The inside of the NT Radian cockpit is crowded with the electronic devices for the LED system. You can tidy up the cockpit by moving all but the white balance plug outside of the fuselage. Tools required are a small box cutter and CA with accelerator.

The best thing about my old Radian Pro were the wing socket plugs. They had long strong pins and I never lost flap or aileron contact over the 5 ? years of abuse. I never screwed the wings to the fuselage either. The painters masking tape on the wing tube gave just enough grip with the foam so the wing did not slip out and away from the fuselage and wing sockets.

To make de thermalizer or parachute landing descents properly the pitch Control surfaces need to be designed properly. A large elevator or full flying stab are the most common. For the FT Radian I�ve added 3/32 balsa pieces that increase the elevator surface area about 350%. I drilled a clevis hole as close to the hinge line as possible. The servo strains to push full up because of the pushrod system.
If I can find the right up angle with fuse descending level I will refine the design.

First test results showed that there was not enough elevator up deflection for proper level vertical descent. I was able to slow down with power off and porpoising took place but there was forward speed even with a 10 mph headwind. I was expecting a drift downwind but it did not happen. After 20 seconds I stopped the test but found out I had no elevator control because the elevator servo had moved forward in the foam cut out and was free to move around so I had not push back to command up elevator. The model stalled and hit the ground in a nose down attitude. The fuse was seperated at the forward wing mounting area and compression wrinkles were seen. The forward magnet seperated from the clear canopy. At the crash site the rudder and elevator servos still worked but because of the pushrod system there was no elevator control.

Repairs consisted of using Loctite plastic 2 part epoxy to glue the magnet back to the canopy. CA was used to reinforce the magnet to foam mount,...Continue Reading