3DHS 52" Edge__Had To Happen

Doc's note: This got a bit longer than I had planned, simply because there is so much to say about this plane. We're going to deviate from our usual format just a little and publish this article without a flight report,  again, to get the information out as soon as possible. We will follow up with a flight report first clear day.

Yeah, it had to happen. Everyone loves the Edge and it's been a sorely missing addition to the 52" lineup. With the straight LE (leading edge) to it's wing, the Edge is virtually impervious to tip stall and wing rock, which greatly improves stability in stall and near stall conditions. In fact, the Edge is so stable here, and so many pilots look so good with them, that flying an Edge is widely considered to be "cheating." Add to that it's long stability inducing moments and lots of lift from generous surface area on the fuselage, fin, stab and side force generators (SFG), and the Edge doesn't give up anything in the precision department. This is a plane for pretty much everyone. The Edge might be the most loved of all 3DXA designs.

The new Edge will be the first of at least two new 3DHS 52" planes this year. 3DHS is in the middle of a reboot, or a reinvention. Since the merger with Extreme Flight, all of the information has been pooled and we are getting the best of everything from both companies. We have all been sorely missing a 52" Edge, and we all want more 3DHS planes in our fleet, so this is a righteous offering. It's not hard to see this plane starting a new 3DHS mania like the original Extra SHP did because this will be an ideal plane for both experts and new 3D pilots, not to even mention sport pilots. Everyone is going to love this plane, especially me.

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The Edge features the latest construction techniques, including the ingenious self aligning horizontal stabilizer that assures a good, straight build that also takes the worst of the stress out of assembly. We'll talk about that later in the article, with photos.

The Kit

Mostly, it's another Big X 52", which is certainly not a dismissive comment. The 52" is probably the largest planes you can buy that's still practical for most people. These are affordable enough that most people have the jack to build one with premium servos and a good stability system, which will send it to the next level. It will fit assembled in the trunk of a Nissan Altima, and uses reasonably inexpensive batteries. All the 52s are also very rugged, so from every angle these are the perfect daily flyers. They are not quite as perfect for this as a 48, but they do fly better and are only a percentage point or two less practical. The flying benefits outweigh this though and as the lineup grows, the 52 will now take it's place alongside the 48s as the mid class planes to have.

Self Aligning Stabilizer
One feature we don't talk about enough is the revolutionary self aligning horizontal stabilizer. This used to be the most critical part of the build, as well as the easiest to get wrong. It's also the worst thing to get wrong if you want a straight and true flying plane. This used to be very stressful and I don't think anyone enjoyed that part. I usually did this first, just to get it out of the way, but now it couldn't be easier.

Click to enlarge on all pictures

The front of the stabilizer is notched and has a flat face. This meets up with an alignment former in the fuselage. As long as you get the stab as far forward as it will go, these two surfaces meet and perfect alignment is assured. Usually something so easy is a trap, but I have now done enough if these I just trust the process. After years of sweating this procedure so much on so many planes, it's hard to believe you just jam the stab in all the way forward, glue it, and it's done. I still measure them just to be absolutely sure, but I've built eight planes with the self aligning stab so far, and all of them came out perfect.

Mixed Composites
The first thing you will notice is the expanded use of mixed composites. Earlier 52s did not use nearly as much compsite, so this caught me completely by surprise. It's not as extensive as in the 60" V2, but it's still in critical places like the entire motor box and all it's formers, battery tray, wing tube mounts and the area where the anti rotation pins seat. The wing retention tabs are also composite reinforced, and the wing itself is retained by vertical bolts you can access with a good allen driver. This is something you will really appreciate if you have big hands or arthritis.

The landing gear area is also very, very stout with carbon tubes and composite reinforcement. The original 52s did not have this V2 treatment because they were strong enough I could not break one, but it's nice the new Edge is even stronger still. It's also carbon, which adds immensely to the cool factor.

All servo openings are reinforced with carbon composite.

Cooling vents are laser cut.

Also note the little X that's laser cut into the receiver tray, where after the plane is finished you'll never see it. We saw this attention to tiny, seemingly meaningless little details on all the V2s, but I think that's the factory adding little touches to show their pride of workmanship. They probably put that there for themselves as much as they did for us.

Hardware
The Edge uses the same hardware package as the other 52s, which is a great thing. This hardware is time tested in not only the other 52s, but in all the 48s we have been flying since 2009. About the only reason to ever get excited about hardware is when it works, so I'm excited nothing has changed here.
Except the kit comes with an Extreme Flight cyclone spinner, so tht's some hardware to be excited about.

The pushrods are identical length to each other, and to the other 52s, which is nice because you can't mix them up! The ball links are the same ones we have been using since the original 48" EXPs came out in 2009, so these items are time tested and proven to give you nice, smooth, drag free operation with no slop.

I do like it that the Edge uses the Extreme Flight tailwheel assembly. I've set so many of these up it's second nature. Early units used a two piece tiller arm that could become loose with hard use, but newer assemblies have a one piece machined aluminum arm that's nearly bulletproof. In the event you do manage to damage it, you can replace the entire unit at the field by removing three simple screws.
Other nice features include the beautifully built racing wingtips and striking multi color wheel pants.

Equipment

Power System
Nothing has changed in the power system, which is good. The recommended Xpwr 3910 motor and Airboss 80 ESC puts out a whopping 1000 watts on either a Xoar (or Falcon) 14/7 or 15/6. You can get away with another inch of pitch on either, but all you get is a tiny bit more power and a lot bigger amp draw. When I went to the 15/6, my temps dropped and I got another minute's worth of run time out of the battery, so for me this was a good move.

Personally I like the 15/6 Xoar or Falcon prop, because the added diameter gives you a huge cone of air blast over the control surfaces when you are flying in alpha (post stall flight). This gives you a lot more control when hovering, doing harrier, or any other time you get the plane going really slowly. This is a substantial improvement. By contrast. the 48" planes use a 12/6 propeller, so with the 52 we went up only four inches in span, but a full three inches in propeller diameter. You can do the math and figure out the ratio for yourselves, but the amount of post stall improvement is utterly substantial.
As is my custom, nothing but an Airboss ESC will do. With the ESC set at high timing, the 3910 performs beautifully, and runs and responds perfectly. You would think after using these for 10 years I would have a lot to say about them, but the opposite is true. It works and nothing else matters. Not much to talk about here, but that's a good thing. An ESC spends it's lifetime buried under a cowling, so there's nothing glamorous about it. As long as it works and stays out of site, it's doing it's job perfectly.

To power the servos, I use the Castle 10 amp BEC set to 8 volts.

Servos
Something that's becoming de rigueur for me on every build is the use of ProModeler servos. Here I am using the same DS100DLHV servos that I have tested extensively in my 52" Extra and Slick. I have been exceptionally thrilled how well these are working out. I also used a set of DS110 on my 60 Extra V2. and those performed well past expectations as well.

While speed and torque are improved over the recommended servos, the real breakthrough is in the servo's laser like centering. This improvement was so stark that the following week I updated my other Extras and Slicks, and there was never a second thought which servos would be going into this plane.

You can read more about these servos in Awesome Servo Testing__ProModeler DS100DLHV.

However, worth noting is these servos put out 100 ounces of torque, which is nearly double what we were using before. While you can feel the difference in hard maneuvers, it's the perfect centering that will most likely catch your attention when you fly them. For me, this made such a monumental difference that there was no turning back and now all of my 52s feature DS100 servos.

Radio Set up
I used a piece of 3/8" balsa to make a shelf for the gyro. I made sure to scuff up the rods to get a good bond because you certainly don't need the gyro slapping around inside the plane.

Worth mentioning are the wire retention holes in the former. The wires can't slip out of these. You just feed them through the holes and forget about them. Personally I have a supreme case of OCD when it comes to making things neat, especially the radio and gyro installation. Things that are neatly done don't fail nearly as often as those that are sloppy and I was very pleased with how these holes made it easy to tidy things up. I'm almost proud of it!

Set Up

Something a little different this time was I changed how I do the ball links. I was gently squeezing

the link with rounded pliers to loosen them up before, but that was introducing slop in the linkage. The ball could move a bit forward and back inside the link, which is not good. I was shooting for the most free linkage I could get, but I went a bit too far and ended up with a sloppy set up. Unless you use reading glasses and really look carefully, you can't actually see the ball moving back and forth in the link, so I had assumed this was slop in the gears because I the past we were fighting  bit of this. However, this doesn't happen with a ProModeler servo, so I knew something else was up. After carefully inspecting all the links, some were indeed sloppy. I changed those out and this time reverted to popping the ball out of the link until they were free, but still tight

There is still a minuscule amount of drag in the links, but at least the slop is gone. With a full 100 ounces of torque, the ProModeller DS100 just doesn't care, and wrenches the control surface back to absolute center every single time. You get the slop out of the linkage and out of the servo you have a tight flying plane.
There is absolute zero slop in the linkage, and coupled with the DS100s tight gear train, now there is no slop anywhere in the entire system and that's what's I'm talkin' 'bout.

I expect this plane will track ever better than my other ProModeler equipped 52, so I am probably going to have to go back and replace the ball links on my other planes that I got too sloppy.

Ailerons
For my other 52s I like to use the ProModeler PDRS101 1" arm. I use the second to the outside hole for the ball link, and this hole is 7/8" from center. Like this I get about 31-33 degrees of travel which is where I am most comfortable. I know people like Jase run more like 38 degrees or more, but as an average guy I simply can't hang onto a plane with that much aileron response.

 

Elevator
I had to drop the servo down about 1/9" to get the Xessories 1.25" arm to clear the bottom of the stab, but this allows for nearly unlimited throw. I'm getting about 85 degrees. The extra movement from using the longer arm acts simply as an airbrake, which is useful for my style of flying. Most people, however, will be happy using the supplied 1" G10 arm that comes with the kit and that allows 65-70 degrees of movement. That's more than enough unless you want to put the plane into park from high speed or throw the tail under the plane in a wall.

If you look at the space above the servo, you can see how much I had to file the bottom of the opening to drop the servo enough. This is not a not in any way necessary. I just like to throw the tail under the plane in a wall. If it ends up being too much throw I can always put the ball link on the second hole.

Rudder
Again, the ProModeler PDRS101 1" arm with the ball link on the second to outside hole. Notice here I am deviating from the way I used to do things by putting the ball link inside the arm. This gives the pushrod a straighter shot to the control horn, which results in a little more symmetrical throw and more efficiency. I like it because it seems to feel a little smoother.