Drawing board

The one thing that’s a constant here is always innovating and creation of new plane designs. The following show some of the progress being made at current, but not limited to.

I’m happy to start out sharing the the next masterpiece currently in the design phase, inspired by the classic Curtis Jenny, a true gem in the world of aviation history.

With a wingspan of 38 inches, this upcoming model is destined to be a superb park flyer.

While paying homage to the iconic Curtis Jenny, I’ve made some thoughtful revisions to enhance its performance and ease of construction. One significant update is the incorporation of a Clark Y airfoil which will be shown on the next update, a choice that promises improved aerodynamics and handling capabilities compared to the traditional under-cambered design.

Simplification is also at the forefront of this creation. Drawing inspiration from the beloved Jenny Stick, I’ve carefully streamlined the building process, making it accessible to all, from seasoned hobbyists to those taking their maiden flight into the world of RC aircraft.

My commitment to delivering a top-notch experience extends to the kit itself. Just like my other lines, this Curtis Jenny-inspired model will be available as a high-quality kit, crafted with precision laser-cut components for easy assembly and a sturdy build.

I take pride in keeping the essence of the classic Curtis Jenny alive while infusing it with modern design and construction techniques. This fusion of past and present ensures that the upcoming park flyers captures the hearts of aviation enthusiasts young and old.

Further development on this bird is well under way. Sharing a couple of photo’s showing the basics resting together. The Jenny is about due for it’s own page all together at this stage to continue on beyond the Drawing board section of the web site.

This next design is a twin boom pusher that was heavily inspired by an EPS foam based plane I’ve built and flown several of in the past. Free plans and instructions can be found here: https://foamflyer.info/plane.html. With this version I’ve opted to explore the use of combining cardboard and balsa together and the results came out quite well.

The wingspan is 34″, flying weight, 550 grams or 1.22 pounds, COG is perfect at 25% from the leading edge of the wing with no ballast required. The wing was covered in simple dollar store tissue with the rest in Ultracoat Parklite.

The results show a lot of promise working with this combination of materials. This is available as a short kit upon special request. The build log is was shared here: https://www.rcgroups.com/forums/showthread.php?4394803-Cardboard-and-balsa-experiemental-plane

New wing options for the AeroScout

After enough rave reviews on this particular plane, I opted into checking it out further, a trainer that’s very new flyer friendly, done up by the big box foamie operations. It’s not super original on design, they did though put in some extra effort into the gear to help rc pilots handle the gambit upon learning to fly and more advanced levels. I’ve opted to come up with some old school, stick and covering versions for wings that can bolt into it, no modifications needed and to include the original gear can be switched out into it with no revisions needed.

The following shared shows some of the design process, in this case, starting out with some small chuck glider versions to test out the new configurations. I started out with the stock format, just smaller in scale and progressed from there, for a swept back wing, and a slow flyer version.

I took a top view for those not familiar with this bird, to show also how the new configurations are going to integrate.

Swept back wing version, 10.5″ Wingspan

Slow flyer version, 12″ wingspan

https://youtube.com/shorts/hv7OaASgcQc

Sharing a third along the build table for now but not limited to is an out of this world, unorthodox space ship type of a design. In this case, it simply began with a random idea for a plane and some insomnia, with some Depron and hot glue on hand for the inspiration. The small chuck glider version of it flew quite well, worthy of further exploring it as an RC plane.

I opted to bash out by hand a 30″ wing/saucer span of it with light weight RC gear and found it flew on rails, to the point, this was easier then the most simple trainers, not needing SAFE or the rest. Aileron/elevator control is all it needed, traditional tractor style prop/direction and it was a matter of it being a very predictable, easy to fly plane with no bad tendencies except for upon landing, it rolling over to it’s nose since there is no landing gear in place upon.

The next stage will be designing it for the laser cutter, balsa and covering format on a larger scale while tackling the landing gear issue.

Moving onto an amusing, nostalgia for me design, a Star Trek, TOS version, Romulan Bird of Prey. I’m sharing some quality work rendered up, leaving the outside party url in tact to share, my inspiration upon for the lines, along with additional works by others, for use as well to help along keeping it stock looking.

I’m sharing the more blue print looking diagrams for the rest of this bird, it was just designed by default for flying well in the atmosphere, in their minds back then, entirely fictional and in hopes it would perform well in the real world.

Amazing works done by prior artists, following their lead, I came up with a new plan for people to cut out their own Romulan War Bird out of 3 mm or 1/8″ Depron, common foam board can be used as well.

The PDF plans are downloaded here: https://happyrcflyer.com/romulan-war-bird-print-2

This, being a simple, small, print out on one piece of standard printer paper sized chuck glider I do from time to time when so inspired with new designs and ideas showed serious promise from general fly-ability, the glide ratio was very good. I was amused too, with the oversized dihedral, this plane auto corrects itself to fly upright, no matter how it was launched, upside down, sideways, cross winds, etc, talk about a perfect trainer. I did try it out without the center/aft fin, it proved doable with hard handling on the sticks and/or computer control, but it’s much better with this small simple fin added onto it, as per the stock Romulan Bird of Prey anyway.

A larger, RC, stick and covering version of this is in the works on the drawing board, many details and revisions along the way will be conveyed, stay tuned!

Another plane, I call the Jetsons flyer, is using a concept designed for fiction and turning it into reality.

I wasn’t expecting much, if anything for exploring this design to actually fly well enough to pursue, yet it rather impressed me and the horizontal stabilizer actually done up with a dihedral does a very good job at keeping the platform stable.

The simplified format via. chuck glider mode shown, is a worthy candidate to pursue further for free flight and RC.