Replies to This Discussion

ModeratorPermalink Reply by Morli on July 23, 2010 at 12:04pm

Sig Rascal is one my all time favorite in terms of flying quality and flying fun. It is also one of my test platform . The only issue, it is very light constuction and needs quite beefing to fit any thing more than servos .Landing gears mount is wek and gets ripped off if any thing other that smooth surface . Haven't started working on it yet but soon enough. I have flown it quite a lot and loved the scale handling. No fancy 3D or high G flying is recommended IMHO.
The other one I can think of suggesting is Hobbico Nexstar 60. or larger if there is one.

Permalink Reply by Erik Hatch on April 10, 2011 at 8:23am

Are the Sig ARF's discontinued? Im having trouble finding one of either to buy.

 

Thanks

Erik

Permalink Reply by JOHN PIZZICARA on July 24, 2010 at 8:42pm

Hi Curt, nice flying plane! I noticed something in the video that might help you maintain directional control over/on the runway while landing. It's great that you used 'slipping' technique to help get the Telemaster down because it is a real floater and doesn't have flaps, but you used the wrong aileron input for the prevailing wind! I know the wind was light but the Telemaster has a light wing loading and responds to light winds. So going with your RWY18 description, the windsock showed the wind from the East (left) but you slipped to the West (right aileron up = right wing down) on final. This would call for more left rudder than you had available to maintain a straight flight path down the runway. After touchdown, maintain LEFT aileron input and control roll out direction with the rudder. Happy Landings!!

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Permalink Reply by Curt Olson on July 25, 2010 at 8:46pm

Hi John,

I figure there's a 50/50 chance I'll get the rudder going in the correct direction. :-) But then figure in some human psychology and murphy's law and realistically that drops to 25% chance on a good day. :-)

For whatever it's worth, my runway is North/South and on the day I was filming with the fly-cam-one, what little wind there was, was coming mostly from the south.

But I definitely know what you are talking about ... when there is a significant cross wind and you go the wrong way on the rudder, you see an awful lot of the side of your airplane on it's way in. :-)

I need to practice a bit more so it's automatic and I don't have to think about which direction I should be going (and reverse it since the airplane's coming at me.) And now having seen how it looks from the onboard camera, I *definitely* need to practice smoothing out my technique.

I discovered that I run out of elevator and it's really hard to flare if I fly a full slip all the way down to the ground. If I can bring it straight in, I can get some of the softest sweetest touchdowns you could imagine with this telemaster. So I shoot for somewhere between a super soft picture perfect landing and a hard bounce + a wing scrape with the tail beating the nose to the far end of the runway.
Practice practice practice!

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Permalink Reply by Curt Olson on July 26, 2010 at 4:39pm

Hi John,

Here's two more take offs and two more landings. The last landing is probably the best in terms of slipping ... except for right at the end I drift off the runway and then save it. The first landing was not very smooth in terms of the slip, but the landing was nice and gentle. I taped the camera to the top of the vertical stab so it was a bit tail heavy.

Permalink Reply by JOHN PIZZICARA on July 26, 2010 at 11:11pm

Hi Curt,

Keep up the good work! You can also use aileron into the wind (along with the usual right rudder for torque/p-factor) during TAKE OFFS in crosswinds. Always taxi w/full up elevator except for rear quartering tailwind use neutral elevator and down aileron on the windward side!

Permalink Reply by space_nut on July 23, 2010 at 12:08pm

I've heard that SIG manufacturing is having some problems. ARF supply will be difficult. The only products that are readily available are the kits.

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Permalink Reply by space_nut on July 23, 2010 at 12:30pm

@Nathaniel

Have you considered using a "disposable" el-cheapo platform for your initial testing? Not sure what is available in your area..

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ModeratorPermalink Reply by Morli on July 23, 2010 at 12:41pm

not unless you consider your AP and all the electronics /related goodies to be disposable too IMHO. unless you are obsolute begginer in terms of RC flying too. A good foundation is great way to build strong building and a good airframe is place to start IMHO. does not mean you have to go for CF or GF arframes , but not the SPAD airframes either.

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Permalink Reply by space_nut on July 23, 2010 at 12:56pm

@Morli

I've found that the AP and electronics will survive most crashes if you keep them away from the battery. Use lot's of Velcro.

Besides, Nathaniel looks like quite a seasoned RC pilot. He has been waiting to get up in the air with his Ardupilot for quite a while.

Foamies like the Easystar, Easyglider Pro and the Radian are much easier to repair than the balsa. Parts are pretty easy to get, too..

Still think he should begin with his Telemaster?

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ModeratorPermalink Reply by Morli on July 23, 2010 at 10:39pm

Hi SpaceNut,
Yes I assumed Nathaniial is season pilot , and I too don't think it is worth months and months of waiting and begging Hobbylobby for it/telemaster.There are /may be few good if not better replacements for telemaster. It is pitty that ebay guy now wants to renegotiate :(( .
And you are right , the high mass objects if kept away from AP and electronics would save the day ( I doubt Nathenial would worry about that with extensive ground testing and cautious first few air test.)
My point is not to waste time and effort on home brewed SPAD design on your first effort. As such we fhave ew unknown factors built into this game and unknown airframe will add more pain to it IMHO.
My approch was/is simple. choose a simple , good and high winger or known stable airframe which is known to be getle flyer too,
Beef it up with required mods to handle additional batt and mounting points. But first test it with dummy loads for testing the load handling and finalising the CG + flight charesterstics learning).
come up with two locations for mounting GPS and various on board TX ( video and telemetry) just incase.
1 first flight - plain RC flying with nothing inside. try and tune airframe for decent fun with both no and high wind landing, down wind landing etc etc
2. dummy batt or equivalent weight in intentended mounting point and fly again, tune/trim if needed.
3. add autopilot but not connected to any thing and do item 1 and 2

so on and so forth with progressive add ons so that we know what is expected , one single big leap may or may not be sucessful and leads to tears IMHO. But milage vary with tastes and urgency.
@ Nathanial , I beg to differ & do not agree with the reason that we don't want to take the effort of tuning /doing it twice and so to take the plunge directly with telemaster is not the best idea. If you have already flown your autopilots and all the related stuff in different airframe already , then it is different story. But waiting for telemaster for almost 6 months now is lot of R&D + fun time wasted!!!. But there is no hard and fast rule in DIY world ,bur we need lots of happy endings too, so do what you have to do and get up there fast :)). Good luck. Cheers and have nice day every one.

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ModeratorPermalink Reply by Nathaniel Caner on July 24, 2010 at 6:47am

Morli,

Thanks for your sound advice. As I stated I do have a Superstar EP waiting in the wings. I am considering putting the AP in that airframe for now. As you stated time is wasting and I'm losing experience with the AP. I am having a change of opinion as to the best way to proceed. I think you have a good point! I believe I will use the Superstar as a test bed to prove the system (and any subsequent new code revisions), and save the SR Telemaster for a proven system. Thus eliminating the "tears"! Any experience is valuable experience!

Nathaniel

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