Well I did some covering on the big Cub today. I know it is no where near perfect, but I am pretty proud of it. I am learning more exch time I do it. The thing I learned today is that I need a real covering iron and a heat gun. I am using a small craft iron from Wal-Mart and an old hairdryer. I went to Hobbytown yesterday but my funds ran out before I got to the covering iron.

Here are some pictures of the Alpha. My friend did some repairs on the tail section covering today. Turned out to be a good looking plane. I am going to his house tomorrow and we will see if it will start.

OK well the title is not completely true. I covered a few control line planes back in the stone age with paper and dope. But this was my first effort with any type of iron on covering. I wanted to try it on my cub before I did it for anyone else. But timing came into play so we gave it a shot yesterday. My friend bought a used Hanger 9 Alpha 60 an he was going to bring it to my house so we could start it and check it out. We knew it needed some covering work but we found one of the wing tips had been damaged and then gotten wet. Needless to say it was rotten. So we cut the wing tip off and rebuilt it. I was comfortable doing this but I wasn't sure we could get it covered. Now unlike me I didn't take any pictures of any of it. But he sent me a pic after he got home.

When you look at the pic of the wing tip the covering was done from the end of the silver stripe on out to the wingtip. The other pictures are just of the plane. He is going to try his hand at some covering today on the tail of the plane.

We all need to have a vision of what we want. Below you will see pictures from what the Great planes Cub looked like when I got it, what it looks like now, and what I hope it looks like when I am finally done. I know the finished version is not Great Planes version, but it was a really good looking Cub. The guy said it was an ARF, it has been a while since that picture was taken, but I watched him fly it several times and it flew well. I just hope mine looks that good one day. Before i put a lot of time into the scale part or making the covering beautiful, I want to see if it flies first.

My hopes are a nice scale flyer that will take off, float like a Cub and land like a feather. I am not looking for lots of power. I have heard all of the stories, you can't have too much power, you always want extra power in case you get in trouble and all of that stuff. I have spent many hours flying Cubs in Microsoft Flight sim.... all versions of it. And one thing is common among Cubs, they are not powerful flyers. they have wonderful flight characteristics, but abundant power is not not something they have. You gain altitude gracefully and skillfully in a Cub. You do not just jerk back on the stick and hang on. They always say that a Cub is one of the safest planes in the world... it only goes fast enough to barely kill you.

Ok I have already started the next project. The Thunder Tiger Sky Lark 40H is on the table. Yea it's an ARF, but I think it will be fun to put together. The box says "ready to fly", but the box is also 26 years old. I should be getting the engine tomorrow. I got an OS 40 on the way. Bought it off of Craigslist for 25$. I will of course post pice of the engine when I get it. The guy I got the engine from is also selling me a flight box. I do not have one at the moment. I use an old tackle box to carry tools and parts. I use my car, lawnmower or my 3 wheeler to power my starter. It will be much easier with a box with a battery and power panel.

Well I have finished the wood work on the cub. And since I am writing this from my phone, I can't post pictures right now. I got the wing tip done and the leading edge sheeted. All that is left is fuel proofing the engine compartment, sanding and then covering.

I will post some pics later.

Here are the pics. You can see all is back together. I have the cracks patched and will sand them today. I wanted to give it a chance to dry completely.

Since I live way out in the country, one of my favorite things is riding my old 3 wheeler. My wife fusses at me because I leave my daughter's 4 wheeler out in the weather while my "baby" gets put in my storage building. But my "baby" is 30 years old and needs to be protected from the weather. The seat is cracked and needs to be recovered now, but that doesn't mean that it is going to sit outside.

As you can see from the pictures, my baby is now covered in airplanes. I am going to hang them from the ceiling this weekend. I think I can get them out of the way so I won't hit my head on them.

The Sky Lark in the box is the 26 year old ARF that I mentioned in an early post. that is my next project after I get the Cub back together. I will prolly start on it before I start covering the Cub. I don't have any covering or an iron at this point. So I will move on to a project that I don't have to put any money into. I have a total of 7 servos right now so I think I will buy 2 more and that will be enough to complete the Cub and the Sky lark. I have an engine that I should be getting next tuesday for the Sky Lark. With any luck i will have 3 planes in flying condition by the time the spring flying season gets here. My car is so small that I will not be able to get them all to the field at one time.

Well I didn't get to the shop as early last night as I had hoped. But I did manage to get done what I had intended to get done last night. I got the blind nuts installed on the firewall and got the motor mount put on.(just a test fit.) I got the top part of the nose skinned and I think it looks pretty good.

You can see below where the crash pulled the lower strut mount out of the right side of the plane. That has been repaired and the hole in the fuse has been fixed with balsa. Now I need to get some kind of filler and fill the cracks for the final sanding. I am not sure what to use. I have read different things about vinyl spackle and wood filler. Not sure what is best. Please feel free to make suggestions if you are reading this.

I hope to get the wingtip done this weekend. It is going to be fun since the parts I need are not really on the plans. I mean they are there but they are shown from above and not a flat shot of them. This means I will need to rely on my machine shop skills to take some measurements and draw them out myself. I should be able to take the measurements I can get from the plans and from the other wingtip and fill in the blanks. I could cut the covering off of the other wingtip but I am going to try not to do that. I think it is kinda like working an algebra problem. Get the measurements of the critical points and then just solve for "X".

As I was looking through my rebuild pics this morning, I was looking for some drastic before and after pics. I think this is a good example.

You can also see that I upgraded the light in my shop too. I had a drop light hanging from the ceiling in the first one.

Well last night I went to my airplane shop not knowing what I was going to do when I got there. I really want to start on that new plane, but I am afraid if I do that I will not be able to get back into the big Cub again. I have a bad habit of not finishing stuff and not just models.

There were some small details that needed addressing on the Cub, so I actually worked on them. If you will notice from the previous pics and the pics below that I reposted, there were some holes and things in the nose behind the repair work I did. There was also a strip of wood missing from in front of the bottom hatch. I think I did a fair job of patching the holes and repairing the area around the hatch.

Now the big holdup is 4 6-32 blind nuts for the back of the firewall to hold the engine mount. I may try to get those today. There is not a LHS very close to me, well considering Christmas traffic that is. There is a small one a few miles from where I work, but its a traffic nightmare just trying to get there. The local Hobbytown is even farther and right next to the biggest mall in this area so it is even worse. Once I get the blind nuts installed I can sheet the top of the nose and the fuse will be basically finished.

I cut into the damaged wing last night too. It is really not that bad. I repaired some of the cracks and broken ribs, but there is one rib that is 90% missing that I need to recut and some wingtip parts that there are not any good srawings of on the roll plans. I think I can figure something out though.

Well I finally got my freebie plane that I have been waiting on since Thanksgiving. A friend of mine's dad has been flying since the 60's. He has several planes and he said he was going to send me one the next time he got a chance. His son (he is at least 55) and I used to work together and we talked about RC flying some times. So yesterday my friend called me and said to come by after work that he had a few things from his dad for me.

When I got there I see this brand new looking box. It looks like it was just bought yeaterday. It is Thunder Tiger Sky Lark 40H. Now I have heard of TT engines and Helis, but I have never seen a TT plane that I know of. Anyway I got it home and opened the box. As you can see in the pic below, it had never been opened. All of the parts are still in the plastic bags. None of the staples have even been pulled open. Its a very pretty plane of what I would call the classic "trainer" style.

So I am carefully going through the box looking at all of the parts. Inside the box I find a receipt. It was where this guy's dad had mail ordered it. The receipt was for $94.99 total. I found a date on the receipt..... are you ready????? the plane was bought 7/11/1986. Its an antique and never been put together. The box also says "ready to fly" but by today's standards it would be considered an "ARF".

The instructions are great. Written in Chinese or Japanese with a little English thrown in. I guess...Continue Reading

i got to spend a few hours this weekend working on the Cub. I got the firewall epoxied in and was going to be happy just getting that done on saturday evening. But the football game last night was no good so I wandered back out to the airplane shop and got inspired to try to finish the nose. I actually got the side and the bottom done. All I need now is the blind nuts and I should be ready to test fit the engine. I still need to touch up some of the joints and stuff with wood filler or glue, but it is coming along very nicely.

On a seperate note, I picked up the 2 planes I bought in Arkansas last night. All I knew was that it was a Cub and a Sig Mayhem 3D. Both are pretty nice, but I now see that neither of them was ever finished. Both are missing a tailwheel. The Cub has a servo installed for the ailerions in the wing. There are some control rods in the fuse, but they are not hooked up to the rudder ot elevators. They are strange because the are large square wooden rods with metal rods in the ends. I am thinking that I will have to change these. There is no servo tray in the Cub at all. It has the side glass but not the front windscreen. I need to know what kind it is so I can look for some plans or something. I cannot find anything about what brand it is. It has one peg in the front of the wing to hold it on and 2 screws on the back of the wing. See the pic at the bottom.

The Sig Mayhem is a beautiful plane. The covering looks good even though he did not go to the trouble to do multicolor covering. There are no control rods at all, no servo horns or anything like that. I am also going to have to find some info on it as well. It is a .40 size. I did find some info on the .60 size but not this one.

First of all I want to say that I know this thing will NEVER win a beauty contest. But remember that it was on its way to the trash can. if I had not rescued it, it would be covered in trash in a landfill right now. My hope is to get her back in the sky where she belongs.

Having said that, I got the firewall epoxied together last night. I got some of the cabin sidewall back on also. I did a little test fit of the engine and it looks like it will need to be mounted upside down to get the muffler to clear the fuse. That shouldn't be a problem, the engine in my white Cub is mounted upside down and it seems to run fine. I do NOT have to turn it upside down to start it. The throttle rod is going to work out in just the right place. It seems like it is all coming together. Hopefully I will get some of the nose finished this weekend.

I read something earlier in the week about making fiberglass cowls. Does anyone know how to do this? Can you point me in a direction of where to find some instructions? Nevermind... I found it. looks like more troouble than its worth. I hate fiberglass dust. It makes me itch and burn like crazy.

Kerry

The good thing about a blog is its a place where you can put your thoughts into words.

I was reading a thread about some of the things that go on in the classified free area. When I first saw that area I thought it was a great idea. You see I am always impressed with the generosity of people in the hobby of RC flying. So far almost everyone I have met has been more than helpful in one way or another. One of my first purchases at a hobby shop in Memphis, one of the guys that worked there actually used his RC club discount for me so I could save a couple of bucks. It wasn't a huge amount, but enough to make me notice his heart was in the right place. I am now a member of that club and have spent a little money in the shop since. MISSION ACCOMPLISHED on his part.

Since then I have been the benefactor of other good deeds by fellow RC flyers. From being given a large wrecked Cub to work on, to a ARF trainer new in the box, to an engine and 6 servos, and I cannot count the advice and time that have also come my way. Now I am not on foodstamps or any other government assistance, but it takes everything I make almost to take care of my family. I have virtually no disposable income to put into my hobby. I use money from small side jobs that I do or I sell some crap on Craigslist to pay for my hobby.

I see some of the people that try to do a good thing and pass on items that they do not need to others seem to to get the short end of the stick for just trying to...Continue Reading

Well Santa Clause came to see me yesterday, or at least he dropped off a package at my house. The package contained 6 Futaba servos and a K&B .61 engine for my big Cub. I was so excited my wife thought I had lost my mind. Now I am really excited about getting that plane finished. I was wondering how I was going to afford an engine for it. But my Christmas Elf really helped me out. Thanks Christmas Elf.... you know who you are!

I got the firewall cut last saturday and repaired the rounded wingtip part. The firewall was fun. I managed to dowel 3 pieces of 1/4 plywood together and cut them all at once. After I took the picture below, I cut the notches in the sides and I think I am ready to epoxy them together. I have an engine that should be here this week and I got the motor mounts last week. I also have some servos that should be here this week....(thank you to my new friend).

I also have a new much larger heater for my airplane shop. It was very cold out there sunday.

I just bought an OS LA .46 off of Craigslist. Got a sweet deal. That will go on my new trainer. I hope to get it today or tomorrow. I still don't know what kind it is. I asked my friend on the phone last week if he knew what brand it was. He said "the kind with wings".....thanks.

So it looks like I am well on my way to having at least 2 more planes flyable before next spring.

I have once again scored. I bought a .40 Cub with a 73 inch wingspan and a Sig Mayhem .40(54 inch ws), both without electronics or engines for $30 bucks. A friend is picking them up and bringing them to me sometime around Christmas. He picked them up last week and should be coming through my way in the next few weeks. The Cub needs the windows and a cowl to be complete and the Mayhem just needs motor and electronics. Either way at least I have a place to put my stuff if I crash my primary plane. I will also be looking for some cheap engines and radio parts over the winter so I can put them in and try to get another plane ready to fly before next spring. If anyone reads this and has an engine between .40 and .91 that they would like to sell really cheap I would greatly appreciate it. Also any radio equipment that they would like to sell also, especially servos. I am not a cheapskate, I am just broke. I think the technical term is UNDER-EMPLOYED!

I started putting it back together last night. I got the backbone fixed and started working on the cockpit. I hope to get the firewall cut and installed over the weekend. I have a $60 gift certificate to HobbytownUSA that will help with my project. May have to make a trip over there this weekend for some goodies.

A fellow member of my flying club gave me a Great Planes .60 Cub that he had wrecked. He said he hated the plane and was going to throw it away. I said "hey, throw it my way" I love a Cub and would have hated to see it thrown in the trash. The damage is not bad, I have the instruction book (he built it from a kit) and the roll plans. All parts are available from Great Planes but I plan on cutting them myself. I will need windows for one side and a new cowl. I am going to order a fiberglass one since they are no more expensive than the origional plastic one. Part of the nose needs replacing, the firewall, the upper and lower tank floors and the wingtip. I am going to try to take my time and work on it a little at a time over the winter. I will be looking for a suitable engine for it also. Since I have no disposable income, I will have to find one very cheap somewhere. Either Ebay, craigslist or somewhere like that. Not sure exactly what size i will need, I keep getting different opinions on the engine size. The plans say .60 to .90. Other people have said it needs at least a 1.2 or 1.4. it will probably be what ever jumps up at me at the right price at the right time. I guess i will finish it and then weigh it and see how heavy it is.

I am joining the Memphis Propbusters this saturday. They are a good bunch of guys. There are about 114 members and they have one of the best flying fields that I have ever seen. I will also get free flight lessons which will help me to not destroy my plane while I am learning. I am hoping my Cub will survive so I can do a complete recovering over the winter. Right now I am just patching the covering back together with blue tape. I am planning a radical new covering job if I do not destroy it while I am learning to fly.