Wot 4 Foam-E Flaperon advice needed.

[Vic Clare 1]

I've just started flying my E Wot 4 from a woodland clearing site. The strip is 70meters long, undulating and covered in something green( not trees) but not your normal grass. Landings are far more challenging than on conventional sites I'm used to. The approach is over 3 feet tall gorse bushes which create considerable turbulence on finals. Because of this I've been trying a much steeper landing approach but the model just refuses to come down unless I feed in a fisful of down but then I'm travelling at warp speed and Go arounds are almost mandatory.

I fly with a Spektrum DX6i and I've just wired it for flaperons. Has anyone out there any experience of this on an E Wot 4 and can you suggest what would be a sensible percentage of flap to start with in my flaperon mix.

All suggestions and thoughts would be gratefully received before I go and try it out. I suspect bicycle clips will be a must on the day too!

Vic

[Denis Watkins]

Flaperons can be fun Vic, and although I would not recommend them in your case, I will answer your question as 25 degrees as a starting point

I think you could float the Wot 4 in ok in that distance without flaps but as you say there may be rough terrain unknown to me.

For me, Flaperons are better on a craft with some authority and weight, and even then they are not best case scenario

Go ahead with your experiment and report to us as it may be a blinding success

[TIM Shaw]

I think I popping your ailerons up and using them as spoilerons would actually be a better solution in this case?

[John Lee]

I think you are trying to fly too fast. A Wot4 foam-e will land in virtually it's own length, you should be able to take off and land comfortably in 10 meters let alone 70.

The model will fly very slowly (in extremis at zero airspeed in the hover) at a high angle of attack & about a third to half throttle. With virtually no tip stall it is safe to manoeuvre at much lower airspeeds than 90% of other models, even those with effective flaps.

I'd suggest starting on a calm day at altitude & practice with increasing up elevator to gradually slow down whilst keeping at a level altitude by adjusting the throttle. When you are comfortable flying around holding the low airspeed make some approaches using the throttle to control your rate of decent & the elevator to control the the airspeed - more 'up' to go slower, less throttle to go steeper. You should never 'have to put in a fistful of down' to steepen the approach, rather just close the throttle bit. Be aware however that closing the throttle will reduce the elevator & rudder effectiveness as they lose the draft from the prop slipstream, hence the practice at altitude.

Just like the full size!

Flaperons may help a bit but the Wot 4 stall is so benign anyway I suspect the effect will be marginal.

Edited By John Lee on 24/07/2017 19:43:06

[og]

70m you lucky sod we have 40m

[Stevo]

Wot4 Foamie landing in 70m? Blimey! What speed are you landing at? You should be able to pop it down in front of you .. Yep I've experimented on one of these and a RIOT, didn't make a huge difference really.

Edited By Stevo on 24/07/2017 21:04:28

[Vic Clare 1]

It's not just me that has the problem and even more experienced pilots struggle with what is a challenging landing approach. Because of the proximity of trees we all have to keep a blue line (sky) between the model and tree tops so we're at height on the base leg. As we turn onto finals were still quite high and with a short run over the gorse which is a bit like a wind tunnel. I've tried slow approach and as the model slows it starts to wallow and has far less authority unless some down is fed in to aid penetration, but then it speeds up. I always have an open mind and am never too proud to copy a good idea. I will experiment some more taking into account your comments, so thanks everyone.

I did think about installing an aileron rudder mix on a switch which should give me more authority for level flight when flying slowly on approach in the wind tunnel over the gorse. I'm still up for looking for a workable solution.

I'm shall see how I fare keeping the fus level, controlling speed with elevator and controlling height with power too. I'm gonna be looking for the best solution cbecause I need to figure how to get from 'where I am to where 'I wanna be.

So all comments welcome, warts and all!

Vic

[Mark a]

I had flaperons programmed on my Wot4 XL but they didn't make a huge amount of difference due to the wotty's big wing. I had a foamie wot 4 and could land that at walking pace but your strip does sound like a challenge so you could try to side slip it in which will give you a fare amount of drag to help slow it down.