A Wing Dragon - My first ARTF

[Simon Chaddock]

Although an experienced balsa nut I have just acquired my first ARTF - a Wing Dragon (electric 4 channel). It says all you need is 8 AA cells for the transmitter and to put it together - well not quite!

I ordered mine from Nitrotec and it was delivered promptly in a huge well padded box. So far so good. All the parts were in the box and nothing was damaged. It even includes a charger & simulation software. Even better.

It is quite a big simple model (moulded foam wings, plastic fuselage, pusher prop) but following the English assembly instructions is not so easy, most of the words are there ok - but not necessarily in the right order! It is obviously cheap and cheerful so is was not expecting too much but it actually went together nicely and looks pretty robust. It is supposed to be capable of inverted flight - we shall see.

My first real concern came when I looked at the ailerons. The push rods to the wing mounted servos were of different lengths and not even in the same horn holes. The ailerons are bottom hinged so they have limited up travel and the way the rods were set the full up limit occurred with only 10% of the servo travel. In addition the rudder push rod was so over length that it had to be shortened by 4mm to fit  at all. To be fair with a little care and attention everything was fixable and it all works well but I am sure it would have never flown "straight out of the box". Flight pics to follow!

From my point of view the attraction is that all the radio gear is very conventional (& small) so it can easily be transposed to another model. I have in mind a nice scale DH2 to make use of that pusher prop.

[Former Member]

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[Simon Chaddock]

It might not have been Almost Ready To but it does Fly. Really quite well. Note the full span ailerons.

Flew three times this evening. First flight started OK plenty of power but briefly lost sight of it in the low sun and as not yet properly trimmed - crunch. A pusher prop may be well protected but what happens when the wing (held on with rubber bands) is pushed back? The trailing edge gets chewed up!

Second flight now virtually no wind so I gave it a bit more of a shove. Climbed strongly, rather too stongly, had something moved from the previous flight? No just my rather strong launch had dislodged the battery pack (it just pushes into a foam mounting in the nose of the cockpit). A bit of firm down elevator to contain the imminent stall and oops! the battery is now hanging down in the breeze by its lead! Fortunately the Deans connector is very tight. Still flying OK if a little tail heavy, bring it into the wind, power off, gently down, don't let it stall. Thinks - boy am I glad this is a deserted playing field, no audience!

Third flight no problem at all. Adjust the trims, flies well on about half power but the high thrust line and low set tail does mean quite a distinct nose up trim change as the power comes off. Controls quite powerful so I am sure basic aeros are possible. Nice gentle landing and its "quit while you are ahead" time to repair the wing. And all this fun on one battery charge!

[Former Member]

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[Klippy]

Hi Simon, have just bought one of these, can you tell me what is a good CG position?

[Jonathan Lewzey]

I had a similar problem with my aerobird ages ago chewing up the wing with a rear mounted prop. the best repair is to use some clear sticky backed plastic and just reattach the original foam or make a new bit.

 

i'd say the wing dragon is more of a RTF than a ARTF as most ARTFs need r/c and engine installing at least. often the wings must be joined and the tail feathers attached too.

[Tony Read 2]

Something I learned form my Electrafun, always double-up the number of lacky bands you put on. I use four, two crossed over and two running fore & aft. Never had a prop strike doing that. They also tend to need a little bit of extra nose weight.