building my Savannah-S in germany

[MajorTom]

Hey guys,

 

I don't want to hijack your threads any longer to ask stupid questions. It ist time to start my own.

 

My kit should have arrived some days ago, but didn't. Next estimate is this Thusday. Right now I'm a little itchy.

 

I cleand up my garage and workshop for 8 weeks now. And it is enough. First I put everything from left to right and back. Later I really started to get rid of some stuff. Guess I will miss ist soon, even though I didn't used it for years.

 

A couple of months ago flying a plane, let alone building one, was a very, very distant dream. O.K. I was an aviation addict for all my life. Built rubber driven planes when I was a boy. Age 13 I saved up all money from birthday and chrismas for 2 years to buy a rc-control, but was denied by the officials in the former estern germany. Did it and doing it still, when the wall came down. Have two great boy, who are flying whit me. First with a student-teacher-cable, since last year both fly all by themselves.

 

October I met a cuban born builder from EAA Chapter 66. He showed me his scratch built plane and we had a long talk. He sad: "When I see you literally crawling into my plane, I know something for sure. You will start building sooner than you imagine. What are you waiting for?" Well, here I am, attending flightschool and starting to built my Savannah.

 

There is no german blog about building the savannah. So I thought I might start one. Everybody who can read german is invited to have a look. I'm planing on taking photos daily and counting hours and stuff.

 

www.savannah-blog.de

 

 

 

 

 

[IBob]

Hey guys,I don't want to hijack your threads any longer to ask stupid questions. It ist time to start my own.

 

My kit should have arrived some days ago, but didn't. Next estimate is this Thusday. Right now I'm a little itchy.

 

I cleand up my garage and workshop for 8 weeks now. And it is enough. First I put everything from left to right and back. Later I really started to get rid of some stuff. Guess I will miss ist soon, even though I didn't used it for years.

 

A couple of months ago flying a plane, let alone building one, was a very, very distant dream. O.K. I was an aviation addict for all my life. Built rubber driven planes when I was a boy. Age 13 I saved up all money from birthday and chrismas for 2 years to buy a rc-control, but was denied by the officials in the former estern germany. Did it and doing it still, when the wall came down. Have two great boy, who are flying whit me. First with a student-teacher-cable, since last year both fly all by themselves.

 

October I met a cuban born builder from EAA Chapter 66. He showed me his scratch built plane and we had a long talk. He sad: "When I see you literally crawling into my plane, I know something for sure. You will start building sooner than you imagine. What are you waiting for?" Well, here I am, attending flightschool and starting to built my Savannah.

 

There is no german blog about building the savannah. So I thought I might start one. Everybody who can read german is invited to have a look. I'm planing on taking photos daily and counting hours and stuff.

 

www.savannah-blog.de

 

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Great intro, MT...and a wonderful thing you are beginning. Also most excellent that you can make a German build blog if nobody has done that yet.

And there are no stupid questions here...just all of us increasing our understanding.

 

As for the Savannah, everyone I speak with says what an excellent aircraft it is.

 

We look forward to your pics and your progress.

 

IBob in New Zealand

 

 

[Neil_S]

Hi MajorTom,

 

Welcome to the forums here, and I just know you will enjoy both the build, and flying, of your Savannah!

 

That is one cool RC model you have in your picture - building the Savvy should be easy after that!

 

Cheers,

 

Neil

 

 

[Kyle Communications]

Welcome Major Tom and congratulations of starting to build. I too have been a aeromodeller since I was 12 years old and now am 58. Have done pretty much all of the disciplines in aeromodelling finishing up in turbines. Since building my Sav 5 years ago I have to admit I rarely do any aeromodelling anymore so be prepared for that once you start flying your pride and joy. Building the Sav gave me so much joy it truely is just a big model but to actually sit in it and fly it by the seat of your pants and not by your thumbs is a very exciting and different feeling. Never be afraid to ask any questions no matter how silly you think they may be as there is a lot of experience in this forum and I am sure you will get solutions.

 

Keep us all informed and I will check your german blog as well....thank god for google translate :)

 

Mark

 

 

[eightyknots]

Hi and MajorTom.

 

It's great to see another Savannah builder on this forum. I have seen a German Savannah blog once which, loosely translated meant "dream of flying".

 

We hope to hear and see more of your build.

 

(edit: the site mentioned above is: Traum_Vom_Fliegen -if you go this site, there is also an English version you can select)

 

 

[MajorTom]

The Eagle has landed.... the boxes are in perfect shape, no damage.

 

So first step is to check / count / sort the parts. I was told by my distributer, I have 14 days to report any missing or damaged parts. Later on, there would be no warrenty.

 

What is the best way to do it? I was under the impression, ICP would provide something digital to do it. A pdf file could be easily serched. Exel would be great.

 

How did you do it???

 

 

 

[Kyle Communications]

Sorry no easy way...get all the parts out and sort them into groups and make them off in the relative chapters there is a index of parts at the start of each chapter

 

 

[MajorTom]

It would be so much easier with something digital. Just press Contol+F ... put in your number ( you could even take a barcodescanner ) and you get to the right page.

 

 

[Kyle Communications]

hahahah sure they are italians :)...You need a language degree to decipher some parts of the manual

 

 

[MajorTom]

Yes, you are right. Some sentences are funny (NOT that I could do better...NO), But even more funny is the german translation. It reads like italien to greek to english and back. ;-) But as long as I have you guys, I'm not affraid.

 

Just thinking about scanning the sparepart lists in the back of my book and putting it to an OCR program or better making a pdf-A file out of the scan. ( pdf-A is a searchable version of "picture" files )

 

 

[Kyle Communications]

You could do that but its easier to just put all the like numbered parts together and tick them off. Its much faster and you have to do it anyway otherwise you will spend sooooo much time looking for parts. You probably will not have enough rivets to complete the build...I dont know anyone that got enough rivets but other than that I have not heard to many at all that were missing any parts

 

 

[MajorTom]

In order to check for missing parts and to sort things into chapters I put the manual, sparepart list e.g. into our office scanner.

 

It tock an hour, but now I have a serchable pdf of everyting. At least in theory. Unfortunally the OCR had big problems with things that have no meaning, like part numbers... to bad. It helped anyway. You just have to try an o instead of zero...

 

I started to sort/check parts by the spare part summary. It works, but I allready got 10 parts, with numbers not in the list...!?

 

 

 

[IBob]

In my manual, while the explode drawings in the spare parts lists are very useful, the numbers there do not line up exactly with what is in my build manual.

 

The part numbers in the build manual more accurately represent what is in my kit.

 

I hope you do not have to test your distributor's assertion regarding warranty:

 

1. It is very difficult to check every part against the manual.

 

2. While you may be able to spot damaged parts, it is almost impossible to spot incorrectly manufactured or labelled parts.

 

On the good side (for me, at least) I am a long way into the airframe assembly, and so far have no 'bad' or missing parts, except for some rivets and a couple of bolts.

 

 

[rmorton]

The Eagle has landed.... the boxes are in perfect shape, no damage.So first step is to check / count / sort the parts. I was told by my distributer, I have 14 days to report any missing or damaged parts. Later on, there would be no warrenty.

What is the best way to do it? I was under the impression, ICP would provide something digital to do it. A pdf file could be easily serched. Exel would be great.

 

How did you do it???

 

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There is no short cut to checking the parts and I seriously doubt you can get through the lot in 14 days. So far (and I am still finding bits I thought were missing) I haven't even got through half of it! Still don't hesitate to ask for specific bits you can't find as I may know where to look and vice versa!

 

 

[rmorton]

In order to check for missing parts and to sort things into chapters I put the manual, sparepart list e.g. into our office scanner.It tock an hour, but now I have a serchable pdf of everyting. At least in theory. Unfortunally the OCR had big problems with things that have no meaning, like part numbers... to bad. It helped anyway. You just have to try an o instead of zero...

I started to sort/check parts by the spare part summary. It works, but I allready got 10 parts, with numbers not in the list...!?[ATTACH]48545[/ATTACH] [ATTACH]48546[/ATTACH]

What options did you order? I am definitely missing some instructions, e.g. parachute installation kit (kindly provided by people on here) Adjustable seat and seat assembly otherwise it is mostly straight forward. I cannot find the UC04010 Internal Hexagonal Screw M4x10 to save my life! If you find yours can you let me know where they were please ;)

 

 

[MajorTom]

What options did you order? I am definitely missing some instructions, e.g. parachute installation kit (kindly provided by people on here) Adjustable seat and seat assembly otherwise it is mostly straight forward. I cannot find the UC04010 Internal Hexagonal Screw M4x10 to save my life! If you find yours can you let me know where they were please ;)

Options: dubble sticks, hangar hanging, 6x600 tyres, park break

 

I don't even know what seats I got. Hope the version for the tall guys...

 

Still much to early, to miss much.

 

Funny thing was the 2. box.... nothing realy in there.... ;-)

 

 

[rmorton]

Was the second box for the cabin frame? I can't see anything in the instructions for the seat. Cant wait to hear how you get on with the wheels, I am leaving that one alone for now :)

 

 

[Tucano]

Re: M4 x 10

 

Try Items in fastenerkitsonline store on eBay !

 

The S/S are suitable

 

 

[rmorton]

Thanks Tucano I will try to find them and if not will have to order some. What type of head are they? I assume the round button type with an allen key

 

 

[MajorTom]

Wheels will have to wait..... a long time.

 

The only thing I concerned about is if I should store them like the are. The are somewhat crunchy. I don't want them damaged just from lying around.

 

And YES the big empty box contained the cabin frame.

 

So many parts.... have to move on with sorting things out. Wished for some parts to have a hat to do it.

 

 

[rmorton]

I wouldn't worry about the tires they seem to come like that, my problem was I couldn't get them on the wheel as you need a tire press, so this will have to wait. The rest seems identical to mine but I didn't need the box for the frame. I see you too got the flush fuel caps. Its very exciting and sometimes a little frustrating but definitely worth the effort!

 

 

[Skee]

i used this file for sorting out all the 26 chapters in to moving boxes.

 

it may be outdated since i used it 2013.

 

sAVANNAH INVENTARIELISTA.xls

 

sAVANNAH INVENTARIELISTA.xls

 

sAVANNAH INVENTARIELISTA.xls

[rankamateur]

Sorry no easy way...get all the parts out and sort them into groups and make them off in the relative chapters there is a index of parts at the start of each chapter

And it is only a guide and often not complete but it will give you some idea. You still will not know until you have it built. Many of the bolts etc are packed in assemblies so it is a pity to unpack them all up front, Get yourself a packet of zip lock bags and repack them and label them as you go.

 

 

[rankamateur]

Funny thing was the 2. box.... nothing realy in there.... ;-)

The cabin frame is usually screwed to the top of the big crate when they are shipped to Australia so a separate crate is quite an upgrade.

 

 

[IBob]

The cabin frame is usually screwed to the top of the big crate when they are shipped to Australia so a separate crate is quite an upgrade.

Indeed...and there seems to be some sort of primer/sealant/coating? on the fibreglass cowlings that we didn't get.

And what's this about flush fuel caps???