes with a big reserve of power.

Changing the design to a 2-piece wing should be fairly easy for you, I look forward to your design changes, and may be able to use your ideas when I eventually build my 150% scale Senior.

How much all up does your electrified version weigh? What motor/KV/prop are you running? Call it crazy but I'd love to try a 3 or 4 blade prop just for grins.

Looking into 2 piece wing. I'm pretty sure I have some aluminum tube that will work. If not I have tons of 450 size heli CF tail booms that should do just fine and be very light.

Joe

 

[Joker 53150]

Slow progress, but I cleared off the bench today to get a little more done. A little more thinned epoxy went on to fully fuel-proof the nose, including covering both sides of a tray for the fuel tank (dark wood in the bottom of the fuselage). Internal runners were added along the top which will eventually be covered with sheet and sanded. I blocked out a small section to allow for easy installation of the plug cap & wire through the nose while I was at it (hidden under the blue tape while glue dries).

The gas tank will eventually be secured with some Velcro and foam padding, and the ignition module will also be mounted above the fuel tank to some simple popsicle sticks glued between the formers. Velcro and foam will be plenty for this style plane so I'm not concerned about parts shifting from vibration.

 

[Joker 53150]

The nose is coming along nicely. It's still rough and needs plenty of sanding and a good coat of balsa filler to clean up the little dents and seams. Sheeting is applied and a hole is visible behind the muffler can for the spark plug boot & wire. I'm glad the plug wire is nice and long, it allows me to fit the ignition module just about anywhere inside the nose. It's taking extra time to get the structure built up around the engine, but overall it'll be a nice combination of open enough for cooling airflow and closed enough to hide much of the engine. So far I've also got fairly easy access to the 4 engine mounts on the firewall, which was a concern. Eventually I'll need to determine hole locations for the throttle pushrod, fuel line, and pickup.

 

[Joker 53150]

More slow work, carving and sanding around the engine before giving the entire inside surrounding the engine a coat of black paint. It still needs a small amount of tweaking before I'm happy with it, but it's getting there. I also gave it a coat of balsa filler to take care of a couple small gaps. I'm going to have to find a source for a silicone tube for the exhaust extension. I do have a couple different stock-style extensions, but I'd like to do a straight-down run on this engine.

 

[Off-topic jes]

This looks really nice

 

[Joker 53150]

It's taken about 6 months of waiting, but the replacement wing kit I ordered from Sig FINALLY arrived yesterday. I could have re-built one of two mostly-finished wings that I got a while back, but both have some damage and I just didn't feel like going through the process of fixing one up.

Now that I have the wing, I need the motivation. The workbench has been taken over by reloading equipment and the building of an old-school muzzleloading rifle my son and I are building, but pretty soon I'm hoping to clean it up and get back to making some balsa dust. Probably...

 

[Marty Feldman]

Electric is a good option for the Senior, and a 4S setup should work well. My other Senior is electric and is running on a big 5,000mAh 5S. Once airborne it cruises at well under 1/2 throttle and will easily fly for over 12 minutes with a big reserve of power.

Changing the design to a 2-piece wing should be fairly easy for you, I look forward to your design changes, and may be able to use your ideas when I eventually build my 150% scale Senior.

I see you and Turbojoe have done your kits as electric versions. I'd like to do an electric also, with ailerons, no flaps. Where do I get started with instructions/tips/help for a conversion to electric? Not something I have experience with, and I am reluctant to dive in without a basic understanding of what's what.

I am also thinking about a Seniorita as an alternative to a Senior. Is your Seniorita kit still for sale? It was a great bargain a few years back when you posted it FS.

-Marty-