Warped Foam Board

[checkerboardflyer]

Occasionally you need to make a piece of warped foam board straight and usable. For me it is for horizontal and vertical stabilizers, rudders, and elevators. Not so much a problem with fuselages and other parts that have panels that are bent and glued. Those tend to automatically straighten out any warps. So I usually take 2 warped pieces at the same time. Put a couple of strips of foam board under each end, then add some sand bags. If you get too aggressive with lifting the ends and adding sand bags you will end up putting wrinkles in the paper covering right where the sand bags sit. It normally takes a few to several days for the boards to straighten out. These pictures were taken outside in Chicago on a cold day. The warmth of being inside the house will be a better place to do this. For other tools and tips visit: https://foamboardflyers.com/

 

[d8veh]

If you put a thin bead of hot-melt glue along the edges of things like tailplane, fin, rudder, elevator and wings, you can straighten them by warming up with a hot-air gun and holding straight while it cools down. I had to do that to my plane after it had been resting on the elevator for a week, which made it totally twisted. I think that the glue bead acts a it like a rigid brace.