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Model gliders - 2 metre span electric powered glider page 2
All finished and ready for action.
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Handling wise this glider will turn quite tight with the right technique, being a slow and lightweight aircraft however means care needs to be taken when flying the model in a downwind area as it can be a job to make headway into a stiff wind. This is made a lot easier if there is still some juice left in the battery pack as the motor can be lit up.
Care also needs to be taken when turning the model low in a wind due to the fair ammount of dihedral and no ailerons. The wind can tend to roll the model more than you would like sometimes, especially when making a turn to a downwind leg. On the whole though this is a forgiving model aircraft to fly.
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The tail end of the model glider showing the closed loop controls fitted to the aircraft's rudder.
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One of the major benefits from having an electric motor on a model glider is the ability to power the model up whenever too much height is lost. This saves having to keep launching the model under low lift conditions, flights of 20 minutes are easy with a 1700mah battery pack even in poor thermal weather. The aircraft can also be flown about at low altitude where it flys like a slow marginally powered vintage model aircraft.
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Control surfaces are covered in yellow film.
Hinges are of the pinned type.
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The aerofoil section for the glider is I have to say not very scientific in it's origin. I decided on a simple flat bottom section with a moderate thickness and quite a small radius on the leading edge. Basically the section is a modified Clark Y aerofoil. I'm certain one of the more exotic wind tunnel derived aerofoils would provide the model glider with better performance but this simple section is proving adequate and it's a simple build.
Tail surfaces are simple flat structures with rounded leading edges and tapered control surface trailing edges.
In all this model has been a complete success, there are of course improvements which I would make to the glider's design but these can wait for the mark 2 version. Things like a D-box construction wing to stop warps and increase rigidity, lower frontal area on the fuselarge, bolted on wing and a better motor would be some of the more obvious improvements to the glider.
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Model glider page one
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