Foam board...RC Predator project 7 foot wingspan

by gear127 | May 6, 2013 | (21) Posted in Projects

I'm using a foam board with a pretty thick paper bacing I buy from a sign maker near my university here in China. Its a little heavier but it's stronger and easier to paint.

 

 

The wing is foldable and detachable to make it easier to transport. Kfm 2 with 2 x 6mm carbon fiber rods

I am eventually going to use this design for FPV but for the moment I was just experimenting with a panning system. Mounted a small LED flash to the nose 

I took off the landing gear and rubber so I could belly land it. I wasnt confident with the landing gear I had on it.

 

The Maiden was great. I hand launched it and it tracked straight like it was on rails. Even with the vertical stabilizer. If you are wondering how you had launch and 7 foot wide plane with a 12x6 prob on the back, the answer is "carefully!"

Cruised around over the stadium at 1/4 throttle for about 10 mins. Batteries still were at 11.8V so I'm guessing if I'm careful I could get about 30 mins fly time.

This this is huge and it doesnt particularly like slow landings, I anticipated this and the plane has flaps to help slow it down for landing.

 

Here are a few pictures from the build process. 

Fuselage

 

Firewalls

Completed Fuselage

Wing profile

 

Plan of the wing

Completed wing and Fuselage

 The Barbados flag. Long way from home so gotta show some love.

Nose section is detachable so I can mount different cameras and flash lights.

COMMENTS

oneiwily on May 7, 2013
looks real nice, it looks like a nice FPV platform.

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jerimiah85 on May 7, 2013
Man I would love to see a video and a build log. is this from any plan?
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gear127 on May 7, 2013
hey thanks, I kinda built it from scratch. up outta my head. I did take a few pictures during the build that I can post later. As for plans there are none but I'll get started drawing some up in CAD. its a really simple build process.
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jerimiah85 on May 7, 2013
Great man this thing is nice. id love to build one like this but when I start from scratch I always end up building a freaky looking plane that wont fly right. ill be looking :) thanks again for sharing.
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gear127 on May 7, 2013
Cheers... I guess eventually I'll go FPV.
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Wyatt Dick on May 7, 2013
Very cool! I think I am going to have to build one of these now!
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RoyBro on May 7, 2013
Looks great! I too would love to see some flight video. I love watching the big birds sail.
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trobi81 on May 7, 2013
Great work man! Love the pictures!
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tamd31a on May 8, 2013
Fantastic plane looks good in the air
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Auxiliarypower on May 8, 2013
Congratz man that looks good.
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oneiwily on May 9, 2013
a little question , why did you use KF step and not true airfoil ?
I think it may give you more rigidity, and you can hide the carbon spear inside the wing , but it will be thicker.
aside from that looks good, I was actually thinking about building something similar before they released the FT Cruiser
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gear127 on May 9, 2013
Hey thanks for commenting. The answer to your question is, I went with the Kf airfoil because I wanted to try it first. I actually already started designing another wing with a true airfoil so I can compare the two. KF airfoils are easy to make and perform quite well so I went with that one first. The wing is only attached to the fuselage by three screws.
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gear127 on May 9, 2013
Thanks everybody... glad you all like it.
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gear127 on May 10, 2013
1000 views
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HighFlyer on May 11, 2013
Plz Make a plan for this o would love to make this and use it for a FPV platform
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GoodCrash on May 12, 2013
An EDF version of this would be cool.

Keep up the good work!
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wanabeRCexpert on December 5, 2016
thats really cool!
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someguyincali on April 18, 2017
I would live to see some performance specs on this. Payload capability? I plan on building something like this but I want to to carry a PTZ Camera as well as a FPV Camera.
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dexgeo on August 1, 2017
Greetings Friend Gear127,
Congratulations on your project.
Your model aircraft looks really good.
Can you share his plan with us?
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Foam board...RC Predator project 7 foot wingspan