Taking elevator servo off

During first 8 flights in one day I realised that I did not change tail angle much, and bird flew well. Also tail was pretty wobbly and shaking a lot during flight, because linkage between elevator servo and ruder servo had to much free play. So I temporary took elevator servo off and set fixed tail angle of attack.

After that I made four flights with my yellow bird, and all was fine. Bird was lighter 2 g because of 1 servo less.

See video here 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IJA5C-ghj4s

How to make crank shaft

Most difficult part to make for beginners is crank shaft which lifting the wings. It is very important that is done very accurately to achieve wing symmetrical flapping. For my rubber band and RC ornithopters I use 10 mm rotation radius for wings flapping and 20 mm lever length on wings. It is 3D object bit difficult to imagine at first. At the end first radius and second radius must rotate at 10 mm radius. Second one is 7 mm but it is 70 deg in respect to firs one. If precisely measured and bent both wing should flap symmetrically  .

see picture 

I use 0.8 mm steel wire or they call it music wire. For RC model I used 1 mm wire because hole in the gear was 1mm. To properly design my ornithopter I used free software from this website.

http://ornithopter.org/software.shtml  It is very accurate ,when I finished my bird everything was exactly same as calculations from that free on line software. Thank you guys from The Ornithopter Zone.

My first properly built ornithopter

I have learnt a lot by doing previous experimental bird. So I decided it is time to make one with individual parts and gathered knowledge and experience. 
Parts i have bought from hobby on line shop.

Inexpensive 4 channel radio (transmitter) DSMX protocol Mode 2.

Receiver DSM2 four servos control and 2 ESC 2A. And of course some balsa wood, carbon fibre rods, glues, polyethylene foil, LiPo battery 180 mAh and 1.5 mm depron for the tail. So after one week of thinking, cutting, gluing and sweating. There we go !!. I will call it Yellow bird.

Now big worry. Is it going to fly. Calm day, well wind 5 km/h. Local park, moment of the truth.

See it on You Tube.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kXasVewnuRY&feature=youtu.be

Not bad at all.

So what to do next ?

So after completed few rubber band powered ornithopters I realised it is nice for startup and learning but it is essentially dead end. There is no indoor flying venues in my town and it requires zero wind for flights which is only few times per year. After watching nice inspirational videos on You Tube about ornithopters I decided to go for RC controlled one.
I have never done it before so I started from scratch. Yes it is 50 times more complicated than rubber band powered ones. I bought X wing E bird toy from the internet for $ 32 to se how does it works. It arrived together with small RC transmitter 2 channels, ESC control and actuator controlled ruder like airplane. I flew it in nearby park and it flyies , Bit difficult to control and if motor cuts off mid flight it nose dives to the ground. But did not break. I decided to use E bird internal organs and tail and try to implant it to my monoplane ornithopter rubber band powered. 

Soon I realised it is impossible. Changed plan to build my firs RC powered ornithopter around mechanism from dead E bird. It proved to be far more complicated than I expected.
When finished motor could not make even one flap and cut off, with my wings 40 cm wide.
Torque was to high to move bigger wings than toy bird. Gear ratio was 1:26 pretty high flapping rate. I could not change that, so i put smaller wing same size like original bird but only monoplane. So wings area is half size of x wing double wings E bird. Bird weight is 18.5 g. Same as original one but half wing area, very high wing loading. I was suspicious that it won't fly at all. 
First version all balsa wood frame  CF rods wing spars modified gear with single crank shaft. Transplanted original tail, no time to develop mine.

So first flight in local park.

Watch that on this link

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ac6Ggp-ecZc&feature=youtu.be

Yes it can fly somehow. Wing was to small for 18.5 g weight. But motor and transmission 1:26 can not drive bigger wing and that was it.

After many heavy crashes every pice of wood was broken. Only wings, mechanism and receiver did not. I tried to improve steering by side truster 4 mm nano motor and prop.

With 6 mm motor and 70 mAh LiPo battery it could fly around 6 min.

Apart from my artistic painting I also like technical stuff. Its a bit like curse if you have multiple interests to enjoy. I took little break from painting now. While sitting in my backyard watching birds flying around I was curious how do they produce lift and thrust by flapping wings. I started watching different articles and videos on the internet about that. Accidentally    I came across  some thing I have never heard of called an ornithopters. I was hocked up.
It looked like very nice to do some fine technical things when have free time (semi retired now). And few months ago I have built my first rubber band powered ornithopter by free plans from website The ornithopter zone. Was not so simple to by different materials and parts, learn about glues. etc. But I have done few of them. They flew nicely but with rubber band power and without any controls flight where very short and unpredictable.

This video is recorded with iPhone camera  slow motion 240 Frames per second.

Actual flight lasted only about 30 sec.

Watch this on You Tube

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fVTaVyG7_2s&feature=youtu.be

While ago when I was living in Croatia I enjoyed flying ultralight aircraft called trike. It was very nice only with helmet and in t-shirts flying over nice landscape like a bird.
Aaa happy days. There is some photos from my former air club back there.

I did not fly since I have migrated to Australia 21 years ago. To expensive and to windy for flying trikes here in Perth.