Cardboard RC Airplane Grade 8 St. Elijah Leader: Ronil Caro Members: Alexander Rauto George Leonard Bumagat
II. Importance of the Research The importance of the research is it could be used as a drone to gather information or could be for lightweight transport on nearby places. The Cardboard RC Airplane is a device we could use for different kind of stuff, e.g. sending mails. This homemade plane could save time and can also help the environment by recycling cardboards and other things we could use as a material. Basically, the Cardboard RC Plane is for surveillance but who might know it could be developed and be used as a drone to our battlefields or a video camera to know the other unknown planets to go to.
III. Materials and Procedure Materials:
Tape Cutter/Scissor Glue gun and glue stick Motor(Gear) 2 pcs. Servo Mechanism Control Horn
2 pcs. 21.5”x15”x15” cardboard 2 pcs. 1.5”x14.5” cardboard 2 pcs. 10.6”x10.6” cardboard 2 pcs 1.5”x1.5” cardboard 1 pc. 6”x 6”x1” cardboard
Procedure: Join together the two 21.5”x15”x15” cardboard and secure it with tape. Then using glue gun place the 10.6”x10.6” cardboard over the cardboard. Then glue the 1.5”x1.5” cardboard to the1.5”x14.5” cardboard. Then place the motor on the cardboard near the middle part and glue it. Take your 1.5”x14.5” cardboard and tape them to the end of the 21.5”x15”x15” cardboards and reinforce it with tape then the cut a 45o angle at the 1.5”x1.5” cardboard. Then on the lower-middle of the 21.5”x15”x15” cardboards cut a slice and glue the 6”x 6”x1” cardboard to it. Get the servos and stick it to the cuts using the glue gun. And do it to the control horns. And lastly test it.
IV. The Research itself
Introduction Cardboard RC planes. I am relatively new to RC flying from Hungary. My first experience with RC flying was a small three channel all foam trainer, a birthday gift few years back. I built the plane by my self with given instruction in the book of words. I learn to fly it with my uncle who gave me the trainer. Once I build the trainer, he was very happy and donated one of his old engines and a 3 channel AM radio for me to fly the trainer. In the area where I am living RC equipment are not available. I usually get things down from various international mail order companies (mostly from USA and/or England). Most of the time, I have paid more money for postage than for the goods! While learning I destroyed my foam trainer that it can not be repaired any more. But my trainer survived and helped me to gain a good experience on how to do basic maneuvers and I was able to fly it alone for about four months before it crashes due to a radio problem I suppose (low battery). Slowly I was able to finance for a Global Skylane 15, for my size 10 engine and 3channel radio. This was about US$ 30 and paid over 20 for surface mail postage! When this balsa kit arrived, I was very happy, but also surprised to see that many other items were needed to complete the kit (such as covering, wheels, etc.) Compared to my first trainer, which was cheaper, but was a complete kit except for the engine, prop and radio which my uncle gave me. Covering problem never came to me, because it uses kind of plastic sticker tape to cover the foam. It took few more months to save my days money to get down all I wanted. I paid nearly the same amount for two rolls of covering, wheels and some more bits (props & glow plugs). I build the whole plane by my self, only when covering and when I needed to clear something I consulted my uncle. My uncle is a very good teacher. He brought me to this hobby, showed me what to do and what not to do. I enjoyed this plane for some years. I still have this plane, retired (but I am sure it can still fly). I was very careful about battery and radio after I lost my foam trainer, because I loved it very much. I had few miner crashes with my Skylane, but I think it was a ideal second pale and I mastered RC flying with the Skylane. After few months of flying the Skylane, I got fed up with maintenance and flying the same thing every time. My uncle and my self got together to build our own plane, without importing any materiel from outside other than the things we could not build like engine, prop and radio. We first started building a copy of my foam trainer with white foam, which were available in 25-30mm maximum thickness and smaller. We used to call this type as "Regi-Foam", but it may be pronounced properly as "rigidfoam". The kind that they used for cool boxes, where they used to store ice-cram and stuff like that while transporting and it is the same kind they used for (while colour) packing electrical appliances. One problem that we had the thickness. My old trainer was about 70mm thick (now I can not remember how much exactly, but) even after two sheets glued on top of each other we could not get the required height. We had to use three sheets, once cut using the electric wire the sheets were bond nicely we could not see that they were glued. Any way we duplicated the trainer nicely - covered with tape, and it flew as good as my first plane. But we had lot of hassle building this plane. Hinges and horns were plastic on the original design, we used the same things salvaged from the old trainer. We realized it will be difficult to make a another copy of the same, without importing items from outside. On the other hand cutting foam with the wire, is not very easy. You need special equipment such as hot wire foam cutting bow and some skill to make smooth parts. Both my uncle and my self agreed if we had Balsa wood, it should have been
much easier to duplicate the Skylane. But covering materiel will have to be imported unless we used silk - which is a another hassle. Any way we did not have Balsa wood either. So we had to think of an another solution. The next materiel we used was fiberglass. Made an another copy using fiberglass mat and resin. With some difficulty we were able to build a trainer, but it never flew, it was heavy as a brick. My uncle converted it to a static model. He added details and build a very beautiful Cessna Cardinal. But that ended making RC planes with fiberglass. We continue thinking about material that we could use for building RC panes. Finally came up with the idea of using cardboard, easily available, cheap and easy to handle. We built four different simple models to finally master the techniques of how to build simple inexpensive cardboard RC models. To date we have built more than 20 planes of different kind, but most of them simple trainer type for the friends in our club. Some club members also have successfully built and mastered the techniques of building cardboard RC planes. We are very proud to say we have well over 30 different cardboard RC models in the club today (July 2001). They are all fly equally if not better than balsa models. Who said, RC flying is an expensive hobby? Well matter of fact it is an expensive hobby, but building planes is not expensive anymore! Here I am trying to explain how to build your own cardboard model. I must emphasize the fact that we have not gone very far from making Balsa models. It will be easy or difficult as building your own balsa model. We have previously tried using Rigid-foam, fiberglass models. We also incorporated these techniques where it is applicable and needed. Thus we can not say these are 100% cardboard crafts. I would say a highbred version. Because we used all the above material, even plywood where it was necessary. I am not going to explain how to build a particular model. But discuss some things in general that I will give you an idea how we build these simple models. For building we used mainly cardboard and rigid-foam. But we used fiberglass and resin where it is necessary to strengthen the structure. We used different types of cardboard, different areas of the model. For smaller aircraft wings we used thin materiel known as bristle-board, for fuselage we used a slightly thicker materiel known as box-board. We have not used corrugated cardboard to cover large areas, I don't say these corrugated materials can not be used, but they seems to be heavier than the materials that we used, but they are definitely stronger too. They may be good for wing ribs and/or servo trays. Always try to use a single piece of cardboard for covering a section such as wing halves, fuselage, fin, stabilizer, etc. Because joints always make the structure less steady, heavy and ugly. Most of the models that we built for smaller engines such as 0.25, 0.15 and 0.10 size. Only few models that we have built for a 0.40 size engine. In our club we don't have many 0.60 size planes. Few proud owners of these planes, need not to be bothered about building cardboard models. Most of them can fly to England to get what they want!
V. Conclusion of the Research I conclude that our creation can conserve energy and this can be done by only using scrapped materials and recycled material. The main idea of this airplane is to Use the 3 R’s help to reduce trash, to reuse it and our production that is the power of it. Since the materials are lightweight and recyclable, the plane could fly easily and also the price of creating this is cheap.
VI. Reference http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2yABnSswoFU
