M. Still

After an earlier discussion about designing a balsa aeroplane my son later in the day presented me with his design of a chuck glider.  We had to see if it could easily be made and if it would fly.

Out of some 1/16" sheet balsa scraps I cut some 1/16" x 1/16", 1/16" x 3/16" strips for wing ribs and leading and trailing edges.  I cut 4 lengths of 1/16" x 1/4" x 10cm strips that we laminated to make a rigid stick fuselage.   We used some scrap tissue for wing and tail covering and by the end of the weekend we had a chuck glider that just needed a small amount of Blu-Tak for a nose weight and it flew perfectly!



I tidied up plans and they are available below:



Fuselage: 10" long, 4 laminates of 1/4" x 1/16th sheet.
Tail fin: 1.5" high, 1.5" long from 3/16" x 1/16th sheet.
Tail wing: 2" wingspan, 1" triangles from 3/16" x 1/16th sheet.
Wings: 5" wingspan, 1 3/8" wings from 3/16" x 1/16th sheet (leading + trailing edges) and 1/16" x 1/16" sheet for the ribs and diagonals.