HyperFlgiht Sky Series Assembly Guide
HyperFlight Ltd
Drybank Farm
Fosse Way
Ettington
Stratford-on-Avon
Warwickshire UK CV37 7PD
www.HyperFlight.co.uk
sales@HyperFlight.co.uk
© 2011 HyperFlight
Revision 1.0
Sky Series Assembly Guide 1.odt
HyperFlight Sky Series Assembly Guide 1
Warning, this is not a toy!
If you are new to the hobby of flying RC model airplanes, DO NOT attempt to fly this
model by yourself! There are hundreds of BMFA (British Model Flying Association)
clubs in the UK. Ask your local hobby shop for the location of the nearest club in your
area, or check out the www.bmfa.org.uk (or your national modelling organisations)
web site. Many clubs often have qualified instructors to teach you how to fly. If you
are an accomplished pilot then you should have no problem in flying this model.
However the Supra-e can fly very fast, and is potentially a lethal object. Do fly
responsibly, and make sure your third party liability (eg BMFA) insurance is valid.
Limit of Liability
All HyperFlight Models products are constructed to the highest standard and made
strong enough for reasonable usage by an experienced and responsible r/c aircraft
pilot. By keeping this model you confirm that the parts have not been structurally
damaged and are fit for purpose as received.
The craftsmanship, attention to detail, and actions of the builder/flyer of this model
airplane kit will ultimately determine the airworthiness, flight performance, and the
safety of the finished model. You confirm that you take full responsibility for the safe
usage, construction, and maintenance of the model, and you will not hold
HyperFlight Ltd or its owners, staff, agents, contractors, or helpers in any way
responsible for any damages or injury that may occur as a result of operating or
flying this model. HyperFlight’s sole obligation shall be to replace those parts of the
kit proven to be defective or missing. If you are not willing to agree to this binding
condition of sale please return the model in as-received condition to Hyperflight for a
refund.
Acknowledgement
HyperFlight would like to thank Steve Bowdler for his help writing this guide, based
on his build of a Sky Master glider.
We would really appreciate input by other builders – both instructions for specific
models, and some construction photos.
HyperFlight Sky Series Assembly Guide 2
Preparation
The mouldings are of reasonable quality but may need cleaning up in a couple of
places. The fuselage had a ridge around the centre line where the two halves had
been joined. Not significant but I gently removed it with a fine file anyway.
The wings had “flashing” along the leading edge from the moulding process which, I
believe, is more significant. I removed this with a fine file also.
I could see that as the fuselage has been constructed for toughness rather than
minimum weight it will be necessary to mount all the equipment as far forwards as
possible to obtain the required centre of gravity position.
I decided to build the model in the following order – Wings, V tail then fuselage. This
would allow me to check the CoG at various stages and fine tune the fuselage
installation as I went along.
Wings
For wing servos I decide to use Hitec 5065s as already had three. In the past I have
attached them by wrapping masking tape around the servo and epoxying them
directly to the wing upper surface. However, I have found that the servo occasionally
wriggles loose in the tape so I tried a new (for me) technique with this model.
I bought some CNC cut plywood mounting plates which are designed for the 5065
and are close fit around the servo. These are epoxied to the wing upper surface and
the servo is pushed into the mount and secured with a couple of spots of hot melt
adhesive. They made setting up the controls much easier as the servo can be
removed as often as needed before being finally glued in place.
The 5065s are 12mm thick and they only just fit into the aileron bay with literally no
thickness to spare. This is the maximum thickness for the servo and assumes no
addition thickness due to mounting the servo in the wing. There is more thickness
available in the flap bays.
1. Servo mounts
a. Remove about 1mm from the servo mount width so that it is a snug fit
between the wing ribs and slides up against the rear of the main spar.
The servos are all fitted with the horn facing a way from the fuselage.
b. Wrap the servo with a single layer of cling film to prevent the servo
being bonded to the mount or wing.
c. Place the mount on a flat surface and press the servo home until the
servo and mount are flush on the underside.
HyperFlight Sky Series Assembly Guide 3
d. Coat the underside and contact edges of the mount with adhesive. I
used microballoon / epoxy mix for this as it provides some gap filling
whilst remaining low in density.
e. Press the servo and its mount into the servo bay and make sure that it
is pressed against the wing upper surface.
f. Clean of any adhesive which is squeezed out.
g. Once the adhesive has cured pull the servo from the mount and
remove the cling film.
2. Servo wiring
a. Use thin multi strand wire for the wings
b. Thread three lengths from the aileron servo bay to the root
c. Cut off the servo connector and solder directly to the wiring. One for
positive, one for negative and one for control signal.
d. Use heat shrink to insulate the solder joints
e. Run a single length of wire from the flap servo bay to the wing root
f. Pull the aileron servo positive and negative cables out into the flap
servo bay.
g. Cut of the flap servo connector
h. Solder the servo positive to the positive cable, servo negative to the
negative cable and the servo signal to the new wire in the flap bay.
i. At the wing root solder on a 4 way socket e.g. Deans micro, and
insulate the solder connections with heat shrink. Connect the cables in
the following order- positive, aileron signal, negative, flap signal.
j. Make up two leads to connect the wing wiring to the receiver.
HyperFlight Sky Series Assembly Guide 4
k. For each lead use two servo extension leads.
l. Cut off the servo end connectors of each lead.
m. On one lead remove the positive and negative cables completely
n. Solder a matching four way plug to the cut ends of extension leads to
match the connections to the wing – positive, aileron signal, negative,
flap signal.
3. Fitting the control surface horns
a. Open up the pre-drilled holes in the control surface horns to suit the
linkages to be fitted as this is easier to do before the horns are fixed
into the wing.
b. Replace the servos in their mounts with the servo arms fitted.
c. Put a piece of masking tape on to the control surface in the
approximate location of the each control horn
d. Using a straight edge mark the masking tape where the horns are to be
fitted.
e. Cut a small slot in to the control surface for each horn. Be sure not cut
completely through to the upper surface. I used a disc in a Dremel for
this.
f. Lightly abrade the control horns in the area where they will be bonded
to the wing.
g. Give the bonding surfaces of both wing and horns a light coat of
adhesive. I used micro fibre / epoxy mix to ensure a good bond with
excellent gap filling properties.
HyperFlight Sky Series Assembly Guide 5
h. Place each horn into its slot and align with the servo and ensure it is
vertical. Each pair of horns (aileron: aileron, flap: flap) should be as
identical as possible in terms of the position of the linkage holes. They
should be the same height above the control surface and the same
distance from the hinge line. Ailerons should have the hole directly
above the hinge line. Flap horns can be placed with the hole a little way
behind the hinge line to assist in achieving the large downwards travel
of the flap.
i. Leave the adhesive to cure.
4. Fitting the linkages
a. Cut eight lengths of 1mm diameter piano wire.
b. Form Z bends in the end of four of them and L bends in the other four
c. Cut four lengths of 3mm od x 1mm id carbon fibre tune
d. Centre the wing servos and the clamp the control surfaces in the
neutral position.
e. Fit Z bend push rods into the control surface horns
f. Slide the CF tubes over them
g. Fit the L bend push rods into the servo horns.
h. Slide the CF tube over the L bend rods and centre equally on both the
L bend and Z bend rods.
i. Run a small drop of thin CA adhesive onto each rod / CF tube joint and
allow to cure.
j. With the servos and control surfaces still centred, add a small drop of
thick CA adhesive to each push rod to horn joint. Zap with a small
amount of accelerator and the flex each joint. This removes all slop in
the linkage.
HyperFlight Sky Series Assembly Guide 6
V Tail
The V tail angle mounting in the fuselage boom is 110 degree so the V tail needs to
be fixed at this angle. T he V tail is designed to be removable but I could not find a
secure and yet removable linkage system to use between the control horns and push
rods so I decided to make my V tail fixed.
1. Joining the V tail halves.
a. Stick a length of parcel tape or similar
to the building board at right angles to
the front edge of the board. This is to
stop the V tail being bonded to the
board.
b. Mark a centre line on the tape
perpendicular to the straight front edge
of the building board. This is the centre
line of the V tail join.
c. Find or make two suitable pieces to
prop up the V tail at the correct angle.
They need to be exactly the same
height and about 100mm high. Two
pieces of scrap balsa block will do.
d. Calculate the distance the props need to be way from the centre line to
achieve an inclusive angle of 110 degrees. With 100mm props this is
142mm each side of the centre line. Mark two more lines perpendicular
to the board edge at this distance each side of the centre line. This is
the position of the inside edge of each props.
e. Hold each prop in place with its inside edge on these lines.
f. Dry fit the V tail halves in place with the join over the centre line and
the V tail panels propped up at the correct angle by the props. Align the
hinge line of the rudder surfaces over the front edge of the building
board. The hinge line should be straight from one end of the V tail to
the other.
g. Once everything fits, remove the V tail halves and coat both surfaces of
the join with adhesive. I used micro fibres / epoxy mix for this as there
was some gap filling to be done.
h. Put the two halves back into the jig and push the two halves together at
the join. Align the hinge lines over the board front edge and the join on
HyperFlight Sky Series Assembly Guide 7
the centre line. Check that everything is square and true. Leave the
adhesive to cure.
i. Clean up the upper surface of the epoxy join and dry fit the supplied
centre piece to the V tail join. Adjust as required to get a close fit of the
centre piece to the V tail.
j. Epoxy in place ensuring that the holes align with those in the V tail
2. V tail push rods
a. Fix the control horns as required. I removed the horns from their
mounting bases and epoxied them directly into slots in the control
b. Make the push rods from two 1 metre lengths of 0.9mm diameter piano
wire.
c. Form L bends on the ends of each
d. Slide the push rod into the factory fitted outer and fit the L bend into the
control horn.
Fuselage
Mount all the RC equipment well forward in the fuselage in order to achieve the
correct CoG without adding any lead.
1. V Tail servos
a) Trim the ply servo tray to fit the chosen servos
b) Fix the servo tray in position by using epoxy to bond it to the fuselage
sides
c) Make sure the tray is fitted such that the servo horns are at the same
height as the pre-installed push rod outers.
d) My servos are fitted in the area of 130mm to 155mm measured back from
the fuselage nose.
e) Make up two short push rods long enough to reach the V tail push rods
and overlap by 20mm. Make L bends in the end of each
f) Centre the servo horns and the V tail surface.
g) Fit the short push rods into the servo horns.
HyperFlight Sky Series Assembly Guide 8
h) Slide a short length of heat shrink over the V tail push rods.
i) Apply a small amount of epoxy to the V tail push rods, align the servo push
rod with the V tail push rod and slide the heat shrink over them both.
j) Check the surface and the servo are still centred and then shrink the heat
shrink with a hot air gun or similar. Allow the epoxy to cure fully.
k) Treat the ends of the push rods with CA adhesive, as per the wings
l) Make tapered support pieces from 3mm balsa to hold the front ends of the
push rods in place and eliminate play in the V tail controls. Fix the
supports between the fuselage sides and the push rod outers with CA
adhesive.
2. Final assembly
a. Fix the receiver behind the servo tray with Velcro
b. Run the wing extension leads from the receiver to the wing seat. And
connect to the wings.
c. Fit the wings to the fuselage with the nylon screws.
d. Connect the V tail servos to the appropriate receiver channels.
e. Fit a receiver battery pack into the nose of the fuselage with Velcro.
f. Hinge the canopy with Diamond tape along one side and fix it shut with
a smaller piece of tape on the other side.
g. Program the radio as required.
3. Set up
a. Rudder function - +/- 12mm travel at root of V tail
b. Elevator function - +/- 6mm travel at root of V tail
c. Aileron function - +12mm, -8mm
d. Flap function - 80 degrees down at full flap
e. Centre of Gravity - usually 70mm from wing leading edge - see
HyperFlight web site
HyperFlight Sky Series Assembly Guide 9
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