Today, I received one of the very first Libelle kit from Dream Flight. The Libelle is a 1.2 meters DLG designed for the modeller who wants to discover the hand launch glider category without emtying his wallet. According to Michael Richter, the Libelle has been designed to be compact (giving more clearance during the discuss launch), with a lower aspect ratio to improve low speed turning abililties, in combination with large control surfaces. Lets have a look to the kit content:
Kit Overview:
The wing panels: They are very nicely moulded, no extraction marks on the upperside, some very small ones underside, but good point, no ugly injection points. The servo and wire prints (including lead extension plugs) are molded, as all the necessary prints for plastics part to assemble the wing panels together. Wing panels have the carbon spar (flat carbon rod) in place and also a plastic part located on each wing tip to receive the launching peg.
Fuselage and Canopy: They arrive already assembled with the carbon boom, the wing fix system in place, the 2 magnets to secure the canopy, the tail mounting piece.
This is a very good point, because it saves assembly time, but especially it guarantee the aligment between the wings, the tail and the rudder, which is essential on those type of sailplane.
The front fuselage is from Elapor with a plastic shell all around, providing some robustness.
The Tail is also ready to use with carbon spar and plastic mounting part. The rudder is ready to glue on the boom.
A plastic bag includes all the accessories like control horn, clevises, wing panel center joiner parts, the peg, and a small piece of sand paper.
The Libelle has been molded around 4 Hitec HS-53HD sub-micro servos for wings and rudder elevator, but any equivalent can be fine with no or little modifications.
Finally, the kit includes a very nice and well written assembly manual, the kind of manual made with passion, with plenty of clear explanations, tips, recommendations, pictures
Like for the Alula and Weasel, the first feeling is that everything is nicely designed to make the assembly easy ans straight forward, even for an average modeller.
Component weight:
- Tail + rudder: 17 gr
- fuselage 54 gr
- wing panels 2 x 51gr so 102gr
- accessories: 10gr
- sub total: 183 grs
Below is the photo album of the kit:
Thanks for the images. Very nice! I need one for the holidays ;)
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