Retracts? - I have a cunning plan!

Like my Durafly Mk 5 Spit, it's a one-flight wonder, because no matter how gentle the landing, the legs bend, so the retracts won't work! :S

Moi! Less than perfect landings?

I expect you are right so until I can get/make some soft long stoke oleo legs it will be hand launch/belly land with the u/c "up" when flying from my rough grass field!

I was thinking of a less than perfect landing strip

The aileron cut out of the wing and skinned with a 6 mm Depron leading edge.

Have to wait for the aileron servos to be delivered before I can go much further.
The other wing is nearly up to the same state.
The tailplane is next.
I think I will use the same motor, prop and spinner as I used in the Petiterina as I have them spare.
It will mean the Ballerina will have a few less Watts/lb but it will still be about 120 (the Petiterina has close to 200!) which should be 'adequate' for a lightweight sports flyer.

Having seen how rigid the aileron is I have decided to use a direct aileron servo as I did with the Petiterina.

This is just a bare test with a spare servo. The actual ones seem to have caught a China slow boat! :woohoo:
In the mean time I have prepared the 3 piece dihedral brace.

The centre bit fits exactly within the box spar and is itself a balsa/Depron/balsa sandwich. The other balsa bits are glued directly to the outer faces of the spar flanges but keep within the thickness of the 2 mm Depron skin.
The wing to wing butt joint will provide all the torsional resistance.
The wing will be held on by 4 nylon bolts.

Made a start on the tail plane.

All Depron with 2 mm skins and ribs with a 6 mm shear web at the elevator hinge line.
To maintain reasonable stiffness it is quite thick 16 mm) at the root.

The elevators halves are built in the same way but with a closer rib spacing.

The elevators are joined by a substantial thin wall glass fibre tube that has been Depron filled to give a good bond to the Depron elevator structure.

The tube also acts as the 'pin' for the centre elevator hinge.

The completed tailplane.

17" span and it weighs just 16.3 g.
Next is the fuselage.

The direct drive 5g servo installed in the wing being tested with a servo tester.

Now i have just got to the same on the other wing.

Not quite the same, Q, it needs to go the other way! :evil:

The RH wing now complete.

Complete with the retract and wheel it weighs 3.4 oz (97 g).
Made a start on the fuselage.
Pretty close to the original but just made in 3 mm Depron!

It has one extra former (2a) and formers 3 & 5 now the full depth of the fuselage.
On the Petiterina the 'glued in' wing added a significant strength to the centre section of the fuselage. On the Depron Ballerina the wing will be removable so the fuselage will need a bit of extra strengthening in that area.
It will use exactly the same motor, prop and spinner as the Petiterina but with a slightly bigger capacity battery - 1800mAh 3s as compared to a 1500mAh.

Putting retracts on such a light slow and non scale plane is pretty pointless to start with so I thought I might as well go the 'whole hog' and make the tail wheel retractable as well! :woohoo:
The problem is how to make it suitable for direct mounting into Depron and be light enough not to add excessive tail weight to what is going to be a very light plane.
To experiment I built a rear fuselage 'test piece'.

One saving grace is that tail wheel loads will be small so a micro 3.7 g servo should suffice.
The 1" wheel is mounted in a wire 'A' frame which pivots in small acetate plates glued to the inside of the fuselage.

A simple 'over centre' linkage is used to lock the A frame in the down position.
The retract under test.

The servo and linkage.

The complete system weighs just under 8g!

What - no steering? :evil:

Just watch out for a sudden pitch-down when you lower the wheels, that fairing might act like a big elevator! [badass]

Given that most of its flying is likely to be hand launch/belly land due to long rough grass a steerable tail wheel seemed a bit redundant but then, in reality, so is the whole retract system! :woohoo: :woohoo:

That's why I added the :evil: [badass]

As the tail wheel retract seemed to work Ok and is suitably light it has been duplicated in the Depron Ballerina.

Had to ensure it took up the minimum space as both the elevator and rudder servos go in the tail as well.
A view looking down the fuselage at the tail wheel in operation.

The hollow Depron fuselage makes the servo sound horrible!