I just threw together a little 11" plane in a total of 1.5 hours, and to my pleasant surprise it flies pretty good. I don't have any good FAI rubber for a motor so I'm using 2 thin rubber bands out of a variety pack I got at walmart. anyways I am considering making plans for it so people can have one more option for an easy 1st scratch built micro.

If you think it would be a good addition to outerzone or other plan repositories then just tell me and I'll get to work. Maybe someone might even build one from plans and get it to go for more than a minute.

I assume I am not even getting close to its max performance since I'm using a diy prop from a umx electric plane and my rubber motor is basically trash so I'm sure someone could get it to go good.

I'm working on another similar size delta type wing micro but I'll be making plans before I build it. I can release plans for that when I finish it too.

A suggestion? It's a trifle overbuilt with the diagonals. Also while it doesn't make a huge difference covering the top instead of the bottom would make a slightly cleaner upper surface for the airflow.

Other than those two little niggles it looks pretty good.

Yeah I think it could be improved a bit, I will take your suggestions and modify the design and make some pdf plans. this will be version 1.0 as far as I'm concerned.

I'm sure you can tell these are just rough drawings made up in paint.net

For the plane in the pictures above the parts are labeled 1,2,3,4 in this order, #1 is the wing pylon,#2 is vertical stab, #3 - horizontal stab (left) , #4 - wing (left)
Its really self explanatory but I just figured I might aswell label them anyways.

Second plane is just a small delta still in early design stages too.


I cant wait till I get some FAI rubber motors on these and try them out for real

The second one is a sort of fancy outline delta wing?

On that first one if the model is fairly small like 15 inch span you'll find that you do not need a wing spar. Just the 1/16 sq pieces on the leading and trailing edges is fine.

Good performance of smaller models like this is highly dependent on the lightest possible weight. And a very light model is a lot more durable and can bounce easier than you might think at first. So using LESS wood and other bits for a light model can actually result in a model that is a lot more resistant to damage. Plus a light model flies for longer.

I would build Clarence Mather's A-6. It's simple, you can fly it in the living room. It will also give you a feel for appropriate wood selection and construction. Use it as a departure point for your own designs. If you search on A-6 designs, you can see how others have modified this basic design and have achieved flights over 10 minutes. http://dcmaxecuter.org/planspage_fil...A6_RulesV2.pdf


Norm

Or at least study the plans for the A-6 to get more of a feel for wood sizes and construction methods at this sort of size range and style.

Here is A LINK to an NFFS paper with the plans and write up on the A-6 along with both Clarence's original plan and some later enhanced versions by some other modelers.

Another good one to study for ideas is the Blatter 40.

Done as per the plans it could be flown outdoors in dead calm conditions as well as indoors. Done with wood sizes roughly halved for light weight and with a suitable motor it rocks as an indoor only model.

Done with even lighter wood and scaled down to 12" span and with a light built up balsa paddle wheel prop it would be a good large living room option too.

Norm, and Bruce, Thanks for the plans.

Kevin

Yes as kevin said, Thanks for the plans and the link to the article. I've actually already read that article on A-6 already, well I've skimmed through it at least. I knew I was building it more robust than I had to because there are no available spaces near me to test a model indoors so it had to be up to the task of crashing in light wind. I have done away with the bbq skewer fuselage and the wing pylon, I am now using a carbon fiber rod and differedt MUCH MUCH lighter propeller unit. I also have the fuselage long enough to where the model is decently stable now too. Updated plans coming tonight.

Here is a little one that I designed a few years ago. https://outerzone.co.uk/plan_details.asp?ID=4503.

When I put it in a local F/F newsletter a remark from one bloke was that it flew better than his big one!

You can obtain decent indoor rubber here https://www.freeflightsupplies.co.uk...roducts/rubber . Mike is a reliable supplier.

* Danny M *

Seeing that you're making these mostly for calm outdoor flying a lot of your design choices now make much more sense.

I think you'll find that a good direction to go is toward a touch longer span and length. As you have figured out this makes for a longer motor and thus a longer motor run and that's never a bad thing. Plus the longer and less wide surfaces are a touch more efficient.

On the other hand if your flying areas are full of lamp posts, fences, buildings and trees keeping things a bit more on the stubby side isn't a bad option. Hurts the performance a bit but makes the models more durable and "bounceable".

If this style of smaller stick and tissue rubber models suits your tastes you may also be interested in some other similar directions. Have you read about "No-Cal" Rubber Scale?

Another half way option which you may find interesting is also for scale flying. Build up and tissue cover the wings and tail surfaces or make the wings and stabilizer built up and tissued with 1/32 sheet for the fin. Make the fuselage from 1/8" sheet and either run the motor down along one side with an offset nose bearing and tail hook or cut a slot along the fuselage for the motor.

Such profile scale models can do really well in small areas like ball parks or soccer fields or even larger size back yards if there isn't too many obstacles.

But regardless of all that you're clearly having a good time exploring all this. It reminds me of my own building and flying when it was all so new and I was learning what worked and what didn't. It's great fun, eh?

Yeah its been pretty entertaining so far. I did get some better performance out of a carbon fuselage that was a few inches longer and a longer motor.

Balsa will be better for a fuselage than the same weight carbon fiber rod. If you had a model that used a carbon rod as the fuselage, for the same weight you could have an 8 lb balsa stick about 3.5 times as large! The balsa wouldn't be quite as strong, but it would be much stiffer. OTOH, a carbon fiber tube with thin walls would be hard to beat.