Model seems too heavy

I've just completed an RK-Vero 27in Tiger Moth from Vintage Model Company, my first build for many years. No complaints about the kit (except some of the balsa seems far too soft for structural longerons), but the model weighs in at 180gm, including a 60gm added nose weight, which seems awful heavy for a small rubber-powered plane.

Is this normal/expected? Advice very welcome please on how to avoid what seems in my inexperience to be the inevitable imitation of a tent-peg -- with tears and broken hopes.

Ray

Ray
The issue really is the 60 g nose weight which is over 50% of the planes weight. :woohoo:
I presume that weight is required to balance it at the recommended point.

The only Vintage Model company Tiger Moth I can find is www.sussex-model-centre.co.uk/vintage-mo...YASABEgKt_PD_BwEthis one at 18 " span.
It appears to come in at 99g or as is charmingly put 22 hundredths of a pound!

The usual problem with such a kit is having the right quality balsa for the right bits. Medium for the longerons but much lighter for everything else especially at the tail.

Even with the weight it will probably still fly well enough but a bit fast and with an even more limited duration.
Any pictures of it?

Ooo! does seem a bit weighty Ray, Did you use the yellow tissue supplied in the kit? Paint etc is the killer.
Try moving the rear motor peg forward and use a shorter motor.
Have a look at this site: www.ffscale.co.uk
Mike is a master of small scale models.

The Tiger has swept wings. Are you measuring the c of g in the correct place?

Good point Eric.

It is hard to tell from the photo, but the tail assembly looks WAY too over-engineered compared with the rest of the model.
The fin and rudder appear to be solid wood, and the ribs and spars of the tailplane look like planks, compared with the mainplane.

I agree, not the kit I was thinking of tbh, have you given it a test glide?
years ago I built a veron tiger and powered it with a mill's. 75....flew lovely.
ps: see you've got the rear peg well forward already
Just looked, the vintage model company have three tiger kits, I built the mercury kit ( real one..not a repro) not the veron kit .

Erics comments are very valid, the tail area looks very heavy. Without having the benefit of a full set of closeups it looks to me as though the build style itself is very heavy. For example there looks to be a lot of tissue glue around and over the ribs. There's also a lot of glue or dope on the top of the ribs. The last free flighter I built was 64 years ago but back then we didn't glue the tissue all over, just the leading and trailing edges. I would dope the TE, then lay the tissue on the wing, use thinner through the tissue to soften the thin dope at the TE, over the LE and back to the TE. The dope would do all the gluing I ever needed.
Just a thought.

The detail of the construction of the tail end of light aircraft, particularly pre-war types, is always an issue simply because it is so far behind the CofG.
You only have to look at a 'skeleton' view to see the effort the designers put in to minimise the weight of the tail end.

Small models have the advantage of materials having a much better stiffness to weight ratio which allows relatively simpler sections of material to be used but the basic ratio of the weight front to back remains the same.
With rubber power in particular (no heavy motor) it is hard to use enough material in the nose area to balance the tail so without resorting to substantial nose weight the whole tail end has to be built 'skinny' light just as it does in the full size.

Now if converted to electric with a heavy motor and battery up front ...
Just saying.

Eric wrote: It is hard to tell from the photo, but the tail assembly looks WAY too over-engineered compared with the rest of the model.
The fin and rudder appear to be solid wood, and the ribs and spars of the tailplane look like planks, compared with the mainplane.

Of course you are quite right, but I did follow exactly the drawing by Phil Smith (RK-VERO 150 range 27in Tiger Moth) as supplied by Vintage Model Company.