The Little Ship Brushless conversion

[Peter Miller]

Suffering from total designers block I am  going to build my fourth "Little Ship" but this time for a brushless motor.

 

The Little Ship was designed by Dick Shumacher and published in the January 1950 issue  of Model Airplane News. As this came out in December 1949 it is a genuine vintage model.

 The original featured "Ruddervator" control,a rotating vane which could be stopped in any of four positions giving selective right rudder,, down elevator, left rudder and up elevator.

The model is fantastic. it copes with stiff breezes, it will do beautiful rudder elevator rolls and it is surprisingly tough.  I lent mine out as a trainer for some time and it came back in one piece. One was flown every week for 6 years and eventually got too fuels soaked to carry on.

And all this from a 44" span model.

Oh I did enlarge it to 58" span and one club member built it and has been flying it for years on electric power.

Back in the Late 70s-Early 80s I even did a short run of kits which were popular

The conversion will allow one to build it for i.c with no modifications

 

[Peter Miller]

Well Good progress.  All the parts cut out.  Fuselage sides assembled with the 1/8" and 3/16 sq along the edges.

 

Not many parts to cut out

Formers added and servo rails added as it is easier at the stage

 Fuselage sides joined with formers.  The engine mount  former is not fitted as the sides have to be pulled into fit.

Below stiffeners added to the 1/8th sheet tail components

St

[Peter Miller]

Well progress is fast  The orginal firewall just has a spacer to bring the motor 

 

The battery platform has been fitted

 

The under carriage is freely pivoted.  It will have a v brace underneath after covering which will have an elastic band holding it withla forward rake

 This is the view when it is mounted 

The wings are just about the easiest ever.

Just got to raise each tip 2 1/2 inches,add the tips and sheet the centre sectiom

 

 

[Piers Bowlan]

Good work Peter, looking forward to the plan. 👍

I have just dug out my Jan 2009 RCM&E plan of your enlargement 'The Big Ship'. I thought an electric version would be nice for that too and a good alternative to a Super 60.

[Peter Miller]

We have an electric powered version of the Big Ship flying in the club.  The owner has been flying it for years. It is his favourite model

[Piers Bowlan]

I thought It might be simpler to build one of these without the ‘flying boat type’ v-hull profile, which in turn would make the undercarriage simpler (and removable). 
On the other hand this feature does provide the model with character and without it, it might not be ‘The Little Ship’ but instead look just like another high wing trainer?

[Peter Miller]

2 hours ago, Piers Bowlan said:

I thought It might be simpler to build one of these without the ‘flying boat type’ v-hull profile, which in turn would make the undercarriage simpler (and removable). 
On the other hand this feature does provide the model with character and without it, it might not be ‘The Little Ship’ but instead look just like another high wing trainer?

Very true.  And I am doing the original undercarriage which is free to pivot with a "V" underneath and elastic bands to a screw under the nose. It all adds character and isn't much harder