Christchurch and District Model Flying Club
Sloping Off - our newsletter

INDOOR UPDATES

#1 by Trevor Hewson

At one of the recent indoor meetings, Andrew Tubb brought along a very nice little model, the SweetDream, which flew very well in the small hall at Durlston. It is one of a range of kits by Stevens  Aero which are sold in the UK by Micron Radio Control. They are  traditional kits inasmuch as they are built from balsa, but the parts  are precision laser cut, unlike the die crunched or even printed sheets I remember from the fifties.

Anyway, I spent several indecisive hours before picking out this one, the Pietenpol Sky Scout, a model of a 1928 homebuilt.

#2 by Roger Villiers

Like Tim, I was looking for a new  build suitable for indoor use and found the “Flying Flea” which appeared simple to build and somewhat quirky! Only the French could design this, and survive! Old Warden has a flyable  one, however, it did not take off during our visit there earlier this  year.

The kit was fine, laser cut parts in both ply and 1/16€� balsa and a twin motored brushed drive and prop. To complete I added a 2.4G 4Ch, LV, DSM2 DSMX Rx. The servos ordered from Banggood did not have the correct size plug, the Rx needing 1.0mm pin spacing, whereas the ones supplied were 1.25mm  spaced. Hobbyking supplied the “Ultra Micro” servos needed (Pt Nr HK-5320S) & my thanks to Tim for that info.

It took about 4 days to assemble, using the invaluable and downloadable  illustrated instructions complete with Chinese sub-titles! You’ve just got to look at the pictures and follow the sequence! No mention of the C of G, so I assume it’s not in any way critical! Lets hope so.

Maiden take-off, due next indoor meeting. (C U there?) Batteries needed are the ones used by both the Vapor and Black Flyer.

So, costs, to date!

Plane £16.97

RX £13.11

Servos £2.85 ea. (2 reqd)

Postage £4.91

Total £39.69.

#3 by Tim Calvert

Like Trevor I have been looking at possible indoor models and selected a Minimum RC Fokker E111 kit from Banggood, a laser cut kit for £11  delivered.

Theres not a lot on the web about these, but seem to build into a possible  E111. The kits complete less motor and electronics, what arrived was 4  laser cut balsa sheets and one laser cut ply sheet, the balsa is  excellent light weight balsa, the ply heavy 4 x the density of the balsa and not great quality.

It looks like it will build into a 30gm-ish model, but only with a bit of  re-engineering, the nose needs extending to bring the motor mass  forward, battery location and the esc brick located further fwd to  obtain a better cg, I will ditch any ply bits aft of the cg and simplify the all moving tail to reduce the tail mass, the supplied UC looks like it will last 5 secs being made out of the brittle ply, I will replace  it a with a non scale carbon rod based up and use a couple of indoor wheels out of my spares box, hopefully this will lighten it up and avoid the need for the lead (supplied in the kit no less).

Motive power will come from a Banggood motor/gearbox, same one as used in the  black flyers, a esc brick liberated from an Eflight heli, and a 150 or  70mah Lipo.

Will it work in Durlston, who knows, watch this space!

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