New Plan Style???

Cdbarron727

Junior Member
I am having a very difficult time with the new style of plans. There is never a duplicate piece in the tiled version of the plans meaning I have save my paper or reprint the second side of the wing, spar, or any other duplicate and figure out how to mirror the image for it to work. Could FliteTest possibly add the old style plans with duplicates as an option or add the duplicate/mirrored pieces? I really wanted the FT Explorer...but I guess I will have to try an older model until I figure this out.
 

Julez

WOT and going nowhere
Instead of cutting along the trace lines on the paper for the entire thing, simply tack down certain points onto the foam board and then 'connect the dots' with your razor and straightedge. I do this for every plan I build off of as I can then save the planes for later.

On the other hand, I know this is something that Dan Sponholz (SPONZ) has been getting several requests for, and I believe he will be adding it in the future. Don't quote me on that. ;)
 

AkimboGlueGuns

Biplane Guy
Mentor
Find a post he's made then click his username and a scroll down menu will popup. Click send a PM and type in your message. He should be in my friends list if you go through my account homepage and click him in my friends list.
 

SP0NZ

FT CAD Gremlin
Staff member
Admin
Moderator
Mentor
I am having a very difficult time with the new style of plans. There is never a duplicate piece in the tiled version of the plans meaning I have save my paper or reprint the second side of the wing, spar, or any other duplicate and figure out how to mirror the image for it to work. Could FliteTest possibly add the old style plans with duplicates as an option or add the duplicate/mirrored pieces? I really wanted the FT Explorer...but I guess I will have to try an older model until I figure this out.

I'm sorry that you are having difficulty with the new plans. There has been some discussion about this a little bit on Facebook already as well. My goal is to make them as user friendly as possible. I'm considering adding the mirrored parts to the plans.

In the meantime, have you considered this method?
http://flitetest.com/articles/make-reusable-templates-from-plans

Since I have written that article, I have started printing directly on 110# card stock. That eliminates the need to attach the paper plans to poster board and significantly reduces the time required to make a set of templates.

Thanks for your feedback and your patience with the new plan format. It will continue to evolve over time with community feedback.
 

DKchris

Member
FWIW, I'm very positive about the new plan setup.

1) The new circled crosshairs at every corner are pure geniality when trying to align the printed tiles.
2) Having a scale ruler on every page is neat when reprinting single or few tiles, should it be neccesary. Something I've done a lot in the past, as I have never printed both instances of a set of symmetric parts, mainly to save paper, but also because tiling up plans can sometimes get a little "wonky" with regard to alignment, and using the same taped up sheet for both sides ought to assure better symmetry, even if both are the a bit off on shape . Which brings us to.....
3) Plans without duplicated symmetric parts hence makes my printing tiles much easier......

I, by the way, use a method much like the one SP0NZ links to, I just dont cut to the outline of the parts , but leave a bit of paper around them, and I skip gluing the plans to cardboard. I find the plans roll up for storage a lot easier that way. Not that that's all that important.
Then, to transfe the plan to the foam, I use T-pins to punch through at all corners and important outlines (For curves I punch a row of holes close enough to be able to eyeball the shape when cutting.), flip the paper over and do the opposite part by punching the needle through the already made holes from the back side.


Also, my laser printer won't take card stock, would have been the best way possible indeed.......allthough a printer that would take the uncut foam stock.........now that would be a neat trick.

But then again, so would having a CNC bench......
 
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Cdbarron727

Junior Member
Thanks for all the response and thank you @SP0NZ for the response. I don't make templates as I just reprint new plans for each build. I'm on my 12th model scratch built and the I've got it down to being able to get a model that's about 24 pages (on average, I haven't tried the bigger ones yet) finished in less than a day. I print the plans. Tape them to the foam board with scotch tape that isn't too tacky. Start on blue line creases, then score cuts, then add a few extra pieces of over the score cuts to keep the paper in one piece (unless I feel the section doesn't need it), then head over to the main black line cuts and finish it off. All of these cuts I've just mentioned are not final cuts but more like traces with the xacto knife. Then I go along the outer perimeter of the paper while slightly pulling up to remove all the paper and most of the tape, excluding the stubborn ones. Then I take the traces and go over then one more time to finish the cuts and score cuts and pop out all the pieces. I have thought about doing the spray adhesive route but havn't tried yet only because I'm used to way I've been doing it. Thanks for looking into adding the mirrored pieces like before with the plans, it would be a huuuuge help. .....and some of you are wondering if I go through a lot of paper or ink. I get ink cartridges from costco that are XL versions so they're packed with ink and I'm just now after 12 models + reprinted pages for mess-ups and fixes (and 2 years worth of school work) and I am just now getting low ink notices on my canon printer. for paper i have loads of paperwork with writing on only one side (legal documents, old bills, unneccessary paperwork) and I've been running through that for a while now and also I have a box of recycled paper for backup when I run out.