MORANE SAULNIER A1 1/3 scale

[Steve Fox]

Hello there all

Well a new build on the table, well to be honest, I started this building this model about 5 years ago and got quite a bit done on the fuselage and tail feathers. But work and starting up a business which until Covid19 arrived was doing very well. So we were flat-out and no time to spare on this project at all.

Life is quieter now and I am making up for lost time.

So this week has been about re familiarize myself with it and where I had got to with it.

It is a Balsa USA plan and I am building from scratch. 103 inch wing span, 25 to 30 lbs and 40 to 60cc engine.

Basic information is the Morane Saulnier AI is a ww1 aircraft initially was a French parasol combat plane which was looking very promising but structural problems with the wing and there appears to have been several deaths related to the wings collapsing. The issue doesn't appear to have been resolved quick enough and future orders I believe were not carried on with 

The Morane was relegated to a trainer role. I will check up on this. Anyway it certainly caught my attention and it has nice lines and a few choices for detailing.

 

Cheers Steve NZ

 

[GrumpyGnome]

That's a VERY nice aeroplane with a VERY short nose!  Lots of lead needed methinks.........

[Steve Fox]

8 hours ago, GrumpyGnome said:

That's a VERY nice aeroplane with a VERY short nose!  Lots of lead needed methinks.........

Yes I agree, going to have to keep the back end as light as possible 

Cheers Steve 

[2.4g Shaun]

Steve,

I've had a couple of BUSA 1/3rd scale Morane's. Great planes to fly.I  used a Zenoah 62 for power and it didn't need much lead up front to balance things up but keep the battery, servos as far forward as possible. One mod I would suggest is a vertical grained compression strut (I believe I used med soft 1/2" sq) between the fin bottom and lower fus as on rough ground it tipped over and "tent pegged" the fin causing damage to the top of the fus where the fin fixes. I know it works as it happened again after the mod and no damage happened . 

 

I like them that much I'm now on my third one. This time it's a Seagull ARTF and I'm very impressed with the quality of it other than the pilot that weighs about as much as a small child. 😁

 

Watching the build with interest. 👍

Edited September 17, 2023 by 2.4g Shaun
Added pic

[2.4g Shaun]

[Steve Fox]

Hi Shaun.

Thanks very much for your input. You must really like this plane to have had a couple of them now! 

I love the picture you have shown, if I get close to that standard I will be very happy for sure.

The power plant size seems to be quite wide from 40 to 60 cc for this model.

You mentioned a 62, is that plenty of power with reserve??

What weight did your builds achieve 🤔 

My main focus this week is just reminding myself of where I got to with it.

This scratch build BUSA 1/4 scale Fokker will be having its first flight at the end of the month 

Cheers Steve 

 

 

[Steve Fox]

Hello all

Well I can tell you today with confidence that no one was flying RC planes in the whole of New Zealand

yesterday and today. The spring winds arrived in full force created havoc everywhere 

We missed the worst of it with only 45 km winds but elsewhere in the country particularly in back farming areas and remote coastal areas  top gusts where recorded at 240 kms!!

So no gardening for me and the garage although noisy. I headed back in to work on the Morane.

The point today's continued efforts was to see if I could drop some overall weight of what I had completed to date.

I have this bad habit of over building my planes, with my last two projects proving this point. Both tail draggers and tail heavy!.
I had most of the fuselage and tail feathers completed. So last night and a couple of hours today I went back through the frames to see where I could lose weight without compromising strength. 
Pleased with the effort and it resulted in reasonable improvement to the weight.
Results below:

MORANE SAULNIER A1 1/3 scale 
Weight loss exercise 

Fuselage 2100 now 1912 gms
9 percent loss of weight 

Tail feathers 177 gms  now  169 gm
4.5 percent loss of weight. 

 

Over weight of 8.6 percent of fus and tail group 

2277gms down to 2081gms 

Includes weight of two hitec Maga servos and 2 futaba 3010 servos in situ.

 

I still have to fine sand the fus and tail group yet so may represent more gms lost.

I estimate that 60 %of that loss is behind the CG area. 

Hopefully a quieter night ,the winds are easing off. 
Cheers Steve 
 

[Steve Fox]

Hi 

Thought to add that is 6.9 ozs of weight removed from the fuselage and tail group rather than grams 

Cheers Steve 👍 

[2.4g Shaun]

Hi Steve, 

I did have a Fuji 45 at first in the  one pictured but it can be quite a draggy aircraft and a boot of power will save the day so replaced it with the Z62 .  Can't remember what the weight was. The one in the pic was lighter than my first. This was built from the plan like yours, not the kit like the first one. I would guess it was around 12 - 13kg.  Looking at the booklet on my latest Seagull one it states just over 12kg. 

 

Shaun.

[2.4g Shaun]

When you get to flying I would definitely put differential in the ailerons. Mine only had about 1/2" down from memory - It will turn nicer.

[2.4g Shaun]

[2.4g Shaun]

A couple more to get you building. 😀

[2.4g Shaun]

In the cockpit shot you can see the carbon pushrods from the servos mounted right up  to the bulkhead going under the seat to bellcranks for the pull, pull cables on the rudder and elevator halves.

 

[2.4g Shaun]

Wheels are a tad oversized. Come off  a 1/3 Camel but back then technically not incorrect as they would use what was available to repair aircraft and get them back in the sky. 

 

Fokker looks great, good luck with the test flight.

Edited September 18, 2023 by 2.4g Shaun
Typo

[Steve Fox]

Hi

Shaun 

Thanks heaps for the pictures, you have inspired me even more to get on with the build!

Funny I had not read your posts until now.  I have just come in after removing the servos from where I had placed them originally which was under the cockpit area 🤔, not sure now why I placed them there in that position. I worked out why up-front was considerably better.

Upshot is I also removed the bearers from the servos gaining further weight loss from behind the CG area.

I realized that I had sufficient room in the bulkhead area for them to go.

Planning on pull pull cables for rudder and elevator.

I managed to miss place my manual for the plane ,but was able to download a digital copy from the BUSA site last night.

I found my data file on the Morane which I tucked away also in a difficult place to find.

Eventually found it amongst all my books in the gardening section??.

Another thing I discovered sorting out where I had got to with it from a couple of years ago was I had traced out most of the wing ribs!! Bonus there!!.

I cut out a couple of  them and tentatively placed them over a spar, also which I had laminated one earlier at some point. 

Last thing I  achieved was another weight saving idea to investigate. Wondering about lightening the wing ribs without compromising strength. I cut one out for a trail.

the weight when from 8 gms to 4 gms. 

Is this pushing it abit. 

Readers thoughts are very welcome. 

Again Cheers to Shaun for your time and pictures. 

Steve NZ 

Edited September 20, 2023 by Steve Fox
Grammar

[Paul De Tourtoulon]

11 minutes ago, Steve Fox said:

Eventually found it amongst all my books in the gardening section??.

That sounds like a bad 'omen',,,,

[2.4g Shaun]

Steve, I wouldn't bother lightening the ribs. The bit of weight saved is minimal but you will loose a considerable amount of strength unless you cut them from lite ply which would then weigh the same as the original balsa ones. 😀

[Steve Fox]

On 21/09/2023 at 02:55, 2.4g Shaun said:

Very true on that point .Will leave as is 

Cheers 

 

Steve, I wouldn't bother lightening the ribs. The bit of weight saved is minimal but you will loose a considerable amount of strength unless you cut them from lite ply which would then weigh the same as the original balsa ones. 😀

 

[Steve Fox]

Hi all

Not much to report for the last couple of days,  the wet weather really set ,bringing snow to the hills around us. So it meant time in front of the fire and cups ot tea.

Frost tonight so it will be a cold start in the morning. 

Does anyone have any handy suggestions for  the tail post and rudder. I don't want to use hinges, but more of brass tubing inside a slightly larger gauge. 

Is that a possibility. I haven't tried anything along those lines as yet.

Started painting the pilot over the last few weeks as time allows. 

Cheers Steve NZ 

 

[FlyinFlynn]

The rudder hinge is a long way back and brass is heavy.  I would have thought it would be better to use pin hinges in a traditional rounded leading edge and concave trailing edge.

[2.4g Shaun]

Hi Steve. 

I've used split pins bonded into the leading and trailing edges of the fin & rudder (same for elevator) then used smaller split pins for the hinge pins. From memory the Morane didn't have a  concave t.e. on the fin / tailplane. Far too modern for this old bus. I believe the leading edge of the rudder/ elevator was tubular and the hinges were   metal straps.  

The rudder horn is internal in the fus on the Morane A1 so you have a pivot , load bearing point where it enters the fus. Have a look on the web at diagrams for the hinges on Sopwith Pups, Camels etc. They were very similar in their approach to hinging control surfaces.

 

Edited September 26, 2023 by 2.4g Shaun
Typo

[Steve Fox]

Thanks heaps guys yes keeping the weight out of the back is of the utmost importance. 

Thanks for the input 

Cheers Steve NZ 

[Steve Fox]

I will look that up Shaun 

Cheers Steve 

[Steve Fox]

Hi all

a small amount accomplished over the last 2 days , the spring winds have a been blowing strongly and making it hard to be outside for long as the temperatures aren't great yet.

I got on with doing further shaping of the tail feathers,rudder etc. I am really taking note of any excess dried glue.

As I started this project over 4 years ago and it sat there collecting dust, I have kinda have forgotten what I had completed and what my strategies were going to be in building the Morane 

Looks like I used wood working glue in the construction of the rudder, fin etc and it has held up well. I had cut slots for the fin/rudder to accommodate flat hinges and Robart hinges points for the elevator. 

Further to this the rudder has bent piano wire glued into it with  a brass tube over that pointing down go to through the fuselage. 

Discovering this I had a closer look at the plans.

The brass tubing is for connecting to a push/pull or pull/pull setup. 

I also found I had started to make the belly pan sometime ago as well,so a further bonus there. 

 

Wire bending sorted as well, but I knew that as I purchased those along with the cowl and wheels from the Balsa USA company. Along with most of the Balsa and plywood needed for the Morane.

I don't know what prices are like over your way but here materials are really costly here.

I remember at the time it was going to be cheaper to bring it over here from the states than buying it here.

That's all for now, hopefully flying in the morning if the winds keep down long enough..cheers Steve NZ 

[Steve Fox]

Hi

Great, I managed to get some flying in this morning at the patch.

Not sure if I mentioned that the local full size club lets fly there with a few rules for safety. 

Remarkably the breeze stayed right down this morning so 4 flights in.

The snow on the Southern alps is still right down if you can see in the pictures.

Cheers Steve NZ