Beginners Towline Glider (oz8249)

About this Plan

Beginners Towliner. Free flight towline glider model. All-sheet towline class C design. Wing area 116 sq in.

Quote: "A clean design capable of excellent performance, we recommend this model to beginners. Beginner's Towliner, by Paul E Del Gatto.

HAVE you ever had the urge to build a model the night before a contest? Well, I did. The result was a Class C towline ship that performs as well as its big brother towliners. It is stable on the line and will take a long towline, in fact much more than is required in competition. All these desired characteristics are due to the nature of the design, which incorporates a high aspect ratio wing with low drag characteristics; also the fact that the model is constructed entirely of balsa wood, therefore reducing skin friction to a minimum.

Through careful selection of balsa for the various parts, this towliner can be made light enough so that the model will not exceed the required weight for AMA rules. The original weighed slightly less than 3 oz while the ballast brought the weight up to 3-1/4 oz. Since present rules call for 4 oz per 100 sq in, the model must weigh at least 4-1/4 oz for contest flying.

WING AND TAIL CONSTRUCTION: To construct the wing, select a sheet of balsa 1/4 in thick, quarter grain preferred. The desired wing profile is shown on the plans. With the aid of a long blade knife, rough out the desired shape. The undercamber is sanded in with the aid of rough sandpaper.

The stabilizer is made from 1/8 sheet stock. However, it will be necessary to lay out grids for the full size pattern, which will be four times the size of those on the drawing. Therefore they will be 1/4 in squares. The next step is to reproduce intersection points in order to obtain identical curvature. The rudder and sub-rudder are similarly constructed with the exception that the drawing illustrates it half scale. However, for full size the grids are still 1/4 in square.

FUSELAGE CONSTRUCTION: The fuselage consists of four pieces: the boom, centerpod, and two sides for the pod. The boom is blanked out of a piece of hard balsa stock, 1 x 1/2 x 17-3/8 inches. Do not shape the boom until all parts of the fuselage are assembled.

To construct the pod, first draw sufficient grids consisting of 1/4 in squares and outline the shape of the pod, referring back to the half scale drawing. The sides of the pods have the same shape as the center except for the portion which overlaps the joint between center pod and boom. This overlap eliminates almost entirely the possibility of breaking there.

To assemble the fuselage, first glue the boom to the center pod or core. Allow to dry for about an hour, then cement the sides in place. Allow another hour for drying... "

Note this is not a fullsize plan, this is a scan of the drawing as printed in the magazine. Formers are shown at 100%, the wing and tail layout is shown at 25%, the fuselage at 50%.

Supplementary file notes

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