Some reflections on building

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Morgan Heather Powell
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EMAIL: RRCCCONTACT@YAHOO.COM WWW.RIVERSIDERCCLUB.

First was my entry into the recent Classic Pattern/Vintage RC Society get-together at our field in June. Second was a Show and Tell presentation by Paul Rinde at our last meeting.

However, good kits were available and lots of plans were around for scratch builders. You might spend a month building a model for a 5-second flight.

Today, of course, if it doesn t come pre-hinged with the servos installed, it is a real problem. At the meeting, Paul Rinde brought a model (Son of Duster) that was built by Regis Mogniac.

I got the call back to the building board. I wanted to bring back that fun, challenge and reward of building my own model. So I joined the Vintage Radio Control Society (VRCS) (www.vintagercsociety.

I downloaded the free plans for the 1964 Krackerjac from outerzone in.pdf format and had them enlarged to full size at Staples for about $5. Next, the balsa was ordered from www.sigmfg.

1 Some reflections on building Hot, hot weather should bring us back to the workshop A couple of things got your editor moving back to the building board this month. First was my entry into the recent Classic Pattern/Vintage RC Society get-together at our field in June. Second was a Show and Tell presentation by Paul Rinde at our last meeting. I started in the hobby over 50 years ago and my first radio control models were controlled by a singlechannel, escapement radio. At that time, you built the model you flew. There was no alternative. However, good kits were available and lots of plans were around for scratch builders. You might spend a month building a model for a 5-second flight. But, no matter, you started right away building another with improvements to make it a better flying model. Today, of course, if it doesn t come pre-hinged with the servos installed, it is a real problem. At the meeting, Paul Rinde brought a model (Son of Duster) that was built by Regis Mogniac. He had basically done a major rebuild (incidences, engine alignment and new horizontal stab surface) to make it a better flyer (which it did). His re-building efforts and skills got my juices flowing. I got the call back to the building board. I wanted to bring back that fun, challenge and reward of building my own model. So I joined the Vintage Radio Control Society (VRCS) ( and found a couple of web sites that offer tons of free plans for those RC models from days of yore ( and I downloaded the free plans for the 1964 Krackerjac from outerzone in.pdf format and had them enlarged to full size at Staples for about $5. Next, the balsa was ordered from and the balsa dust started flying. Try those four web sites yourself and start building again. Don t make it a big project to start and I ll bet you a dollar to a doughnut that you will beat a path to your workshop to get the next step done. For those of you that have never built a model from just plans, you will be surprised at the enjoyment you will have. Editor RRCC CLUB OFFICERS President: Jeff Szueber Vice-President: Bob Baker Secretary: Rob Evans Treasurer: Larry Roberts Safety Coordinator: Jim Bronowski Field Director: Dale Yaney Newsletter Editor: Jim Bronowski Turbine Flying Director: Berry Hou ALL OFFICERS MAY BE CONTACTED AT: NEXT MEETING SATURDAY Jul 21st 10:00 am crowley field

2 Call to Order: President Jeff Szueber called to order the regular meeting of the Riverside RC Club at 10:05 on June 16th, 2018 at Crowley Field. Minutes of the Previous Meeting: The minutes of the May 2018 meeting were approved as written and published in the June 2018 Prop Talk newsletter by the members present. Old Business: Paul Rinde spoke about the Classic Pattern/Vintage RC event. There were 21 participants entered in the event, most with several models. Paul took some pics and videos and posted them on New Business: Please make sure to bring toilet paper out to the field. The toilet paper in the porta potty keeps getting stolen, so to curtail this, we ve asked the company to just not supply any. BRING TOILET PAPER FOR YOURSELF (BYOTP). For those of us from the Midwest a Sears Catalog is fine. Larry Roberts passed around a new AMA SAFETY HANDBOOK. Our Safety Coordinator (Jim Bronowski) will prepare briefings and/or publications to inform the club of its contents. Oscar Weingart, long time standing member and board member of the club has passed away and will be dearly missed. Oscar did a lot for our club over the years. We reminisced at the meeting about Oscar. He was a great person and a superb builder/modeler/newsletter contributor. Bob Jones spoke of the Gilman Springs field. The owner of the property wanted to raise the rent to the $1000 per month so sadly that club will be closing their field soon. He mentioned there might be some materials at the field that we may be able to use. The UCR group did not make it in time to qualify for the Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV)event this year. Hopefully the team will be able to get back together next year. Our thanks to Bob Jones, Bob Baker and all those who gave the UCR group a great deal of help. Jim Bronowski mentioned that he was out here at the field on Wednesday and found more 45 caliber shell casings and used hyperemic needles. If you come across any of these needles please be careful and don t let any children near them. Secure them and find someone who has knowledge of Sharps disposal to take care of them. Hepatitis is no fun!

Program and Show and Tell: Raffle Bob Baker picked up an electric Super Cub (Timber) by E-flite. He got this one at Dynamic Hobbies. It comes with floats and flaps.

3 Program and Show and Tell: Raffle Bob Baker picked up an electric Super Cub (Timber) by E-flite. He got this one at Dynamic Hobbies. It comes with floats and flaps. The cost of the plane was about $250. Plug and Play setup. It also has the super safe feature. It flew great. Jim Bronowski showed this new glue that he is using: GO2 by Loctite. It seems to work on just about everything. He was not sure it would be good for foam. It sets up in a few minutes but will fully cure overnight. The glue cost about $5. Patrick Greenhouse showed his electric Sweet Stick. It s electric-powered but has a plastic replica glow motor on it to give the appearance of a glow-powered model. Very nice! Paul Rinde showed his pattern plane: Son of Duster. This is a plane that belonged to Regis Mogniac back in This plane was completely scratch built from Regis own design (this was model #194). He had recorded over 75 flights on this plane. It looks like a Kaos. Paul had to remove the 10 ounces of weight out of the plane. The plane had 2.5 degrees of positive incidence. The engine had 1 degree of positive incidence. Paul removed the 2.5 down to ¼ degree and set the engine to -3 degrees. He also recovered parts of the plane and used Rustoleum paint. The plane flies great and tracks well through the air. a) Fuel b) C-17 electric plane. c) Receiver d) Lipo Battery e) Fuel Pump Adjournment: Bob Baker adjourned the meeting at 10:50 a.m. Minutes submitted by: Robert Evans I would like to introduce to everyone our newest regular contributor to our Prop Talk newsletter: Malcolm Oliver. His Malcolm s Musings replaces the late Oscar Weingart s column. Whatever your tastes in this hobby from the technical, to our radios, to the workshop and tools to how to prepare for a swap meet, Malcolm is certain to cover it. Editor Malcolm s Musings How to lose weight By Malcolm Oliver Hi, I guess this is a question that most people would like to know the answer to. I m not talking about trips to the gym; this is how to lose weight on your airplane. Light airplanes fly better; forget about making your plane strong enough to withstand a crash. Believe me heavy planes will crash. The higher your power to weight ratio the less likely you are to crash in those moments of panic where the plane does exactly what you tell it, if only you could remember what it was! Continued

(How to lose weight) I was introduced to the benefits of building a light plane in 1996 by pilot Mike Cross, he was flying a Carl Goldberg Ultimate at an airfield in Ventura County.

4 (How to lose weight) I was introduced to the benefits of building a light plane in 1996 by pilot Mike Cross, he was flying a Carl Goldberg Ultimate at an airfield in Ventura County. To me his flying was unbelievable, hot dogging in the extreme. I guess now such flying is almost common place but it was the first experience for me. His wife Marianne was also there, (is this Nirvana, she also flies?) between them they picked up the plane at the wing tips and you could see the wings bend! This required further investigation. His Ultimate weighed 6lb. 12 oz. and was still powered by a YS 91 4 stroke! At that moment I was introduced to a whole new philosophy on how to build model airplanes. If a piece of wood doesn t seem to do anything then throw it away, cut it out or at least introduce it to a Dremel tool Mike had replaced the birch wing spars with balsa wood ones, took out several of the plywood bulkheads replacing them with balsa ones. He minimized the use of epoxy glue and had even investigated which seemed to be the lightest CA glue! I m not convinced this was worthwhile, but it underlines the importance of attention to detail. Over the next few years I took this philosophy on board and built the Carl Goldberg Extra 300 and Suhkoi 26, I just love Dave Patrick designed models. Both planes ended up about 8 ounces lighter than the original design. The most significant weight saving was achieved by using carbon fiber landing gear. The planes flew beautifully. However. it wasn t until I bought an Airwild Extra 260 around 2006 that I really developed my approach to reducing model weight. A couple of years earlier I had seen Howard Pilcher flying an electric powered Quique Somenzini 76 Suhkoi 54. Another epiphany moment, electric planes were the way to go. So I built a couple of electric powered QQ 85 Suhkoi 54s. This was of necessity as I ran out of talent one day flying the first one! Large electric planes do have the unfortunate drawback of those heavy 2x6s 5000MAh LiPo batteries, yet another challenge. The essential tool when starting out to reduce model weight is an accurate set of electronic scales. NOTHING is ever fitted to my planes until it has been weighed to make sure it is the lightest component available. Harbor Freight sell electronic scales and I ve just bought a new one for $6 which only weighs up to 5lb. (2.5 Kg.) but with a claimed accuracy of +/- 0.5 grams, great for weighing all those small components. Another unfortunate but essential requirement in reducing model weight is a willingness to spend some money! Let the moths fly out. So to give you a detailed insight into model weight reduction here is the list of changes/choices I made building my AirWild Extra 260. Unfortunately I don t have any photographs but hopefully the descriptions will give you sufficient insight. All of the weights quoted are in ounces Neu Y 1040KV motor w/gearbox v. Hacker 16L - 8.4oz. BUT +$280 JETI Spin 99 Opto ESC v Castle HV oz. but +$70 AXI aluminum prop. driver v the steel unit on the NEU motor 2.2 oz. Used a Hacker motor mount but used only 4 aluminum nuts & bolts instead of 8 steel ones to assemble it and applied CA glue 0.2 oz. Deleted the 6.0 volt regulator for Rx power supply, system now runs on 7.2 LiPo directly. HiTec confirmed their servos would be OK. 0.6 oz. These days I use an ESC that provides a BEC. Carbon fiber wing tube, stabilizer tube and landing gear to replace aluminum components 7.1 oz. PSP titanium axles for the landing gear 0.6 oz. Dave Patrick foam tire main wheels vs Hanger 9 Pro-Lite 2.4 oz. Bison Mufflers carbon fiber spinner. The solid aluminum back plate was reduced in thickness from.110 to holes were drilled in it and the web between the 6 radial cone retaining screws was removed 1.8 oz. Twin elevator servos replaced by a single servo and two carbon fiber push rods to operate the elevators 1.9 oz.

Another reason for this change was to move the CG forward, to compensate for the lighter NEU motor. The rudder pull-pull servo was also moved forward.

Deleted the #4 blind nuts for retaining the canopy (6), the cowl (4) and stabilizer (4). Now the aluminum fixings screw directly into the threaded wood structure, the threads being hardened with CA 1.

5 Another reason for this change was to move the CG forward, to compensate for the lighter NEU motor. The rudder pull-pull servo was also moved forward. Both servos were now much closer to the Rx so the extension cables were also deleted 0.8 oz. All cap screws and nuts were replaced with aluminum ones of the same size 2.2 oz. Deleted the #4 blind nuts for retaining the canopy (6), the cowl (4) and stabilizer (4). Now the aluminum fixings screw directly into the threaded wood structure, the threads being hardened with CA 1.2 oz. Deleted the 4 mm. blind nuts and bolts used to retain the wings. The inner plywood wing rib was threaded to 1/4x20, hardened with CA and a short plastic screw used instead 0.3 oz. Made up an aluminum based rudder pull-pull system with 49 strand plastic coated steel wire (33 lb. breaking strain) oz. EVO light 5350 Mah batteries v std. EVO 5000 Mah batteries 2.0 oz. These days I would use the HobbyKing Compact batteries which are slightly lighter still. Deleted the flight batteries series wiring harness using Deans connectors and replaced with 6mm. bullet connectors. 1.1 oz. Fuselage structural modifications 3.4 oz. o Windows cut in all 4 sides of the motor box. o Central hole cut in the front panel of the motor box to provide battery cooling and passage for the motor wires. o 3x7/8 holes drilled each side in the front bulkhead around the motor box. o Window cut in the center of the U/C mounting plate. o Foam scooped out of the top hatch/canopy. o o Removed the cockpit floor. Removed 4 of the 6 wooden blocks for the canopy retaining screws. The canopy now tucks under the back edge of the cowl with 2 plastic fixings at the rear. The two locating dowels at the front of the canopy were also removed. o Removed the rudder servo mounting plate, replaced with a much smaller plate. o Removed the center part of the wing guide tube. o Removed the gas tank mounting plate. I did fit some wood to improve structural stiffness which added 0.5 oz. If you add up all of the weight savings and the lighter component weight choices I made it comes to 38.1 oz. but it also added $425 to the cost of the build. The final take-off weight of the airplane was 14lb 7.5oz. This compares to the AirWild 15 lb. estimated weight of the DA 50 gas powered version before adding the 20 oz. of fuel. Perhaps Jeff Szeuber Jr. summed it up when he said it was the best Extra 260 he d flown and at the time he worked for AirWild. To some extent the Airwild Extra 260 did offer more opportunity for weight savings, most current ARFs already incorporate many of my actions. However hopefully this does give an insight into what weight savings you can achieve if you are consistent and disciplined. Every ½ once you can save does matter and it is VERY easy to add weight. Remember Weigh everything before you fit it to your airplane. One last thought Always carry out a flight line check before you take off. Malcolm Oliver Dale Yaney with a couple of his new fan models. The Cougar Jet on the left was totally built by him (as usual) and flies great. The one on the right is a foamy and is fast, fast, fast.

6 . Paul Rinde (R), his son Jonathan (L) and Rich Mogniac (C) holding Paul s Son of Duster at our field. Patrick Greenhouse with his electric-powered Sweet Stick. Bob Baker with his electric-powered Super Cub. A great, stable flyer. That is not really an OS engine. It is a dummy glow motor with an electric motor inside. How about this whirlwind spotted just east of our field. That s one powerful thermal. This is the GO 2 glue mentioned in this month s minutes. It s worth a try.

Runway cracks growing larger

EMAIL: RRCCCONTACT@YAHOO.COM WWW.RIVERSIDERCCLUB.ORG Runway cracks growing larger A work party will be formed this month for repair As you can tell from the photograph below, it s time to get-to-it and