Last year at the AMA Convention, I purchased two House of Balsa Micro Cubs and an Astro Flight 010. I built one of the cubs and have flown it just about every week since. I love this plane so much I wanted to share with all of you the build up of the second kit. The contents of the kit include all the wood needed to build the plane as well as all the pushrods, wire landing gear and a decal sheet to finish up the cub. Wheels are just about the only thing not included in the kit. The wood included is of excellent quality and whoever is doing HofB’s laser cutting, needs a big pat on the back.

Enough of my rambling, let’s get started…

This thing builds up extremely quick. I had all the parts separated and started in less than ten minutes. Building one before makes this a much easier task but anyone could build this kit without a problem.

About thirty minutes later I had a completed fuse and tail sections. I told you this thing builds up quick.

With the fuse done, I turned my attention to the wings. The wings build use two main spars with a cap going over one to hold the ribs in place. The trailing edge is .040 thick sheeting bottom and top with a ¼ inch sq leading edge.

Did I forget to mention I’m adding ailerons to this one????

I couldn’t resist adding ailerons to an already excellent flying plane. I love my three channel cub so much I just had to add a fourth channel to the mix. I built the wings per the instructions then cut out the trailing edge from ¼” in from the trailing edge sheeting. Once I had the aileron free, I cap stripped the aileron and the wing with 1/8” balsa. I’ll then close up the ends of the ailerons and hinge them in place. Control will be from a pair of torque rods going from the aileron to the center section. I thought about making barn door ailerons but because of the distance between each of the ribs and the need to keep the weight down, I chose against them.

More tomorrow…

OCModels,

Thanks for posting the building of the HOB Micro Cub. I have looked at it for some time, but could not decide to purchase it. The pictures in all of the ads have not hit my "I like it" button.

What you are showing has made a few hits. I do like the lightening in the tail and fuselage.

I'll keep a close eye on this thread.

Thanks,

Roger

I have to second OC's statement about this being a great building and flying plane. I love this little plane. Long flights, and she zips around nicely. I love doing just basic aerobatics with her. (mine is rudder elevator)

--Paul

Started working on the second wing panel today. The wing is very easy to modify since the trailing edge is sheeted top and bottom.

First thing I did was to mark off 1/2 inch from the trailing edge sheet in. I then cut away the trailing edge two ribs in and out to the tip. I installed the tip before doing this as it adds strength to the tip rib.

Once I have the new aileron seperated from the wing. I trim the remaining ribs from the aileron. With the aileron and the ribs sanded flat, I added 1/8" strip to cap the aileron and the wing.

Now comes the tricky part. I wanted to control the ailerons using torque rods running through some mini nyrod tubing. I had to figure out how to get the wire through the tube once it was installed in the wing. I decided to bend a 90 degree bend in the aileron end then feed it through and bend the control end after it had been inserted into the tube. I then installed a piece of plywood to attach the covering around the control.

Another of the aileron control

Since I'm adding ailerons, I really didn't need all that dihedral the stock wing requires. I decided to use the wing joiners that came with the kit but had to modify them a bit to get them to fit. The wing is really over built to begin with so this little mod won't make it any weaker.

With the wings joined together, 1/16" sheet is used to cover the center section. I had a picture of the center section before the sheeting but I can't get it from the Smart media card for some reason. Time for a new card I guess...

Here is a comparison shot of the stock wing and my modified wing. Should look great with the reduced dihedral. I wonder if I should add wing struts for a bit more realism....

Here are the two cubs!