Mark's aircraft

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page updated: 2009.07.16

aircraft - gliders - siesta

early electric power gliders helicopter indoor technology future

zagi zagi thl stiletto siesta filip400 simply the best nano floh skorpion

selection

Most recent slope soarer. Really a 100" class thermal soarer. Chosen for its looks and the fact that it is a "wooden" build it yourself thing. I wanted something to fly on the slope when the wind was too light to fly the zagi and stiletto.

construction

3 piece balsa built up D box almost flat bottom wings with spruce spars. Piano wire and brass tube wing joiners. Fuselage is almost identical in construction to the stiletto ie. ply sides with balsa top and bottom. Again, I modified various bits, especially the tail, where I used thinner balsa and stretched it a bit. The kit specifies options between a conventional fin/tailplane and V tail. I think the V tail is so much prettier. I also put the control horns for the ruddervators on top, so that they would be out of the way (of the ground). I reduced the wing di/polyhedral, as I thought the amount specified looked a bit excessive. I drew a few sketches and ended up going for 4 degrees at each wing kink, which I think looks just right. I slimmed the fuselage down considerably, fitting 2 hitec HS80MG servos in tandem. I actually overdid it a bit, leaving myself with a problem trying to fit the standard hitec Rx and the Ken Hewitt mixer in there. In the end I solved it by wiring the servos directly to the mixer. Fixed the hatch with a concealed screw instead of the sliding catch. I put some 1mm ply across the central wing join. Dowel and nylon screw wing fixing. I fitted the internal fixing for the towhook and made the hole, but left the wire hook itself out to keep the bottom smooth - I can fit it later if I want to try winching it. Special 700mAh pack (also from phoenix) required to go in the rather slim nose. Still needs a bit of lead in there. Didn't quite cut the correct angle off the fuselage sides for fitting the V tail option, so the tail is slightly at the wrong angle requiring a bit of down elevator for neutral flight. Covered in the usual red solarfilm with a black hatch.

flight

Flew 1st time at the Darnford slope Sept 2001. A bit light on the rudder control, possibly due to the reduced dihedral, but I managed to fly it successfully. A big model like this is going to be a bit ponderous. Recently (Mar 2002) flew it from the Pole Cot slope very nicely in moderate winds with a bit more lead squeezed into the nose. Even looped it a few times (rather gently). April 2002 flying from the reservoir slope it suffered a head on mid air collision while crossing the slope. Not too badly damaged, just 1 cell of the d box near the centre. Now repaired.

Another pretty model, although it looks a bit big after the stiletto.

statistics

Here are some more photos.

And video.