I get a lot of stick for carrying by plane box into work so I though it was time to develop the briefcase plane. So here's something I've been playing with for a couple of weeks.
Basically 8" square of 1/32 balsa covered in cling film (Mylar would be better). Pager motor (Didel 9:1) at the front powered by Grahams 5V dc-dc, 40mA LiPoly, couple of elevons on the back, 100R aeronutz style actuator. I/R control with high current driver.
lt fits flat inside a 2" deep box for protection and then into the briefcase! No more sly comments :).
Some figures:
| Motor/Gearbox/Prop | 2.6 grams |
| Balsa | 0.7(est) |
| Covering | 0.3(est) |
| Carbon rod | 0.3 |
| Wheel | 0.4 |
| Battery | 1.7 |
| dc-dc | 0.3 |
| I/R rx | 1.0 (est) |
| switch | 0.5 |
| total | 8.5 |
| AUW | 11 |
| unaccounted | 2.5 |
I estimated the covering at about 7 grams per square meter, about 3 times heavier than 2 µm Mylar. So arround 0.3 grams.
The sort I had was really cheap stuff from Aldi. You can get away with heating it gently under a spot lamp to remove wrinkles.
I used a 'Bostik Rapid Gluepen' to glue it, it leaves a tacky surface like post-it notes, I guess you could probably peal it off and recover?
Initial opinion is that the motor / gearbox is plenty powerful, remember Gordon was flying a 16 gram pager plane on less than 5:1 fitted with one of his 'evil' props. Proper test flight on Monday!
AUW is 11 grams it ought to be more like 9, the undercarriage wheel is heavy and some of the reinforcing is over the top.
Leaves the ground in the kitchen but needs a bit more space to get the cog right, I've started with the balance point at the first rib, any suggestions?
Heres a plan, not that there is much to it!:
Something for the purists!
25 AUW 3-channel radio all Depron