So for about a year or so I have been planning this plane with these goals in mind:
A fuse that can be used for wings ranging from 60 inches to 80 or maybe a little more. Nice shape that lends itself well to bladder molding. With minimal changes in tooling it can be either a slope glider with a solid nose, slip on nose cone, or a canopy and be small yet capable of loading a ton of ballast in or cutting the nose off and stuffing a nice motor in there with 6 to 8 cells of LiPos. The fuse is long . Longer than needed so I can get away with smaller tails (T type) or cut the fuse off before the vertical and go with V tails.

To date three prototypes have been built and flown all with one off lost foam fuses and bagged wings. No pics were taken of any of these.... sorry. But I have everything just about where I want it now and have moved into building the molds for the fuse and the first wing which will be a 68 inch one piece wing. So far I have pulled three fuses from the mold and am just now getting what I think are very good results.

Lee talked me into sharing this project and pics with him and Steven but feel free to chime in just bare in mind that I am doing all of this old school style with no cnc 'd molds and a full time job so progress will be slow. Here are a few pics of the third fuse out of the mold.

I did manage to find pics of prototype #2 that flew (twice) this last spring.

Aaron, I always enjoy your creative building, this is a fun looking project. I like how versatile your fuselage design is. Looking forward to seeing more details

wait ... where did the name come from?

Originally Posted by moonraker007

wait ... where did the name come from?

What he said!

Thank Steven for that. It's catchy right?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cervix

I am well aware of the definition but thanks for sharing. Quite a few names were brainstormed at Cape Blanco last year. It just as easily been call the "Enamizer"

Just a quick note on something I tried for the first time on the plug prep. I had no where to spray some nice 2K auto paint on it so this time I put the plug standing up vertical in a vice and brushed on two heavy coats of thin epoxy with some graphite mixed into it. It went down really nice and smooth and only pooled a little bit around the trailing edge of the vertical but that was easily sanded to shape after it dried. Wet sanded the whole plug with 1200 and then 1500 grit and polished out from there. Even though it took longer than painting this just may become my new goto method for plug prep. I am going to try it on the wing as well once I get the plug bagged up.... hopefully this weekend.

Watching and learning

Wow cool way to finish your plug. Far superior to rattle cans. Especially cool that you used wax only for release.

Hopefully you can squeak out of work early tomorrow so you can get 2 full days of building before Christmas eve dinner and what not.

Please keep us posted

Lee

PS I'm getting the Wife Beater prepped for NZ

Sweet Have a great time in NZ Lee! Merry Christmas to you and your family!

Originally Posted by JarheadFlyer

Just a quick note on something I tried for the first time on the plug prep. I had no where to spray some nice 2K auto paint on it so this time I put the plug standing up vertical in a vice and brushed on two heavy coats of thin epoxy with some graphite mixed into it. It went down really nice and smooth and only pooled a little bit around the trailing edge of the vertical but that was easily sanded to shape after it dried. Wet sanded the whole plug with 1200 and then 1500 grit and polished out from there. Even though it took longer than painting this just may become my new goto method for plug prep. I am going to try it on the wing as well once I get the plug bagged up.... hopefully this weekend.

graphite, interesting your mixing that into the resin...,

I think Graphite is too large to bond with, you can buy Nanocarbon graphite online, its an even finer particulate that bonds with the loose atoms on a molecular level in plastics when melted and makes plastic 1000x more durable and bullet proof to AK 7.62 ammo. ask me how i know, lol


you can manually apply a thin layer of nanocarbon to the plug easily, just use a soft pice of sheep wool and rub til the nanocarbon is attached, very slippery and conductive

This is the additive I mixed with the epoxy to use as final coat on the plug instead of the usual 2k auto paint.


From the west systems website:
423 Graphite Powder is a fine black powder that can be mixed with epoxy to produce a low-friction exterior coating with increased scuff resistance and durability. Epoxy/graphite is commonly used as a low-load, low-speed bearing surface, as a coating on rudders and centerboards, or on the bottoms of racing craft that are dry sailed. It does not provide antifouling qualities. The epoxy/graphite mixture cures to a black color.

I use graphite powder with a little Cabosil to make a gelcoat of sorts for my molds.
I never though about using it as a plug finish. Great idea. I might just steal it.

Al