Still too windy for flying, a couple of refinements while waiting for weather to improve, the cockpit canopy was painted and the tailplane seat has been sanded a tiny bit to level the tailplane. My friend had a look over it last night and we ended up gliding it back and forward to each other, in my shed! Its pretty cramped but we saw enough to know it is going to be a nice flying plane with a really flat glide. .
The smaller 36 inch span minium equiped version, which cruises around level on quarter to a third throttle, was tested in the same way with much more drop in height from the same type of launch. The smaller one flies really nice outside, with a very gentle and predictable stall, enough power to climb steadily up to height and enough control to do some fairly tight turns.
Here are some photos of Floaty finished. The battery slides into an angled slot just in front of the radio board, it could take 3 batteries, as I expected it to need a bit of weight up front, turns out it only needs one cell to balance, which is good, each extra cell would add another 6g, although after seeing it glide, I dont think that would affect it much.
The small hole right in front of the radio board has the excess motor wires poked down into the cavity below. The hatch is a snug fit between the fuselage sides and this holds it firmly without need for any other securing.
The 10mm motor/gearbox looks as if it will be a bit overkill, but we will see, I may be able to change to a syma 7mm motor and gearbox if the 10mm is vastly overpowered. I could put that on a plane that actually needs that much power. All 50g of it!
A bit of calculation showed that in imperial values, Floaty has 1.7 ounce per square foot wing loading, I always regarded 4 ounces per square foot as being really light. Cant wait to try it, eventually.... when rain and wind stops.