CMAD Small Wonder build pics

[twitte]

Tim,

What do you use to balance your plane?

Trey

[KRProton]

Tim,

What do you use to balance your plane?

Trey

Hi Trey.

I use this laser-cut C.G. stand.

I came up with the idea when I was working on the Great Planes Rifle in the R&D dept. at Hobbico. The plane is pretty small and fast, so getting a good C.G. reading was important. So I came with this simple stand with dowels (the smaller one in the photos) that we actually included with the kit. The builder was instructed to put small vinyl tape strips on the wing with a line drawn on the tape over the recommended C.G. The points on the ends of the dowels would grip the tape so the plane wouldn't slip off the stand.

So I just adapted the idea for a bigger stand for Q40 planes and such, only instead of tape on the wing, I use laser-cut strips of 1/16" ply with small holes spaced 1/8" apart (to support the increased weight and so the points don't poke into your wing). I use double-sided tape to attach the ply strips to the wing and place the plane on the stand. If, say, you wanted the plane to balance at 3-7/8", you would mark this on the wing (I lay down masking tape and draw a line on the tape), attach the ply strips directly to the wing with the double-sided tape so that the middle holes (marked by a line) align with your C.G. mark on the wing. Place the airplane on the stand to see where it balances.

Though the holes are spaced 1/8" apart, if the plane balances with one of the dowels in the 3-7/8" holes and the other dowel in the next hole back, well then the C.G. is at 3-15/16", so with this dowel spacing the stand is accurate to within a 1/16".

I plan to offer this along with my airplane stands, but just haven't gotten around to it yet. I feel it's simple, fast and quite accurate. All I gotta do is shoot over to Lowe's and buy some dowel!

Tim

[KRProton]

Tim,

What do you use to balance your plane?

Trey

Ask and ye shall receive;

($15.00 plus shipping - comes with double-sided instruction sheet of course!)

Tim Lampe