Altering the ekranoplan

ekranoplan M3.9

Winter continues and I continue to prepare for spring. I redid the ekranoplan. He lengthened the front wing by 18 cm to get a little more lift and redesigned the cockpit. Moved the cockpit forward a little to move the center of gravity a little forward. I think this will solve some of the problems that arose at the maximum speed of the boat. I also hastily made a 3d model of the boat as I see it, ideally, and I want to make a new boat if the tests go well and the result satisfies me, then the next boat will be more licked and other materials will be used in it. But this is still only a dream, but for now I am looking for a more powerful motor for testing, if I cannot find it, then I will have to rent again the one that I took last time. Power is not enough for him, but I think it will do for the next experiment. Photos of the model and video of the alteration of the ekranoplan below.

The final test of the ekranoplan on the water in the 2020 season

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I’ll be brief. I finished with the ekranoplan. The water tests went well and now I have to return the motor to its owner, disassemble the boat and put it in a corner for the time being. This time everything was very fast. The weather was good, I quickly assembled the boat, sat at the helm and started off. With the Polini Thor 250, the boat immediately jumped into the water and glided along the surface. The front wing is always in the air at a speed of 35-40 km / h, the rear wing is also in the air and the boat is held by the water only with rubber strips that I screwed on before the last test. In general, at a speed of 50 km per hour, the boat flies very confidently, but at some point (I want to note that not always) the boat begins to sway and longitudinal instability arises. The first thought that came to my mind was that because the wings were too close to each other, it would be possible to lengthen the hull, or install a horizontal stabilizer to balance the boat in flight. I would also like to redo the motor mount again and reduce the motor angle by five degrees, plus raise it a little higher. Finally, you need to slightly reduce the angle of attack of the front wing by a few degrees. But this is all another time, I was exhausted during this season, there were so many alterations and visits. It is both physically and mentally difficult for one person to do more. Therefore, with a light heart, I postpone this project until modern times, what I wanted to do – lifted my boat into the air. Made my own small ekranoplan. Though not high, it flies. And it is also well managed. I didn’t make any extreme reversals so that some accident didn’t happen. Since the motor is not mine and I didn’t want to get a few thousand euros. Having made three high-speed races on the lake, I understood everything for myself and quickly disassembled the boat, washed off the lake until no one woke up in the vicinity. So now I am satisfied and can calmly engage in other projects that I am already doing in parallel. These will also be motor boats. One will be a two-seater motor boat which I am going to make according to the drawings of 1960 and the second one is a single-seat speedboat according to the drawings of 1941 which I am going to convert into an airboat with aviation styling. So what’s next is more. The video is as usual below.

Test with Polini Thor engine

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Polini Thor 250. This engine is what I need! I finally tried it out today. The propeller that I ordered a month ago came and this morning I tied the ekranoplan to the boxes at the entrance to the hangar where I work and started the engine. On the model, I already tested the method of binding the ekranoplan, so I knew how and in what places to bind it so that it could stand symmetrically in the air stream. In short, everything worked out for me. The boat flew up and stayed in the air while I held full throttle. I think that on the water I will give full throttle and immediately jump out of the water, and as the speed increases, I will slow down the throttle and get the right flight. I would very much like the rear wing to work correctly and the flight would turn out to be horizontally even, and not with a raised nose. The model flew smoothly and so far everything worked out just like on the model, so there is no reason to worry about the fact that the full-size device will carry itself any differently. It remains to wait for the weather and go to the water. Video from the tests below.

Work on strengthening the structure

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I thought about the boat and realized that the attachment point of the front and rear is very fragile. I decided to strengthen it with aluminum tubes. I did it this weekend. The boat looks very good, it has a beautiful streamlined hull. Pontoons turned out very well and look organically with the body. One problem that I did not see initially seemed to be plywood as a material – the hull slightly bent at the junction of the front and rear of the boat. Due to the increased humidity in the hangar, plywood absorbed a lot of moisture and bent from improper storage of parts, but now when I connected the front and back, a slight bend appeared. I have a couple of ideas how to fix this, but all this after I have glued the hull of the boat with fiberglass. After pasting the hull, the boat will become tougher and it will be possible to fasten and straighten it normally, and after painting, moisture will no longer affect the hull. I also made a front little ruder and figured out the place where he would stand. It turned out pretty well. As always, the photo report is below. The quality of the photos is not very good, for which I apologize the protective glass broke on the phone and the photos turn out a little muddy.

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Continuing to build ekranoplan

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For today, the project with ekranoplan significantly moved forward. I managed to do a lot and changed my mind and decided a lot. It is important to maintain the ease of use. I made the spars and ribs of the rear wing, which in combination will also be a boat. Strength is needed, so the weight of the parts is quite large, although I removed the material where I could. However, if I will do the front wing using the same technology using plywood and wood, I’m afraid my motor will not be able to tear the boat from the water, but I had a different solution – I will use a PVC fabric wing and a pair of aluminum or thin-walled steel pipes, it’s easier to work with them, I will make ribs from aluminum tubes and it will be simple and easy. I will do a motor frame at the very end when I collect the main parts of the boat. It is very important that the boat is collapsible, otherwise I can’t get it to the water in my car, the floats will be dressed separately on the shore.

The rear wing I put together today. The ribs are on the spar and glued. At the weekend, I will glue the necessary details for the strength of the structure and process the end boards, then it will be possible to glue the skin. With the front wing, it’s all the more less clear to me, it remains to deal with the floats, I think they should be made of polystyrene foam and pasted over with fiberglass. It is important to make a boat that can completely come off the water and fly stably on the screen. To do this, I will have to find the perfect balance between the weight of the boat with the pilot with engine power and the force that will occur during riding in all modes and in any wind. No stabilizer is provided if the boat lifts its nose too much, then I will simply remove the gas at this stage I don’t need extra leverage; the main thing is to build the boat and it will be possible to turn it on the water further. The main thing for me is to make a boat that could take off low above the water in straight sections and, of course, the atmosphere of a propeller spinning in front and the feeling of flying on an airplane. At the moment, I think there are enough goals. Below, as usual, some photos from the work on the boat.

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