Balsa Wood build of the Blunt Nose Versa Wing.

First a little about me and what I enjoy about the RC hobby. I love to build planes, it's that simple. Since I started in this hobby my TV consumption has gone down drastically because I always have something to tinker with. I started with a store bought plane- the Hobbyzone Super Cub. I soon found online all the mods you could do to it. So after I learned to fly it with many repairs and new parts I started to modify the plane. I soon learned that I enjoyed tinkering with them as much as flying them. Soon after this I discovered Flite Test. I started to build. In the beginning it was great because I wasn't too good at flying so I would break them and I could just build another. But after about a year of flying I didn't break them very often so to get my build fix I would just build another. After getting up to about 20 different planes in my hanger I had to do something different. So I decided to try things that would take much longer to get finished. I decided to try some of my favourites from Flite Test but build with Balsa.

Here enters this project. A balsa 120% Blunt Nose Versa Wing. Shown below with my trusty spotter Murphy.

So here is my thought process. How do I get the shape of the versa wing replicated into the balsa. So I actually printed out the plans at 120% scale and made one wing really quick.

I then cut the wing into sections and transfered the cross section onto the balsa

After I got all the sections onto the wood I doubled the wood up and cut two pieces of each. One for each wing sections. With the shape of the original wing on the foam I pinned all the pieces to the table and glued them together.

As you can see from the picture above there is  some cross bracing in there using some left over balsa and some BBQ skewers.

Next came the center blunt section

Using some 1/8" light ply and balsa side ribs I got the center shape glued together.

Its starting to take shape. Here are the sections laying togther on the floor to see what it looks like

I need to mount the servos and a place for the video transmitter so I make some pockets in the wings. You can also see the reciever antenna in there which needed to be mounted before I covered the wings.

With everything together I start to cover.

Too much white. A friend has some yellow so, white and yellow it is.

Now for the final assembly. Here is motor I picked with a 9x6 APC prop.

I run with two times 3000 mah batteries with tons of room in there.

Here is the control center. (After the maiden flight having issues with the flight controller I switched it out for an APM 2.6.)

Here is the final product against the original blunt nose. (note the original was signed by Josh and Chad at the first Flite Fest and is made from model airplane foam instead of foam board)

Notice the center fins and the blunt nose section a bit longer. This helps the CG a bit and gives tones of room for the batteries. The center fins are for a bit more yaw stability

Off for the maiden flight. I was very nervous for this flight, After the longer build of the plane I wanted it to work well. I wasn't disappointed. I started out wondering how to launch the plane. With a foam plane you can just grab the wing anywhere. I had to be a bit more careful to grab the plane on the ribs. I shouldn't have been worried as it flew great. The first 3 mins of the video was me just getting it figured out. It needed a fair bit of up trim and a bit of aileron trim. At about 3 mins in I tried switching the flight controller into stabilized mode. I found that it was not working correctly (it was in a bad crash in the previous FPV plane. I ended up chucking it out as I didn't trust it anymore and put in an APM 2.6 board). After getting more confident I brought it down low for some up close passes at around 6 mins in the video. This is the best part to see it flying as it was a dark day and the video looses it in the clouds at times. I brought it down for its first landing. I didn't care where in the field so I just brought it down carefully to see how it handled the landing. It slowed down very nice and was very gentle. I did one more quick launch and landing for good measure. I am very pleased with my creation.

Here is the same flight but from the onboard camera if anyone is interested.

Well I have to say that the build turned out great and the flights are also great. Unfortunately it didn't last too long. During some testing of the RTH features of the APM 2.6 I crashed it and broke it up bad. Totally my bonehead move. I turned off the controller to test the failsafe. But it wasn't set up right and when I turned back on the controller it never regained connection. After watching it crash I looked down and on the screen I saw the throttle warning. If I had only lowered the throttle it would have started to transmit again to the plane and it would be here with me today. I have the video of that crash shown below

At about 2 mins into the video I start to test the RTH function. First I test from the mode switch and it works great coming right back and circling over head. Then at about 3 mins into the video I turn off the transmitter and from there you can see the destruction of the balsa wing.

Here is it's ending.

Well don't mourn for my loss. I had a blast with this project. I loved the process of creating this plane and the satisfaction of seeing it work better than I could have expected. I quickly went back to the drawing board and re-created this same plane but this time with the hot wire cutter and Home Depot insulating foam. But that's another story.

Parts used in this build

• Wood various types (see pictures)
• Glue
• Monocoat
• Turnigy Aerodrive D3536/5 1450kv motor
• Turnigy Trust 45 Amp ESC
• 9x6 APC prop
• Open LRS 433mhz reciever
• IBCrazy Turnstyle UHF Antenna
• APM 2.6 flight controller.
• 2x 3000 mah 3s batteries

FPV Gear

• 5.8 Ghz 600mw transmitter
• Mobius Action Cam with live output
• Cloverleaf antenna
• MinimOSD

Thanks, Jim