Klingon D7 Battlecruiser "Vengeance"

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Toys I brought to the Kennett, MO, rc airfield:

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My Dynasoar Pegasus is on the left, and the helicopter is an old Cox free-flight model, using a glow fuel .049 engine.
 
Sorry, I got the wrong person, it's another Crawford in Alabama that has a klingon it as well.....never mind:) It did look really cool in the air though, right, and really easy to fly, much more-so that you would think.


Huh? Person or Star Trek reference?
 
AFter a successful flight, time to add more details.

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The Klingon symbol (red/black) came with the kit (thanks, Frank). The bright yellow is a Monokote Trim Sheet. I am trying to give a "warp glow", and add colors to help observe the model in the sky. The turquoise color of the Battlecruiser has shown up well.
 
Decided to paint the fin (rudder) blue, with some Tamiya paint I had lying around.

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The Tamiya paint worked ok, but not great. The Testor's Model Master paint worked much better.

NOTE: This color of blue turned out a little darker than I had hoped. Might repaint later with a lighter blue.
 
And some paints DON'T WORK.

My original idea, for the Impulse Engines, was to paint strips of foam in neon orange. So I tried some Rust-o-leum Neon Orange, that I had.

And it melted the foam:

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The orange strip on the right is 1 inch long and 3/16 inch wide. Severely deformed by the paint.

This is why you do paint tests on spare foam pieces. :surprised:
 
Tamiya is laquer, so generally a no-no, as are pretty much all other paints other than model master or testors enamel, oraybe selected acrylics.
 
Well, decided it was time to return my Klingon Battlecruiser to the Vekah Shipyards around Qo'nos.

Here is the problem: my Klingon D7 tends to turn right. And depending on the wind, I can't get it to turn left.

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My guess is that I have some misalignment with the rudder and/or the warp nacelles (on the wing tips). I feel this was a construction error on my part, not a design error.

This problem only seems to manifest itself during glide; I have not noticed any 'twisting' during launch.

Sooooooo…..what is the solution? I am thinking that I need to add rudder control to the model.

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How much throw do you have on ailerons? When you say it turns is it a yaw or roll?

If you don't see it on boost I don't think there is misalignment. You shouldn't need a rudder.

You do need to keep airspeed for control, have you tried pushing forward a bit while you turn?

Worst case just turn right, ie keep it turning around to the right till you get where you want...
 
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How much throw do you have on ailerons? When you say it turns is it a yaw or roll?

If you don't see it on boost I don't think there is misalignment. You shouldn't need a rudder.

You do need to keep airspeed for control, have you tried pushing forward a bit while you turn?

Worst case just turn right, ie keep it turning around to the right till you get where you want...

THROWS - Will get this for you.

YAW or ROLL - Not sure. Seems to be a yaw problem, but difficult to define.

BOOST - I said that I didn't see the "turning right" on boost; but I also would describe the boost of this model as 'squirrely' (erratic). Boost happens so fast, it may be that I am reacting to problems too fast to get a feel for the flight (during boost).

PUSHING FORWARD WHILE YOU TURN - Not sure if I have tried this.

RC PERFORMANCE
Note that I have also set up this model with an electric pusher prop. It did fly, but I had the same problem: Wanted to turn right. Had to use a large amount of Left Aileron, but still had issues.

WHY RUDDER?
Over the years, here is what I have noticed:

If you have an AILERON problem, the aileron trim will generally fix the problem. And you usually don't need much trim.

If you have a RUDDER problem, the model will tend to act like it has an aileron problem.......but adjusting the aileron trim doesn't seem to completely solve the problem.

I believe that adding rudder control offers the simplest solution, with the best chance of success.
 
Interesting, I've built three of these and never seen that on any of them, but if the rudder or or warp pods are off-center I suppose that could cause it. When I run a pusher, with a normal pusher prop, typically that will torque left and require right aileron trim offset even with the battery mounted on the right side, I've never had one roll/yaw right. So the fact it is rolling right even with a pusher prop tells me something is crooked. Rudder may in fact do it for you, it just adds a bit of weight in the tail, but you have a long nose moment arm on this model so you won't need too much nose weight to compensate. the way it is constructed the warp pods should be self aligning assuming you didn't get the doubler too crooked, but the vertical stab is just glue in place without an aligning tab. You might check the centerline of the tube and carefully measure the warp nacelles and the rudder just to see what might be causing it. Have you also checked the weight on the wings, ie is one side heavy compared to the other.
 
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Just came across your build thread today, really enjoying it, especially how causes for problems are diagnosed and how they're corrected. Trying to get some RC piloting experience so I can move up to RC rocket gliders (finally got the chance to try out a Champ this past weekend--not as easy as I thought or maybe the control surfaces are out of alignment) so following along as you correct things is fascinating.

Sorry didn't mean to hijack your thread, just wanted to say how much I'm enjoying it.
 
It's a loooooooooooong way from a Champ (the little UMX Champ?) to this.

Keep at it and get to where something that moves twice as fast is comfortable to fly before trying one of of these. Granted, I'm speaking from having five flights on my Battlecruiser (which is my first RC rocket glider) now.....but quite a few years of RC flying. I would consider myself a competent sport flyer - not precise enough to do competition aerobatics and not skilled enough with the left hand in particular to do some of the crazy stuff that goes by the term "3D flying".

To the OP: is that rudder pushrod unsupported that whole length? If so it's gong to work great pulling (left rudder) but might not be much good for right rudder due to bending/buckling. I suppose since you mainly want left rudder to counteract the model's tendency to turn right it might be OK.
 
It's a loooooooooooong way from a Champ (the little UMX Champ?) to this.

Keep at it and get to where something that moves twice as fast is comfortable to fly before trying one of of these. Granted, I'm speaking from having five flights on my Battlecruiser (which is my first RC rocket glider) now.....but quite a few years of RC flying. I would consider myself a competent sport flyer - not precise enough to do competition aerobatics and not skilled enough with the left hand in particular to do some of the crazy stuff that goes by the term "3D flying".

To the OP: is that rudder pushrod unsupported that whole length? If so it's gong to work great pulling (left rudder) but might not be much good for right rudder due to bending/buckling. I suppose since you mainly want left rudder to counteract the model's tendency to turn right it might be OK.

FLYING RC - Suggest you look at trainers at MotionRC. And/or consider a computer flight simulator for RC models.

RUDDER PUSHROD - Near the front base of the fin, there is a guide tube for the pushrod. It is over 1 inch long, and held with Blenderm tape.

I must admit that I am not thrilled with my setup on the rudder. But since I am trying to add left rudder for better aileron control, rather than use the rudder for flight control, I think my setup will work.
 
I would have inset the rudder in the vertical fin base stack of foam since it isn't that far back from the CG and your nose is very far ahead it wouldn't have cost much in weight and you could do a direct pushrod setup and would hide it better. I do want to note, this seems to be a unique problem to his particular model that I have not noticed in mine. Hopefully it will fix it for him.
 
I saw that bit near the leading edge of the fin but couldn't tell if it was a support/guide tube or if it was a heat shrink tubing adjustable splice.

Hopefully that will be enough.

My Battlecruiser has no such issue. After five flights it's now grey rather than white, but no other real detailing added yet. I'm going to rig something for the forward photon torpedo tube I think....
 
It took me a little doing, but I found it. Will keep that in mind. I was thinking more about a JT-5C covered in chrome Monkote projecting from the front....or something along those lines.
 
Had a good flight today, with my Klingon Battlecruiser. The rudder control addition did improve its ability to turn to the left, especially in fairly windy conditions.

Knocked of Right Warp nacelle on landing. Maybe some of the cause of my turning issues?

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Thanks. There is some method to the madness here.

It was a windy day. I am guessing that the winds were over 10 mph, maybe closer to 15 mph.

In these wind conditions, I have found that it can be very difficult to get the rocket glider to glide back to the launch location if it gets downwind. I also expected the wind to "push" the rocket glider right after launch.

So, I actually had something of a FLIGHT PLAN: After launch, direct the glider into the wind, at roughly a 45 degree angle. After the motor cuts out, turn the glider back to the launch site (travelling downwind). Once the model gets back to the launch site, turn into the wind again. I was expecting to get very little forward progress going into the wind, due to the wind speeds.

Another challenge for the day was the field conditions. It wasn't terribly muddy, but there were a few spots of puddles, especially south of the launch site. In fact, I thought I had screwed up, and waited too late to make my turn. To make headway into the wind, I would dive slightly to gain airspeed. When the model is 20 to 25 feet off the ground, I fly over some fairly large puddles.

Fun fun fun! :);)o_O
 
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I am using a 1/4 inch launch rod, about 48 inches tall. It has a 5 degree angle (85 degrees from the ground), and I have it pointed into the wind. In this launch, the launch rod is pointed into the wind (north; the direction the camera is facing).

The bottom, or "belly", of the Klingon Battlecruiser is facing the wind. Otherwise, the wind blows it around too much.
 
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