snaps together with the fuselage’s super magnet. To help keep the vertical stab at 90 degrees to the horizontal stab, I glued a clear acetate “wing” to the bottom of the ver- tical stab. You can see it if you look closely at the photos. 12. Horizontal stab supports: When I


bench tested this Tiggie, by having Snoopy run up the throttle while I held onto the tail, the tailfeathers had a noticeable flutter above half throttle. So I borrowed from the full scale Tiger Moth and put supports from the fuselage to the horizontal stab. These are made from ¹⁄₈-inch square balsa stick stock, medium hard, sanded to an airfoil shape. Tiny super magnets (2mm long by 1.2mm in diameter) are inserted into holes drilled into the outer ends of the supports and then into holes cut in the underside of the horizontal stab. At the fuselage end of this scheme, I used


¹⁄₃₂-inch soft aluminum wire that is super glued to holes in the balsa supports and then looped around a nylon bushing attached to the last bulkhead that is accessible from an opening under the tail of the fuselage. 13. Servo compartment hatch and landing


gear: Cut two corners and hinge the hatch over the servo/radio compartment with plas- tic strapping tape. As the wings are remov- able, the landing gear must come off easily. The front of the landing gear wire is already pre-bent to give a good friction fit into a slot in a bulkhead that separates the radio/servo compartment from the motor compartment. The back of the landing gear assembly is


a very clever shock-absorbing design. It is composed of plywood pants that attach to the gear’s wire and then project through two holes in the bottom wing. The really clever part of this is that the two ply pieces actu- ally meet each other inside the fuselage and provide spring like action that allows the wheels to be independently suspended. But we need to be able to remove this


whole kit and kaboodle. The friction fit of the formed wire is perfect, so all that is needed is to squeeze the wire on each side as you push it into the front slot. Same for tak- ing it out. But, the hatch gets in the way and needs


to be slightly modified by cutting two cor- ners and then is reinforced and hinged with plastic strapping tape. Bingo! It can now be pried up and forward and left in place on its hinge as you remove the landing gear. The instructions recommend using epoxy


to attach the ply wheel pants to the wire. I substituted canopy glue and aluminum tube bushings. The aluminum tube is opened up along its length with a Dremel carbide cut- off wheel (if you don’t have one and are us- ing aluminum tubing, you can use a hack- saw blade or a triangle shaped file to cut the slot) and then pressed over the landing gear wire and canopy glued to the plywood pants. Before canopy gluing, I tacked everything into place with medium viscosity super glue. Check the photo out, as it should be self- explanatory.


Miscellaneous notes Call me a daredevil, but I do not use keep-


ers on the pushrods at their control horn ends! As the stiff music wire pushrods are en- cased in relatively hard plastic tubes that come through narrow slots at the tail of the fuselage, I calculated they would stay in their control horn holes at the elevator and rudder by their natural spring action, once they were


FLYING MODELS


locked down at their servo ends. A season’s flying without problems was the proof. It would be easy enough to add the keep-


ers if this makes you nervous, but I love the ease of popping them on and off without keepers when I break down the Moth. I also found a place for epoxy in the tail group. The little foam location tabs, on the fuselage tail end, are easy to crush taking the tail on and off. Smear a light coat of epoxy on these and they will stand up much better. As I reflect on this experience of adding tinker’s delights to an ARF, I realize that I have defeated one of my early justifications for buying it, as I do care what happens to this airplane! I have made her my own. Adopt some or all of these ideas, or put your own inventive twist on them, and there is little doubt you will have an airplane that evokes both pride and smiles when you fly. To those of us who have been won over by


this foam Tiggie, it would be a great move for Electrifly, www.electrifly.com/parkflyers/ gpma1134.html vendors to stock spare parts. That would make this an airplane I could easily endorse, without reservation.y


I have flown my ElectriFly Tiggie for a full


season and I have not had a wing separation in flight, even when I have put the throttle to the wall and looped her, or pulled hard banks pretending she was a pylon racer, which, trust me, she is not! And I know my crashworthy system continues to save re- pairs, both in the shop and at the field. With the speed she flies, I can report that


the mobile trees at my flying field have once again become more firmly rooted. One of the things that I liked best was boxing her up at the end of the season and knowing that she is safely stored for the winter. I look forward to taking this Tiggie on some road trips in the coming years. It will be great to have such a compact, sweet flying airplane along. Particularly just before those setting sun moments when even the wind stops to watch the show. Always happy to hear from readers! You


can contact me at rradams@charter.net. Signing off from the Great Western Upper Peninsula of Michigan, where the only things that crowd the skies are bald eagles and peregrine falcons!


Materials Providers: Classic References and Hyperlinks


This is the RC Groups thread. It begins with a very nice overview by Jon Barnes, who happens to be an excellent photographer, including basic specs and a downloadable video of outdoor flying:


http://www.rcgroups.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1207539 This is the canopy glue I have used and can recommend:


Horizon Hobby, 800-338-4639; Stock No. DLMAD12; RC Modeler Craft Glue 4 oz. by Deluxe Materials $5.39


http://www.horizonhobby.com/products/r-c-modeller-craft-glue-4oz-DLMAD12 I’ve heard good things about this canopy glue, but haven’t tried it: http://www.centralhobbies.com/building_materials/adhesives/canopy_glue.html Sources for the large (3⁄16″ by 1⁄16″ or 5mm by 2mm) super magnets:


Hobby Lobby; 866-512-1444; Product No. DMAG308; You will need 14; they sell a pkg. of 4 for $3.39


http://www.hobby-lobby.com/magnets_449_ctg.htm Super Magnet Man; 205-978-2885; 40 cents apiece; Disc – D1023B http://www.supermagnetman.net/product_info.php?cPath=31&products_id=568


The K&S soft aluminum rods I use: My local Ace Hardware carries K&S products and you can buy them singly and you should be able to find K&S products in almost any hobby shop.


http://www3.towerhobbies.com/cgi-bin/WTI0001P?I=LXS011&P=8


A source for the tiny super magnets used on the horizontal stab support (2mm by 1.2mm) and for the Blenderm tape I used to re-hinge the rudder:


Bob and Janell Selman, BSD Designs, (order by product name or description), 417-358-9521


http://www.bsdmicrorc.com/index.php?categoryID=49&show_all=yes Alternate source for tiny magnets (2mm x 2mm): Super Magnet Man; 205-978-2885; 23 cents apiece; Disc – D1006 http://www.supermagnetman.net/product_info.php?products_id=149 Robart style micro hinges: BP Products; Cat. No. 937, 15/pkg; 908-431-5603


http://www.bphobbies.com/view.asp?id=D3605259&pid=B3545176&img=l


And last, but not least, Snoopy! Use the “mirror” function of your graphics program to make both sides; scale to the proper size, print and attach to sheet balsa, cut out with a jig saw or an X-Acto blade and pop into the cockpit’s pilot slot:


http://www.tombraider4u.com/pictures/snoopy2.jpg 59


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