Hints & kinks

Model Airplane News, May 2001 by Newman, Jim

For the past 26 years, Hints and Kinks" has served as a forum In which readers help one another. Your practical advice, complemented by Jim Newman's technical artistry, has been the source of one of our most popular monthly columns. With this Issue, Jim is retiring from Model Airplane News, and we wish him good health and good luck as he plots his new course.

This section of the magazine will continue under a new name with Illustrations by David Baker.

SPRING FEVER

If your landing gear tends to spread out under those lessthan-gentle landings, add a little more spring tension to the gear. Drill a couple of holes near the axle, hook a small bungee cord to it, then secure the middle of the cord to the center of the gear with a nylon clip or wire guide.

Randall Huston, Bolckow, MO

SEND IN YOUR IDESA. Model Airplane News will give a free, one-year subscription (or one-year renewal, if you already subscribe) for each idea used Send a rough sketch to Model Aiplane News, 100 East Ridge, Ridgefield,CT 06877-4606 USA. BE SURE YOUR NAME AND ADDRESS ARE CLEARLY PRINTED ON EACH SKETCH, PHOTO AND NOTE YOU SUBMIT Because of the number of ideas we receive, we can't acknowledge each one, nor can we return unused material.

"CHEEP"

CHICKEN STICK

Use this homemade chicken stick to flip over your prop and avoid damaging your fingers or the prop's trailing edge. Cut a 3-foot long, 3A-inch-diameter dowel and one foot of 1 A-inch-diameter vinyl tubing into four pieces. Insert the dowel into the tubing, and you have four chicken sticks for yourself and your friends at a nominal cost.

John Gustafson, Decatur AL

HOOKED ON TRANSPORT

A simple way to secure your model to the carpeted floor of your vehicle is to strap lengths of hook-and-loop fastener over the model as shown. Just be sure the flight box is equally well secured, and you won't end up with a plastic bag of balsa splinters after some heavy braking!

Dawson Gillaspy, Long Neck, DE

NON-SPILL TRAVEL

This simple external plumbing device allows the tank to be filled or the feed line to be broken with the pressure line plugged into the tank. Follow the circuit, and you can see that you will have made the system airtight, so the model can travel without spilling any of the leftover fuel in the tank. Don't forget to disconnect the pressure line when you fill the tank so that it can serve as an overflow vent.

Michel Faizandier Cambridge Station, Nova Scotia, Canada

HERE COMES THE JUG

Make this handy storage container out of an empty, cutout juice or oil jug. Drill keyhole-shaped holes in the back, and hot-glue blue foam or Masonite dividers into it. The keyholes allow the jugs to be hung from a backboard on large-head screws. You can take them down if necessary.

Richard Ochmann, Lady Lake, FL

SQUARED AWAY

Slide two carpenter's squares onto one straightedge, then use them to assemble a true and square fuselage. After you've inserted the formers, snug the squares up against the two sides, then tighten the thumbnuts to clamp the sides into place until the glue has dried.

Ralph Erskine, Grand Junction, CO

VINTAGE EYELETS

The rolled and padded leather coaming on old airplanes was laced into place through metal (usually brass) eyelets. Make mini eyelets by tightly winding soft brass wire around a suitable metal rod. Slip the coil off the rod and snip the individual coils from it. Slightly flatten each ring by tapping it with a hammer over an anvil, and then glue it over the pierced hole in the leather flange with a little CA. Hide the split in the ring under the leather lacing thong. The sketch shows the proper method of lacing the coaming through the turtle deck.

FK. Spokes, New Milton, Hampshire, England

SLOW-FLIGHT BUSHINGS

Ultralight wheels for slow flyers are usually made out of dense foam, and a pair of free-running nylon hubs can be found inside an old audiotape cassette. Just press them into the center of the foam wheel and secure them with a smear of rubber cement or CA.

Merv Matthews, Palmerston North, New Zealand

KEYED WINGS

Properly align your plane's rubber-banded wings before you glue split-dowel locating keys beneath them. Small models can use 1A-inch-diameter dowels; large models can use 1/2inch-diameter dowels. If a wingtip snags the ground, the half-round dowel will ride up over the wing seat and allow the wing to slew without damage. You can also use a single split dowel fore and aft on the centerline, each fitting into a little trough in the wing seat. The dowels can also be positioned on the inside of the wing saddle.

Raymond Sylvia, Somerset, MA

BALANCING ACT

Make this simple jig by hot-gluing a length of foam pipe insulation to a suitable heavy board, such as a piece of chipboard. Be sure the factory split Is uppermost so that it will securely hold a wing without damaging It while you work on the hinges, etc.

Charles (Bud) Welch, Arkadelphia, AR

ALMIGHTY AEROBAT

It is easy to see that Galloway, OH, resident Jeff Shapiro, who is dwarfed by the stature of his 40percent Carden Aircraft CAP 232, does not take giant-scale modeling lightly. Powered by a 3W 150cc engine, this 116-inch-span machine rips through maneuvers. Jeff spent three months building the plane, outfitting it with nine servos and two receivers; he then finished it off with Ultracote and paint.