Twister Wing - Maiden Flight Report from the Zaerodrome

getback wrote:i was wondering about the spar repair i had asked i guess you missed it...

Sorry, Eric. How about re-ask the question so I don't have to research it.

I'm lovin' this carbon veil. It's very forgiving stuff as long as you work faster than the dope dries. And just like silkspan, any overlaps around the edges can be removed with a few swipes of 320 grit and it's as clean of a cut as a razor blade. Unfortunately you can tell which one I did first. That's just the beveled edge where the wood is exposed, not any of the flat surface. Also, unfortunately, that's the pretty(top) side, DOH! But I don't think it'll show under the paint. I did that before I realized scissors were the wrong way to trim the edges.
Rusty

Cool! What's it feel like to work with? Looks kind of like reallly thin felt.

RknRusty wrote:

getback wrote:i was wondering about the spar repair i had asked i guess you missed it...

Sorry, Eric. How about re-ask the question so I don't have to research it.

I was wondering about the spar repair with the Carbon Tow string / but you had told Ian you opted from using it , That's all Rusty

Rusty, one thing to keep in mind. If your using dope on the flaps and this is laser cut material, make certain you apply equal coats to the top and bottom of the flaps. If for instance, you coat the top then flip it over and coat the bottom and place the flap down on the table to dry, the top flashes off faster than the bottom and induces a warp. The underlying side has the solvent trapped and remains wet so to speak and the top quickly dries. If possible, hang them using a clothes pin on a string or wire so that they dry equally. When trying to bury the veil in multiple coats of dope, also make certain that you don't coat one side more than the other. A few days later, you might start to see the flap cupping and warping due to the side with the more material shrinking more. I have experienced this more with lighter wood ( laser cut stock) than with stock that was used in die cut kits. In the event you witness what I'm stating, coat the opposing side only and many times it will pull it back. Ken

Happy birthday Dude!  I spent an hour catching-up on this thread this morning.. and there's some great repair-tips!

I have a question on how you did the lead-outs at the bellcrank. I've always used solid-wire.. and want to try stranded. Regarding the brass tubing; do you use a shim when forming the U-bend, to prevent pinching the arms? Can you form the bend(s) by hand.. or do you need pliers? They look really slick!

What size (dia.) is the stranded-cable that you're using? I have a spool of cable that we used to hang signs with at work years ago.. but it's .031" dia.



These crimp-ferrules are made for use with it.. although they may not be safe enough alone (or at all..) for our application. The cable will only pass through these ferrules twice.. rather than the three times that's recommended for brass-tube crimps.




Hope you enjoy your birthday buddy!

Thanks for the tips. Ken, I am aware of the bowing effect of uneven doping and took precautions. My little flap-painting holder shown below has braces made from Exacto blades hat allow me to rock it back and forth so I can easily flip from working one side to the other without touching the table and fouling my work.In the picture below, they are rocked over, but when I left them to dry, they were standing upright.



Roddie, I have answers to all of your questions. But I gotta take a break right now. My wire is .027". I'll get back to it later, and I'll answer Eric's question too. I've been in Huntersville all day and a 2 hour traffic jam on the way home.
Rusty

Cooooool man! I got stuck in traffic today too. Bridge re-construction detoured a major divided state-highway through a nearby small town in-between exits. There were more police-details than I've seen in YEARS!!! Both local and state.

Roddie, the Sullivan C-D leadout kits were very good quality back in the day. That was the staple for most kits. AThey can still be purchased but like most everything quality went into the toilet. They changed they're crimp tubes which used to be bullet proof. They added some aluminum piece of crap which I wouldn't use to fix a shoelace. Doing a quick net search I see Tower Hobbies list the C-D kit for $7.39 with the copper crimps. Sullivan gold wire is very strong and it also is very flexible making it a good choice Brodak kits have a tendency to be short almost all the time. The wire also is very firm which makes it incredibly difficult to bend and if you over do it, your kinking it putting a stress wire in the leadout. MBS Model Supply sells 300' of .027 for $17. Considering Tower Hobbies sells the Sullivan wire with each kit having less than 8' per package you can see there's a benefit. Your spool of wire would work all you need is some termination equipment. I rarely wrap wires and use mostly crimps. My father made me a nice tool for swaging the cable. I have never had a crimp fail. In general. crimps rarely failed if done properly, the cable breaks directly in front of the sleeve. Using shrink tubing though can add considerable life in regards to preventing the flexing in front of the sleeve which causes the break.

Thanks Ken, You gave me a lot of great advice when I made my first set and a button-style crank for my 1/2A foamie. I used some .018" that I cut from a set of 52' lines. I like Rusty's bearing-tubes that he has installed in his crank.. and was curious of how he formed the bends. The first 90 degree leg of the "U" would seem easy enough.. but it's the 2nd bend (turn-back) that puzzles me. How do you keep from pinching the arm(s).. and also maintain a reasonably perpendicular form for a bearing? This is where I assumed that a shim of some sort is used to set a gap.. and then removed after the 2nd bend is formed..?

EDIT: taking another look.. I see that Rusty's bellcrank has countersunk holes for the bearing-tubes.. and the crank-arms look like they're thinned-down at the ends. Does that bellcrank set-up come as a "kit" with the brass tubes?



I'd like to try that when I get around to working on my Ringmaster's wing.

roddie wrote:Thanks Ken, You gave me a lot of great advice when I made my first set and a button-style crank for my 1/2A foamie. I used some .018" that I cut from a set of 52' lines. I like Rusty's bearing-tubes that he has installed in his crank.. and was curious of how he formed the bends. The first 90 degree leg of the "U" would seem easy enough.. but it's the 2nd bend (turn-back) that puzzles me. How do you keep from pinching the arm(s).. and also maintain a reasonably perpendicular form for a bearing? This is where I assumed that a shim of some sort is used to set a gap.. and then removed after the 2nd bend is formed..?

EDIT: taking another look.. I see that Rusty's bellcrank has countersunk holes for the bearing-tubes.. and the crank-arms look like they're thinned-down at the ends. Does that bellcrank set-up come as a "kit" with the brass tubes?

I'd like to try that when I get around to working on my Ringmaster's wing.

Oh, I forgot to answer this, sorry.

No, Roddie, it's all just stuff out of my drawer and tube bits box. The bellcrank just looks like that, I didn't thin it. I don't know where I bought it, it's not a Sig, maybe it's a Brodak 3" piece. .027" leadout wires wrapped with 28g copper.

The holes look more countersunk in the picture, but I just cleaned off a 64" or so around the holes with an exacto blade. For bending the second hole, I just bent it over a stick of 1/16" ply. But the tube inside the crank is straight so it won't flop down while it's slack and at rest. That helps keep it from getting stuck or touching the rib slot. All the moving parts have a spritz of silicon lube on them.

I came to the thread tonight just to post a pic of my redneck incidence checker. A laser on a tripod, and I made sure the wing and stab were parallel. The elevator is a little off from neutral, but it is in line with the stab. No matter, it's screwed and glued now.
Rusty

I use the laser a lot. The cross hair laser works great for lining up the leading edge. fuse and vertical stab. It doesn't get anymore accurate.

OK, I WILL brake out the laser level on my next (current) build. I have the parts to finish my RST but haven't ...

Phil

For the sake of a better illustration, I could've used a yard stick and made the laser beam the same height off the floor as the plane's target centerline. I didn't here, so it doesn't draw the line straight through the prop shaft, which on this plane is on the same line as the wing. But it is parallel with the stab. As hard as it was to neatly clean out the wing root, I'm lucky it fell into place as well as it did.

There are some significant gaps that need filling after tacking and aligning the wing in place with CA and shims. For those gaps, I cut balsa strips to fit tightly, painted both sides with gorilla glue and forced them into the gaps. For the rest, I'll flow epoxy in just like I did the first time. Another few hours and she should be ready to fly. Fillets, Monokote, sand off the clear and touch up paint surrounding the area, decals, and powerplant... I bet it'll be the weekend after Huntersville

I wish I could get that done in a week. This has blown my winter fun builds out of the water, but I haven't quite had the stamina to really attack it. Next on the list is glue the Nobler together and start on my Sterling Mustang. I'll be looking around now for a Max-S .35 for that.

Okay, that's it for the Rusty Toy Shop report. I'm waiting on flying weather for some flight reports, so I'll see y'all at the field.
Rockin' Rusty

RknRusty wrote: Next on the list is glue the Nobler together and start on my Sterling Mustang. I'll be looking around now for a Max-S .35 for that.

I have a Sterling Mustang (kit S-2). It was my first attempt at a built-up wing... and I botched-it bad. I built it with Ambroid over 25 years ago. I gave up before the tips were even installed.



Not a telling photo by any means.. but there's a pronounced twist to the trailing-edge. Brodak has laser-cut rib-sheets in stock for $14.. but not a complete wing-kit.

Everything else is still in the kit-box.



I believe that you said it was the same size/class as the Yak. That'd make for some fun combat!

Rusty above you said you were in market for a OS Max S 35

Randy has a NIB box one for $110
http://stunthanger.com/smf/classifieds-92/kits-motor-etc-for-sale-new-and-used/?topicseen

I have one with OUT venturi/NVA or prop washer (keyed drive washer and thrust shim are present) that I got from Jim Green thinking I would finish it out with Lee machine stuff

Looks like the mounting holes were drilled larger

Jim said it had only been bench run one on a few oz of fuel

I would let it go for $40 (what I gave Jim)

I am more focused on LA/FP 40/46s at the moment and will probably never press the Max S 35 into service

Okay, Fred. When I actually start building the plane, I'll get it from you unless one just falls out of the sky. But yours, being practically unused, sounds great. I can probably get Bob to make the Venturi, and I bet I have a prop washer. So thanks for the offer, and I'll let you know when I'm ready.
Rusty

I will be here brother

A little more.

Okay, lets review. I wrecked the Tazz Twister in either the last week of October or first of November... we'll call it some time in Octember. Well I talked about what an adventure piecing it back together would be, bought a few sticks and sheets, and it finally got cold. So did my body and mind, because 2 weeks after the wreck, I had the neck thing happen, dousing my flames entirely, though I did unsuccessfully try to hide my distress. That's when an Umland wing kit shipped to my front door one lucky Thursday, compliments of the Great Fred Von Gortler... a big lift for me, thanks, Fred. I finally stopped talking about it around the first of February and started gluing the thing together.

12 weeks from then until today, with the finished wing now installed and covered, and damn near ready to fly, as slow as I usually am, that's not too bad if you forgive the short winter shop sessions. And now I've found I can fly patterns again, sort of. I haven't done one that would get the pattern points, and stumble around like a drunk, but I'm thinking I'll try an event in Huntersville this coming weekend. Hey, I gotta fly for Kim, he'll be there cheering me on. So maybe I'll actually complete my first pattern since October. Hell if I'm gonna fly my Twister on the tarmac, but My Tutor will stand in. I've almost completed one pattern with it and out of four flights, I've only crashed it twice, and once was when the plastic flap horn broke... I think. It did break, and I was flying very well at the time... That's what I'm calling it. We'll just forget about the Cardinal, which I also blame flap failure, but who's to know for sure. I've never been one to deny pilot error.

But anyway, Wayne says he'll flight trim the Twister for me. We hope to get to the Fort this week, but it's likely going to be windy, and I don't know if I can have Tazz ready for Tuesday. Thursday probably, but that's Stuntersville staging day so I can be packed and ready to roll out after dialysis first thing Friday with Holley at the wheel.

That pretty much summarizes my fall, winter, and spring so far. And  to cap off the summary, here's what we have going on as of tonight:

Pretty slick, eh!
But... I still have to do fillets and attach the flaps and controls. Then re-install the powerplant. I have extra vinyl Tazz decals, so that'll be quick, and the paint touchups can wait until later. Sunday's goal is to install fillets, flaps, horns, rods, and leadout eyelets.


I'm only showing the wingtip because I like my little color transition at the edge. My camera died as I was shooting the same thing on the blue side. I accidentally reversed the colors. I had red on the OB tip before.

Rusty, have you flown over asphalt before? While it's not a big deal, having a pull out reference certainly assists. In Huntersville, there's not a lot of them in the background. You might be able to use the tree line in your peripheral vision. Many tend to keep the maneuvers high which even in intermediate isn't a huge problem especially if you keep them all high. Unfortunately, some pattern points will be taken away but your scoring should be consistent from flight to flight. The outside square is one that many panic due to aiming the plane down towards the ground and the vertical eight tends to have a very oblong bottom. Ken

Red is left, green is right. Same as on boats. The catch phrase to pass the test is "Is there any PORT LEFT?" Port is a red wine, and the left side of a boat or ship.

Now what colors you choose is up to you. That is fine looking and I love the even reveal on the top of the wing. I am sure I could pull that off, but probably not on the first try. I have never built anything with square tips like that. Since a twister or twister kit bash are on the list I might have to save this as a high bar to strive for.

Phil

The Twister looks GOOD !Rusty i still hope to bee there to watch the fun and you fly , i want know till friday i guess ?? have not got a answer so far but will see // Life has thrown all i can handle at me lately been busy as a one leg man in a ass kicking contest