Alpenbrise - 4 Meter by Aeroic, anyone make it electric

[gluderguy1]

Hello,
I'm thinking of buying the Alpenbrise - 4 Meter by Aeroic and making it an electric sailplane. Has anyone done this and how difficult is it?
Many thanks,
Bill

 

[Wayne]

This is very common mod in Europe. You have a good bit of space for power systems and battery. To illustrate, here is a photo with a 1 foot ruler in the nose.

Found a video - not much going on in it but it shows a bit of what she does with electric launch:

Looks like the guy was going to go for a glide test and then decided to power up..? Good maiden.

 

[Doc J]

I'd say over 70% of the European Alpenbrise models (Over 50 models now) are electric conversions.

I designed the nose round to take a spinner and of course the front end of the electric motor for exactly this reason.

First obtain the motor and spinner you want (some of our European friends put ridiculously powerful motors in) then screw on the mounting plate at the front .

Take a piece of suitable substrate, plastic, hardboard etc. etc. and cut a hole in it the size of the spinner you want to use, to make a simple cut marking jig. Its useful to mark 'cross. hairs' on the jig that will help line up with the vertical model seams

Push the marking jig over the nose, carefully line it up, and using a soft pencil, scribe the line around the fuselage where it touches.

Then take a hacksaw and carefully cut close to the line you have made, but leaving a little 'meat' in front for trimming to the exact spinner size.

Epoxy in the motor plate and any ther motor supports (Check the alignment again) and then when cured trim the cut end of the fuselage to exactly fit the spinner.

Robert is now your father's brother.

Doc.