Wednesday, March 18, 2015

PowerUp 2.0 Capacitor Power Unit for Paper Airplanes

My Background on Capacitor Powered Free Flight Airplanes

When the first PowerUp unit came out for free flying paper airplanes I thought this something I just had to try. In the past I have bought or built various free flight model airplanes powered by a capacitor and found the thought of getting it to perform just a little bit better very fun. For whatever reason I did not order the first version but when the PowerUp 3.0 for radio control became available I ordered one of each.

PowerUp 2.0 Capacitor Paper Airplane




PowerUp 3.0 RC Unit



My first capacitor airplane was sold in toy stores by Estes, it was light, small, and flew fairly well. After buying another one, I put the power unit from the first one on a very light balsa and tissue covered airplane. It flew a couple of circles indoors and then there was too little power left to stay airborne.

Estes Capacitor


Balsa Airplane Using Estes Components



After this I purchased another capacitor airplane at a toy store that had a gear drive spinning a larger propeller, it was fairly heavy but the power was pretty good. Stability of the little yellows low wing foam plane wasn’t the best, with some tweaking I did get some fairly good flights.

My Wright Capacitor Design


Student Designed Capacitor Airplane



My next experience with capacitor powered airplanes was to design a balsa and tissue airplane that conformed to the rules for the Wright Capacitor Science Olympiad event. With a working airplane I was able to coach a student my email so she could create her own airplanes for competition, see my blog post about this.

Observations of the PowerUp 2.0 Unit
On my scale the entire PowerUp 2.0 unit weighed about 6.3 grams. The weight is distributed with the heaviest component the capacitor and plastic clip on front and the electric motor and propeller at the other end. It is not possible the change the distance between the two components because of the mounting on a carbon rod. 

PowerUp 2.0 Components


In designing an airplane normally the nose is shorter and carries more weight and the tail needs to be as light as possible to balance. Paper airplanes tend to be a delta type of wing with more lifting area to the rear which should be better with the weight of the motor in the rear. From the ideas I have seen of other foam plane designs for PowerUp, twin booms are used so the motor/propeller can be slightly forward of the tail surfaces without interfering with the propeller. That is what I plan to try next.


Without making any thrust measurements and from what I have seen, the amount of thrust produced by the tiny propeller on direct drive appears to be minimal. For comparison just feel the air movement behind the propeller and feel the air behind a 6” diameter propeller spun by a loop of rubber, no doubt more thrust from the rubber power source. Therefore the airplane will need to be light, produce a fair amount of lift yet not create too much drag.


Paper Airplane Attempts
After receiving the PowerUp units I folded the paper airplane design given in the instructions with the 2.0 airplane. After much tweaking of the paper tabs I never was able to get a flight much longer than 35 feet. It appeared that as the airplane was starting to show signs of level flight the paper would bend and the plane would spiral into the ground.


PowerUp 2.0 Added to Foam RTF Glider



Using the Foam Airplanes I Had
My original intent was to put the unit in a foam model airplane so I started trying to put the PowerUp on some the foam airplanes I already had. First was a ready-to-fly foam glider that appeared to be about the right size and felt fairly light. I bent some paperclips to attach the unit on top, it would extend the glide slightly but never would climb.  After that I found a canard glider I built from foam plates and a plastic straw, not enough wing area, same for a similar constructed glider but this required nose weight to balance.


PowerUp 2.0 on Canard Foam Glider




Next Steps
At this point I am searching the Internet to see what other people have done for better success. There is a guy on YouTube known as GrandDadisAnOldMan that had a couple of videos on a twin-boom airplane built from foam plates that with some adjustments he got to fly rather well, I am going to attempt a similar airplane.  I also found a video of someone that had built a better paper airplane with larger wing area that flew pretty well. This has motivated me to try building from paper again also. If I can achieve some success with the free flight capacitor unit I will attempt experiments with the PowerUp 3.0 radio control unit.


So much fun experimenting with this, I hope to hear from other people working with this.

Update:
I tried another paper airplane design and put new batteries in the charger. This plane flew better than previous design but still would not climb, only flew level.



Bill Kuhl

Related Links




GrandDadisanOldMan Great PowerUp2.0 Flight  - in this video he was getting goods flights at the end













8 comments:

  1. I have tried a couple of designs too, some flew like a dart very straight fast, no control and not real flight just extended gliding, some spin out of control like a car taking a sharp corner, and my last which needs a lot of work. I have never achieved controlled flight so far....rudder doesn't do all that much..... Using power up 3.0/....paper and cardboard combo
    ...since I can't post pics and willing to exchange emails for designs and idea exchange

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I just found this video today that appears to fly pretty well
      https://youtu.be/EjoSmAgkaZQ
      My PowerUp 3.0 quit working before I even had it in an airplane.

      Delete
  2. I have tried a couple of designs too, some flew like a dart very straight fast, no control and not real flight just extended gliding, some spin out of control like a car taking a sharp corner, and my last which needs a lot of work. I have never achieved controlled flight so far....rudder doesn't do all that much..... Using power up 3.0/....paper and cardboard combo
    ...since I can't post pics and willing to exchange emails for designs and idea exchange

    ReplyDelete
  3. 1. Can you please tell about the motor and prop used in these models? I have ordered 2.7V 10F supercaps and 716 coreless motor with 45mm prop. One 716 motor has a 137mm prop with gearbox.

    2. With 716, what weights of gliders can I expect to fly?

    3. Can I convert your foam plate - straw gliders to capacitor powered ones? What modifications and trimming will be needed?

    4. Are there any plans or links to construction of these gliders that would help beginners like me, like your Ideas-Inspire or EndlessLift websites?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Ashutosh I am no expert on this. On the YouTube Channel Granddad is an Oldman are a bunch of videos of capacitor planes. In one video he did get the PowerUp 2.0 to fly a foam plane, I gave up on that. The capacitor and motor you ordered I think is what was being used in Wright Stuff event. I built a lightweight plane from balsa and tissue what flew okay but the climb was slow.

      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=10DBAYjqy08&list=PLA5a2xPRSrB1wNvirrwAn69eo_pM0tdEM

      Delete
    2. My F-4, which I suppose you will get to see once this is moderated, weighs just over 7 grams without the power unit, and the wing area is something like 42 square inches (280 sq. cm.?) area. I was pleased with how it flew, but I tried charging it "just a little more" to get it to fly longer, and cooked the capacitor. I bought a capacitor that is @ 1/3 heavier that I am just starting to try to hack in to replace. So far I have to find a new way to switch it, since the tiny switch in the PowerUp was lost during the surgical procedure. I don't know how they managed to manufacture these things since there are no markings, even for polarity on the capacitor. The capacitors must come on some kind of strip or spool that fits in a machine.

      Delete
  4. Well, since you asked...
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YQ-B2jYWGIk

    ReplyDelete