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FT Mini Scout Build (Mighty Minis)
- Thread starter fliteadmin
- Start date
Mini Scout ...my new favourite
Finally finished my mini scout. I have painted it and installed a panda pilot courtesy of my granddaughter. I am telling everyone the Kung Fu Panda took over from the Red Baron.
I built this light... specifically to fly indoors this winter and I flew it indoors for the 1st time today. After trimming it flew very slow and stable. (it made me look like I'm a much better pilot than I really am). Many of my indoor flying friends thought it was store bought and once they realized it was scratch built they asked for the plans and what mods I made.
I took off all paper from the foam..adjusted the plans to compensate for the A and B folds with butt joints.
I used WeldBond glue instead of hot glue..I just have much better luck with it...just a slower build as you need to let the glue dry longer.
The servos were reduced to 3.5 grams and seemed more than adequate.
The motor is a 10 gm 2000 kv motor.
The prop is a GWS 6 X 3.
The motor mount and control horns were made from and old credit card. Surprisingly the motor mount was quite sturdy and supports the motor more than adequately.
The windshield was a piece of a clear water bottle.
The landing gear wire is from the wire used in utility locate flags.
I widened out the spacing between the wheels to provide a little more stability.
The landing gear wheel hubs and spacers were from some hollow shafted Q tips.
I am flying with a 500 ma 2 cell and get great flight times and no balance problems. Actually it flew a little tail heavy initially and I had to adjust accordingly.
Thanks to those who had so much input to the mini scout. I enjoyed the build as much as flying this one.
Flite Test...Thank You!
Finally finished my mini scout. I have painted it and installed a panda pilot courtesy of my granddaughter. I am telling everyone the Kung Fu Panda took over from the Red Baron.
I built this light... specifically to fly indoors this winter and I flew it indoors for the 1st time today. After trimming it flew very slow and stable. (it made me look like I'm a much better pilot than I really am). Many of my indoor flying friends thought it was store bought and once they realized it was scratch built they asked for the plans and what mods I made.
I took off all paper from the foam..adjusted the plans to compensate for the A and B folds with butt joints.
I used WeldBond glue instead of hot glue..I just have much better luck with it...just a slower build as you need to let the glue dry longer.
The servos were reduced to 3.5 grams and seemed more than adequate.
The motor is a 10 gm 2000 kv motor.
The prop is a GWS 6 X 3.
The motor mount and control horns were made from and old credit card. Surprisingly the motor mount was quite sturdy and supports the motor more than adequately.
The windshield was a piece of a clear water bottle.
The landing gear wire is from the wire used in utility locate flags.
I widened out the spacing between the wheels to provide a little more stability.
The landing gear wheel hubs and spacers were from some hollow shafted Q tips.
I am flying with a 500 ma 2 cell and get great flight times and no balance problems. Actually it flew a little tail heavy initially and I had to adjust accordingly.
Thanks to those who had so much input to the mini scout. I enjoyed the build as much as flying this one.
Flite Test...Thank You!
Attachments
Oh what fun
My FT Mini Scout has sat on my wall for a while now.
One of those I'll get too it things.
Recently I made 2 changes and then really regretted not flying this plane sooner.
The first was removing the originally motor which is great for slow flyers, put in a banged up 1806 and the 2nd change was to add ailerons.
The rest is history.
My Dad has been flying his for well over a year now but last weekend we flew together and well it was controlled chaos with a lot of giggles. Specially from my son who wanted us to drop parachute dudes from the plane.
- My Dad's well flown FT Scout.
- Banged up 1806 and 5x4.5 prop
My FT Mini Scout has sat on my wall for a while now.
One of those I'll get too it things.
Recently I made 2 changes and then really regretted not flying this plane sooner.
The first was removing the originally motor which is great for slow flyers, put in a banged up 1806 and the 2nd change was to add ailerons.
The rest is history.
My Dad has been flying his for well over a year now but last weekend we flew together and well it was controlled chaos with a lot of giggles. Specially from my son who wanted us to drop parachute dudes from the plane.
- My Dad's well flown FT Scout.
- Banged up 1806 and 5x4.5 prop
Scout CG Tips from my build.
I finished the Scout using the recommended EMAX MT1806 and a 2 cell 500 mAh battery. I used the Adams Dollar Tree foam board. I found the plane tail heavy. I did coat all the edges of the foam with hot glue which is heavy, anyway I needed to add 27 grams of lead weight to the nose to balance. The plane flew OK but was sluggish due to the weight. I built another and moved the servos as far forward as possible and used lighter wire for the push rods but this made little difference. To fix this I added 1.5 inches to the nose of the plane so now it fly's fine without the lead wight. Anyway if you build using a similar setup you might consider making the nose an inch and a half to an inch and three quarters longer which gives more leverage for the weight in front of the CG. This will give you more room to slide the battery forward or aft to get the best balance. If you use a heavier motor or a mount that sticks the motor out further in front you may not need to do this. Since I had already built the plane I just cut some more foam using the plan for the nose just using the last inch and a half and glued it on then added more poster board for the top.
Another tip: Use CA hinges so you don't have to deal with cutting those bevel edges for the control surfaces. I used Great Planes GPMQ3950. http://www.greatplanes.com/accys/gpmq3950.html Just use your Exacto Knife to cut a slot in the edge of the foam and slide the hinge in a little less than half way then use some thin FOAM SAFE CA on the hinge where it goes into the foam and the CA will wick in to the slot, then cut a slot in the adjoining surface and slide it in place over the hinge living a gap so the control surface can move then add some more CA and there you go. It's amazing the hinge stays flexible better than the hot glue coated edges using paper as a hinge.
To find the center of gravity for the plane I used this site which worked well: http://www.rcacf.com/HelpfulHints_files/CG_Calculator.htm
A higher tail fin with rudder could possibly give more yaw control but may mess up the classic look but these are easy to build so you could build a few and experiment.
Thanks Flite Test it's a great looking plane.
I finished the Scout using the recommended EMAX MT1806 and a 2 cell 500 mAh battery. I used the Adams Dollar Tree foam board. I found the plane tail heavy. I did coat all the edges of the foam with hot glue which is heavy, anyway I needed to add 27 grams of lead weight to the nose to balance. The plane flew OK but was sluggish due to the weight. I built another and moved the servos as far forward as possible and used lighter wire for the push rods but this made little difference. To fix this I added 1.5 inches to the nose of the plane so now it fly's fine without the lead wight. Anyway if you build using a similar setup you might consider making the nose an inch and a half to an inch and three quarters longer which gives more leverage for the weight in front of the CG. This will give you more room to slide the battery forward or aft to get the best balance. If you use a heavier motor or a mount that sticks the motor out further in front you may not need to do this. Since I had already built the plane I just cut some more foam using the plan for the nose just using the last inch and a half and glued it on then added more poster board for the top.
Another tip: Use CA hinges so you don't have to deal with cutting those bevel edges for the control surfaces. I used Great Planes GPMQ3950. http://www.greatplanes.com/accys/gpmq3950.html Just use your Exacto Knife to cut a slot in the edge of the foam and slide the hinge in a little less than half way then use some thin FOAM SAFE CA on the hinge where it goes into the foam and the CA will wick in to the slot, then cut a slot in the adjoining surface and slide it in place over the hinge living a gap so the control surface can move then add some more CA and there you go. It's amazing the hinge stays flexible better than the hot glue coated edges using paper as a hinge.
To find the center of gravity for the plane I used this site which worked well: http://www.rcacf.com/HelpfulHints_files/CG_Calculator.htm
A higher tail fin with rudder could possibly give more yaw control but may mess up the classic look but these are easy to build so you could build a few and experiment.
Thanks Flite Test it's a great looking plane.
Rasterize/Stephen's lozenge camo art
Hi Stephen,
I can't remember if this has been asked before but are you willing to make available the Mini Scout Lozenge graphics in either PDF or Illustrator format? Your Lozenge camo Mini Scout looks absolutely amazing! l have been flying around in my Mini Scout with a sort of 'Red Baron' design, airbushed by hand:
Now I would like to build a second one to get my daughter interested in flying, and I would like to try the paper replacement technique with it. Many of my flying buddies at the field have started to look closer at my 'trash foam' planes as I've learned to fly better and now they are seeing how well the Mini Scout flies. I can't imagine how their jaws would drop if they ever saw something like your Lozenge Mini Scout!
-Ilkka
Hi Stephen,
I can't remember if this has been asked before but are you willing to make available the Mini Scout Lozenge graphics in either PDF or Illustrator format? Your Lozenge camo Mini Scout looks absolutely amazing! l have been flying around in my Mini Scout with a sort of 'Red Baron' design, airbushed by hand:
Now I would like to build a second one to get my daughter interested in flying, and I would like to try the paper replacement technique with it. Many of my flying buddies at the field have started to look closer at my 'trash foam' planes as I've learned to fly better and now they are seeing how well the Mini Scout flies. I can't imagine how their jaws would drop if they ever saw something like your Lozenge Mini Scout!
-Ilkka
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Hi Ilkka!
Thanks for the kind words. I just finished sending out the latest version of the corsair to some test builders and thought to myself "You know, I should go back and revisit some of my other designs and make them available." Now I know which one I should do first.
You read my mind. Kind of creepy. :O
Stephen
Thanks for the kind words. I just finished sending out the latest version of the corsair to some test builders and thought to myself "You know, I should go back and revisit some of my other designs and make them available." Now I know which one I should do first.
You read my mind. Kind of creepy. :O
Stephen
FT Mini Scout Build
Hi Guys first of all thankyou for the inspiration to go fly a plane
I have recently retired and been learning to build and fly quads with my grandson. I have watched the videos on your foamboard builds and just thought this this tip may be helpful to anyone outside of the States where the kit isn't available? After a lifetime in carpentry I'm a big fan of jigs for repeatability and speed. So I took a couple of hours to make the patterns out of 1/4" ply just one wing and a half fuselage gives perfect symmetry. The great thing is that using 1/4" ply and a pointed scalpel the ply guides the blade AND keeps the cut perpendicular giving great results. Additionally they give a permanent supply of repeatable spares See photo's and thanks again God bless
Hi Guys first of all thankyou for the inspiration to go fly a plane
I have recently retired and been learning to build and fly quads with my grandson. I have watched the videos on your foamboard builds and just thought this this tip may be helpful to anyone outside of the States where the kit isn't available? After a lifetime in carpentry I'm a big fan of jigs for repeatability and speed. So I took a couple of hours to make the patterns out of 1/4" ply just one wing and a half fuselage gives perfect symmetry. The great thing is that using 1/4" ply and a pointed scalpel the ply guides the blade AND keeps the cut perpendicular giving great results. Additionally they give a permanent supply of repeatable spares See photo's and thanks again God bless
