Daz flying my 70% Veron impala on Phil Green reeds emulation TX.

Daz impala (1 min 8 sec)

Just a few of my favorite pics from MSF 2019....Continue Reading

Well the Sniff was a success. It had it's maiden at MSF in September & flew perfectly from the start. CG was perfect at 8% static margin & the throws were pretty much spot on.
Speed was good & was extremely nice to fly.

Fast forward a few months & it had it's first DS laps at Wybung.
Sadly, also it's last as I ran out of talent & put it through the trees at a high enough speed to write it off.
I have another fuselage laid up & the mylars so will build another when time permits.

This is mainly for reference later when I forget my layups.....
Sniff is an old school HLG for which a good man lent me the fuselage molds recently.

Mine are being built for heavy slope use so fuselage layup is as follows.
2 full layers of 195g cloth + 1 layer of 195 from the nose to just behind the TE.
Let green & trim, then laminate in some full length carbon tow & a full layer of 195 overlapping for the seams. Close the mold & press the seams down.
The result is like a baseball bat. Canopy is 3 layers of 195.

I'm now at the wing stage with the tails already bagged & the wing cored cut.
Wings are Rg14 with 200mm root & 150mm tip. 30mm sweep on the LE.

The first wing layup will be...
1 layer of 80g surfboard cloth, 2 layers of 195g glass, 50mm Carbon tape along the TE to stiffen the control surfaces, 25m Uni carbon on the top surface (spar) & 6 strands of tow on the bottom surface (Spar).

I have no idea how this will turn out as it is my first bagged wing but we'll know if a few days.

The latest additions to the PSS fleet.
F18 from the Paul Janssens plans thanks to Maarten X. Flies well at 1.1kg but the maiden was in fairly big air & it was a bit light for the conditions. Flew half dozen flights while I gradually reduced nose weight until I got disoriented on landing approach & stuck it in pretty hard. Minimal damage & already repaired.
Build log here
https://www.rcgroups.com/forums/show...l-Janssens-F18


The Lightning is converted from a Tony Nijhuis electric plan. All balsa & 23" span, 390g. Yet to fly.
No build log on this one.

Maiden flights of the Vic Smeed Pulstar today.
Rudder & throttle control only. With a bit more right thrust & some trimming it'll be ready to fly single channel on the button.

Pulstar maiden (0 min 56 sec)

Not much flying lately but a bit of building.

After 15 years or more of sitting in a box waiting to be built, the Southern Sailplanes Tbird is ready to fly.
The Blur is repaired & has flown a couple of times.
The Mefisto I bought with a busted fuselage is repaired & ready to go

Tomboy built & flown several times. Now trimmed & ready to fly single channel
Pulstar almost ready to fly, also single channel....Continue Reading

Another MSF come & gone.
The weather made up for last year & I got a LOT of flying in.

The BV141 proved to be perfect for the conditions most days & did more flying than everything else combined.
Some pics of my birds attached courtesy of Norm, Stehl, Owen & Andrew. The link below will take you to the thread with pics & commentary of the entire event.

https://www.rcgroups.com/forums/show...ia-2017/page83...Continue Reading

Frog Junior Sailplane built at 150% scale which makes it 30" span.
LemonRx 1.4g micro receiver, 2 x 1.7g servos & a 750 mah 1s lipo gives it an AUW of 88g RTF.

Covering is Solarfilm & decals are Inkjet printed onto clear sticker paper....Continue Reading

Reeds emulation radio built using the Reeduino sketch from Phil_G.
http://www.singlechannel.co.uk/

The Reeds set that never was. Thanks to Ron for the original Single Channel decal that was modified to make this one.

Vic Smeed Chatterbox built at 120% size.
Motor is a Turnigy D2822/14, 2s battery, 9x 4.5 prop making 75 watts. Rudder & throttle control.
AUW between 680 & 720g (23-25oz) depending on the battery used & loading is between 13-14 oz/ foot.

Covered in Chinacote & the Chatterbox decal is inkjet waterslide decal photoshopped from the original plan.
Maiden as soon as good weather corresponds with a free morning.
Build Thread here.
https://www.rcgroups.com/forums/show...terbox-for-TBD

Al

I finished the Little V slope Soarer today.
36" span & 320g AUW ready to fly.

The pics show it sitting beside my 36" Veron Impala.

No Build log on this one.

Al

The Veron Impala has been successfully maidened on the reeds transmitter.
Flies great.
Link to build log
https://www.rcgroups.com/forums/show...0-Veron-Impala

Video

Veron Impala on Reeds (5 min 1 sec)

My BV 141 built from the Ziroli plans. The plan was reduced to 36" span & then the wings were stretched back to 41"
The fuselage & pod were made in a similar fashion to lost foam only they were hollowed out to be around 15mm thick & the foam was left in after glassing. The wing is balsa over foam with an RG14 wing section & covered in film. It's painted in Lifecolor acrylics with Tamiya clear.
700g AUW & loading around 16 1/2 oz per square foot.
Build log here.
https://www.rcgroups.com/forums/show....php?t=2659928

Video courtesy of Mark.

Als BV 141 PSS on the slope. (0 min 23 sec)

...Continue Reading

Not much building of late. Work, family & a few overdue home projects have made sure of that.
Most of the projects are now done so I thought I'd throw together an assembly bench. Too many times I have to stop working as the workbench is full of things waiting to dry.
It's only taken a few hours of work so far. Not finished but usable now. I'll finish it in bits as I go from here.

Time for a change of pace.
70% Veron Impala build with a view to practice my singe channel flying.

Build log here,
https://www.rcgroups.com/forums/show...8#post34351619

Maiden video here.

Impala maiden (1 min 34 sec)

Next is something to fly at the local slope (Wybung).

A P40 Kittyhawk built from the Paul Janssen plans. This one was built pretty much exactly to the plans.
It flies fairly well & is much more suited to the local slope.
Wingspan is 37" & it weighs around 780g.
Construction is foam core wing & fuselage sheeted in balsa & covered in film.

Build thread here.
https://www.rcgroups.com/forums/show....php?t=2517319

The MSF 2015 group build was a Chaos which is a sort of slope scale L39 designed & kitted by Jordan (Hamburglar on RcGroups).

A really nice kit & flies extremely well.
The best quality fiberglass fuselage I've ever seen. Mine is built with balsa sheeted foam cores & 4oz glass. Painted in Auto acrylic white & acrylic model paint for the trim. Hand cut decals.
Came out around 1kg & flies beautifully though mine was true to form & a bit nose heavy.

Group build thread here.
https://www.rcgroups.com/forums/show....php?t=2271605

Next was a French Dewoitine 520 fighter in Bulgarian colours. This was a bit faster build but still pretty slow.
Based loosely on the Paul Janssens plan however his is all balsa & around 48" wingspan. Mine uses fiberglass over lost foam construction the same as the P51 with a 60 inch wingspan & an AUW of 2.3kg.

It was also maidened at MSF 2015 & also very nose heavy with the CG at MAC 27%.
This one however, was very prone to hyper stalling the tail & had to be flown very carefully. It flew well but to much elevator resulted in a nasty roll onto it's back.
It managed 3 or 4 flights at MSF before I damaged the tail on landing. It'll be repaired shortly & will also fly with a more rearward CG at MSF 2016.

Build log here.
https://www.rcgroups.com/forums/show....php?t=2197808

Video courtesy of Matin.

AL's Dewoitine (3 min 1 sec)

I'm sitting here with not a lot to do & thought I'd put a few pics of my builds up here.

The P51 was my first real PSS project & took just over 12 months to finish. It took that long as I was learning as I went, I have a fairly busy life so can't devote large amounts of time to building, but mainly because I'm a slow builder.
It's built using fiberglass over a lost foam plug & 0.4mm ply sheeted foam core wings. Based very loosely on the Paul Janssen 42" plan but only the rough outline remains with so many changes there is nothing the same. The wingspan is 60" & AUW is 2.7kg. It was maidened at Manilla Slope Fest 2015.
It was VERY nose heavy at 27% MAC so was zooming quite badly but otherwise flew well. Minor damage on landing & will fly with some fine tuning at MSF 2016.

Build log here.
https://www.rcgroups.com/forums/show....php?t=2197808