Advanced Pylon Products "Sidewinder"

[Marauderer]

I finally went to the AMA nationals this year and that was an experience that everyone needs to do. I flew 426 and 422 and at the end Tom Scott had a raffle for some items to raise money for the FAI Team. I won the Sidewinder in the raffle. I didn't even know what it was but since I have never had a brand new Q40 I was going to build this one.

Below is a pic of the completed airplane at Mike Langlois new Old Julian Airport.


I will tell you how the build went for me and hope all enjoy. Please provide feedback if I could have done something better so I can learn when I get the next one.

How did it fly? I had my friend and mentor Dean Stone maiden the Sidewinder. It took zero trim and literally flew itself off the ground. It is nimble and fast

How much does it weigh? 4 lb 1 oz. I am not to that stage of building that i can get a very lite plane.

This is what the kit looks like just out of the shipping box. It was an excellent job of packing.



I will continue more this evening.

[Marauderer]

So after I unpacked it and had a chance to check it all out it was a real good looking airplane and it felt light. I won the base kit and I had Gary Sr. upgrade it by installing the firewall, motor mount, and drilled the wing on a jig. To me it was worth the additional expense as Gary did a great job with those items. I did not have him drill the hole and install the shut off cup because I wasn't sure where I wanted it.









I finally decided to put the cut off cup on the right side. And after the install I might do the next one differently.



I ended up drilling the fuel tank tubing hole on the left side and it made a long run of fuel tubing but so far it is working well. The next time I will bring it through the middle of the mount and straight to the needle valve and have the shut off after the needle valve. It will be a much shorter run of fuel tubing.

[Marauderer]

I used a Jett 6 oz flat tank and it fit very well and high in the fuselage. I used a tongue depressor to keep the tank from sliding forward and reinforced packing take to hold it to the tank and to also stiffen the tank walls also. I personally like the fuel dot system and the fuel accessories from Central Hobbies.


The tank isn't quite on the CG but close. and the fuel dot lines up well.

[Marauderer]

The graphics package came from Dennis Kirby and I installed it on the horizontal stabs and elevators before installing the stabs on the fuselage.


As I was fitting the stabs and elevator linkage I noticed I couldn't get it symmetrical. I went back and looked at some of my former flyable airframes and noticed that they weren't symmetrical either. Since the guys that had assembled those plane are very succesful Q40 pilots I accepted that it didn't have to be.


The hole in the fuselage ended up being much larger that I first expected it to be. This pic was taken early on and it was much larger on the final product but it covered with tape easily.


I then had trouble with the elevator throw and had to enlarge the holes on both sides of the fuselage to obtain the proper throw on the elevator. You can see how much it was in the final on this pic. The rudder was straight forward and no problems.

When I got the tail feathers completed I notice they were not in the same plane. The left elevator trailing edge was lower that the right. I tried to bend the metal elevator bell crank but I was concerned i might break something. So, I took the elevator that was lower off the metal pad and put painters/masking tape on the metal pad till the elevators were equal.

[Marauderer]

When I talked to Advanced Pylon Products Gary Sr. said to mount the servos as far back as possible to the front of the rear wing cross brace. I made my own servo tray and used rubberized CA to glue the rails and the tray to the rails. Make sure you get the tray high enough in the fuselage so that the servo push rods clear. I also made sure the push rods did not rub or touch each other on the way back to the control surfaces.



This was the initial final set up and the battery is a Zippy 700 mah Life that ways 40g.


The wing is not predrilled and tapped for the landing gear. I set the landing gear bracket all the way to the rear of the tray, marked my holes and drilled starting with a small bit and finishing with the proper bit to tap the holes to 1/4-20 threads. I was careful not to drill out the top of the wing and after the holes were tapped I put thin ca on the threads and after they cured I retapped them for strength.

[Marauderer]

I then fit the belly pan to the wing and fuselage. The Belly pan needed some work as it did not fit well.


I moved the pan all the way forward and saw that the gap was about 3/16-1/4" so I taped the out side of the rear pan with painters tape and put two layers of 3/4 oz cloth let cure and it made a great extension. The pan also need to be contoured to the wing and the landing gear bracket.


I took the plane up to Julian for the maiden flight and Dean Stone maiden-ed it. I set up the throws that APP recommended. Dean said it needed zero trim and literally flew itself off the ground


Since I won the plane in a raffle would I buy one in the future> Yes, I feel advanced Pylon Products builds a very good plane for a fair price.

Dean liked it so much that he is now the proud owner of it and it will be interesting to see how it does this next year.