| I want to enter a race with a wing/400 brushed setup. What would be the | best route. Buy a setup (no transmitter/rx/servos) or buy just the | unfinished wing and work it over to make it lighter and maybe modify it | to make it more manouverable.
More maneuverable usually means slower, as you get a thicker airfoil. It's all a matter of tradoffs. Pylon racers are not that maneuverable, but they're fast ...
| What mods could I make to increase the rpm and or duration of the | motor.
Get a better speed 400 motor than the stock $10 one that Zagi sells. Beyond that, more cells in the battery will give you more power.
As for duration, most races don't last long. Do you really care about duration? Any energy left in your battery at the end of the race is energy wasted.
| Fixed at 48 inches, speed 400, no lithium batteries and use a zagi | style prop(?).
Are those the only limitations? Then you probably want 10 cells and the best speed 400 motor you can get, one of the cobalt magnet ones would probably be good. You can get speed 400 sized brushless motors, but I'm guessing they're not allowed.
This sort of motor is what I'm thinking of --
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though even better brushed speed 400 motors do exist. Perhaps the PMX4011 from
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?
Sub-C batteries are better than the 5/4 A cells that are often used, but they're bigger, so you'll need to modify the plane a bit for them. But they'll give you a lot more amps for the motor ...
Are you limited to only one motor? :)
There's an old `zagi style' prop that was made of floppy plastic. It worked OK with the stock motor, but when you gave it more power it flopped around too much. But Trick R/C doesn't even seem to sell them anymore (good riddance!) so I guess I don't know what `zagi style' means.
These are what I'm thinking of --
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and they're not very good. If you're forced to use these, I don't know if using a better motor will even be worth it.
| I dont like to carry dead weight. Should i go for a built up wing.
You could, and it would probably fly a bit better, but it'll be a lot more work to make and a _lot_ more fragile.
The usual charm of the foamie flying wing is it's durability. Do you really want to give that up for a potential tiny edge in a race?
I'd suggest a foam wing, with lots of carbon fiber for rigidity.
Ultimately, you'll want a small wing and the best power plant you can have, so it'll probably be a lead sled unless the course is very short and so you'll need to do lots of tight turns.
| This plane will only hve to last for length of the race.
Really? You'll never test fly it before the race, never practice?
How much money and time do you want to throw at this race? Do you want to have fun, or is winning the most important thing? If you've never done this before, I'd suggest going more for fun, and just take a mostly stock XE2 but with a better motor.
| Is it conceivable that I could link the elevator with the ailerons | and get away with one servo. Only up elevator. To come down back off | the throttle.
You won't do yourself any favors by trying to get by with only one servo. Do you really want a plane that flies like the original Firebird? Pylon racers use the elevator a lot, especially in the turns. Get two servos and use elevon mixing like everybody else.
If you've never done a flying wing before, I'd suggest your standard
48" foam flying wing kit. Cover it with ultracote rather than packing tape. Get servos with metal gears -- HS-81MG servos work nicely.
Get something where the batteries are buried in the wing rather than in a canopy -- something like the Combat Wings XE2. If you really want a racer rather than a fun plane, once you're done you'll probably want to cut the tips of the wing down and make the wingspan smaller once you've gotten the best battery and motor you can get -- making it smaller will make it faster and less maneuverable, but I really don't suggest doing that until you've got more experience with the plane.
It won't speed your plane up much, but it'll look a lot neater if you put the servo rods in the wing rather than on top. To do that, you have the servo arms going down into the wing rather than up out of it, and have the control rod going through the foam rather than above it.