Baby Clown Construction Hints?

Anyone out there got a Baby Clown that they like? Flies good? How did you set it up? What does yours weigh? Engine? Lines? CG?

Mine is about half framed, and I'm worried the mods are gonna make it a pig....

Dave
LA_Flyer
"Little Pukey Profile Dude"

LAST EDITED ON Jul-10-04 AT 00:02 AM (CDT)
 
I flew my Baby Clown last year at the NW Regionals and scored a two flight average of 469. http://aeromaniacs.com/Northwest2003.htm
I modified my to accept a beam mount for a Norvel BigMig .049. I only put about one penny for tip weight and moved the lead-outs further up to about 1/2" behind the C.G. The C.G. was about 15%. I used an APC 5.5 X 2.5 prop with a Brodak BH521 1 OZ tank modified to uniflow (no muffler presure) I flew the Baby Clown on .008 X 42' cable. The total flying weight came out to a hair less than 7 oz.

I use wheels and gear from an electric park flyer. I epoxied it into the fuselage using 1" X 1/4" dowl to support it. This will help save some weight. The wing is covered with the supplied light silkspan and is painted with about 6 coats of clear colored with only dye.

More setup info is on my web page under Tips, please check it out.

>Anyone out there got a Baby Clown that they like? Flies
>good? How did you set it up? What does yours weigh? Engine?
>Lines? CG?
>
>Mine is about half framed, and I'm worried the mods are
>gonna make it a pig....
>
>Dave
>LA_Flyer
>"Little Pukey Profile Dude"

Hi Dave, what modifications are you talking about? The Brodak
Baby Clown(an abstraction of the original PDQ Baby Clown), is
only 134sq"....build it as light as you can....preferably 6oz's or
less if possible. I think Larry Rengers' Baby Clown weighs 5 1/2ozs.
It is powered with a PAW .5cc diesel. It flys beautifly at that
weight and that .5cc power. A modern 1/2a engine in this model is
Overkill. I also believe Larry is using .008"x 40' lines.
Good luck with your Baby Clown. Tony

Dave,
Put that Baby Clown back in the box and finish that Buster!!!

Send pics!!!

Thanks
Paul

LAST EDITED ON Jul-12-04 AT 05:00 PM (CDT)
 
Actually, 5 ounces even and 37' lines. I scored 486 points in Classic with it one time snagging 3rd place against the "big guys". The little PAW 55 requires all of 3/8 oz of fuel to complete the pattern (new or OT).

John Wright has taken the Leprechaun trophy twice with his Baby Clown. It is powered by a C*x Medallion .049. He won 1cc last year and came in 2nd this year with that plane.

It is a very pleasant plane to fly. No bad habits. Scaled up to about 240 sq.in. with a 1cc engine it could be awfully good! Then again, I think that is bigger than the full size Clown...

A "full size Clown" is 350 sq.in.; a Super CLown. A Flying CLown is about 200 sq.in.
Bare

>Actually, 5 ounces even and 37' lines. I scored 3rd place
>in Classic with it one time snagging 3rd place against the
>"big guys". The little PAW 55 requires all of 3/8 oz of
>fuel to complete the pattern (new or OT).
>
>John Wright has taken the Leprechaun trophy twice with his
>Baby Clown. It is powered by a C*x Medallion .049. He won
>1cc last year and came in 2nd this year with that plane.
>
>It is a very pleasant plane to fly. No bad habits. Scaled
>up to about 240 sq.in. with a 1cc engine it could be awfully
>good! Then again, I think that is bigger than the full size
>Clown...

Heman, Tony and Larry,

Thanks for the help! I wanted to use a Cox Medallion .049 that I had (practically brand new) so I made a new fuselage and landing gear. The wing assembly, uncovered but with the controls installed is about 42 gm; the fuselage is about 29 gm, the tail is stock. Depending on my (lousy) painting ability it may be possible to keep it under 6 oz. I'll have to measure all the bolt-on pieces tonight. I'm guessing that the Medallion isn't any heavier than the BigMig. Thanks for the info on the tanks! I'll check to see if the same tank will fit my fuselage. I wanted to use MonoKote on the flying surfaces, but now am wondering if it will add too much weight.

Regarding tip weight, it sounds like the 1/4 oz. might be too much? I trimmed a miniscule amount off the chunk provided to fit inside the rib profile. I would hate to cut things open....

Because the wire landing gear was designed to go with the plastic motor mount, I set it aside also. I made up some aluminum legs using 4-40 bolts for axles. I think the gear is around 5 gm.

What did you guys use for the elevator horn? The plans show a fairly reasonable size one, and there is one on the parts list. What I got was the tiny one that came molded to the bellcrank parts. Will this make it too sensitive?

Dave
LA_Flyer

PS--Sorry about getting sidetracked from the Buster project Rootbeard! I smashed my new (well, WAS new) igNoblarf last week on the first day of the holiday weekend. I needed to build something to cheer me up, that I wouldn't agonize over, and something that if I screwed it up because of a misaligned mental state I wouldn't feel too bad about..... I didn't want to mess up the Buster. Building a quicky 1/2A seemed like the perfect cure. Fun so far!

PPS--The igNoblarf is still sitting in pieces all over the living room. Initially the crash didn't seem that bad (low pullout from my 4th vertical eight attempt) since it hit at such a shallow angle, but the fuselage really came apart. It is rebuildable, but still annoys me when I look at it.... At least it is still in the house! The Lightning Streak is in a garbage bag out in the garage....

Hey Dave,
Sorry to hear about your Nobler. Was just kidding about the Buster. I can not get Josh to do 3 laps in a row without taking a short cut and popping over the top.
He just wants to have fun. Guess that is why we are called fun flyers.
The Clown sounds like a fun plane.
We head to Mucie on Thursday!!!
Take care

Paul

The Brodak Baby Clown does not have any spar and center sheeting, so it may be difficult to put hi-temp monokote on the wing.

I would just use the supplies light-silkspan. If you want to use an iron on film, try "Nelson Lite Flim". I just covered my old 1/2A stunter with it and it came out very lite. It tricky to put on, because the ends want to curl in like suran wrap.

Heman,

I forgot to tell you that I sheeted the center section like a conventional profile stunter using 1/20" balsa. I think I can get the film on. The toughest part would be the tips. Whether film is too heavy or warps the wing in the sun would be a good question. With no spars, etc. the covering has to supply almost all of the torsional rigidity.

I've been avoiding dope finishes. My last one was less than durable. Pactra/Aerogloss(?) yellow on a tissue covered Mouse racer. Lots of fissures, crackle, and other uglies. I'd like to build one airplane that looks good....

Still have to weigh the parts tonight to see how much of the weight budget is left for the finish. Gotta remember to weigh a penny, too since you recommended that for tip weight.

What did you use for hinges? Control horn?

Thanks for the help! Wish I had a camera so's you could see the parts....I'll try to talk my buddy into taking some photos.

I always use a medium or large size nylon horn on all my 1/2A model. It make the control less sensitive.

Use Brodak Dope instead of Aero-gloss. The new Aero-gloss dope is cramp. It has a problem with cracking. I only use clear dope on my 1/2a model. You can dye the dope directly with Polyspan dye after the 2nd coat. Put it on very thin and it good really good.

Ok, I weighed the BabyClown parts last night. Before finish, and not including fuel tubing and fasteners, everything weighs 5.8 oz.

Wing Assembly (incl. bellcrank, leadouts, tip wt.) 49.5 gm
Fuselage Assembly (incl. canopy, motor mts, doublers) 31.9
Horizontal stabilizer and elevator 5.5
Vertical Stabilizer and Rudder 1.2
Engine (Cox Medallion .049 w/ stock spinner & screw) 46.5
Fuel Tank (wrong tank, 1 oz. stolen from racer) 20.9
Landing Gear (.032 alum sheet) 5.7
Wheels (blue racing wheels from D. Albert) 3.3
Propeller ?

Total 164.5 gm
5.8 oz

I weighed a stack of pennies. The average weight is only 2.52 gm. Even with a side mounted engine, using a single penny for tip weight seems kinda light. Did I understand correctly? You would need almost 3 pennies to get to the 1/4 oz. on the plans.

So if I want to keep the finished plane under 7 oz., it looks like the finish has to be less than 1.2 oz. I guess if I looked at the data sheets for the different plastic coverings, they would list the oz./sq ft. Not sure what a silkspan/dope finish would weigh....

Rootbeards,

Nah! You can razz me about the demise of my igNoblarf and my lack of skill that nearly killed it. Everyone else did!

I need to start putting filler on the Buster. Not sure if I should use more epoxy with microballoons or what. (Can you tell I slow down when I get stuck?)

I hope you guys are having a GREAT vacation. You should enjoy the days you spend at the NATs, too. I still can't get over the whole "Josh Field" thing. What a deal! Don't worry about Mr. Wingover. Mebbe we'll just time ten laps including maneuvers!!! Now, before he gets together with ol' Propbuster and they outsmart us all, doing ten loops over the starting line definitely does NOT count!

All the best to the "travelin' Rootbeards!"

For an ultra light finish, put 2 coats of clear (oil base) Urethane on the fuselage and tail, and CoverLite tissue on the wings. No dope needed on the Coverlite it is TOTALLY fuelproof. It is an iron-on, lighter than clear-doped Japanese tissue, and WAY tough. You stick it on by sealing the wood with SIG Stik-It or Balsarite if you still have it (Tower won't ship it to California), then ironing the covering down.

That tank is far too heavy. Build one out of .005 brass, or use a small plastic bottle. See my "Tanks fer Nuttin" article in Flying Models a couple of years ago. Most "Travel Size" toiletry bottles are fuelproof, and Goop Adhesive is also fuelproof. Poke holes for tubes and seal them with Goop, plus you can see what is happening in the tank.