mstull
R.I.P.
I was asked to post about the new, carbon wing, for my self designed U/L, that I'm fabricating. The goal was to improve my climb performance with the tiny CorsAir engine. The challenge was to design the new wing with a much higher aspect ratio and deep undercamber... yet keep it very light. To make it even harder, I decided to make it semi-cantilevered, with wires down to the landing gear that would only take about 1 G of the load. Due to the shortage of carbon cloth, I was forced to fabricate the tubular carbon spar last. I would have preferred to do it first, since everything has to connect to it.
I posted some photos previously in this Light Stuff section, under Self Designed Carbon U/L, including one showing piles of ribs for this new wing. The 1/4" thick balsa ribs, that are scrimmed with very thin fiberglass on both sides, worked out great. I like them better than styrofoam core ribs for the less structural ribs, that only support fabric. I just glued together 1/4" by 3" by 36" sheets of balsa, edge to edge, to form large flat sheets of balsa. Then I scrimmed them with fiberglass on both sides. The ribs were cut out on a band saw.
The stronger ribs, that support the engine, cockpit, etc. are made of 1/4" balsa with two plys of carbon on each side. But and tip ribs are 1+1/2" thick styrofoam, with two plys of carbon on both sides. They needed the extra thickness to take the side loads of the fabric pull.
The carbon leading edge was layed up in 3' sections on a mold I made:
I posted some photos previously in this Light Stuff section, under Self Designed Carbon U/L, including one showing piles of ribs for this new wing. The 1/4" thick balsa ribs, that are scrimmed with very thin fiberglass on both sides, worked out great. I like them better than styrofoam core ribs for the less structural ribs, that only support fabric. I just glued together 1/4" by 3" by 36" sheets of balsa, edge to edge, to form large flat sheets of balsa. Then I scrimmed them with fiberglass on both sides. The ribs were cut out on a band saw.
The stronger ribs, that support the engine, cockpit, etc. are made of 1/4" balsa with two plys of carbon on each side. But and tip ribs are 1+1/2" thick styrofoam, with two plys of carbon on both sides. They needed the extra thickness to take the side loads of the fabric pull.
The carbon leading edge was layed up in 3' sections on a mold I made:
