Zephyr II bay measurements

I didn't see these online anywhere, so I made a few quick measurements, close to at least a couple of mm.  If there's more than one depth measurement it's front/middle/back.

            length  width  depth
    front bay  152    110  35-40-38
    back bay    70    110  20-15
    servo       53     40  20

Kicking off the Zephyr II build!

 Well it looks like our favorite uncle in Hong Kong is ALMOST ready to send a gift to me, so it's about time to get my Zii build kicked off.  Here's a couple of pictures of the Zii kit out of the box.  Andreas loaned me his can of 3M 90 spray adhesive, and I picked up a can of flat black spray paint.  Here's everything as they came out of the box.  The wings were wrapped in foamy wrap.

 Here's the (optional) gopro kit and skids come in one bag.

 The motor mount, battery compartment cover, and wing tips come in another bag.  There's a bit of cutting dust from the wing tips, so it seems like they're CNC milled?  Chris has a nice video about attaching the motor mount that you should watch before starting to build.

Left to right, the (optional) covering, spars (2 black, 4 white), and balsa ailerons.

Zephyr II launching notes

From Chris:

Launch with 3/4 throttle to full power.
Align elevons to match wing top foil contour out by the wing ends
and give 3 to 5 clicks of up.  If you align with bottom you will
stall it as soon as you launch and naturally try grab for elevator
up.This will also cause the roll out during the tip stall, its not
an issue with lateral balance , its you stalling it by too much up
input and no airspeed.
Once you get it flying and trimmed power on then do a few passes
under good power and chop the throttle to see if she rises or drops
once power is removed.  If it does either than your thrust angle
is off ,and will need to adjustment.
Launching it with no power and holding it back by the prop opening
is just asking for finger slicing issues.

Ritewing Zephyr II + Ardupilot Maiden

Great success with Andreas' Zii/APM combination.  Flew beautifully, APM control was good, able to tune things in the air. All around a great success and left everyone feeling very pleased.  Andreas has named it Beast of Kandahar.

We flew with two batteries... 3S/5000, and then a 4S/3000.  The 3S seems to provide plenty of power -- enough to accelerate straight up. Andreas had also just upgraded the power system to:

    NTM Prop Drive 35-36A 1800
    Turnigy Trust 70A
    10x6 prop

Ground Video. This contains most of the flying modes, takeoffs, landings, and low passes.  I'll make a trimmed down version later if this one seems repetitive.

Airborne Video.