Not a speck of glue is required to assemble the model and all the major parts (above) fit perfectly. There’s a complete set of parts for the floats and the main gear (at right, above) which are easily interchangeable. A lot of small screws hold the Beavertogether but thankfully they’re in separate bags and labeled (at right).
As icing on the cake, there is a complete nav/landing light array pre-installed and wired into the plane. It’s a nice little extra touch. The Tactic receiver in the Beaver is 6- channel and the lights are on channel 6 but can’t be turned on or off. And if battery du- ration is a priority the cable lead for the lights can be disconnected from the receiver. The only things needed to complete the model and get it ready to fly are an 1800 mAh Li-Po battery and a transmitter as al- ready noted. All the necessary hardware is included, and that means a bunch of differ- ent size screw to put the model together on wheels or floats. There is no need of glue for anything.
All those screws come in different sizes ac- cording to their application and fortunately are packaged individually in small plastic bags with the parts that require them. Makes finding them a lot easier. It’s worth noting here that all of the screws, machine or tapping, go into plastic. It is easy to strip the plastic mounting holes if these screws are overtightened. Slow and careful is the operative word here.
The most involved part of assembling the model is the installation of the floats. Wouldn’t be a bad idea to familiarize your- self with the struts, spreader bars and floats
themselves beforehand. Each of these parts has a label system that identifies each for its function.
In some instances, like the float struts, there are labels on one end, and an em- bossed ID on the plastic attachment bracket on the other end. Though not mentioned in the manual, it worked out the ends of the float struts with a “2” on their label were at- tached to the float. A hole will need to be cut in the flat plate label for the screw holes in the plate.
One of the pictures will also show the at- tach plate on a float. In the plate are a series of holes but a label on the plate shows the specific holes to be used and which end should be matched to that hole. Takes all the guesswork away but unless you have all the parts identified it won’t go easily. Installation of the main landing gear is very simple by comparison, and so is the in- stallation of the tail wheel bracket. All of these simply screw into place. Some foam may overlap the attach point for the wing strut but it’s easily cut away with a hobby knife or pen knife.
About the only other involved process is putting the wings on. There are four things that project from each wing root: a carbon fiber spar (in the right wing it’s two smaller
CF spars); a music wire flap pushrod, and the servo extension cable for the aileron, and an extension cable for the light(s) in the wing panel.
All of these slide into their respective holes in the side of the fuselage above the cabin. The rectangular slot for the extension cables needed to be opened up a little to let both cables and their connectors through it. The only other item that kept me scratching my head and preventing the wing to seat into its retaining clips was the flap pushrod. I could only get the wing panel in so far and then it wouldn’t budge.
The culprit was the outer sheath over the flap music wire pushrod. It was a clear plas- tic, unnoticed, and the edge of it didn’t go through its hole but hit the plastic plate. Once I got finished saying duh, the wing panel went in all the way.
The wire pushrods for the flaps have to go through the E-Z style connector. It’s tight but they do fit. Note the position of the flap servo arm. That ensures the proper deflec- tion of the flaps. And to fully seat the wing panels the end of each spar(s) has to seat in the respective hole of the plastic plate on the opposite side of the fuselage. It will take some gentle flexing of the panel up and down until it goes “home” in the holes. Once
With all the struts needed to attach the floats to the fuselage, it’s a welcome feature that the appropriate holes and the corresponding strut ends are marked
FLYING MODELS
(above left) on the plastic attach plates in the floats. Use any good pointed knife to pierce the label (above right) so the spreader bar screw can be inserted.
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