Puddlemaster

Revised and updated July 14, 2007

This kit had been residing under my workbench since 1994. Ace R/C went out of business and the kit was thus out of production, and then they came back under new management, but the Puddlemaster was no more. Now, I am not sure if the Puddlemaster preceded the Pondside or vice versa. But the Pondside kit, which is virtually identical to the Puddlemaster if available from Hobby Hangar still. Both kits were designed by Scott Hartman, and I'll assume they are about the same.

The kit called for an Astro 05 Cobalt motor and warned that the weight of the receiver, servos and receiver battery must be kept under 6 ounces! The good old days of early electrics. With a modern ESC, there is no receiver battery, and I hazard a guess that the servos and the receiver weigh less than 2 ounces.

This model can be flown off snow as well as water.  Float planes provide a lot of winter flying fun here in Maine. And, we usually have no shortage of snow. Another joy of electrics is the ease of winter flying. No groveling around in some snowdrift fooling with jugs of glow fuel, heavy field boxes and so forth. Just turn the model "on" and fly.

I managed to remember to take a few photos as construction progressed. I actually feel a bit sorry for those who do not build, as they are missing a good part of the fascination with this hobby. This project required that I work my way around several issues presented by putting equipment in the model that was not invented or manufactured when the kit was made. Solving these problems and producing an R/C aircraft that you made yourself is a great joy.

This is a partial picture of the box label.  Note the "power recommendations".

 

The balsa was on the hard side and required some taping and so forth. As is my practice, gluing was taken care of with
CA and also carpenter's glue (alphatic resin yellow glue). The latter can be sanded, and the former cannot be. I sometimes use
Gorilla glue for small joints when I do not want to mix some epoxy. I think it is just as strong as epoxy and relatively convenient.

 

One of my sanding blocks is on the right. I buy lengths of wood at Home Depot and cut it into blocks. Then, I glue the sandpaper
directly to the blocks with contact cement. When the paper wears out, I peel it off and start again. I write the grade of paper
on the blocks. Those pins I got from Hobby Lobby, and they are made in the Czech Republic. They are very sharp
and thin, and they are the best I have ever used.

The rudder and elevator are controlled with plastic push rods that run down the inside of the model on each side.
I needed to apply a liberal dose of silicone to the inner rod to reduce what turned out to be some substantial friction.

Back to the nose. The servo mount was cut from liteply rather than using the hardwood mounting rails provided.
 This was much easier to line up and install.

Back to the nose. The top sheeting was glued together, the hatch (bottom of picture) was cut out, and then the sheeting was glued to the
top of the nose. I installed some balsa to provide a lip to hold the hatch. A thin plywood tongue was installed in the
front of the hatch, and two small screws hold the back down.

Carving wing tips is always fun. I glued the blocks on and went to work with the little Stanley plane.
Notice the spars. There is only one spar in this wing, and it is made by sandwiching a hard balsa stick between two basswood sticks.
 I used Gorilla glue, and they turned out very strong and stiff.

While I was glassing, I decided to glass the front bottom portion of the fuselage. This plane will be flying off snow and ice,
so the extra strength will be needed. By carefully using a kitchen spatula, I get most of the resin scraped away leaving a tough, light cover.

The original kit called for the wing to be held on by rubber bands. I opted for a bolt on wing, and the front hole is shown here.
That is a washer of 1/32" plywood I made to provide a strong base for the bolt. I also doubled up the ribs in the center of the wing to provide
more strength when I drill through. The oblong hole I cut for the motor wires.

The model is now covered and ready to fly. The bolt on wing is a nice feature, but the wing does have to be removed to replace the flight pack. 
This is the original Polycover silver wings and stabilizer.  I found this covering sags like crazy.  You have to tighten it up each time you fly it! 
It went on okay, but I will not be using it again.  The Cub Yellow is good ol' Ultracote.  I am sticking with it in the future.

The maiden flight. (Photo by Joe Gilbert)

Float Flying

The water test came on May 6, 2006, and was very successful.  I did find that adhering the
floats with Velcro did not work that well and I have now permanently attached them
with silicone.  I sealed the wing saddle with Silicone also, and not a drop
entered the fuselage and there were no over heating problems.



The model takes off easily with less than full power.  Some compensation is
needed due to the high motor mount as power settings are changed, but not much.

 


The original power was a Nippy Black 1608/160.  I found it really ate the watts up in the power system and the BEC in the Jeti Advance 18 Plus was forever
cutting the motor off.  Therefore, I installed an Axi and a Castle Creations Phoenix ESC.  The model was also "Spektrumized" with an AR6000 receiver. 



Recovering the tail resulted in new tail surfaces being built from the plans.  The Polycover was stripped and Ultracote used all around.
The Axi is very happy with a 2100 mAh Thunder Power battery, and 3-blade prop works great.  I have had many excellent
flights off of water and snow.  This is a great model and well worth the effort.

Specifications

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