H
ANDLING
Y
OUR
B
UTTERFLY
NOTE: Watch the video on the included CDROM for more
detail on handling, flying and maintennance of the Butterfly
Pick Up the Butterfly
at the middle of the wing. Index finger on
the front (leading) edge of the wing and your thumb on the rear (trail-
ing) edge of the wing as shown in
Fig. 3.
It is
not
good to pick it up by the tail or by one wing tip. Kids love
the Butterfly, but they will need some instruction on how to pick it up,
or they may damage it - this applies to adults too! This model can
withstand crashes quite well, probably the highest risk of damage
comes from handling by humans, so keep this in mind.
Once you have picked up the Butterfly, you can hold it along the fuse-
lage just behind the receiver as shown in
Fig 4.
This is a good posi-
tion for examining the model, attaching the battery, and for launching
the model into flight.
Adjustments to your Butterfly
Your Butterfly has been test flown
by Plantraco technicians before shipping and it has been set up to fly
nicely indoors - right out of the box. You probably won’t need to
make any adjustments for your first flight.
Having said that, it is important for you to understand how to make
adjustments to the Butterfly to change it’s performance characteristics,
or correct problems caused by changes in the structure of the air-
frame from crashes and repairs etc.
For any adjustments to the airframe it is important to stabilize and
support the airframe with one hand and slowly move or squeeze the
other part. Slow, steady, monitored force is the way to adjust the air-
frame.
Wing Incidence and Tail length adjustments are made by sliding
balsa spars through paper tube supports. Always brace the airframe
by gripping the white paper tube, and then with steady pressure, the
rear pylon or the tail stick can be moved.
See Fig 5
Propeller Thrust Line Adjustments are made by squeezing the gearbox
and giving it a slight bend in the desired direction. In general, the
Butterfly is set up with a little down thrust and a little right thrust. If
your plane doesn’t quite fly straight, you can make a little bend in the
appropriate direction, and check the result with a test flight.
Center of gravity on the Butterfly is set approximately in the middle of
the wing. Since we are using throttle and rudder only, we like to keep
center of gravity a little bit further back than on other models. This
helps us to maintain altitude in turns. In general, more incidence will
slow the butterfly down and will give you a better climb rate. Tail
length is adjusted only to shift center of gravity.
2
3
Fig. 3
Pick up the Butterfly along the midline of the
wing from above, as shown.
Fig. 4
The natural position to hold the Butterfly for
connecting the battery and for launching it for flight
Support Here
Support Here
Fig. 5
Always support the airframe when making
adjustments to wing incidence or tail length.
