Bird of Time

So, how are you going to get it up there? mk

"Electric sailplane" is somewhat of an oxymoron. A big sailplane with a

4 oz/sq ft wing loading bears little resemblance to those other planes with motor assist and a halfway decent glide ratio. The only trick is getting it up in the air.

I'm not a sailplane expert. I had a friend who used to fly them, and when I took a whack at it I realized how much skill is involved in keeping one up in the air. I need to build that Paragon I've been wanting to build for years.

You'll have to let us know how you like your Bird of Time once you get it in the air.

My $.02 worth.

I bought one over a year ago and installed spoilers in the wing for RES flights. The spar does not have vertical grained webs installed, which I corrected. ( The instructions do stress high start launches and discourage winch launches.) See here:

I also used a 90° bellcrank in the tail centered in the round port for elevator control. The standard size servo is mounted up front with the rudder servo.

On my third test flight the fuselage broke just in front of the tail while landing. Inspection showed that the glass cloth was not "wetted" with epoxy. I contacted Tower Hobbies and eventually received a new fuselage from them.

When I finished the new fuselage including a plastic tube for the antenna I filled the fuselage from just in front of the bellcrank to the wing trailing edge with spray foam that is sold for sealing against drafts around windows, doors, etc. This added at lot of strength to the aft part of the fuselage with little weight penalty. According to my scale the flying weight is right on the 60 oz. advertised.

The first flight with the new fuselage was in 15 to 20 mph winds using a medium duty high start. The plane flew great and I tested the spoilers at altitude for the first time. They worked fine with no nose down pitch. I increased the rudder throw to all I can get since it was a bear to make the crosswind turn when landing.

With these changes the airplane is great.

I built one several years ago

You will need a medium or heavy duty Hi-Start, if that is the way you are going to launch it. Not that it is very heavy, it`s just a big bird. I also towed mine up with a 1/4 scale cub and a few other tow planes. Mine liked to get up and "fly", more so then just "float" around, so keep the speed up just a bit and you will loose less altitude in the process. However mine was covered and painted and may have been a bit heaver than your film covered one. The BOT is known as a floater on landing though not totally necessary spoilers are a big help. I built mine that way and they are fun to play with and helpful on a short field. As Jarhead said, set rudder throw to all you can get, I also set pitch up on expo for my personal taste. rick markel snipped-for-privacy@aol.com

Here is a forum link for the BOT:

I meant to put it in the last post but couldn't find it in my favorites.