My friend Gary (youtuber sr71afan) makes some of the coolest simplified RC foam flyers and fun little videos to go with them. By going with hyperlightweight foam and flying either indoors or in still outside air, he experiences a purified beauty of flight that really clicks with me... I hope it clicks with you too.
This one is a very conventional looking taildragger with such a lightweight wing structure that the wings sag on the ground and have loads of dihedral in the air. The takeoff roll from a standing start looks to be under two feet and the overall slow flying is very relaxing to watch. And don't be impatient and give up after 30 seconds... if you do you'll miss the flight thru the lean-to porch at :50 (after the spectators clear a path), and even more important, you'll miss his sweet formation flight with a full scale aircraft passing overhead at 2:45. It's more of the creative RC flying that makes Gary's videos so much fun to watch. His hat-mounted video cam is also a big part of what makes his videos different. As long as he's watching the airplane, we are too. Plus, that's why we get some passes that go by so close to the camera.
I've just created a new AirPigz category labeled sr71afan so you can easily check out the other videos from Gary, some of which are him flying and some are other cool flyers. Enjoy!
OK, these sweet RC 'flying people' aren't patterned after Superman, Iron Man and the Rocketeer, but I say they should have been! Regardless (or as the uninformed say: irregardless), they do look pretty cool with New York City as a backdrop. Especially when the Statue of Liberty is in the frame. It's a really well produced video even if it leans a bit hard on artsy over substance. It's also pretty popular as it's already over 1 million views and it appears to have been uploaded just yesterday.
It looks to me like these New York flying people are based on the one from RcSuperHero.com but it's hard to say for sure. Anyway, it's a cool video of some sweet electric RC flying machines... and I still wanna try to build a flying AirPigz 'flying pig' for OSH12 : )
You might be tempted to be very impressed with the size and flying qualities of this electric-ducted-fan (EDF) RC model of the C-5 Galaxy built by youtube user Gradivarius... but that's not the part to be very impressed with. You need to pay attention to the mind-blowing details in the way the main landing gear functions exactly as it does on the real C-5 - this is pure genius! Even better, one of the multiple onboard cameras gives you a perfect view of the gear in action. I love this stuff!
Video screenshot of the RC model C-5 landing gear just before touchdown
If you've been riding with AirPigz for a while now, you might remember my fascination (and revelation) with how the main gear operates on the C-5. I posted a video here and some pix from OSH10 here (scroll down once there) about this crazy landing gear. And now we've got this incredible RC model to marvel at. And it's not just the gear that's amazing, the fowler flaps incorporated into this model are very impressive as well.
If you're a freak for more details like I am, the video below gives you a much better look at how the systems function. Some very, very excellent work here - enjoy : )
This amazing and very large (1:10 scale) Airbus A400M RC model has been around for a while but there's so dang much cool stuff on the interwebs these days that sometimes it takes a while to find the must-see items. With a nearly 14 foot wingspan, a little over 90 pounds, and with 18 servos operated by two people with two radios, this is one complex RC model. And, as this video shows, it has video cameras mounted in the cockpit(!), under the belly, in the tail, and one pointed out the back of the cargo area. That last one is especially cool since it gives us the chance to see the cargo doors open from the inside while in flight, and then we get to see some little paratroopers exit the aircraft! (doors opens at the 3:10 mark)
The model is from France and took 6 years to build. In addition to being large and complex, this A400M appears to be a great flyer. You even get a bit of a scale-like sound out of it at times given that it has some pretty massive electric power. The flight props in the video are just two bladed but the Facebook picture gallery from Millenium Modélisme in France shows the scale 8-bladers that are also fitted. I'm assuming they are static display only... but wouldn't it be awesome if they had airworthy super screws for this thing!
Video screenshot of the huge and awesome RC A400M in flight
You can learn a bit more from this Millenium Modélisme blog post , otherwise there doesn't seem to be a lot of additional info on the model to be found. Hopefully we'll see more great videos of this amazing beast in the future!
Elliot Seguin flying Dale Kramer's amazing electric and amphibious Lazair ultralight
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Elliot Seguin works at Scaled Composites, has experience racing at Reno with his Wasabi Air Racing Cassutt, and he loves to fly... this extensive pilot report is posted here on Airpigz with his permisssion. The electric Lazair is a recent update to the design by Dale Kramer, the original designer of this very popular late 70's ultralight aircraft.
We had an amazing opportunity recently to fly arguably the most operational electric airplane out there. Dale Kramer is a master builder of all kinds of interesting projects. His shop was extensive and impressive. He designed the Lazair in the 70’s during the boom in the ultra-light industry. Over the next several years the factory he set up sold 1200 of the airplane to enthusiasts from all over the world. Dale became interested in other types of flying (heavy lift airships, competition soaring) and separated himself from the Lazair.
But recently the electric aircraft boom has inspired Dale to dust off his Lazair. The resulting set of experiments resulted in a new chapter for the design and perhaps for general aviation. Dale’s final iteration included hanging two Joby electric motors from the Lazair’s nacelles replacing the two JPX two strokes he had flown behind for years. When he put this new configuration on floats he had the first electric seaplane, a terribly practical electric airplane, and one heck of a beach toy.
I called Dale after seeing the airplane at Oshkosh. I was hoping to learn more about the switch to electric and where he thought electrics could go. When he responded with an invitation to visit his home in western NY and “find out for myself” it was just a matter of buying the tickets. In the three days we spent with Dale and Carmen on Keuka Lake the Electric Lazair was flown almost twelve hours total by six different pilots in many different atmospheric and water conditions. We walked away with a much better understanding of this new way to propel aircraft and with big smiles on our faces.
Could electric power plants change full size aviation the way they did r/c? The shift to electric from glow power in RC aircraft has drastically improved accessibility, ease of maintenance, and in general relieved the boundaries of entry to that sport. Before electrics even the most experienced RC pilot might spend ten minutes getting his glow engine to start on his model, and he would most certainly smell like glow fuel when he was done. With modern electric models an operator no longer has to spend all that time and energy dealing with the powerplant. I wondered if that would be the case with electric man carrying airplanes.
This little RC flying machine is getting some big attention here lately... the video above has had over 1,300,000 views in just over 2 weeks. It is pretty impressive how it mixes such stable vertical flying with a rapid transition to a more normal horizontal flight.
The smallish and very well rounded UAV was developed by the Research Department at Japan's Ministry of Defense. On one hand, it's not really much different than the impressive Dark Deltoid posted back in February (video), but the addition of gyros coupled to the servos gives some added position stability, and the round shape does give it a rather unique option to roll along the ground. Not sure I'd say it was bargain for the claimed $1,400 to build, but I'll admit that I've never seen any flying machine blow the top off a spherical storage box and then launch vertically out of it : )
I did a moment of research and found that it was demonstrated a while back as seen in the video below that was uploaded almost exactly a year ago. Maybe, just maybe, we'll see a $60 version of this roundy show up just in time for Christmas... if so, you can count me in!
Oh sure, at first glance this 16-motor (electric) multicopter aircraft from the German company e-volo is pretty cool looking with an actual human pilot onboard, but I have to say I think we are at an important crossroads with the future of flying machine design, and I think we're taking the wrong road. I could be wrong here, but the idea of using 100% thrust-vectoring to achieve flight is very high risk... in fact I'd say it's just too risky. And it's not just the thrust-vectoring element that concerns me, more on that in a minute.
Don't misunderstand, I think there's a lot of promise with what's been done here, I just don't think human beings with souls should be onboard. (Feel free to draw your own conclusions about whether humans without souls should be flying one of these!) The positive here is that we see a large-scale and very practical multicopter with a significant payload capacity, which means that the UAV applications for these kind of machines continues to widen. However, having just said that, the same risks that make this too risky in my mind for humans on board mostly still apply to having lots of these things flying unmanned overhead. So I guess I'm conflicted about the real practicality of the direction we're headed. And if I'm concerned about all this, can you imagine what the fine folks at the FAA are thinking?!
The primary things that really concern me are the reliance on electrical systems and computer control to keep us alive when we're off the ground... well, that and the lack of a wing of some sort that can still provide lift when all power has been lost. Now there's no doubt that aircraft like the General Dynamics F-16 ushered in a whole new era of electric and computer control back in the mid 1970's, and they've been very successful. But, much the same way that the Boeing 787 now relies very heavily on computer control, these kinds of aircraft have billions in research behind them, millions in production costs, and a vast amount of system redundancy.
Small general aviation flying machines don't have that luxury. And while I understand how reliable the transmitters, receivers and servos are with modern RC aircraft, the truth is that these systems do sometimes fail. And when you add the wild, ongoing dream (pushed by Popular Mechanics and Popular Science) that someday the average guy is gonna have some sort of flying machine, I turn and run the other way. Have you been paying attention to how ignorant, dumb and/or stupid the average guy is these days? I don't mean this to be a put down to the average guy on the street, but I sincerely hope we don't ever try to get these people into the pilot's seat of a flying machine. Maybe you weren't around in the 80's when ultralights began attracting massive numbers of non-pilots. I was, and I remember a lot of people died because they had very little idea what they were doing, but they had affordable and relatively easy access to a flying machine.
And then you've got that lack-of-a-wing issue. I'm a fan of BRS systems, and I'm glad that we have them available, but when you have an aircraft that HAS to go the route of a BRS when all power is lost, I think you've traveled down the wrong road. This is where I hit a hurdle with the Martin Jetpack as well. Would I fly one if given the opportunity? I think so. But that doesn't change my thought that I hope they don't become popular. I just think there's too much at risk overall.
There's no doubt that I don't have all the answers here, but I'm a really strong believer in making inexepensive aircraft as low tech as possible when it comes to the systems that simply have to work to keep you alive. You just can't beat the reliability of cables and pushrods to drive the control surfaces or other critical systems. I'll admit that I've dreamed many times about what simple fly-by-wire systems would do for making a homebuilt aircraft much easier to build, and for adding some slick programmability, but I keep coming back to the unacceptable risk of failure.
And flying without a wing, (fixed, rotary, inflated or whatever else) with 100% reliance on thrust-vectoring seems like a recipe for disaster to me. The public perception of aircraft safety is a really big issue going forward. I hope we're very careful about which road we take into the future.
There are several of Burt Rutan's unique aircraft designs all clustered together just off the edge of the main display ramp at Oshkosh. As you might expect, this collection of flying machines attracts a lot of attention thru the day. After the rain finally stopped around noon on Wednesday, I put some attention on the Rutan Model 81 Catbird.
The Catbird was conceived and built in the late 80's by Burt as an outgrowth of a design-project by Scaled Composites (owned by Beech at the time) for a possible Bonanza replacement. The five seat cabin is unusual (imagine that) in having the pilot sit in the middle of the airplane, slightly forward and between the second and third seats. Then, the last two seats are facing aft. If I remember the idea from back in the day, this arrangement kept the biggest part of the body mass fairly close together for CG control while also putting the heads of all five people relatively close together for easy and delightful airborne chat.
The airplane also had both a canard and an aft mounted (forward-swept) horizontal tail. To learn a boatload more about the Catbird, check out this 1988 Catbird article in Sport Aviation... it'll really give you the inside scoop. Most of the Catbird pix here are from Wednesday. The two without a big crowd around it are from Sunday, before Oshkosh started.
Props not installed, BiPod 'hops' into the air for first flights (photos: Scaled Composites)
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Oh, it's got two fuselages and 4 wheels too... would you expect anything less unusual from Burt Rutan with his last design project before he retired from Scaled Composites April 2011? If you know anything about the amazing and unique career of Burt, you know this is right down the middle for him!
According to this Aviation Week article, the BiPod first flew on March 30th, but those were just 'hops' into the air via the driven rear wheels. I'm not sure the current status of flight testing or of the propeller installations. I'm sure more info will surface before long.
Scaled Model 367 with wings and outer tail panels removed for road testing
The Scaled Model 367 is unconventional on many levels. It's a roadable electric-hybrid aircraft for two people with an intended high speed cruise of 200 mph. It'll have two 450cc engines (one in each fuselage) powering generators designed to drive two 15kW motors at the rear wheels for 'road mode', and then four 15kW motors spinning props for flight mode. As the illustration below shows, two of those motors are mounted on the wings outboard of the fuselages, and the other two are mounted on the horizontal stab between the fuselages. There are also some small batteries in the nose to provide a little power boost when needed, and also to act as a short duration backup in the event of a total loss of engine power.
If you're like me and don't speak German... you'll still love this video since it gives some great visual insight into the sweet all-electric flying machine from PC-Aero in Germany. Not only do you see quite a bit of the first flight conducted back on March 19th (with the uber experienced former Scaled Composites engineer/program manager/test pilot Jon Karkow in the pilot's seat), but you see some of the load testing and other behind the scenes work done leading up to the first flight. I admit that I wish I spoke (or at least could understand) German so I could get an explanation of the 'snap' sound that was heard during load testing... tho obviously it wasn't something serious.
The bottom line is that the Elektra One is off to a great start in PC-Aero's quest to eventually fly a two place and even a four place all-electric aircraft. From this summer going forward, it's going to be very interesting watching a wide range of electric powered projects take to the skies from all over the world.
The PC-Aero Elektra One showing a real eagerness to climb on all electric power
Saturday, February 18, 2012 at 04:31PM 
