The "Simple Stick" - builders thread and plans

The Hangar

Fly harder!
Mentor
Plans HERE!

So last year about this time I decided to build my first 4 channel plane, the Simple Scout, after finally getting the hang of flying on my Old Speedster. I painted it up to look like a Hangar 9 Ultra Stick and I flew that thing a ton. It suffered a lot of crashes as I was still learning to fly, but it held up for many months and really helped me get confident in my flying skills. A couple months ago I retired it since it was having a weird servo glitch, and it was really old, warped, and beat up. She now is proudly on display on the wall of my workshop. :) Anyways, that was one of my favorite planes for a long time and I missed having one in my hangar, so after I retired it, I decided to build another, but this time modify the wing and make a custom fuselage and tail to make it look like the real ultra stick. Well I started that project but after a while it got pushed to the side and other projects took over my workbench. But this month, thanks to the build-ruary challenge by @FoamyDM , I got the inspiration to finish this bird up! The last couple days I have spent several hours finishing up the build and painting this bird, and today I was lucky enough to be able to maiden it! I know often this about most planes, but this Simple Stick is the best flying plane I have ever flown! I wasn't the only one who thought that either - I let several of my flying buddies fly it and they were blown away by it's stability, speed envelope, and handling. I really hope some of you community members build it and are able to enjoy it as much as me and my buddies did! It slowed down to a walking pace and you still had good control. It doesn't have any bad flight characteristics and has very gentle stalls. If you cut the throttle and give full back elevator, it won't stall and will just glide down, but if you point the nose up and cut the throttle, it stalls gently and you are able to regain control fairly quickly. Also, it flies inverted very well. I wasn't planning on making plans for it but after me and my buddies had run a couple packs through it, we were convinced I should make plans as it flew so well it would be a pity if I couldn't share it with others!

Here's the setup I was running with for the maiden:
Power pack B motor
30 amp esc
8x8 APC thin electric prop
1000mah - 1500mah 3s lipo

With the B pack it definitely wasn't overpowered and didn't quite have unlimited vertical, but it was a very relaxing and scale experience, and there was enough power to do basic aerobatics like loops, rolls, and hammerheads. I plan on testing it out with the C pack and 3s and 4s lipo to see how the experience changes with the different power plants. If you're a beginner pilot, the B pack will be plenty, and if you are just looking for an sunday afternoon cruiser, you can't ask for anything better. (I'll edit this post later on describing the flight characteristics with the larger motors and batteries.) I definitely recommend this plane for beginners as it can fly very slowly, and also, I would recommend it to advanced pilots as well especially with a larger motor as it can cruise along nicely and do basic aerobatics. It's a great plane to try new things on as it's a super quick and simple design, and a durable construction.
Here’s the maiden flight footage:
And here are some pictures of mine:
729E9E16-8A86-4F47-BEDA-7AA42F5D4CD6.jpeg
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D41B8FF3-3E3B-400E-BC8F-E820985BA802.jpeg
2DDD97BB-12C1-461F-A119-B2F1BDD957F8.jpeg
F53E2CF2-B8F4-45A2-958B-E9E9F917CA2C.jpeg
804DC02A-463B-4187-8349-69809A74C619.jpeg
60A07470-93D3-4218-8C7B-AB9DCEACF489.jpeg
2B4E6DD4-16F8-4C7A-9B85-758A2963204F.jpeg
F6D9AAC1-B8D2-4C3D-9B45-E7323AFF4438.jpeg
 
Last edited:

Wildthing

Legendary member
So last year about this time I decided to build my first 4 channel plane, the Simple Scout, after finally getting the hang of flying on my Old Speedster. I painted it up to look like a Hangar 9 Ultra Stick and I flew that thing a ton. It suffered a lot of crashes as I was still learning to fly, but it held up for many months and really helped me get confident in my flying skills. A couple months ago I retired it since it was having a weird servo glitch, and it was really old, warped, and beat up. She now is proudly on display on the wall of my workshop. :) Anyways, that was one of my favorite planes for a long time and I missed having one in my hangar, so after I retired it, I decided to build another, but this time modify the wing and make a custom fuselage and tail to make it look like the real ultra stick. Well I started that project but after a while it got pushed to the side and other projects took over my workbench. But this month, thanks to the build-ruary challenge by @FoamyDM , I got the inspiration to finish this bird up! The last couple days I have spent several hours finishing up the build and painting this bird, and today I was lucky enough to be able to maiden it! I know often this about most planes, but this Simple Stick is the best flying plane I have ever flown! I wasn't the only one who thought that either - I let several of my flying buddies fly it and they were blown away by it's stability, speed envelope, and handling. I really hope some of you community members build it and are able to enjoy it as much as me and my buddies did! It slowed down to a walking pace and you still had good control. It doesn't have any bad flight characteristics and has very gentle stalls. If you cut the throttle and give full back elevator, it won't stall and will just glide down, but if you point the nose up and cut the throttle, it stalls gently and you are able to regain control fairly quickly. Also, it flies inverted very well. I wasn't planning on making plans for it but after me and my buddies had run a couple packs through it, we were convinced I should make plans as it flew so well it would be a pity if I couldn't share it with others!

Here's the setup I was running with for the maiden:
Power pack B motor
30 amp esc
8x8 APC thin electric prop
1000mah - 1500mah 3s lipo

With the B pack it definitely wasn't overpowered and didn't quite have unlimited vertical, but it was a very relaxing and scale experience, and there was enough power to do basic aerobatics like loops, rolls, and hammerheads. I plan on testing it out with the C pack and 3s and 4s lipo to see how the experience changes with the different power plants. If you're a beginner pilot, the B pack will be plenty, and if you are just looking for an sunday afternoon cruiser, you can't ask for anything better. (I'll edit this post later on describing the flight characteristics with the larger motors and batteries.) I definitely recommend this plane for beginners as it can fly very slowly, and also, I would recommend it to advanced pilots as well especially with a larger motor as it can cruise along nicely and do basic aerobatics. It's a great plane to try new things on as it's a super quick and simple design, and a durable construction.
Here’s the maiden flight footage:
And here are some pictures of mine:
View attachment 159573 View attachment 159574 View attachment 159575 View attachment 159576 View attachment 159577 View attachment 159578 View attachment 159579 View attachment 159580 View attachment 159581 View attachment 159582
Well done
 

L Edge

Master member
Yes it is! I always chop the alignment tabs off all my power pods though. Do you think I should make it a little taller for those who have power pods with the alignment tabs?

Did you know that the first design was called DAS Ugly Stik. The first one I made back in the 70's called for a dihedral, I made it straight and it became an excellant pattern plane for my son and he won numerous events with it.

Right now I am putting together the 30 cc Ultra St from HH, looking forward to trying crow and double ailerons. Your 's is looking quite good.

Are you going to try flaps?
 

OliverW

Legendary member
So last year about this time I decided to build my first 4 channel plane, the Simple Scout, after finally getting the hang of flying on my Old Speedster. I painted it up to look like a Hangar 9 Ultra Stick and I flew that thing a ton. It suffered a lot of crashes as I was still learning to fly, but it held up for many months and really helped me get confident in my flying skills. A couple months ago I retired it since it was having a weird servo glitch, and it was really old, warped, and beat up. She now is proudly on display on the wall of my workshop. :) Anyways, that was one of my favorite planes for a long time and I missed having one in my hangar, so after I retired it, I decided to build another, but this time modify the wing and make a custom fuselage and tail to make it look like the real ultra stick. Well I started that project but after a while it got pushed to the side and other projects took over my workbench. But this month, thanks to the build-ruary challenge by @FoamyDM , I got the inspiration to finish this bird up! The last couple days I have spent several hours finishing up the build and painting this bird, and today I was lucky enough to be able to maiden it! I know often this about most planes, but this Simple Stick is the best flying plane I have ever flown! I wasn't the only one who thought that either - I let several of my flying buddies fly it and they were blown away by it's stability, speed envelope, and handling. I really hope some of you community members build it and are able to enjoy it as much as me and my buddies did! It slowed down to a walking pace and you still had good control. It doesn't have any bad flight characteristics and has very gentle stalls. If you cut the throttle and give full back elevator, it won't stall and will just glide down, but if you point the nose up and cut the throttle, it stalls gently and you are able to regain control fairly quickly. Also, it flies inverted very well. I wasn't planning on making plans for it but after me and my buddies had run a couple packs through it, we were convinced I should make plans as it flew so well it would be a pity if I couldn't share it with others!

Here's the setup I was running with for the maiden:
Power pack B motor
30 amp esc
8x8 APC thin electric prop
1000mah - 1500mah 3s lipo

With the B pack it definitely wasn't overpowered and didn't quite have unlimited vertical, but it was a very relaxing and scale experience, and there was enough power to do basic aerobatics like loops, rolls, and hammerheads. I plan on testing it out with the C pack and 3s and 4s lipo to see how the experience changes with the different power plants. If you're a beginner pilot, the B pack will be plenty, and if you are just looking for an sunday afternoon cruiser, you can't ask for anything better. (I'll edit this post later on describing the flight characteristics with the larger motors and batteries.) I definitely recommend this plane for beginners as it can fly very slowly, and also, I would recommend it to advanced pilots as well especially with a larger motor as it can cruise along nicely and do basic aerobatics. It's a great plane to try new things on as it's a super quick and simple design, and a durable construction.
Here’s the maiden flight footage:
And here are some pictures of mine:
View attachment 159573 View attachment 159574 View attachment 159575 View attachment 159576 View attachment 159577 View attachment 159578 View attachment 159579 View attachment 159580 View attachment 159581 View attachment 159582
I should build one and see how it compares to my mini ultra stick.
 

The Hangar

Fly harder!
Mentor
Did you know that the first design was called DAS Ugly Stik. The first one I made back in the 70's called for a dihedral, I made it straight and it became an excellant pattern plane for my son and he won numerous events with it.

Right now I am putting together the 30 cc Ultra St from HH, looking forward to trying crow and double ailerons. Your 's is looking quite good.

Are you going to try flaps?
Thanks! I would really like to get the 30cc ultra stick sometime, but at the moment, it’s beyond my budget. I hadn’t thought about adding flaps, but I should try it. I could program flapperons quite easily, but I could also split the ailerons and do separate flaps as well.
 

The Hangar

Fly harder!
Mentor
Alright, so today I was finally able to test the simple stick with the bigger motors! The old c pack or esc was glitching so I didn’t really get to test it but it still flew with the limited power output. Then can the radial c pack on 4s with a 9x6 prop. She really cruised! Then it started flying really weird when I was all the way at the end of the field. I managed to bring it back and come in for a low pass and noticed that the power pod was hanging 5 inches out in front of the nose! This was a shortened power pod that was like 6 inches long so it was almost all the way out and I had a severe right and down thrust. I circled around and landed it. I was amazed that it still flew under those conditions though! Last but not least, I put in the rimfire .15 motor with a 10x7 prop and 4s and that’s where the most fun was at! This is the setup that @Marty72 uses in his “super sportster” and I can see why he likes it so much! It really hauls! It handles the speed nicely as well, but due to my cheap servos I could hear them slipping under the load like they were stripped. Also, since I have the long ft pushrods in there, it’s a long way for them to be going pushing so there is some flex. If you used metal gear or higher quality gear plastic gear servos that you placed close to the tail, it would make a great speed plane.
 

Wildthing

Legendary member
Alright, so today I was finally able to test the simple stick with the bigger motors! The old c pack or esc was glitching so I didn’t really get to test it but it still flew with the limited power output. Then can the radial c pack on 4s with a 9x6 prop. She really cruised! Then it started flying really weird when I was all the way at the end of the field. I managed to bring it back and come in for a low pass and noticed that the power pod was hanging 5 inches out in front of the nose! This was a shortened power pod that was like 6 inches long so it was almost all the way out and I had a severe right and down thrust. I circled around and landed it. I was amazed that it still flew under those conditions though! Last but not least, I put in the rimfire .15 motor with a 10x7 prop and 4s and that’s where the most fun was at! This is the setup that @Marty72 uses in his “super sportster” and I can see why he likes it so much! It really hauls! It handles the speed nicely as well, but due to my cheap servos I could hear them slipping under the load like they were stripped. Also, since I have the long ft pushrods in there, it’s a long way for them to be going pushing so there is some flex. If you used metal gear or higher quality gear plastic gear servos that you placed close to the tail, it would make a great speed plane.

No video????????