...and it's still in one piece!
After a very windy last evening it was most surprising to wake up to the firmament being calm and still. This unexpected bonus had me feeling suddenly nervous considering that I'd recently trashed both of my other planes, and was now facing a first flight.
I arrived and got out the car to conduct a quick weather report. A breeze had picked up by this time, although it was nice and steady, definitely flyable. So out with the transmitter and Walrus, time to fly!
The duck pond was as full as I'd seen it, and a group of kangaroos grazing around the borders casually jumped the fence on my approached.
The wing-cam was already mounted on top of the fuselage using Velcro. This setup was similar to that I'd used on the Phoenix 2000 and worked fine despite its rudimentary nature. I opted to leave the camera on for the first flight having found it to have negligible effect on flight characteristics, certainly at the relatively low speeds I anticipated achieving this morning.
So, with little ceremony, I got the Walrus connected, started the camera, set the throttle and lobbed the Walrus on its way. Now, I'd been particularly nervous about the launch, not because I'd had problems with either of the other planes in this regard lately, but rather because the Walrus fuselage is so wide it makes getting a good grasp for launch a bit awkward.
Nevertheless, the launch went without incident, with the Walrus taking to the air quite readily. It should be remembered, however, that I was launching into a steady breeze which would have helped.
What I did immediately noticed was how responsive the Walrus was. The Phoenix, with two metre wings, had a fairly slow roll rate, while the Floater, although about the same size as the Walrus, has its ailerons set quite far inboard so that the roll response is quite muted.
The other factor was that I'd set the control surfaces with fairly large travel, although I was still only flying at seventy percent. The result is the jerky movements evident in the video.
What I think I need is to activate the exponential rate on the transmitter to dampen the response around centre. Then we'll take the Walrus out at the next opportunity and give it a bit more of a run...
...so many toys
In the aftermath of the aileron chatter incident, the wing camera and Walrus have taken a bit of a back seat - no point in having a brace of aircraft and nothing to fly them with!
Anyhow, with the new Spektrum DX6i transmitter now in hand, so to speak, the next thing to do is get the Walrus finished. It's a pretty easy build - just glue on the vertical and horizontal stabilisers and screw on the wings. The servos are already installed with only the setting of the servos requiring attention.
I am still a little unsure of the best approach for this, although I am going to leave the control rods off until I have powered up the Walrus so that I know where the neutral positions are going to be. That's the theory anyway.
The canopy of the Walrus I find a curios configuration as it created a dead-space with the canopy itself attached to a "frame" creating a miniature blacked-out cockpit. As this space would comfortably accommodate the wing camera I've chosen to screw the canopy on, allowing later access I might also swap these for magnets if I end up using this space regularly.
I've tried out the wing camera and found the video quality to be pretty impressive for such a tiny device. I have also managed to correct the settings, so that videos won't be date stamped 2091. Curiously though, you have to connect the device to a television to access the setting menus, which seems a bit retro for such an advanced piece of kit.
Anyway, the weather for tomorrow is forecast to be still so I hope to take the Phoenix, complete with wing cam, for a bit of a fly...
...a notable omission
The lingering trauma following the major disaster with the Phoenix 2000 lead me to reconsider taking it to the air again in the short term. While comments I'd read suggested a larger aircraft was easier to learn with, other comments backed by my experience with the Phoenix, indicating it wasn't really a beginners' glider. Having a nylon fuselage made it a bit heavier and thus slower to respond. I therefore began a review of alternative "beginners" gliders for something more suitable.
Two candidates made themselves conspicuous, both sporting an over-wing motor configuration. The one I chose was purported to be a "floater", the Clouds Flyer or Floater Jet as it's also known. This was a smaller span of 1.3m with a broad wing chord and light all-foam construction. Apparently just what the doctor ordered...
However the first flight was, as you may now imagine, a bit of a fiasco.
Now let me explain that the wings of the Floater join through the top of the fuselage with a novel jigsaw joint, made possible by the tough and flexible characteristics of EPO foam (an expanded plastic). However, due to delays in assembly from to waiting for servos and a receiver to arrive, a key item ended up being omitted from the construction...
The launch went OK. On about one-third power and with a slightly upward trajectory, and the Floater flew surprising quickly across the field. Heading now towards the pavilion I pulled back on the elevator to get a bit more height and hit the ailerons to the left. Going into the turn, the wings suddenly bent upwards surprisingly. I hadn't expected them to be that flexible, a bit like an ASW-20 on a cable launch.
When the wings reached about an 80 degrees angle I was fairly sure that something was wrong. Quickly cutting power, the Floater fluttered earthwards following a gentle arc before clattering into the boundary fence. The crumpled heap looked like devastation, however, closer inspection showed very little damage apart from a few minor dents in the wing where it had contacted the fence, a testament to the robust nature of the EPO construction.
So my flying capability seems to have changed little, all too brief followed by violence...
In this particular case, the omission of the carbon fibre reinforcing rod between the Floater's wings appeared to have contributed to the failure of the flight...
