JA 37 Viggen

Here's the AJ 37 Viggen R/C airplane, a scratch built foam EDF plane made by our very own David Windestål.Modifying the plans by Johan Hansson, David made his own wooden templates and hot wire cut this plane piece by piece.The sections are all made with laser cut wood templates that were cut and then pieced together.It was a slow process creating this airplane as each section needed cut, sanded, glued and sanded again.The airplane was made with 4 inch blue foam and the same dollar tree foam board as our swappable planes. 

David did some fiberglassing around the intakes because of how thin the foam was. You can see the full build log of this project in David's article HERE.
Chad painted the scratch built airplane with an airbrush to create the control surfaces on the canards and add a nice weathered look.  

Also, check out the Weathered Plane episode to learn more about painting your airplane.This foam plane is light! It weighs in at about 820 grams.The ESC is on the bottom to keep it cool.This Viggen is setup with a 70mm fan with 10 blades which creates a nice "roar" sound instead of the "whiny" sound you usually get with EDF's.The side inlets are the only ones on here (no cheater holes) and in most cases that is usually a bad thing, but for this scratch built plane its no problem at all.There's no landing gear so it's hand launched and belly landing.
Despite the small wings, this airplane handled great in the air.  
The airplane is fast, we clocked this scratch built EDF at 80mph.

The stall charecteristics are fantastic! With a combination of the wind and the airplane's canards, Josh was able to get the plane to practically hover.

This airplane turned out to be a great scratch build and after the maiden, it's now Josh Bixler's favorite EDF.This project plane turned out great! The airplane handles great and it looks fantastic in the air.Hopefully we'll have a chance to take this plane out again in the near future!

The scratch build took David over 20 hours but the results were great!  If you'd like to build your own, be sure to look for the hot wire demonstration episode (available this Wednesday) and download the plans below!  

You can also check out Johan Hansson's original build article HERE!

The original plans, along with David's modified version, are available here:
JA 37 Viggen EDF Plans   

More photos available in the forum post HERE!