Click the link to download the Plane Balance Project jar file PlaneBalanceProject.jar Then double click the file PlaneBalanceProject.jar to launch the program.
When launching the application you will see the GUI displayed like the image below.
To familiarize yourself with this tool, follow the example below.
<enter> means to press the enter key.
You could also press the tab key.
Follow the steps below
Click the red circle
Enter
Name : Motor <enter>
Weight : 40 <enter>
Location : 0.1 <enter>
Click Lock
Click the green circle
Enter
Name : Battery <enter>
Weight : 20 <enter>
Location : 0.2 <enter>
Click Lock
Notice with this setup, 44 grams are needed at the tail to balance the model.
Click and Drag the Gray circle to the left of the red circle.
Notice the Weight needed needs to be added at the front of the plane.
The name field should display "Center Gravity." If not, click the gray circle.
Enter
Location : 0.3 <enter>
Click Lock
Click the button "Add a hanging weight"
Notice the weight added in color blue.
Click the Blue circle
Notice the name field displays "W2" for the third weight.
Enter
Name : Servo 1 <enter>
Weight : 10 <enter>
Location : 0.7 <enter>
Click Lock
Click the button "Add a hanging weight"
Notice the weight added in color blue, indicating W3
Click the Blue circle
The name field displays "W3" for the fourth weight.
Enter
Name : Servo 2 <enter>
Drag the Blue "Servo 2" circle to the right between the circles "Center Gravity" and "Servo 1" Also and adjust the length and notice the weight changes.
Now you can position servo 2 such that no weight will be needed to balance the plane. You can also see the results if a heaver servo is used
Here we see the results. Notice Servo 2 is a heaver servo. If the weights are entered in Grams, we need 2.1 grams added at the tail to balance the plane, with Servo 1 mounted 70% back and Servo 2 mounted 60% back from the front of the plane.
Now click and drag the Weight Needed to Location 0.90 The weights needed at this location is 2.5 grams.
Plane Balance limits
Enter a Weight : max is 100
When Dragging : max is 100
Lock - when checked, prevents moving the item using the mouse.
When entering data in the fields you need to press the enter key
or the tab key for the data to be registered and updated.
When adding an item, the following defaults as used,
Name : W# where # represents the next item
Weight : 25.0
Position : 0.25
The position is based on a percentage.
0.0 is the front and 1.0 would be the tail
To determine the location in % for your plane, two values are needed
1. Length of plane
2. Position of item back from the propeller.
For example, a plane 20" long, with the battery weighing 20 grams
positioned 3" behind the propeller,
we have 3/20 = 0.15.
So enter
Name : Battery<enter>
Weight : 20<enter>
Location : 0.15<enter>
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