Heath LNB-4 Parasol (oz15134)

 

Heath LNB-4 Parasol (oz15134) by Robert Kitson 1981 - plan thumbnail

About this Plan

Heath LNB-4 Parasol. Radio control scale model. Wingspan 95 in, for .60 engine.

Note this is a very low resolution plan. This is a scan from the magazine pages, scaled up to fullsize at 95 inch wingspan. The details and text are essentially unreadable. If anyone can submit a clearer scan, that would be good.

Quote: "This is the kind of Quarter-Scale that is large, but not monstrous, the kind we promoted in our 'Mammoth Scale' articles a few years ago. One of the prettiest of the pre-WWII kit or homebuilts. Any .60 engine will do the job, but it's a natural for the D.S. 4-cycle.

This one-quarter scale Heath Parasol is for the model builder interested in a large model that is easy to build, easy to fly, and, with a little attention to detail, can be entered in "RC scale" competition. It was selected to provide this builder the relaxation therapy necessary to recover from a P-51 project. Criteria were as follows: fixed gear, no flaps, simple color scheme, accessible engine, and large enough in size to be flown easily by an inept pilot.

Construction is about as challenging as the 1938 Ace Whitman 10-cent kits. Merely use 1/4-inch instead of 1/16 balsa strips, and bigger pins.

For scale details, these drawings should be supplemented by the Paul Matt plans available through the Aviation Historical Society, PO Box 33, Temple City, CA 91780. These are excellent three-views of the full size aircraft with plenty of detail, and are exactly one-fourth the size of a quarter-scale plan.

Two modifications have been made from true scale. The thrust line was lowered three-eighths of an inch so the airplane would cowl the Ogawa FS 60 four-stroke engine, and the wingspan was lessened by six inches at each tip so it would fit the Toyota automobile. These alterations will slip easily past the scale judges at most contests. (In case Bob gets the opportunity to judge your Heath, we have shown the wing with the proper scale span. wcn).

The first Heath Parasol was designed and built in 1926 by Ed Heath, instigator of today's well-known 'Heathkits'. The LNB-4 modeled here was certified by the US Chamber of Commerce and manufactured in 1932. It was also available in kit form for home-builders. Twenty-five horsepower gave it a 62 mile per hour cruising speed. This model floats along at a very realistic speed of about 15 miles per hour.

Begin construction by drawing the fuselage centerline and bulkhead positions on a strip of shelf lining paper over a wooden working surface. Build the lower portion of the fuselage first by pinning the bulkheads, bottom up, into position over the centerline. The bulkhead width will determine the position of the two main longerons forming the basic fuselage crutch.

The landing gear is bent from 5/32 wire at this time and sandwiched between the double plywood bulkheads (#2) with a generous amount of epoxy glue and plywood fillers.

The remaining longerons, engine mounts, and stringers are now pinned and glued intoposition. Carefully chosen hard straight balsa strips should be used here. By pawing through the supply at your local hobby shop, quality wood should be selected for the entire project.

Continue by placing diagonal braces in every rectangular space of the top, bottom, and sides, keeping in mind that they were omitted from the plans for the sake of clarity. The exact position of these braces is not critical, but they firm up the structure tremendously and their weight is not a factor. Be sure that formers One through Four are of 1/8 aircraft plywood.

Remove the lower fuselage section from the work surface (did you remember the waxed paper?) and add the top formers and turtle deck stringers. Sheet the nose with 3/32 soft balsa after deciding whether to leave a rectangular cave or a hatch on top (as we did) for access to the fuel tank..."

Supplementary file notes

Article.

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Heath LNB-4 Parasol (oz15134) by Robert Kitson 1981 - model pic

Datafile:

ScaleType:
  • Heath_Parasol | help
    see Wikipedia | search Outerzone
    ------------
    Test link:
    search RCLibrary 3views (opens in new window)


    ScaleType: This (oz15134) is a scale plan. Where possible we link scale plans to Wikipedia, using a text string called ScaleType.

    If we got this right, you now have a couple of direct links (above) to 1. see the Wikipedia page, and 2. search Oz for more plans of this type. If we didn't, then see below.


    Notes:
    ScaleType is formed from the last part of the Wikipedia page address, which here is https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heath_Parasol
    Wikipedia page addresses may well change over time.
    For more obscure types, there currently will be no Wiki page found. We tag these cases as ScaleType = NotFound. These will change over time.
    Corrections? Use the correction form to tell us the new/better ScaleType link we should be using. Thanks.

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User comments

A Heath model and a hot model. All's right with the world.
Miguel - 26/02/2024
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  • Plan File Filesize: 610KB Filename: Heath_LNB4_Parasol_oz15134.pdf
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Notes

* Credit field

The Credit field in the Outerzone database is designed to recognise and credit the hard work done in scanning and digitally cleaning these vintage and old timer model aircraft plans to get them into a usable format. Currently, it is also used to credit people simply for uploading the plan to a forum on the internet. Which is not quite the same thing. This will change soon. Probably.

Scaling

This model plan (like all plans on Outerzone) is supposedly scaled correctly and supposedly will print out nicely at the right size. But that doesn't always happen. If you are about to start building a model plane using this free plan, you are strongly advised to check the scaling very, very carefully before cutting any balsa wood.

 

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