RAAF Roulettes PC-9

Being a fan of Flite Test since it's beginnings, I've bought and built many speed build kits and all have flown great. But economic times are tough and it's very expensive to get these kits here to Australia. So I started buying foam board (FB) from Officeworks but at $14 AUD per sheet, this was proving to be costly as well. Thank goodness for ebay. I found a company in Sydney who sell 5mm foam board for $8 per sheet and the sheets are bigger than the others. The only down fall is that the paper doesn't peel off which then creates more challenges.

So now armed with a carton of FB, what to build. I've been scratch building in balsa and ply for many years so I was keen to try this in FB as well. In my earlier years I was a Security Police Dog Handler in the RAAF and I spent a few years at the RAAF Base at Sale in Victoria where the RAAF Roulettes display team are based. I spent many hours watching them come and go and have always wanted a model of the PC9 so it came to pass.

I'm a firm believer in the KISS (Keep It Super Simple) principle and so I started out looking for a suitable wing. This proved very easy as the Flite Test Mustang was pretty close so I downloaded the plans and built the wings in conventional manner.   As this is a well established and proven airframe, I then took the fuse and modified the plan by removing the belly intake.   I dont build my planes as swappables and hence I don't build the fuse in the standard A fold/B fold manner.   I built this in more of a convensional balsa style with two seperate sides, formers and top and bottom.

Then using the horizontal and vertical stabs from the plan for general sizing, I then cut out these parts in a much more PC-9 shape.

Next the turtle deck and top cowling.   I don't particularly like using poster board as it tends to crease and dent too easily so I decided to continue using FB.   Now as mentioned earlier, the problem with this particular FB is that it is just about impossible to remove the paper making it difficult to make smooth curves.   However going back to some other Flite Test methods, I found that by scoring numerous lines and opening them up with a paddle pop stick or BBQ scewer, you can make just about any shape.   The closer the lines, the tighter the curve.

The turtle deck was made in three different pieces.

It looks a bit rough on the inside but that is covered when the canopy is in place and afterall it was my first attempt at doing this.

Speaking of the canopy, again all FB, curved, pushed, shoved, trimmed and sanded until it looks like this.

It has a scewer at the front and a magnet at rear making it super easy to change batteries.   I'm running a Turnigy 2836 1100kv motor on a 2200 3S and 9x6 prop.   There's no rudder so bank'n'yank.   The whole airframe was brushed with Cabots Cabothane Clear polyurethane (I think similar to Minwax) and then painted with el cheapo rattle cans.   The decals were printed off my computer onto self adhesive label paper.   Flying weight is just on 800g (28 ounces).   Hand launch is a simple matter of pointing it up at 45 degrees, give it about 3/4 throttle and let her go.   Flying is I imagine about the same as the original FT Mustang.   Certainly it is every bit as good as the FT Spitfire I had a couple of years ago.   Looking back I should have put landing gear on it and the horizontal stab needs to have a larger chord so that it has more stability authority.    And with these, it will then lend itself more to having a rudder as well.   The next one will also have a slightly more powerful motor.

So there you go.   Take a subject you like, find a known airframe which is close and/or can be modified and don't be afraid to really push the boundaries of FB.   Also, the internet, particularly Google Images is your best friend.    Just write in exactly what you want.   In this case I literally typed in "PC9 plan views" and I got heaps of them.   Then I typed in "RAAF Roulettes" and again heaps of good colour photos showing every angle. This makes painting and adding details very easy.   With these types of models, the more little details you can add, the better the illusion of scale.   In this case, the paint job, the roundels and the scrolled 'R' on the tail make it stand out as a Roulette.   But smaller details such as the exhaust stubs make it stand out as a Pilatus turbo-prop.   Do a half decent paint job and you have a cheap, strong, very tough stand off (a long long way) scale model.   Here in Australia just about everyone recognises the RAAF Roulettes and its the same with this model, not one person has asked me what it is because they all know.

Next up is building one with retracts.  Stay tuned.