Valiant 1.9m (74")

Some have heard rumours. Some have seen prototypes hiding. Some have stopped buying ANYTHING until they know what’s going on. Well, the rumours are true, and the news is out. CARF-Models has done it again. A new Pattern Plane is in the works. Actually, in production. The Valiant!

Bryan Hebert, very well known in the US for his F3A designs, approached CARF Models in 2008 to see if we were willing to team up with him and produce his newest design, which indeed has a lot of very spectacular features. Thus extensive engineering and manufacturing challenges had to be overcome. CARF-Models has taken on these challenges, because we think we are very capable of converting a most advanced new design into ground breaking serial production.

Based on the experience of producing the Revolution Pro, Impact and Integral since 2001, many of the developments in sandwich technology find their place in the new Valiant as well. The fuselage is made from 2 layers of 2 oz cloth and hand picked, thinnest and ultralight 0.5mm balsa sandwich material. A strip of Kevlar along the fuselage sides and a carbon fiber reinforcement in the nose section are also added. Of course the crucial fomer behind the canopy and in front of the fin are installed, as is the horizontal foam “crutch”. The canopy extends all the way to the spinner back plate and the chin cowl follows modern pattern designs as well.

The carbon landing gear is now lightened and it flexes perfectly to protect the light-weight fuselage structure.

A firewall is not glued in, but various different designs and nose ring are included, to accommodate two and four stroke engines as well as electric motors. The positions for the vent holes in the airplane’s nose are exactly designed to feed crucial cooling air exactly to the spots where it’s needed.

The sleeve for the wing tube is glued in and aligned, as well as the anti rotation pins. No incidence adjusters are needed here because the incidences follow strictly Bryan Hebert’s advice and are checked and confirmed on every single airplane by a tenth of a degree. There is only one correct setting, everything else hypothetic field talk.

The most revolutionary changes are made on the wing and horizontal tail. The wings, even a bit smaller than the ones of the Integral, feature fully separate, center hinged ailerons. They are virtually gap free and readily installed to the wing. They do feature a counter balance surface at the tip, which is shaped perfectly to reduce (or even replace) electronic exponential. Geometrically and mechanically not possible with a skin hinged aileron on an all composite wing, we have no choice than mastering the challenge of creating a superlight pattern wing with these center hinged, gap free ailerons.

But there’s even more: A 30 degree slanted trailing edge provides the aerodynamical solution for the precise zero incidence lift. It is responsible for perfect up and down lines and eliminates the need of aileron differential. The wide trailing edge in general virtually increases the size of the wing. The efficiency of the ailerons and at the same time keeps the drag very low. What else can you put into a pattern wing? There’s nothing else in the pipeline of today’s greatest pattern designer what this Valiant wing wouldn’t have…

The stab has anhedral, just enough that the rolling axis becomes perfectly straight and zero rudder coupling is noticed in knife edge flight. The elevators are center hinged just like the ailerons, and have aerodynamic counter balance tabs as well, which gives a very smooth elevator feel around the neutral position increasing it’s efficiency exponentially the larger the deflection gets. Here, too, the need of elevator expo is drastically reduced.

The CARF-Models Valiant is currently produced all white, in Jason’s classic Shulman Scheme and in Bryan Hebert’s favorite patterns and colors. Custom Schemes are possible, too.

The sensational surprise in the pattern scene. The absolutely most advanced, most precise state-of-the-art all composite F3A plane available today: The CARF-Models Valiant.