Instigating more trouble

Well, I built a C/L plane for The World’s Smallest Travelling Engine, but I decided to build an R/C plane for it as well, as I couldn’t be sure of having a buddy to hand launch for me when I get the little sucker.  I looked at all the designs that came up on Outerzone for .010 R/C, and thought I’d build a Schoolboy by Ken Willard, but making it two channel.  After printing out and taping together the plans, it just seemed too big for a TD 010.  Maybe I’d use a TD .020, but I don’t want to try the .010 on that big 36” wing.  So, I decided on a Willard Pageboy.  But, the 11.5 inch wingspan seems too small, and the article and YouTube videos show it to fly pretty fast.  I figured I’d stretch the wingspan to 13 inches and add an inch to the fuselage.  I’ve never tried one of those wings with solid balsa top sheeting and no bottom sheeting, and I’m kinda excited by the thought of trying a new wing method.

So, as I was re-drawing the wing and fuse for the extra length, I started looking at the rudder and stab.  I figured I’d make a couple of tweaks to bring it into the next century.  I drew out a couple of different tail group shapes, and haven’t decided exactly what I want.   Then I started thinking about other plane designs that I like, which brought me to a new thought….

RCModeller magazine had their own RCM Trainer designs.  There were five of them in fact.   They ranged from .049 to .60 size.  All basically with the shape.  I know Model Airplane News had a couple of magazine trainers, and I’m sure other magazines had their own trainer designs as well.

But what about us?  Shouldn’t we have a CEF Trainer?  People always ask, “What’s a good trainer airplane for R/C or C/L?”  And there are always a bunch of different suggestions for Man-Wins or Stunmans 23s, or Skyrays, or Q-Tees.  Why don’t we have our own designs?  Something that can be recommended as THE trainer for the CEF?  Or rather, a CEF C/L Trainer series and a CEF R/C Trainer series?   Simple designs for .049s that can be scaled down to a TD .010, or scaled up to a Medallion or TD .15?  It wouldn’t have to be anything radical or innovative, just a plane with tried and true parameters that’s quick and easy to build.  We’d just have to agree on a basic layout of the nose, wingtips, and tail surfaces, so they all more-or-less look alike as they are scaled up or down.  For R/C, a basic high wing design with slab sides and sheet surfaces with a simple built up wing.  For C/L a simple profile that could be built up with a sheet wing or a built up wing, so long as they both have the same wing plan and area.  Obviously the C/L plane and the R/C plane fuselage side views wouldn’t look alike, as they have different aerodynamic requirements, but the C/L planes would share the same wingtip and tail surface shapes with the R/C planes, marking them as “CEF Trainers”.

We could submit our ideas for “practical” nose, wingtip, and control surface shapes in this thread, and after a bunch of shapes have been submitted, we could have a poll on how we want them to look.  I’ll volunteer to draw up some initial working plans and put them on the forum for everyone to approve.  Then I’ll build it to test fly.  If it works, we’d have to find someone who can draw good to translate the working drawings to official plans, as I’m a lousy illustrator.

For the basic R/C fuselage planform, what came to me was something similar to the RCM 1/2A Basic Trainer.  Simple and elegant, and could be tweaked for our style preferences.  For the C/L, I’m all over the map, so the more suggestions we got from people who are better C/L pilots than me, the better.

What do Y’all think?

The Instigator Mark