Here are few more shots of how the tank is going to be positioned, all that is left here is to lay dowm some foam and secure with velcro straps from Home Depot, they are Red, 1/2" wide and about 15" long...comes in a pack of six or eight...plenty to do a 40% plane.

These shots show how I located the slots for the control horns. The horns are made out of that G10 material... they are supplied with the kit. One thing to note here is that it is up to the builder to either put in these control horns or the simple 8-32 screw (Rocket City). It took me a good 6 hours to complete the entire process on the wings, from start to finish (horns glued in). I think the pics are self explanatory in how I went about locating the slots and the dimensions.

These pics show the slots cut out...accomplished this with an xacto knife. The next shot shows a trial fit, and the last shows the Inboard and Middle servo horns. I also did the Outboard, but I am only flying with 2 servos per wing - the I/B and Middle bays.

This is how I located the hold down screws for the servo hatches in the wings. Lay down some tape and transfer the rails to the tape...put down the hatch and the transfer the lines you just made to the hatch...drill your holes. One thing here...is that there was no modifying these hatches at all, fit like a glove.

Checking to see how the holes fell out...is good. The next shot shows the hatch secured in place with allen head wood screws...be sure to run the screw in and back out...run some thin CA, and run the screws back in to clean it up...I always apply some silicon glue to the threads on final assembly just to prevent the screws from backing out due to vibration.

This final pic shows the servo rails and a triangular support to each leg. Pretty self explanatory here. Some may have noticed..if you recieve '3D (sport) Flyer magazine...that John Glezellis did an article on converting this type of servo mounting...to installing his servos in the typical fashion of just dropping into the wing. There is no wrong way to do this...he prefers the other method so he can quickly see at a glance that everything is intact on the servo. Its just a matter of preference.

welp, thats it for this week and weekend...going to head out to Charlotte tomorrow morning with my buddy Wayne Mathews to compete for the Gold in another IMAC contest...until then, have a good n'.

Joe

thankyou how long til maiden you rekon keen to know how it goes

OK, sorry for the delay...since last weeks contest, I have been playing catch up around the house. Tomorrow, Wayne and I head out to Camden, SC for another IMAC contest...this will be my last one until the Nationals. I believe Wayne is going to one more in Alabama at the end of June.

So, where were we...oh yeah, the wings. Not much accomplished this week, but none the less, made progress...just not 'visual' progress. In the pic below is showing the servo/hatches for the wings. Krill does supply a vinyl decal for the hatches, but I had found that that the color was just quite not right. So, being the anal person I am, I covered the hatches with Missle Red and Jet White Monokote...perfect match!

Also, the servos for the ailerons will be the new JR 8711's. The I/B servo requires no servo extension, but the middle servo will require about a 15" extension to match the excess wire hanging out the root rib of the I/B servo wire.

One thing to note here is that I make all my servo wire extensions. I use the twisted wire from Airwild, they also sell the Male and Female connectors to finish this off. The reason why I do this is for one...piece of mind knowing that there is only one point of connection between the Receiver and the servo and two...to eliminate and voltage drop going through multiple connections (as described on TBM website), and three...it gives me another warm fuzzy knowing just a little bit more about my 'inards' of the plane.

I will touch base on the wings again when the servos are going in for good, which should be next week. The servos were programmed through the Duralite Powerbox Champion. Wayne Mathews has lead me to be a firm believer in this distribution system. The servos were initilaized through the powerbox, the centers were found and saved...the next step here is to put the servos in the wing and then...using the Powerbox again...set the end points. I know right now that all I want out of the wings is 28* of throw Up and Down...once thats set...the wing servos are done.

On that note, the batteries of choice are going to be the new Duralite Li-Manganese batteries. They are bigger and heavier than most...but thats what I want, this plane comes out tailheavy, so if I am going to need to add dead weight on the nose...it might as well be useful weight. The batteries are 3800 mah...Wayne Mathews is flying these batteries in his Yak...after all day of flying, he has almost no drop in readings...another neat thing about theses batteries is that he put a 1 AMP load on the batteries....no voltage drop - not even a flicker! I am sold on that right there....also, no special charger was needed to buy, I am using my Fromeco charger - thumbs up from Duralite folks. Contact Wayne Mathews for more details about these batteries as well as all of the Powerbox systems...he really knows his stuff!

I had ordered the batteries with 4ft leads...I mounted the batteries in the fuse, routed and secured the wires, then trimmed off the excess...solder on the connectors...good to go! Duralite will solder the connectors on for you if you know the length you want.

The next item I had gotten out of the way is mounting the Fuel Dot. In the past I have always used the DA fuel dot...no more. Nothing wrong with it, but a good buddy of mine, Mark McClellan (and competitor in IMAC) came up with a pretty slick idea...he has had these items out for quite sometime, but I never went with one of his fuelers simply because I had the DA's....until now. I wanted to treat my Katana to something nice, so I bought her a "McFueler"....Mark came up with the idea to make a threaded plug with a barb that swivels...so when the fueler line is plugged and then screwed back into position...the fueler line is allowed to stay put and wont get twisted from screwing in the plug....pictures paint a thousand words, take a look.

Thing to note here...is that Mark makes all of these fuelers himself. He can be contacted at 828-612-3726 or at markmcclellan@charter.net. These are cheaper than the DA fuel dots as well as the 3W dots.

I didnt get a shot of the fueler plug, but there is a extruded piece that looks like a tip of a flatblade screw driver for you to screw and unscrew the plug into place.

The last thing I did on my plane this week was mount the JR Heavy Duty switch for the ignition as well as installing the charger jacks from Ernst for the Li-Maganese batteries. This is not necasarry, but I do this so I dont have to pop the hatch off the plane to check voltage levels or to charge the batteries....you can go by the L.E.D's on the Powerbox Champion...they have green to yellow to red to let you know if your batteries are starting to drop in voltage.

Thats it until next week. I will finish off the wing servos, and then start on the stabs. Until then... be safe!

Joe

Alright guys, back on it this week. Spent the weekend in South Carolina at Craig Bakers/Charles Youngbloods IMAC contest in Camden....the contest ran very smoothly, it seemed as though all the pilots were on the same page wanting to get all three rounds in the first day...Anyways, back to the build.

Tonight I had gone out and verified that the wing servos were set at neutral and going in the right direction. I then put on the SWB Double Lock servo arms that measures 1.25" in length. Ran the wires in the wing and secured the servo/hatch in there rightful positions. I am using TBM Right and Left threaded 4-40 ballinks and H9 Titanium links. I was able to set up my JR10x to 140 on the Travel Adjust, set the titanium link to 1 1/8" on the servo arm...3 holes up on the control horn...and was able to achieve 23 Deg of throw in both directions...I will get the other 5 Deg through the Powerbox when setting the endpoints...my Dual rates will be around 70% on Pattern, less on the roller mode and spin mode. I will cover all of that when the plane has flown.

I also weighed the wings ready to fly... one is 4lbs 1oz and the other is 4lbs 1.5oz. Dont forget the wings have blade spars that run to the tips of the wings. I am very happy with this number as it is VERY consistent with the Katana I am currently flying with the weights being only a couple of ounces off..proly due to the different servos being ran...which are the HT 5955TG.

Some may choke at those numbers...but I'm not

Until tomorrow!