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Building The Waco CG-4A
January 31, 2004: Done!
Wing struts and landing gear on, this one is all done. I love this plane!
Movies of the Waco available here:
January 16, 2004: Nearly Done
My first quarter of graduate school put a neat end
to my efforts at finishing the Waco, but at this point
a leisurely build pace has become de rigeur, I
suppose. In any event, I managed to paint the invasion
stripes and canopy on, and add the insignia over the
winter break.
I am still committed to adding the wing struts and landing
gear, but I make no promises about when I'll get around to it!
In truth, I'm enjoying the rather slow completion of the project,
because I get to set it aside for a while and each time I come back
to it I get a renewed feeling of satisfaction from working on it and
seeing it evolve. There are also numerous additional details to add,
including some panel lining around the nose section and doors, painting
on the side porthole and top window between the wings, and drawing on
the spoilers. So that should carry me through Spring Break at least!
August 31, 2003: Finally Flying!
After far too long, I've gotten the CG-4A into a flyable
state! She had her maiden flight today at Cajon Pass, and
she flew great...like a Gentle Lady with ailerons and a
weight problem, and I mean that in the best of all possible
ways! Full details of the maiden flight are available on
the Flying page.
Of course, I still have some work to do before I'll be
satisfied with the plane. I need to paint on the windshield
and the invasion stripes, and do some panel lining with
a Sharpie, and apply the "stars & bars" decals.
I've also got some incidence modification to do, but I want
to try flying the plane with the struts and landing gear
attached first, just to see if they make any difference.
May 22, 2003:
Work continues and is focused upon the radio gear installation
within the fuselage. Had about a week of delay while I was
waiting for a 2000mAh NiMH battery to arrive from ServoCity.com
-- at least I got free shipping! I decided to go with a
big, heavy battery up front because I know that this plane
is going to need some serious nose weight to balance correctly.
At this point, the radio gear is pretty much installed,
the pushrod channels have been routed out and the pushrods
installed, and the cutout for the landing gear box has been
made. I need to shore up the rudder and elevator servos
with some little wedges of EPP, and then hot glue them in
place, and after that I'll cut plugs out of scrap EPP to
go over the top of all the radio gear. From there, it's
on to the landing gear assembly, which is composed of a
small "box" made of lite ply and basswood, and
1/8" music wire for the actual wheel struts. Then the
fuselage will be just about finished, ready for sanding
& spackling!
May 2, 2003:
The wings are now about 90% complete, having had wingtip
strengthening plates added, the strut hardpoints installed,
and the ailerons cut to rough shape. All that is left for
the wing is to install the servos, put an edge shape on
the wingtips and ailerons, spackle and sand the wing surface,
join the two wing halves, and finally, install the bolts
and blocks that will hold the wing to the fuselage.
Before I can put the wing hold-down blocks in, however,
I need to figure out where my rudder and elevator pushrods
are going to be running, and in order to do that I needed
to get the tail surfaces built. I chose 5/23" sheet
balsa for both surfaces, which is most likely a bit bigger
than is absolutely necessary, but nice because it will hopefully
be a bit more durable. I inset the front part of the vertical
stabilizer 1" into the fuselage for added stiffness
and durability. The horizontal stabilizer will be installed
into a routed out area in the top of the tail area. The
rudder has about 2 1/2" of total throw, which comes
out to around 50 degrees or so of total movement. This is
a bit less that I would've liked, but it can always be modified
later if more rudder authority is required. The tail moment
is fairly long, so hopefully this will be enough, but we'll
see...
Next on the list: route pushrods to the rudder and elevator,
install wing hold-down blocks in the fuselage's wing saddle,
build landing gear, install strut hardpoint, install all
radio gear, then spackle and sand. And probably a bunch
of other stuff I'm leaving out at the moment, but that's
the basic idea. Hope to make more progress over this weekend,
but in any event it's finally starting to really look like
an airplane. All up weight is just over 16 ounces.
April 29, 2003:
Progress continues, but somewhat slowly. I got sidetracked
working on spoilers that I've ultimately decided to leave
off due to there being no genuine upside to including them
on a slope glider of this size and type (i.e. the plane
should have no trouble slowing down for landings without
them, considering the width of the fuselage and the fact
that I'm using a Clark Y airfoil). In any event, the spars,
subspars, and trailing edges have been epoxied on, the wingtips
have been shaped, and the holes for the wing servos (HS-81MGs)
have been hotwired. Locations for servo wires have been
marked, as well as wing strut attachment points. I've decided
to make the wing removable, and plan to attach it using
nylon bolts and blind nuts. Much of the "noodling"
required for completion of the wing has been done, so it's
simply an issue of getting the work done. I hope to start
on the fuselage (and specifically tail) very soon. Total
weight is approximately 14oz. as shown below.
March 18, 2003:
With the help of Michael Richter of Richter
R/C, I have successfully cut out the wing cores and
the fuselage for the Waco. I ended up using 1.3# EPP for
both the fuselage and the wings. 1.9# would've been total
overkill for the fuselage, as it's quite beefy already and
very, very strong with the 1.3#. Total weight of the wing
cores and fuselage is about 12 oz.
| Specifications: |
| Scale |
1/16 |
| Wingspan |
63" |
| Length |
36" |
| Chord |
8.25" |
| Wing Area |
519.75 sq. in. |
| Airfoil |
Thinned Clark Y |
| All Up Weight |
50oz.
|
| Wingloading |
14 oz./sq. ft. |
| Channels |
3 (Rudder/Elevator/Aileron) |
| Materials |
EPP, Balsa, Basswood, Aluminum Tubing |
| Covering |
Solartex (Olive Drab) |
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