Clover

Introduction:

I've been flying the blue noodle and really love how stable and predictable it is in the air. It is not a fast precision flyer, but it does just about everything else. The only problem I have with it is the size. It's fairly large and hard to carry, so I wanted to address it by creating a smaller version.

Components (~$30)

• AX-1806N-2100kv with a 5040 prop (flies better with a tri blade 5040 instead) this broke after a couple crashes
• Blue Wonder 1300kv motor with a tri blade 5040 propeller
• 3x 3.7g servos with push rods
• 4g receiver
• Turnigy 10amp plush esc
• 1 sheet of dollar tree foam board and green tape
• various bamboo skewers for spars

Conclusion:

The build was fairly straight forward as it was an almost exact scaled down copy of the blue noodle. I did enlarge the ailerons a bit as I was worried it would not create enough air deflection (I was dead wrong on this). The fuse was primarily a piece of foam pipe insulation.

While I was trimming the plane on the initial maiden flights, I quickly realized that the ailerons were a bit too effective and it was *very* roll sensitive. This was the first plane where I had to turn the aileron rates down to 20% to have it behave like a normal plane (see maiden video - it is already dialed down in it) as it was not flyable on the windy day I chose to maiden it on otherwise. Aside from that, the maiden went very well. At first, I thought I chose a bad day as it really was too windy to maiden such a small plane, but then I realized that it was a good day as it gave me a very realistic idea of what the plane is capable of.

In short, all small planes will be susceptible to winds much more so than their larger counterparts. There is just no getting around it. Due to the small size of this plane, it in no way flies like its larger cousin. During a brief period when the winds died down, it actually flew really well, but when the winds picked up, it was definitely not an easy flier although I still think it performed better than I'm giving it credit for. I mean I was able to fly it, right? I probably wouldn't have tried some of my other planes of a similar size in this wind.

The construction was great as the plane tumbled many times (and cartwheeled to the ground) with almost no damage. Having a fuse and tail that can bend (foam insulation + bamboo skewers) negates most of the forces on impact. The motor is ok...I need to try it out some more, but so far, I much prefer the feel of the multirotor 1806 size motors (e.g. emax) as they seem to put out more power. I later found out that using a tri blade prop makes this plane almost silent while increasing speed and performance.

If I had to do this over again, I think I would increase the size of the wings (chord). I don't want to increase the overall wingspan too much though as that would once again make it less portable and I may as well take the blue noodle out.

Update 1: 8/15/17

The AXN 1806 motor turned out to be complete crap. I was surprised given how solid it looked. Performance was not great and after a couple of crashes, one of the magnets came loose so now the entire motor vibrates and is generally unstable. The only good thing was that it was almost silent with a tri blade prop. I have now upgraded the motor to a more reliable and better performing blue wonder 1300kv.

I also take back my previous comments about maidening planes on windy days. After I flew it again the following day without the crazy winds, I realized that it was actually tail heavy. That was not apparent at all the first day with the wind tossing the plane around every which way. In any case, the plane flies much nicer with a neutral CG.