It has been a while… sorry
I hope everyone has managed to stay safe and well during these last few months… strange times.
We have been busy working on multiple projects one of which is the SeaDart. We had planned to do the initial water tests in April but as it became clear this would not be possible we switched focus to other design work and projects that could be undertaken easily from home. I suspect we will be looking at the end of the summer before we can get the whole team together to begin testing. When we can the model is ready and waiting.
In the mean time I’ll start updating the thread. The last posts were at Fighteraces with them having just completed the paintwork.
Once delivered to me the first thing to do was install the new elevon mechanism that was designed while it was in paint to replace the previous iteration which wasn’t up to the task. The new system has two large servos per elevon mounted near the CG. The elevons are actuated via a carbon tube and large drive horn. The bearing block and elevon drive is shown below.
F434BC2F-7892-417C-B063-67D86F8BE44C by
Alex Jones, on Flickr
4BF4E8BE-4016-4797-AB37-1E0B645FB01F by
Alex Jones, on Flickr
Servo frame work that will be bonded into the fuselage near the CG.
F9DA4661-1BAD-406E-922E-AB07627FB067 by
Alex Jones, on Flickr
8DFCA86F-156D-4ED1-B604-67626D7598BE by
Alex Jones, on Flickr
We are having to move considerable torque through this system so everything gets tied into the existing structure.