Freedom Flyer's sailplane hangar

[Freedom Flyer]

Here's a pic of all my sailplanes, someday I hope to have a mouldie or 2 in there.

[Freedom Flyer]

I know I posted this on another part of this forum, but these are my two older brothers, this Senior Telemaster is mine.  We use these when the wind isn't blowing and we want to try some thermal activity.







This is my Oldest brother Arlen and I, and this is his Senior Telemaster built by my brother Wayne in the above picture.

[andrew wallace]

hi tracy welcome aboard
some nice looking models there

i'm interested in the cradle you have on the tele master any close up shots of it, what method did you use to keep the glider on the cradle

i've done a bit of aero-towing in the past and i've always been the tug pilot but now i want to the the glider pilot and this might be a good method for me to get a flight  

[andrew wallace]

this is my hanger 9 cub with a 30cc dle engine i use for towing


and this is my 2.5m cm pro discus on tow, ive had some great flights with this model off a flat field

[Freedom Flyer]

Wing is bolted on plane with 4 nylon bolts so I have utilized the wing bolts to mount glider cradle



Here's a pic from the back, the rubber bands up top stretch over the wing, across the leading edge down to a couple of music wire forks mounted through the dowel. I mounted the release servo flat and have a string going from the servo to a piece of music wire that is pulled back to release the dowel with the forks attached. pretty mechanical but seems to be pretty fail safe.





Here's one of two pics with rubber bands stretched over the wing to the forks



Note the wire protruding through the slot perpendicular to the one in the end of the dowel, that's the one that has the string attached to it going to the servo.  The opposite end of that wire is attached to the opposite side of the cradle.




This is a picture of one of the wing supports, I made these adjustable as I haul up different wing configurations and needed to be able to  move the supports up to the bottom of the different kinds of wings, I found these to be extremely important. Any breeze or wind during climb out to launch altitude will tip a larger plane to one side or the other causing all sorts of fun for the power plane pilot.  Also be in sync. with the glider pilot and ready with your finger on the release switch and ready to dump the glider should you encounter some difficulty




Just another picture of the bands stretched over the wing to the dowel forks



A drawing of the dowel fork




Hope these drawings help explain how the release mechanism works




Here's a couple of pics of my Goldberg cub, I don't use it for anything except flying

[andrew wallace]

you're a gentleman tracy many thanks for that  :clap:  :clap:

[Freedom Flyer]

Andy,
        Your Welcome, I hope you give it a try. Tracy

[DaveMc]

Love that Cub on Ski's  

D.

[andrew wallace]

hi tracy
you got me thinking big time

this is a kadet senoir which belongs to my dad we're going to put a .62 two stroke engine in it


this is the first stage of my cradle



and checking out the model for size

[Freedom Flyer]

Andrew,
     Cool!  The .62 should be enough power providing you don't go too big with the plane you plan to carry. A few things I need to mention is to make sure the top of the cradle is the same incidence as the bottom of wing. They need to be parallel otherwise it causes all sorts of issues. The other is, I made my cradle with the sides opened up because it acts like another vertical flying surface and if there is any cross wind of any kind it affects the way the plane handles not only with the glider on board but even after you release it.  I also tried to keep my glider as low as possible so it didn't act like a big weather vane on top of my plane. Also make sure you have PLENTY of rudder throw, I use both elevator and rudder when piggy backing a glider up. That Senior Kadet is a GREAT airplane, they've been around forever.  I'm looking forward the finished product and hearing how it all goes. Thank you for sharing the photos with me. Tracy

[andrew wallace]

hi tracy
keep the advice coming :clap: managed to get a bit more work done today, i was able to lower the height by 2 inchs so the model is a lot lower to the top of the fuslage


i've just cut the lighting holes on one side at the minute i'll try and get the other side done later  

[Freedom Flyer]

You're making your cradle so nice and sleek, I'm going to have to make a new one, it makes mine look crappy and like I've never built anything before.
 :oops:  :oops:
Here's a couple of pics of my Older brother Arlen's Senior Kadet, very nice flyer, he has a 90  four stroke on his, PLENTY of power. He highly recommends it in a tail dragger configuration, I know Sig designed it in the trike gear configuration for beginning pilots, but it flys well either way. That choice would of course be yours.
Keep the updates coming, it looks Great! :clap:  :clap:







One other thing, you'll want to make sure that there is sufficient surface area on top of the cradle for the glider wing to support both leading edge and trailing edge of the wing.

[andrew wallace]

wow tracy
that's a beautiful model  

the one that i'm gonna use is almost twenty years old, my dad's cousin built it and couldn't fly it so he gave to dad and he has kept it in the attic all these years  :lol:

so hopefully it'll get a bit of flying now  
at the minute it's tricycle under carriage but might have to change it to a tail dragger, we'll see if the nose leg can stick the extra weight on take off
we take off a grass strip and it has no alierons as well so i'll see how it flys with just the rudder first before cahnging it

[Freedom Flyer]

Andy,
      My brothers plane is an ARF plane, it came with ailerons. He added the black pin striping, moved the landing gear for the tail dragger configuration and because of our altitude put the big 4 stroke on it, I don't think he needed to go quite as big as he did  :shock:  :shock: but it does fly very well and is a very relaxing model to fly.
      I would strongly suggest that you do at least one thing before attempting to haul up a glider, I think it would wise be to add ailerons to that plane, it's a decent sized rudder but I don't think you will be able to maintain control with a sailplane mounted to the top with rudder only.  I'm not saying you should, but you might also want to be prepared to go with a tail dragger set up, especially if you are flying off of a grass strip.  There's going to be just enough weight added to the plane and also enough in front of the CG that it may cause the nose gear to "dig in".  I do think it will be plenty of plane to haul up the glider you have sitting on it in the picture, and if you can put some sort of support out near the bend in the glider wing to keep it from tipping side to side.
     The very first RC plane I saw fly was a Sig Kadet Senior, the guy that helped me get started in the hobby had one. He had made a set of skiis for it so he had a great big nose ski that the prop just barely missed when running, it was rudder only but flew great on the powder snow he was flying off of.  Unfortunately his depth perception wasn't as good as it should have been and he hit a football goal post about 6 inches out from the fuselage on the left side of the wing, it was a total loss but fun while it lasted.   Keep the photos coming I'm excited to see the progress.  After seeing yours you'll probably see a pic of a new one mounted on my plane. Tracy.

P.S.  Do you guys get any snow on the tops of your slopes? and do you fly mode one or two there?

[andrew wallace]

hi tracy
i've been busy this past week or so and i haven't been able to get much work done  
we have had no real snow this year so far  

i have the cradle made and i was wondering how do you keep the wing from slipping back when you pull the bands across i find the wing tends to slip back a good few inches and that would affect the CG  i was trying to keep the wing leading edge close to the leading edge of the plane  :?:  :?:

thanks for your help and hope to get a few photo's soon i have the plane converted to a tail dragger now