XXL Polaris scratch build

[Bill G]

Looks great Larry!
Need a little more bodywork on the farings though.

[Larry3215]

LOL

Compared to your builds I need to do a little more body work to everything! I am in awe of your builds Bill.

I figured I was doing good as it is

The last time I slaved over the details on a model and really cared about how it looked was a Byron F86 ducted fan I built back in the mid 70's. My buddy and I had invested a couple grand and several hundred man hours in that thing. It turned out very nice indeed. We came in second in the only scale event I ever entered.

I lost it on the second flight due to aileron flutter. I almost quit the hobby right then. After that Ive never been willing to put that much time or effort into something I know has a limited life expectancy. Especially the way I fly!

[Bill G]

You know I was joking about the purple farings that you drew onto the picture using MS Paint, or something like that. The finished ones look good.

I hear you about putting so much work into 1 plane. The few where I've done that, I never brave flying. I flew my Rake Bristo M1c once, which flew well, but I'm still afraid to fly it again. After that, I've been doing only simple foam scratchbuilds. Anymore than 2 weeks or so on a project is too much emotional investment for me.

[Larry3215]

Thats about where Im at with it too. The difference is I have been spending money to get good looks and you do it with a magic touch

The last few weeks Ive been debating on my next build and having a hard time deciding. I have had my eye on several different projects for some time now, but my hobby budget has gotten drastically smaller lately thanks to the economy.

Im also about out of room in my shop thanks to the larger foamies Ive been doing lately. I was looking over my planes and decided to catagorize them by how much fun I had flying them.

The best loking ones I own - ARF's mostly - are also the ones I have the most money invested into and are the ones I fly least often!

The planes I have the most fun flying are the ones that I am least worried about crashing. The others are very cool in some ways and fun to take to fly-ins and show off but I dont get that much of a kick out of the flying. Im afraid to take any risks.

The Mega Capricorn and BUFY were far from beauties but they are an absolute hoot to fly.

So - Im going to get rid of my big balsa 30% KMP Yak and put the power system into a foamy that is the same size but weighs 1/3 as much and fly the crap out of it

[Larry3215]

I finally got a chance to fly the big Polaris off some decent sized water.

It flew great! It tokk me a coule of tries to get the landing techinque down but Im pleased

I did discover a couple of areas that are going to need some more strengthening. I'll post about that later.

YouTube Video

[CHELLIE]

Show Off That was neet Larry, First time i have ever seen, Water touch and goes Take care and have fun, Chellie

[Larry3215]

Originally Posted by CHELLIE

Show Off That was neet Larry, First time i have ever seen, Water touch and goes Take care and have fun, Chellie

Guilty!

Not ALL of those touch-n-goes were the result of dumb thumbs

One of the guys sent me some pics he took at the float fly.

[Larry3215]

I went to a float fly today and got the XXL Polaris wet again

Got another shot with the Mega Cap showing off the size along with my copilot in training and chief design assistant

[Alpea42]

I've got my plans done at Kinkos for the standard sized one. And Steve has ordered some 6mm depron that should be here this week. I've been reading the long thread at R/CG. And I'm getting anxious to get started. Of course it's created from the North Star. But it reminds me of a ground effect air boat I saw in Pop. Mechanics years ago. That boat was a pusher air boat with a delta wing that let it cruise just above the water.

[Larry3215]

I saw a home built full scale WIG plane similar to that on U-tube awhile back. I think they were selling them.

Keep us posted on your progress.

[Larry3215]

No one has done a regular Polaris build thread yet. You should do one.

[Alpea42]

Larry did you know that Steve Shumate himself posted your video of your giant one over there.

[Larry3215]

No, I didnt see that. Was it recent?

[Alpea42]

I skipped thru the thread so I don't know where it is the thread is so long I can't be sure. Best thing to do is coordinate the date of your video to the dates on the pages. It's there tho. I tried to find it but no luck. This plane is very popular. I didn't find it yet Larry but I went thru the thread from the begginning and I found this pic. of a ground effect flying boat This is post http://www.rcgroups.com/forums/showp...&postcount=331 Can you imagine the ground loop that thing would do if the driver drops a wing tip into a wave. A craft like this would never be available to the non-pilot public. Would it?

[Larry3215]

I just had shoulder surgery and Im still on the good drugs (thats my excuse anyway) and I just remembered that Steve did post a link to the first video I did. No need to look for it

Thats a cool looking bird! The one I saw on U-tube was much smaller - 1 or 2 person sized.

[son of alpea42]

My son got one of the regular sized Polaris'es we're building done, Larry. He didn't want to fly it off dirt so no maiden today.

[Larry3215]

I understand his concern Its one good looking airplane!

What did you guys use on the bottom for skid material?

Duct tape works fairly well and is cheep and easy to replace but wears off pretty fast and isnt the slickest material.

Ive used plastic from coke bottles, milk jugs and cat litter containers and bleach bottles. I like bleach bottles and cat litter plastic the best. Bleach bottle stuff is lighter but the cat litter stuff is indestructible. You need 3m 77 to get it to stick and sand the plastic and clean it with ascetone first to get the best bond.

Some guys have also found some very thin plastic baking sheet material from Target that works well but I haven't tried that yet.

My favorite is an industrial teflon tape thats used on conveyer belts instead of rollers. Its very tough, self sticking, water proof and very very slick - its also very expensive though.

Also - do you have any air flow for the esc and pack? I think your going to need that.

[son of alpea42]

Yeah it's a C C Pheniox 25A ESC. His prop motor draws 18A . We're not trying float plane flight yet and for right now thats his ESC surface mounted right under the prop.

[Larry3215]

I didnt see it back there! You did just the opposite of what I did. I used long motor side leads and kept the battery leads as short as possible. My esc is up from with the packs.

If you do decide on some water runs - get some CorrosionX. That stuff cant be beat for waterproofing. See the second or third post in my Capricorn thread for details.

I dont know how many times Ive been upside down in the water with rx and esc and motor ALL completely under water for long periods with NO damage. 8 times out of 10 the wind will blow me back right side up and I can take off again in just a minute or so like nothing happened.

Just last week I was out with my big foamy Yak on the lake and dumb thumbed it in. It drifted across the lake for over 30 minutes with all the goodies under water. I got it back, drained the water out of the fuse and took off again

Good luck on the maiden!

[son of alpea42]

It flew, but was long on the take off run. And then needed up elevator trim. I think the neg. angle on the motor thrust means I need a few clicks of up elevator trim. Other than that it was very stable and fast and didn't show any bad traits. The 1st take off was comical as speed got up I applied back pressure on the elevator stick it bounced a couple of times like a big sea plane and got air born no problem. But the neg. thrust angle makes you think it doesn't have enough power which is a false symptom because when you reduce throttle it continues flying fine. The other trait that made us think not enough power was the bare depron on the bottom of the fuse was too much friction to move at full throttle on the damp early morning grass. Also like your 1st landing it's critical to get the landing speed and AoA just right on landing to keep from making a 3 or 4 bounce landing. But once you get that figured out it lands smooth.

[CHELLIE]

Originally Posted by son of alpea42

It flew, but was long on the take off run. And then needed up elevator trim. I think the neg. angle on the motor thrust means I need a few clicks of up elevator trim. Other than that it was very stable and fast and didn't show any bad traits. The 1st take off was comical as speed got up I applied back pressure on the elevator stick it bounced a couple of times like a big sea plane and got air born no problem.

Yea, It Flies, We Need Video Good job you Guys, Take care, Chellie

[Larry3215]

Congrats!!

Yeah - we need video!

[son of alpea42]

Too bad U tube edited the audio it was hilarious. http://www.wattflyer.com/forums/show...postcount=6053

[Fviking]

My Polaris is done, and the wind is kicking up whitecaps on the lake !
I waterproofed my ESC with conformal epoxy 3M makes it it is called DP 270
you mix it up and after removing the shrink wrap pour it all over in into the ESC, not on the heat sink though. Then take a heat gun and heat it up the epoxy thins out and most runs off but enough to waterproof it remains. Hang it over a paper plate untill it stops dripping.
You can find 3M DP 270 and Corrosion X Here http://www.offshoreelectrics.com/products.php?cat=79
I also do Fast Electric Boats that is where I learned that trick. I have a 36" fiberglass boat I made that does 50 mph. Video here

Scratch built 36"fast electric boat Viking 42mph

Enjoy;
John

[Alpea42]

FVik I saw yours at the thread at R/C G nice job. We've up motored ours to a Turnigy 450 1050 Kv with a 7x5 prop on 4 cells and it seems to have greater than 1 to 1 thrust now. So I'm hopin it gets air born quicker and the motor wont be hot. Have ordered this motor for the 2nd one Says it's equall to a Axi 2808.