Hey everyone,

Dont know if any of you have seen this link or not. It is for a small Ekranoplan (aka WIG, WISE, etc) made from poster board. I built one and it flies great! Perfect if you have access to a large gym or any other smooth surface. Who will be the first one to build this light from foam and make it R/C???

http://g5.damp.tottori-u.ac.jp/WISE/ramodel.html

Chris

BTW - anyone who builds one (RC or FF) it would be great if you could post pictures in this thread - especially if you made variations on the original design.

oh! ME!!! gimme 24 hours!!!

Fascinating subject ground effect vehicles. Russia did quite a bit of research into ground effect boats? 20 or so, years ago.
Iv'e found some pictures of a huge Ekranoplan which they produced which was 242 feet long.

For a model capable of flying out of ground effect, the airfoil would need to be re shaped with some reflex so that it would be stable in pitch.

The other Graham

Anyone know what the slanting tubes on the top of the fuselage are for?

http://www.se-technology.com/wig/index.php

some time ago I bought a set of planes, but I do not have the Time to build one..

Great planes at; http://freespace.virgin.net/home.taylor/

Graham,

I believe the tubes they were for launching missles out of, I recall seeing a video of this happening. That one in the pictures had a lot of engines, but it only used them all for getting airborne. Once airborn, it only used 2 I think.

Chris

Graham,

The one you've posted pictures of was known as the "Caspian Sea Monster"
The americans spotted it in dry-dock on a satellite photo during the cold war and thought it was a massive unfinished bomber.

Chris,

I'm pretty sure you're correct about the tubes and also the two engine cruise. It took a serious amount of thrust to get clear of the water but very little to keep airbourne.

Aidan

OKay, now I'm starting :-) Gimme an hour :-P

On another note, anybody like the EKIP as much as I certainly do?

Okay... I failed :-P Tried my own design, couldn't trim it :-P

Pete,

Got any links for the EKIP?

Apparantly ekranoplans are very CofG sensitive, which can make them difficult to trim.

Chris

I found that out the hard way :-P

EKIP link
http://www.ekip-aviation-concern.com

There isn't much about it at all, I did a report and found possibly 10 pics total :-P Over a month!!

I to beleive they are rocket launchers, Look at the bulge on the front of the rudder it appears to be a radome. Would be an interesting subject for a high speed boat.

Robert

i ran across this thread while looking for some hover craft info for my new little 5.5" hover craft i recently built. i only learned of WIG type crafts a couple weeks ago and have had them on my mind, so when i saw the little one in the first post i thought it would be a perfect fit for the trusty x-twin electronics.

i changed the plans a little, adding a 2nd verticle stab and making it 4.75 inches long and 4.5 inches wide. the motors/props are mounted as such that a little less than half the prop wash flows under the craft, the rest flows over the top.

the picture was taken right after building it and i found (quickly) that the CG was back too far - insta-flip! but that was only at around 1/2 throttle, so with the proper CG it should perform pretty well. from what i've read in the threads, the CG can be tricky, so i'll be adjusting the lipo in very small increments, i'm hoping i can balance it like a normal wing. but, i dont have much room here so i'll have to find somewhere else to really get it right.

interesting little project.

nick

Bump.

Micro,
What ever came of your project?

Corey

I remember seeing photos of some amphibious 1/2 A powered freeflight ground effect vehicles online somewhere. They were of the Lippisch ram-wing configuration. Sounds like a fun experiment for electric power and micro RC. Once in cruise flight, they're inherently stable.

Tom