Well, not being one who likes to get rid of anything, I figured I'd use up some more stuff I have laying around. My bro-in-law had just receintly finished up a twin star II and and I was rummaging through some parts and pieces of planes long since retired, I came upon my old GWS A-10 wing. Hmmmmm!! It kind of looked like a mini version of the twin star wing. (Light bulb comes on now), I know, I'll make a smaller version of a twin motor, high wing plane roughly based on the porportions of the twin star. I'll turn the landing gear nacells into motor nacells. And.... Well, I have some EPS foam containers, the kind that perishable foods are used to ship across country. This is very good EPS, quite dense. I cut one up into blocks and glued them together to make a block ~ 3"X4.5"X32". Hand drew a side and top profile on the block and using a band saw and a scroll saw roughed out the fuselage. Then using a sanding block started to put the finer details on. I then got some 5mm & 1.5mm depron and laminated the vert & horiz stabs. 5mm between 1.5mm sheets. Here she is so far with the stabs and wing just sitting on the fuse. I have some little eskay XT400 outrunner motors I plan to use with some 3 blade 6X4 MAS props. It's going to be aileron, elevator controls. And I plan to put tricycle landing gear with a sreerable nose wheel on.

Well, I've finished up the basic airframe and finally flew her tonight. She really flew quite well and needed very few trim clicks to trim out. The steerable tricycle gear works great. She needed more of my air strip to get airborne than I thought she would need. Almost in the weeds but finally lifted off and climbed out. The props are MAS 6X4s & I used a Dymond 1800mah, 3cell, 12c LiPo for a 7 min flight. When I charged the batt, it only took 600mah. 10min+ flights should be no problem. Quite a fun project. Now to dress her up. Happy flying.
Rick

That's a great looking ship, Rick! I'd like to see more pics. Could you show your motor installation?

I like high wing twins and kind of had my eye on a Twin Star II, but I like your idea better...

What kind of paint job were you thinking about?

Keep the pics coming!

Cheers,

Mike

Hello Mike,
Here's some pics of the mounts, nose gear and battery/Rx bays. I plan to paint her in USCG colors. Enjoy.
Rick

Great looking plane! I have been looking for a small nose wheel steering mechanism, like you have installed in there, for a plane I'm building. Is that a commercially available one? TIA for any info.

Bill

Bill,
I've tossed the packaging but I think it was made by Du-Bro. I purchased them at Martys Hobbies in Thousand Oaks Ca. They have a web site. It was the smallest set I could find and fit great. Good luck.
Rick

Looks great RickAvery! I like multi-motor planes.

Rick,

Thanks, I think I've found it.
http://www2.towerhobbies.com/cgi-bin...?&I=LXD845&P=M

OK, here's the finished product. Thanks to all for the kind words. It sure means a lot as this is the first plane that I've built almost all of the parts. Except for the GWS A-10 wing, all was built on my bench using the TLAR method. Happy flying!
Rick

I'm guessing you could increase the prop size...it will give you more power for the climb out, etc.

Wow, that thing looks great. With the paint, one of the best I have seen in a while. Just a suggestion on your long take off run. Your main gear is quite far back in relation to where I am guessing the CG is. That is one major thing I had to keep in the simulations when I was working on my senior design project. One of the planes from the previous year had a low enough stall speed but couldn't get enough moment to rotate about the gear to reach the necessary AoA. You may have clues to suggest otherwise but I would try moving your gear forward. A general rule of thumb is to have 10% on the nose and 90% on the mains.

Aceshigh84,
Hmmmmm... I had never thought of that! The placement of the rear LG was a result of needing weight to the rear as the nose gear and servo added a bit of weight way up front. If the larger props I have ordered don't seem to cure the pucker factor at take off, I'll move the gear forward and give it a go. I'll most likely have to do some more work in the battery bay to move the battery back further. The basic porportions i.e. wing span to fuselage length, distance of the leading edge to the nose, Tail feather sizes & the CoG as mentioned, were taken from the Multiplex Twin Star II. So really, the CoG placement was just a guess. Thanks for the complements and Ideas. This project is far from complete. Class is in session.
Rick

Shoot us a video if you have a chance Rick.

If moving the gear forward doesn't do the trick. Have you thought about increasing the incidence on the main wing? Maybe 1/8 of an inch at a time and try it.

Ray,
Thanks! Another excellent idea and easily doable with my mounting setup. I may try that before I relocate the rear LG.
Rick