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  #1  
Old 03-27-2015, 02:08 AM
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blackshire blackshire is offline
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Default New foam Shuttle B/G!

Hello All,

Many of you remember the Estes foam Space Shuttle boost-glider (not always with affection, although mine always flew perfectly; monoceran luck, I guess :-) ). Guillow's makes a catapult-launched foam Space Shuttle glider that isn't much smaller (it has a 10" wing span, see: http://www.rudystoys.com/Products/S...r__03-2650.aspx ) than the Estes one. Instead of boring or melting a hole for the rear-ejection motor pod into this glider, the motor pod could be mounted to the underside of the glider, with a ventral fin on it to "balance" the glider's vertical stabilizer during ascent. (This would enable the booster pod to use "maple seed" recovery.) Also:

A dowel-and-balsa-strip hook on the glider could be used, which would engage a length of launch lug on the booster pod (or vice-versa). To avoid melting or marring the underside of the glider, the ejection charge orifice at the front end of the booster pod could either be angled slightly away from the glider's underside, or it could issue from an off-center hole in a forward closure disc (on the side of the disc that is farthest from the glider's underside).

I hope this information will be helpful.
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  #2  
Old 03-27-2015, 07:33 AM
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Ironnerd Ironnerd is offline
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One of the guys in our Section flew something very similar with the entire shuttle stack. The glider flew parasite style, and glided back pretty nicely - it was a hair out of trim in pitch, but it still looked cool.

One thing about those foam glider shuttles is that the wings are HUGE.

Thanks for the post. I may have to get one.
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Old 03-27-2015, 08:23 AM
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blackshire blackshire is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Ironnerd
One of the guys in our Section flew something very similar with the entire shuttle stack. The glider flew parasite style, and glided back pretty nicely - it was a hair out of trim in pitch, but it still looked cool.

One thing about those foam glider shuttles is that the wings are HUGE.

Thanks for the post. I may have to get one.
You're welcome--I just happened to find it while looking at their selection of boomerangs. I don't mind somewhat "exaggerated" (for better glide performance) wings on such gliders. Using one of M. Dean Black's finless rocket stabilization methods (particularly the second one *here*--see "Finless Rockets Using Engine-Driven Gas-Dynamic Stabilization" by M. Dean Black [Apogee Components Peak of Flight newsletter, Issue #379, December 2, 2014: http://www.apogeerockets.com/educat...wsletter379.pdf ]), a full-stack Shuttle model using the foam glider could fly stably with *no* clear plastic fins (or fins of any kind) at all!
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Old 03-27-2015, 09:57 AM
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Cool.

I have two of those Guillow's shuttles. They actually fly pretty well. I was thinking full stack but I hadn't sat down and put pencil to paper to compute the scale diameters.

If anybody's done this I'd love to see a picture or two.
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Old 03-27-2015, 10:09 AM
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blackshire blackshire is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by MarkB.
Cool.

I have two of those Guillow's shuttles. They actually fly pretty well. I was thinking full stack but I hadn't sat down and put pencil to paper to compute the scale diameters.

If anybody's done this I'd love to see a picture or two.
How long are they? (I was going to figure that out using the 10" wing span and the actual orbiter's length and wing span to "scale it out," until Ironnerd posted that the glider's wings are larger than the scale size.) Another possibility (although not scale) would be to stack two of the gliders on either side of a finless, parachute- or streamer-recovered core, in the manner of the Estes DOM "Space Twins" and the Cox "Space Shuttle America" boost-gliders.
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Old 03-27-2015, 11:26 AM
AstronMike AstronMike is offline
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Default Parasiting Gliders

I've always found it easier to just use two gliders with a single central, usually finless, carrier tube. This also allows you to add length as needed, so you end up using less nose weight if needed. That 1467 internal pod orbiter sucked even when it flew 'right', as it weighed around 8z, most of this being the pod needed ballast weights. All that, on even a C5-3 was pretty dismal by my standards.

I've tossed around the idea of making a rather large full stack, but the diameter of the ET gets pretty out of sorts considering the size of the orbiters I'm considering. IIRC, that UHS shuttle project back twenty years ago in Sprocketry did not need fins at all due to its size, which was 1/40 scale.

Of course, it would be lots easier to just do two orbiters of good size and place them on like a 3" or 4" tube setup, but that would be cheesy, as orbiters rightfully 'belong' on a stack.
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Old 03-27-2015, 11:43 AM
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blackshire blackshire is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by AstronMike
I've always found it easier to just use two gliders with a single central, usually finless, carrier tube. This also allows you to add length as needed, so you end up using less nose weight if needed. That 1467 internal pod orbiter sucked even when it flew 'right', as it weighed around 8z, most of this being the pod needed ballast weights. All that, on even a C5-3 was pretty dismal by my standards.

I've tossed around the idea of making a rather large full stack, but the diameter of the ET gets pretty out of sorts considering the size of the orbiters I'm considering. IIRC, that UHS shuttle project back twenty years ago in Sprocketry did not need fins at all due to its size, which was 1/40 scale.

Of course, it would be lots easier to just do two orbiters of good size and place them on like a 3" or 4" tube setup, but that would be cheesy, as orbiters rightfully 'belong' on a stack.
The trim of my 1467 foam Shuttle was excellent, but its flights were rather low and too-brief. I never tried it on an 18 mm Aerotech D10 or D21 motor, but one or both of those motors would likely have turned in satisfying flights.
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http://www.lulu.com/product/cd/what...of-2%29/6122050
http://www.lulu.com/product/cd/what...of-2%29/6126511
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  #8  
Old 09-15-2015, 01:40 PM
tab28682 tab28682 is offline
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I have been flying a Guillow's Shuttle converted to RC for a number of years. First as an electric prop pusher model and for the last year as a parasite RC glider on a non scale booster.

There is a series of flight photos in the last post of the linked thread over at the "other" forum:

http://www.rocketryforum.com/showth...m-Space-Shuttle
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  #9  
Old 04-08-2016, 01:49 AM
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blackshire blackshire is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by tab28682
I have been flying a Guillow's Shuttle converted to RC for a number of years. First as an electric prop pusher model and for the last year as a parasite RC glider on a non scale booster.

There is a series of flight photos in the last post of the linked thread over at the "other" forum:

http://www.rocketryforum.com/showth...m-Space-Shuttle
Thank you for posting those! (I apologize for not responding sooner--sometimes I don't get a "notice e-mail" that new replies have been posted to a thread.) With a couple of Rapier jet motors, you could make an R/C "Aero-Buran" model using one of the Guillow (formerly North Pacific) foam Space Shuttle gliders.
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Black Shire--Draft horse in human form, model rocketeer, occasional mystic, and writer, see:
http://www.lulu.com/content/paperba...an-form/8075185
http://www.lulu.com/product/cd/what...of-2%29/6122050
http://www.lulu.com/product/cd/what...of-2%29/6126511
All of my book proceeds go to the Northcote Heavy Horse Centre www.northcotehorses.com.
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