[DemonFrog]

I find the main problem with the SPAD idea is finding some of the materials.

does anyone in southern ontario know of a store or something that i can buy yardsticks from? i've checked the local rona as well as home depot but there may be some selling it right? if anyone knows a place please speak up.

and in case you are wondering it is for a spadet, i have my dogfighter made but i am going to wait till i know how to fly an rc plane properly before i maiden it.
Demon

[Bent]

Forget the yardsticks, they can still be found but aren't the bargain they once were. I'm currently making a Debonair wing for a student in our club. It would cost more than $10 to make the two spars from yardsticks. Instead, I bought a 6' piece of select pine 3/4" X 1 1/2" from Home Depot for $3.50. On a table saw it was ripped into one length 3/4" x 1/4" and three lengths 1 1/8" X 3/16". No waste and enough HIGH quality spar wood to make lots of SPADS ! If you really must have yardsticks, I heard the RONA at Martin Grove and the 409 in Toronto has them.

[Gary Maker]

I have honestly tried using pine as the spars. Even select pine I have found inadaquate as it tends to break much easier and warps easily. MHO!

On the same note, at Home Depot you can purchase 6" X 36" or 48" poplar 3/16" thick and I ripped that to 1 1/8" for the spars. Much stronger and does not warp near as much especially for a larger SPAD wing like the Debonair! Its still less than half the price of yard sticks!

I do however only use one spar in the Debbie wing rather than two as per the plans. I use 4mm coro on the bottom of the wing with the flutes running spanwise and 2mm coro on the top with the flutes running cordwise. This results in a much lighter wing and is very strong only requiring two of the ripped pieces of poplar with an 18" joiner epoxied to the center of the two spar pieces. I also made the wing flat (no diehedreal) This does not effect the stability of the plane at all.

I have really put my Debbie through the paces. It flies very stable and yet is very agile. Slows down to a crawl on landings. Its just a very fun and a real pleasure to fly. I have made three now for fellow club members, two of which do NOT have their wings and they say they love the way the Debbie handles and yet can take the abuse of not so perfect landings as per some student pilots. By the way, I built the last two as conventional gear (tail draggers) which helps to keep them even lighter!

This is just my opinions and experience with these SPADS and is only given to give you some other options and food for thought!

Here is a pic of my spad showing the wing construction:

[Gary Maker]

Here are a couple of other pics showing the wing construction. The Black spad is a Das Plas Stick but the construction is the same for the Debbie wing.

Notice that the bottom Coro is left 2" wider to mfg the ailerons and slots are cut along the aileron at the hinge line allow much easier operation of the ailerons and DOES NOT weaken the hinge line at all!

[ronm]

They look remarkably similar Gary!

[Gary Maker]

Actually the yellow spad is the same plane in both pics. The black spad is the one I flew a year ago at the Stoney Creek IMAC during the break!

Just wanted to show the wing construction. I talked to Tattoo about this and he agreed that it is fun to expriment which is the idea with Spads and he liked my re-design of the Debbonair wing. Believe me, I have really punished this plane in the air pulling high G manovers and the wing is very strong even with the one spar and can take anything you can throw at it. You've seen it fly Ron!

And built this way as well as eliminating the front nose gear and linkage reduces the over all weight by almost 1/2 a pound which is substantial for this airplane! Even without the diehedreal, it is an awsome trainer type plane and the student is not fighting the inherant stability of the plane trying to correct itself all the time.

And without the diehedreal, the student can progress easily with a plane he/she is familiar with to learning basic aerobatics: Eg:

Inverted flight, immelmans, split ess, cuban and reverse cuban 8, Hammerheads etc etc. Exceipt for the spin, which may be done with some weight shift experimentation, one could almost fly the basic routine in IMAC with this plane...LOL!

[ken park]

Your Local Home Hardware store can order them for you - Buy a whole bunch and have yourself a good stock pile eh!

[ronm]

Yes, it does fly VERY well Gary!

And about dihedral, you know that I feel it is unnecessary and actually detrimental on a high-wing plane, so this type of construction, in my opinion, is perfect for a simple trainer-style airplane.

[Bent]

Nice SPADS Gary. In the name of science I just sacrificed a brand new yardstick from RONA by bending it until it broke in half. A piece of clear pine the exact same dimension easily went the distance...and then some without breaking. I should of mentioned in my earlier post that I always give a potential spar (pine or otherwise) a hard twist test to expose any weakness.

[Chris Cann]

Home depot has them but they are in the paint section. A bunch of guys in the US are using deb's with no dihedral for IMAC planes, they say they do Basic great!