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The Atom Special


Richard Harris
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Alan,

It will perfect for dipping the old fixed wing toe into the puddle of autogyros wink 2

 

Cali, scale it up 3 or 4 times and its in your league! teeth 2

 

OK, moving to the boom...

Made from two lengths of 6mm square spruce cut to a length of 400mm each. T1 joins them at the rear and is glued into position first.

 

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The two square strips are then inserted into the female holes created in to the rear of the fuselage making sure they are in until they bottom out.

 

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Making sure everything is square T2 is glued into position flush with the rear of the fuselage

 

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The boom can then be pulled out of the fuselage (it will not be fixed making it removable). At the rear there are two 3mm lite ply T3's top and bottom which are drilled where shown straight through, this will be for the rudder bell crank.

Turning it over the tail skid is fixed centrally to T1, you will note that I have added a small skid made from 0.8mm Fibre glass sheet. I am sure builders will be able to cobble up something better, maybe a steerable tail wheel, there are some clever builders out there.

 

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Rich

 

 

Edited By Richard Harris on 16/08/2014 20:03:46

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The rudder is connected to a bell crank via a simple closed loop system, keeping things simple I had the idea of using a servo out put arm. A rummage through my bits and pieces I found a few of the cross type arms (mine is a standard futaba arm), one arm was cut off and the remainder becomes a bell crank on the cheap.

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Its centre hole was opened out until it slid over a piece of 10g piano wire with no slop, the axle is cut t a length of around 30mm and is slid through the hole in T3. It is captivated on the underside with a suitable wheel collet.

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Onto the top is slipped a spacer, being tight I used one of those shaft inserts that we all get left over with an electric prop

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On top of that goes the servo arm bell crank with another wheel collet on top. Fitted to the centre arm is one of those (not sure what they are called?) servo thingies??

img_4562.jpg

All the bits used

img_4557.jpg

Rich

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Chris,

It doesn't need to be pushed in right to up to F2 , my prototype has a piece of foam in the nose before the lipo is fitted.

As a cheap alternative I have opted to make my pilot out of blue foam. Bearing in mind this is no scale aircraft something very basic will do fine here.

I started off by drawing an outline of a pilot out of my head, a simple helmet is easy to do as there are no facial features to worry about.

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I cut around the profile with a coping saw then separated the helmet and body.

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Starting with a sharp knife I trimmed away until it was close to how I think it should look

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Then with fine sand paper it is finished off.

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The good thing with blue foam is you can press any lumps into it at the final stages.

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Fits OK into the canopy floor I made yesterday, time t paint it whilst the sun is out with some water based enamel.

Rich

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I have given the pilot and canopy floor a couple of coats of quick drying water based enamel, seat belts are drawn on with a permanent marker pen. The visor is aluminium duct tape.

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Though completely wrong I made up a steering wheel using a small length of silicone fuel tubing pulled down into position with cocktail sticks, all painted black.

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I used this UHU glue bought from the pound shop to glue the pop bottle canopy into position.

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the canopy is held in position with duct tape until the glue has cured.

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When dry the canopy is removed and trimmed leaving an over hang of around 10mm so that the canopy self locates into position. To keep it down I will add a couple of magnets.

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Jobs a 'Good Un' thumbs up

On to the U/C next

Rich

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The U/C is made in two parts which are identical from 10g piano wire, easily bent up in a vice using our favourite tool in the bag!

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Using a correctly sized drill the holes in the U/C lower plate ar drilled out straight through the B1 and B2. The short leg is inserted into one hole

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Followed by the second leg

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A couple of simple fibre glass sheet clamps is all that is needed to secure the U/C in place. This will now be removed and put t one side in readiness for covering.

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Mast next

Rich

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Rich

I thought it must be something like that............Bit silly 500 long, eh Andy....could have a bit of a balance probsarcastic.

My build is just up with yours......its pretty complex..smiley

I have a couple of HK heads on the way that were ordered prior to this build...but hopefully are only a couple of days away.

Chris...

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dscf0001.jpgdscf0013.jpgdscf0011.jpgdscf0006.jpgdscf0004.jpgOK gents

This is the way I went about making a canopy for this model. Now I am pretty sure that a lot of you aware of the shrinking bottle method of moulding canopy's, but if its new to you ,then this may be of interest.

The plug was made of blocks of balsa sanded to shape. The surface needs only to be of a smooth finish using a course paper . I used a two ltr soft drink / pop / soda bottle with both ends removed. Using a heat gun on a low setting slowly and evenly apply the heat to the plastic. If two much heat is applied then you will find that the operation is hard to control and the material will discolour. This was my second attempt as I did not position the tube correctly.

As the heat is applied ,I could hear the fuz being squeezed leaving a few bruise marks on the balsa,which were later removed by applying water.

I'm pretty sure that Rich would have used a similar method .

Happy Landings

Chris..

I see that the picks did not come out in the correct order, but I am sure you will work it outsmiley

Edited By Chris Dowell on 24/08/2014 09:21:05

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Hi folks. Quite keen on this build, but I am worried that the weak link in the whole plan is going to be Hobbykings awful stock levels of parts which seem to spend most time on back order and unavailable. Also the head may only be a few pounds, but watch that postage as the only ones are in the 'international warehouse', and only a few at that. It ranges from £4.00 up to around £17.00 for postage so watch those tick boxes!

Cheers, Simon

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Hi Rich

Another great model for sure. One I intend to add to the very long build list.

Couple of questions:

To order the blades from UK would cost an absolute bomb in freight.

If I were to make them, what dimensions would I be looking at?

Alternatively, would the blades from the Hobby King Crane Fly suffice or would they be to small?

Chers

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dscf0009.jpgSteve

Look very carefully at the two pics and you will see the difference. Several years ago when the HK C-30 came on the market I got hold of one and could not get it to fly .Rich saw my pics and noticed the fault. As shown in my first pic...you will get NO lift. It is actually inverted. It's all to do with the angle of the blade into the oncoming wind. The flexing plate works OK as long as you replace the brittle plate supplied and you will also most likely find the white plastic parts will also break .The try glass plate is the way to go.

And those gents talking about the cost of the freight on one HK head....well its always going to work out like that...but buy putting a small order with several parts that will be required later soon ...then I think it brings it back to a more cost friendly exercise.

Chris...dscf0006-001.jpg

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Malcolm at Coolwind also stocks the heads, a little dearer but you can get them quick. I spoke to him at the Nats and he is also going to CNC cut the the Fibre Glass sheet parts for the ATOM thumbs up

HEAD

Looking good Chris, your canopy is a little different in shape to mine but the method is exactly the same, here is a video I made a few years back of me making a canopy for another model, it may be of help or it may not!

To use a 2 litre bottle for the ATOM canopy will be fine but you will have to thicken it up a bit more on the front/back and underside. Good thing about the 2 litre bottles are that you can get different colours.

Out of interest, I used a 1 litre flavoured spring water bottle from TESCO, three for £1.50, these make the cowl as well and there good for you wink 2

Rich

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