Alem, the unfinished project.

[elossam]

This is one of the more complex plane I ever built. Designed to be used as a UAV controlled by a Micropilot MP1000 (I´m talking about five-six years ago). The plane was powered by two Supertigre 2300 giving a static thrust of 8 kg. aprox. Cant remember the total weigh but far away of a plarkflyer :) . Two 4 Lts fuel tanks allows the machine to be in flight for more than two hours. The two tail booms has double chamber, one to run the tail wires and another inside the first one to canalize the exhaust smoke from inside the model away from it in a clean fashion. The available space inside was enough to accomodate whatever we want in the five storage areas (one on each side of the main body for side view cameras and minor hardware) , two more were the fuel tanks are placed and with enough space to take care of future retract landing gear plus many other stuffs. One central for the main electronic and a front& bottom view camera and a big one on the rear side for the parachute.
The strange tail has a so low dihedral angle due to the reduced lateral surface of the model compared with the plant area. Two single tails were choosen to allow the parachute an unobstructed deploy from the rear boot.

The unit was successfully flown after 6 months building and flown only once (manual mode only). After that flight and due to irrelevant questions the partner cooperation ceased and the model was retired. The MP1000 was never tested and all the time, effort and money was thrown to the trash. I keep with me the satisfaction of building a big model from a simple idea to a operative reality and the frustration of a non finished project.

These are some pics of the building process. Hope you like them.

Built from blue foam
http://www.rc-flysafe.com/ALEM/ALEM1.jpg

The original mold and foam negatives after the cutting process.
http://www.rc-flysafe.com/ALEM/ALEM2.jpg

Quite advanced stage The wing ends were designed to increase the total span adding extensions at the end of each wing using the three carbon adapters.
http://www.rc-flysafe.com/ALEM/ALEM3.JPG


A view of the lifting body (basically a very similar profile to the wings one scaled to work in conjunction with the main wing tp lift heavy payloads), we found later the model is quite similar to a desing of Burnelli´s concept of aeroplanes.)
http://www.rc-flysafe.com/ALEM/ALEM4.JPG



The "D" day just before doing the pre-flight test.
http://www.rc-flysafe.com/ALEM/ALEM5.JPG

A detail of the inside, the two main fuel tanks, the glow plug on-board lighten system. See on the right side the exhaust tube running inside the fuselage directly to the tail boom. The wood structure on each side were done to fix there the retract landing gears. the four rings on the top are the ones to tie the parachute.
[IMG]http://www.rc-flysafe.com/ALEM/ALEM6.JPG

The last picture before the test flight.
http://www.rc-flysafe.com/ALEM/ALEM7.JPG

Have fun
Elossam

[GeorgeDog]

Nice plane - sad outcome. How well did it fly? -GD

[brianhomer]

Its Like a stinger fish!
How long it can keep flying, lift off power?

[elossam]

With such a tank reserve 3-4 hrs of flying should not be a problem. The two engines required a little less than 1/4 of the total throttle available to keep the unit flying with a 5kg dummy load inside.
How much can it lift? it´s a speed, profile and surface relation. Cant remember the exact numbers but mathematics result applied to this model exceed by far what I initially expected to be possible.
The flight was stable and showed only little shakes due to the breeze. That confirms the model was flying below its best wing load numbers (may be another 5-10 kg load would help but don´t know. The model is hanging in a wall and there are no plans to put it in flight again so, will not be possible to check it. Electric flight is the way to go, will see how it ends.

[GeorgeDog]

I didn't want to ask if the plane really went into the trash as it earlier sounded...I'm glad it didn't. I have no idea if it is an aerodynamically efficient design but it is way cool looking and the construction looks superb. So please don't just tease us...go out and get some pictures of this beauty in the air. :)

GD

[brianhomer]

With such a tank reserve 3-4 hrs of flying should not be a problem. The two engines required a little less than 1/4 of the total throttle available to keep the unit flying with a 5kg dummy load inside.
How much can it lift? it´s a speed, profile and surface relation. Cant remember the exact numbers but mathematics result applied to this model exceed by far what I initially expected to be possible.
The flight was stable and showed only little shakes due to the breeze. That confirms the model was flying below its best wing load numbers (may be another 5-10 kg load would help but don´t know. The model is hanging in a wall and there are no plans to put it in flight again so, will not be possible to check it. Electric flight is the way to go, will see how it ends.

Well this would be an optimized carrier for UAV. In case this is drive by batteries instead of fuel. The inner construction and propulsion system should be consider in details. Any news please keep me posted.

Very Nice job!

[elossam]

Thanks guys,
I´ve no plans to get it in the air again even when it´s no other thing to do that screwing the engines and servos in place again. It´s a honour question not to make it fly again, so stupid but so real. I lost lot of money, time and a friend in the project and the prototipe is all what I keep from those days.

As I wrote above , if you like this kind of planes you will enjoy reading about Burnellis history , i.e
http://www.earlyaviators.com/eburnell.htm
http://www.aircrash.org/burnelli/chrono1.htm
http://www.aircrash.org/burnelli/chrono2.htm
http://www.popularaviation.com/PhotoGallery/3516.jpg

See you
Elossam

[libelulamodelos]

i like your plane !!

[awmeade]

any plans / dimensions / drawings you could share? she is a beaut :)

[elossam]

Here´s a render pic of the original CAD design structure (note it still has the positive "V" tail fins)

http://www.rc-flysafe.com/ALEM/alemcad07.JPG


The reason of this post was to show in a general fashion a slightly different airplane plant but have not to show detailed info. The idea and experience from this unit will be used in a comercial project shortly so I hope you can understand it.

[juliantkp]

Hi,
Sorry, know its been long since this post been posted up. Just wondering, would you be interested to sell your MP1000 to me? was thinking to use it in some of my project.

Thanks.

JulianTKP

[Airboatflyingshp]

Enya have just released a 40 sized 4 stroke diesel ..................... makes a 4 stroke look thirsty.........??? Love the Burnelli influence by the way :cool:

[elossam]

Julian, I don´t have the MP1000. After the cooperation dissolution I held the entire plane and my "lovely" partner the MP1000.
In any way I think you will actually save lot of money, time and headaches investing in any of the picco pilot or simmilar units. The Mp1000 was indeed far away from any user friendly item as they must be numerically programed using the hyperterminal (no window interface available for that model).