Hey dudes.

The plane has been online for a little while but as there is no official thread and no definitive review of the beast i thought i better get this thing going.

The ZXL is the Ritewing ZII we all know and love with a pair of wingtip extensions, tanking the span to 81". The wingtip extensions also have a socket for additional servos you can pop in if you would like to add the safety of redundancy in the event of a servo failure, or added functionality if you would like to try something like flaps or brakes, or even drag rudders if you are really adventurous.

The ZXL also comes with upgraded sparring over the ZII, with 2x solid fiberglass spars for the centre cavity, and 4x full length wing spars for the top and bottom cutouts in the wings. The motor mount is upgraded too with a lot more thickness and strength, and will carry some massive motors.

I built my ZXL over a few days, using only the standard supplies. The running gear i added was two 3s 4000 batts for 3s 8000, a plush 60 ESC, the ritewing 1300kv 150g outrunner, and an 11x5.5 apc style e-prop. it pulls about 400w WOT and has almost 1x1 thrust at launch. Servos are bluebird 10kg metal gear fullsize items, about $10 each from hobbyking. Receiver is EzUHF, and RX and servo power comes from a 700mah LiFe batt. I had an elcheapo 5A HK BEC but it would cut out when swinging the sticks hard, so the LiFe batt solved that problem. The horns i have are actually the remnants of an old carbon prop balancer frame, chopped up and glued in with 5 min epoxy at a height of about 30 - 35mm, to keep the servo resolution as high as possible. The clevis' are 4/40 hardware with fiberglass tube covering the threaded rod, and heatshrink covering the whole lot including the clevis for massive stiffness.

I added 5m of LED strip lighting and 4x 10w LED spotlights, with LED drivers and heatsinks. The spotlights are only running at about 2w each as they generate so much heat they would burn straight through the lam on full power.

The winglets are detachable on my ZXL as it is so big i would struggle to fit it in my car if they were glued on. I have 1mm aluminium sheet goop'd on the wingtips and the winglets screw into that with a 2x 3m bolts. The lighting on the winglets plugs in with a servo extension plug.

The CG came in just behind 11 inches, the sweet spot right between 11 and 11.5 inches. all up weight with my feeble power system i am guessing to be abou 2.5kg.

I have flown the plane a couple of times and it just RAILS. so smooth, so predictable, it creates confidence and you just want to fly lower and lower all the time. With the big prop and low wing loading it just flies out of your hand and wants to stay up up up! i usually thrash it about for about 15 mins and land and only 50% of the power has been used. With throttle management you could stay up all day :P

if anyone else gets one and needs help in the build or setup, feel free to ask a question here and i will try to shoot you in the right direction.

Good luck, and happy flying!!!

ZXL nite flyer maiden (3 min 0 sec)

Looks good, like the red coro.

show us the removeable wingletts

is it getting fpv gear?

Nice. Good build.

Where Do you buy the huge led headlights ?

wiring for FPV gear is installed but it will not be going FPV for a while. maybe if i crash one of my other FPV planes.

i'll get some pics of the winglets off later today.

you can get the huge LED's on ebay for a few $ each. you also need a LED driver and heatsink, and some thermal epoxy , or they will burn up real quick.

here is a pic of the screw in winglets. goop is holding the aluminium to the lam.

awesome! Its so huge!

looks great mate, how much was it to get the cores shipped over here?
thanks spud

about 250 USD i think, email CK he will hook you up.

Originally Posted by verticalspark

awesome! Its so huge!

you have no idea

6' 220 but it was sitting on my foot so it's up a little.....

Originally Posted by brosius85

Hey dudes.

The plane has been online for a little while but as there is no official thread and no definitive review of the beast i thought i better get this thing going.

The ZXL is the Ritewing ZII we all know and love with a pair of wingtip extensions, tanking the span to 81". The wingtip extensions also have a socket for additional servos you can pop in if you would like to add the safety of redundancy in the event of a servo failure, or added functionality if you would like to try something like flaps or brakes, or even drag rudders if you are really adventurous.

The ZXL also comes with upgraded sparring over the ZII, with 2x solid fiberglass spars for the centre cavity, and 4x full length wing spars for the top and bottom cutouts in the wings. The motor mount is upgraded too with a lot more thickness and strength, and will carry some massive motors.

I built my ZXL over a few days, using only the standard supplies. The running gear i added was two 3s 4000 batts for 3s 8000, a plush 60 ESC, the ritewing 1300kv 150g outrunner, and an 11x5.5 apc style e-prop. it pulls about 400w WOT and has almost 1x1 thrust at launch. Servos are bluebird 10kg metal gear fullsize items, about $10 each from hobbyking. Receiver is EzUHF, and RX and servo power comes from a 700mah LiFe batt. I had an elcheapo 5A HK BEC but it would cut out when swinging the sticks hard, so the LiFe batt solved that problem. The horns i have are actually the remnants of an old carbon prop balancer frame, chopped up and glued in with 5 min epoxy at a height of about 30 - 35mm, to keep the servo resolution as high as possible. The clevis' are 4/40 hardware with fiberglass tube covering the threaded rod, and heatshrink covering the whole lot including the clevis for massive stiffness.

I added 5m of LED strip lighting and 4x 10w LED spotlights, with LED drivers and heatsinks. The spotlights are only running at about 2w each as they generate so much heat they would burn straight through the lam on full power.

The winglets are detachable on my ZXL as it is so big i would struggle to fit it in my car if they were glued on. I have 1mm aluminium sheet goop'd on the wingtips and the winglets screw into that with a 2x 3m bolts. The lighting on the winglets plugs in with a servo extension plug.

The CG came in just behind 11 inches, the sweet spot right between 11 and 11.5 inches. all up weight with my feeble power system i am guessing to be abou 2.5kg.

I have flown the plane a couple of times and it just RAILS. so smooth, so predictable, it creates confidence and you just want to fly lower and lower all the time. With the big prop and low wing loading it just flies out of your hand and wants to stay up up up! i usually thrash it about for about 15 mins and land and only 50% of the power has been used. With throttle management you could stay up all day :P

if anyone else gets one and needs help in the build or setup, feel free to ask a question here and i will try to shoot you in the right direction.

Good luck, and happy flying!!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IFgRU...1&feature=plcp

Nice build, i love what you did with the winglets. Chris and I have built 4 ZXLs and all fly exactly as you describe. We are also loading them with the same motor and battery setup as you. Flying does lure you to the ground, with the confidence it instills you find yourself wanting to fly low, very low. We typically are zipping around the field at 10 to 15 feet off the ground and just cant stop commenting to each other what a grand slam the wing is. We have been using them for some longer range video testing as well. With the autopilot engaged and a criuse of 30kts we easily get 40mins in the air and come down with about 1000mAh left in the tank of our 8000 3s set up, so about 14% reserve. The video is amazing from this wing as well, so stable and fluid. Its deff worth trying to fit this thing in you car!