DuPage Free Flyer - General

Why Fly Free

Details: Category: General - Free Flight General - Free Flight; Published: 02 December 2020 02 December 2020

Why do modelers still fly planes without radio control, almost as they would have over 80 years ago? First of all, you surmount the challenge of making and adjusting something that will fly well as it it leaves your hand or the launch table. You need to adjust control surfaces and propeller thrust line, and position the center of gravity, for the plane to fly well in climb and glide. You can build light, without radio gear, and use less power.

Elements of Rubber Power

Details: Category: General - Free Flight General - Free Flight; Published: 01 December 2020 01 December 2020

Getting a rubber powered plane to fly as long as possible depends both on the total weight of rubber you use and the total width of the rubber strands you use in the motor. A plane weighing 1/2 0unce might have a good flight powered by 1 gram of rubber, arranged in 2 strands, each 1/8 inch wide.. The prop for such a plane might be about 5 inch diameter.

Wing Loading and Cube Loading

Details: Category: General - Free Flight General - Free Flight; Published: 13 December 2020 13 December 2020

Wing Loading, the ratio of airplane weight to wing area, generally in units of ounces per square foot for small planes, is a useful comparison for glide performance. Usually lighter glides better. However, this measure works best for the same class of plane where wing areas are similar. Cube Loading is a measure which can be used over a broader range of aircraft size. Weight scales as the cube of length. Wing area multiplied by the square root of itself gives a number which scales as the cube of length. Thus, if we divide wing loading by the square root of wing area, we get a number with units of ounces per cubic foot, where both top and bottom scale as the cube of length, and this is called the Cube Loading.