60 INCH SLOPE RACER

Richard Yates

After launching a number of large aircraft off the slope in a strong wind and having extreme difficulty in doing so. It was decided that it was about time to have something you could easily launch , fast to put together and if you did damage it you were not to concerned. The whole plane is built by traditional means except for the spars these are carbon fibre arrow shafts, the only other thing is that the end ribs are made of glass fibre printed circuit board.


The wing was the first thing to be built and the section decided upon was SD6080 (the E374 replacement) as I could make this in wood fairly accurately. All the ribs were made by the sandwich method with the two holes for the spar (or one in the tips) being easily sorted out with the aid of a pillar drill. The ribs were cyanoed to the bottom sheeting the spar pushed through the pre-drilled holes and cyanoed to the ribs. Shear webbing and tip joining tubes are put in the normal fashion. The wing bolt blocks were made out of hardwood as this was free and easily worked with a milling machine (normally I would make this from ply). The centre section was built flat with three degrees of dihedral built into the tip joiners with the ailerons being 25% of the chord (i.e. they taper towards the tip). Whilst building the tips the aileron servos were built in and are a semi permanent feature.

The root chord of the wing is eight inch's going in a straight taper to the six inch tip chord.

The body is a John Stevens design as are the tail planes. John generally uses 3/16 inch stringers in the fuselage , however I only had 1/4inch spruce and so that is what I have used. The fuselage is quite a pleasing shape (to my eye that is.) and you can get standard equipment in it without any difficulty.

The tail feathers as you can see from the drawing's are bolt on. This does enable you to take them off for transport or to easily replace them in case of an accident. The present set of tailplanes are slightly heavy, needing a bit more weight in the nose than I expected , however this has not detracted from the planes performance. The first flight saw the plane rush towards the bottom of the slope, but with the addition of about two thirds uptrim, it was flying (even if I do say it myself) rather well. The only thing left to do now, is to make the small alterations in nose weight and to alter the throws on the ailerons and elevator . Small alterations are all that are necessary, but it is the fine trimming that turns an ordinary model into one that is a delight to fly.


  • Back ToArticles Page

  • Back ToSoar Valley Soarers Home Page

    1