GWS Slow Stick

The Slow Stick radio controlled model plane is a basic, electrically powered, trainer park flyer that can be flown in relatively small spaces such as parks which permit RC aircraft.

It is popular with beginner or novice RC plane pilots due to its reatively modest price, slow flying speed and docile handling.

The plane is made by Taiwanese company Grand-Wing Servotech Co.,Ltd ("GWS") and is available in a "barebones" kit form, without ESC and radio control but with engine, or as a Ready-to-fly (RTF) package, which contains everything needed to get airborne.

The Slow Stick has been sold with 3 different motor versions, the Slowstick EPS150C, EPS300C and EPS400C.

The most common version appears to be the Slowstick-EPS300C in Red. Some versions are available in Green, Blue, or Yellow.

The design

The Slow stick is, as the name indicates, based on a simple stick fuselage, made of a square section of carbon fibre profile, to which the engine system (motor and gearbox), the electronic speed control ("ESC"), the flight battery, the radio control receiver, and servos are attached. The tail fin and stabiliser are glued and/or bolted to the fuselage. Finally, the wing is attached with rubber bands to make it detachable and more crash-resistant.

The wing is made of foam and is reinforced along the leading and trailing edges with glass-reinforced plastic (GRP or fibreglass) rods, giving a light and relatively crash-resistant wing. The stock wing has a fairly high dihedral and a pronounced airfoil shape, meaning it is designed for generating high lift at low speed, but will generate a lot of drag as speed increases.

The fin and stabiliser are made from sheet foam, so are of non-aerofoil constuction, with comparably large control surfaces hinged using plastic tape. The control surfaces are actuated using traditional piano-wire push rods from the two servos.

pecifications

Dimensions and loadings

* Length: 954 mm (37.6 inches)
* Wingspan: 1176 mm (46.3 inches)
* Flying weight: 405-440g (14.3-15.5 oz)
* Wing loading 12.4-13.5g/dm² (4.0-4.4 oz/sq.ft)

Control Surfaces

* Elevator: yes, tail
* Rudder: yes, tail
* Ailerons: no

Power system

* Motor: GWS EPS300c / GWS EPS400C
* ESC: GWS ICS-300 / GWS ICS-400
* Propeller: GWS EP 1180 / GWS EP7035
* Battery: 7.2V, 400+ mAh

Radio equipment

* Minimum channels: 2, recommended: 3+
* Servos: 2 x Pico/Naro/Mini

Flight characteristics and performance

The Slow Stick relies on its rudder for horizontal control and the elevator for vertical control. There are no ailerons for banking so rudder input which causes the outside wing in a turn to "fly faster" than the inside wing and generate more lift, raises that side of the wing and banks the aircraft. Once the rudder input is returned to neutral, the dihedral ensures the plane automatically returns to level flight.

The stock motor is mounted perfectly in line with the fuselage, meaning there's a fair amount of torque effect which requires trim changes to compensate for different throttle settings. It is fairly common for pilots to modify the motor mount to address this (see modifications, below)

The plane can be either hand-launched or take off from hard ground and, once in the air, responds very well to control inputs at medium throttle settings in level flight.

Climb performance is adequate and the stall characteristics very docile, especially when the centre of gravity is set around the forward range of 95mm-105mm from the leading edge of the wing, as recommended for learner pilots. The plane is not able to hover using a stock motor.

The large control surfaces mean it is possible to overcontrol the aircraft and there are reports of the wing failing or "folding" as a result of overcontrolling at high speeds, especially dives.

Modifications

Popular modifications often recommended to beginner or novice pilots include:

* Fitting a DIY prop saver [ [http://www.rcgroups.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&postid=153984 RCGroups.com discussion and pictures of homemade propsaver] ]
* Reinforcing the landing gear
* Modifying the motor mount to offset the thrustline by 3 degrees down and 3 degrees right. This greatly recues the torque effect from having the thrust line in line with the fuselage. [ [http://www.wattflyer.com/forums/showthread.php?t=27852 Wattflyer.com discussion on Slow Stick's thrustline] ]

More experienced pilots often experiment with modifications such as:

* Fitting Lithium-Ion Polymer batteries (Lipo or Li-po), which are able to deliver more mAh per unit of weight
* Fitting brushless motors, which are much more efficient and powerful than the stock motors
* Fitting camera equipment
* Fitting floats
* Re-buidling the wing to remove the dihedral and fitting ailerons
* Fitting twin engines
* Replacing the traditional tail with a V-tail and ruddervators

Critisism

Some users have commented that the EPS-300 motor is prone to burn-out due to the gearbox designer using reverse polarity to ensure correct rotation on the output shaft.

There are also reports of the wing being too weak and prone to "folding." The stock wheels and landing gear is sometimes criticised for being too weak.

Finally, the English language manual contains some fairly obvious translation errors and is in some parts quite difficult to follow due to this

ee also

*Park flyer

References

External links

* [http://www.rcgroups.com/forums/showthread.php?t=122951 The Ultimate Slow Stick Help Thread on RCGroups.com]
* [http://mattsrc.rchomepage.com/ssir/allinone.shtml Slow Stick Information Repository - The newbies guide to the Slow Stick]

* [http://www.gws.com.tw/ GWS website]