First Flights w/Video
Well folks... it flys! I finished it up "enough" to fly it today and even managed to get some video both on the ground and with the camera attached in flight. All I can say is wow, it flies fantastic! It flies better than I ever anticipated. All the weird little quirks have been engineered out of the first couple designs and I can say that it has all payed off! There is one problem that can be solved quit easily and that is rudder flutter. I put in a 'step' on top of the rudder (similar to a cub rudder) and I think that is contributing to it quite a bit. Also, I had to put a funky bend in the control rod running back from the servo which allows for some play. At slow speeds it is a non issued, but faster it does the fish quite badly.
As far as the rest of the flying qualities it is amazingly stable and retains a lot of maneuverability. The stall characteristics are amazing and I don't know how I managed to make such a stable wing. First of all in straight and level flight stalling straight ahead there is no wing dip and full up elevator can be held and it simply goes into a stable state of flight with a high angle of attack. However the most amazing characteristic (and this is something that I have never heard of in any airplane model or real airplane, and I'm an airline pilot and flight instructor) is it's stall behavior in a high bank high speed turn. I put it in about an 80 degree turn to the right and pulled hard back on the elevator. When it stalled there was no dramatic drop in AOA but it did roll gently to the left. I was thinking that it was entering a spin to the left and quickly released back pressure and flew out in level flight. I then tried the same thing to the left expecting it to break hard into a spin to the left. To my surprise, it rolled gently to the right! Fantastic! Turning hard at high speed and inducing a stall only causes the airplane to roll back to level flight?!?! Unbelievable. I must admit that in no way was I attempting to create this type of flying characteristic. All I was trying to do was create a wing that stalled at a slower speed and didn't have any bad wing drops during a stall, never did I expect this type of characteristic!
I also created two separate noses that can be interchanged easily via two BBQ skewers. I'll post some pics of this as well, basically one for the GoPro and the for flying with no camera.
These flights were flown with the batteries attached under the swappable pods just like the bloody wonder. I am still waiting for some electrical chord on order from Hobby King to allow the batteries to be installed in the fuselage. If you wanted to use the fuselage for payload (candy bomber etc.) there would be a huge amount of space inside with the batteries out under the pods.
Next up: Redesigning the vertical stab and rudder, and engineering and building the mini nerf football bomber drops to be mounted between the fuselage and power pods on either side under the wing...
Now for the pics and video you've been waiting for. I'll post the pre flight pics with the two nose configurations followed by the videos. On the maiden flight at about 2:30 you will see some stall testing, at 4:30 and 6:40 you will see some of the rudder flutter. It was late in the evening with an overcast sky so its a little hard to see an all white airplane. Once the rudder flutter is fixed and it is in its final configuration paint will be in order!