Frog Gliders
Wren
I think this 25 inch span glider is one of the prettiest Frog models, and it should be a very simple build. You have 8 A4
sheets to tape together to create the plan, or you can download the whole thing and chop it up yourself! 3 sheets of parts patterns are also provided.
In case you are wondering how well the model can fly, here are some great reminiscences from Peter Redhead:
At the tender age of 11 in summer '55, I built my first FROG kit, the 'Wren'.
What a contrast to the rock-hard printed sheet wood in the other brands - beautiful white wood,
cleanly die-cut, and everything fitted! I was suitably inspired to a new high of neatness in building,
with no blobs, lumps or strings to spoil the covering, and I even sanded it!
Along with two school friends, we took the newly finished model (still smelling of dope!) to the local park
in Preston on a balmy Sunday morning with just enough breeze to make it easy to tow the model on a
50 foot reel of button thread 'borrowed' from mum's sewing basket. We spent two, maybe three hours
taking turns to tow it up, straight as an arrow, top of the line every time, for a long wide glide
circle back to earth. Finally, the luck ran out and we 'tree'd' it, although it was easily retrieved
with only a small hole in the left wingtip.
We decided that it might be wise to pack up at that point, as refreshments suddenly seemed like a good idea,
but we'd only just started to wind up the towline when I spotted my mum and dad walking towards us across
the park on their way to catch a 'bus to Blackpool for the afternoon. 'Do you want to see my new model
fly?' - of course they did! (they got no choice!). Off it went, the hole making no difference to the towing,
but this time when it came off the line it started to go up, and up...When it finally disappeared over the
trees at the edge of the park, my dad was so impressed that he immediately asked, 'how much was it, son?'
'7s & 6d', I replied. He put his hand in his pocket and gave me a ten-bob note. I was speechless,
as the only active interest he'd ever shown in my models before was the day he sat on my newly
finished KeilKraft Hunter!
Later in the afternoon, there was a knock at the door, and one of the girls in our class at school stood
there. 'Have you lost one of your models?' she asked. When I confirmed that I had, she went on to say
that she had been playing in the backyard, and had seen a red and white model glide down to land in the
yard of the corn mill which backed on to their house. When we got there and looked over the wall, there
it was, with no further damage.
Of course, I forgot to mention it to dad - I hid it in the bedroom for a month, and then announced that
I'd built another one, exactly like the first....As you can see, I have very fond memories of that model
- my first thermal encounter, a successful retrieval (in spite of no name and address!), and a profit!
Download Wren pdf file (A4 sheets) here (240 KB)
Download Wren A4 bmp files (zipped) here (278 KB)
Download complete Wren plan as a single bmp file (zipped) here (187 KB)
Many thanks to Harry Sokol in Australia for sending me a picture of his completed Wren. He says it was a
spur of the moment effort - The Wren looked so nice that he just had to make one!
Thanks to David Stapleton for sending this photo of his and Ken Ings' Wrens. David's is the one at the front and was his first attempt
at building from a plan. Both the models look very well finished. David says the Wrens needed quite a lot of noseweight but flew well,
his nearly ending up in the trees.
Guiye Re from Spain sent me a picture of his see-through Wren which will look splendid flying overhead on a sunny day.
I was very pleased to meet Gray, who some of you may know from his regular column for RC Model World magazine, at the Oxford Dreaming Spires
meeting in 2011, where he showed me this very nicely built Wren. It was nice to hear that the part templates proved accurate, and that the
model was a straightfoward build.
Diana
Here is a rather larger, and equally pretty glider model, with a wingspan of 36". Frog described this one as a high performance lightweight sailplane. I guess Lightweight
can be a relative term, but for a Frog design, this one is reasonably restrained in terms of balsa wood content!
This is the model I attempted to build during the Wilmot Mansour exhibition at Solent Skies museum, and failed miserably. It has got
a little bit further, but unfortunately is still not finished. If you can do better, please send me the photos!
I have drawn up most of the parts on the five sheets, but there will still be a few bits and pieces for you to work out for yourself. If there are any serious fit problems, please let me know.
I think the fin parts are 1/16" sheet, so have labelled them accordingly. If this is wrong, again, please let me know.
Download Diana pdf file (A4 sheets) here (355 KB)
Download Diana A4 bmp files (zipped) here (405 KB)
Download complete Diana plan as a single bmp file (zipped) here (390 KB)
Thanks to Tom Ready for sending me this photo of his completed Diana. It really is a rather elegant design, as you can see. He certainly has put me to shame, as mine is still not finished!
The nostalgic among you may appreciate this photo of an original kit which was sold on Ebay (for a considerable sum!)
When you put plans up on a site like this, you obviously have no idea where in the world they are going to end up, and
just to show what a great thing the internet is, here are some photos kindly sent to me by 14 year old Tibor Kertesz all the way from Venezuela. Here is his
Frog Diana, and have a look below at the spectacular scenery at his flying site!
Grzegorz Ryszawy from Poland has become a fan of the old Frog designs and has built several including this nicely made Diana
which he wrote up on the rcclub.eu web site.
Slingsby Skylark
Here is another pretty glider from the Frog range, this time a 27 inch span scale model of the Slingsby Skylark.
As well as the formers shown on the plan, I have drawn up the missing ones as well as creating a set of ribs on the parts sheet.
The parts are ready to be transfered to a 3 inch wide sheet of 1/16" balsa.
I am afraid you will have to mould yourself a canopy for this one.
Download Skylark pdf file (A4 sheets) here (200 KB)
Download Skylark A4 bmp files (zipped) here (274 KB)
Download complete Skylark plan as a single bmp file (zipped) here (193 KB)
Thanks to Andrew Darby for this photo of his very neatly finished Skylark. Andrew says hand launched glides look very good -
I'll let you know when I hear how it behaves on a towline.
There was a problem with the shape of some of the formers on the printwood patterns I originally posted for this plan,
but thanks to Simon Rogers, who supplied
me with correct patterns, I have now updated them.
Two more Skylarks to admire - the one above was built by Chris Murdoch and the one below by David Stapleton. Thanks to both for sending me the photos.
Vespa
The Vespa dates from 1953 and is handily sized between the Wren and Diana with a 30 inch wing span. Frog seem to want it both ways, describing the
model as both sturdy and lightweight - construction is typical Frog of this era, so a fairly robust airframe.
I've drawn up the wing and tailplane ribsets, plus the fuselage formers. All other patterns can be copied from the plan.
Thanks are due again to Andrew Darby for scanning the original plan in one piece for me. The pdf of the complete plan is scanned at 300 dpi,
whereas the digitally cleaned up bitmap file is 150 dpi, as are all the other smaller sheets.
Download Vespa plan on one sheet as a pdf file here (627 KB)
Download Vespa plan on one sheet as a zipped bitmap file (150 dpi) here (268 KB)
Download plan on four A3 sheets as a pdf file here (372 KB)
Download plan on eight A4 sheets as a pdf file here (388 KB)
Download plan on four sheets suitable for printing onto A3 paper (zipped bitmaps) here (291 KB)
Download plan on eight sheets suitable for printing onto A4 paper (zipped bitmaps) here (297 KB)
Download parts on two A4 sheets as a pdf file here 41 KB)
Download parts on two A4 sheets as zipped bmp files here (22 KB)
David Stapleton was first off the mark with a Vespa - here is his nicely finished example. At the time he sent me the photo
he was waiting for the wind to drop so he could give it a test glide.
Wasp
Here's a Frog glider you can probably make in an evening. Thanks to the efforts of of Les Saxby, I'm pleased to present the 12 inch span Wasp glider.
Les told me he was surprised (and delighted) to come across four of these kits on sale in a country garage on a holiday in Wales in the 1970's - price?
Just £1 each. Needless to say he bought the lot!
The part patterns are copied from an original kit. I suspect you can get away with a hard balsa fuselage instead of obeche
Download parts, plan and instructions as a pdf file here (211 KB)
Petrel
Here's a nice simple 33 inch span glider from 1964 designed by C.T.Buffery. I've drawn up a set of wing and talplane ribs - everything
else you need is shown on the plan.
The plan is presented as a single pdf which can be printed tiled to suit the paper in your printer using Acrobat reader X or newer.
Alternatively you can take the file to a copy shop and they can print it on a single sheet for you. The parts sheet will print on two A4 sheets.
Download Petrel plan on one sheet as a pdf file here (2330 KB)
Download parts sheet 1 as a pdf file to print on an A4 sheet here 11 KB)
Download parts sheet 2 as a pdf file to print on an A4 sheet here 9 KB)
Junior Sailplane
Many thanks to Gary Button in Australia for finding a 50 year old plan for this little gem, then getting it scanned and sent to me. The plan was in two
halves, with brown sellotape marks along the join, but thanks to the editing skills of Steve at Outerzone, I am pleased to present the restored plan as one sheet,
looking as good as the day it was printed. The icing on the cake is a tracing by Gary of the tailplane, which was
supplied as a die cut part in the original kit.
Keep it light for best results, and I would suggest using the absolutely lightest 1/16" balsa you can find for the tail surfaces
and then giving them a good sanding.
I drew up a rib set, which wasn't too onerous a task as there aren't very many of them.
If you build one (it won't take long) - please send me a picture or two and let me know how it flies.
The plan is presented as a single pdf which can be printed tiled to suit the paper in your printer using Acrobat reader X or newer.
Alternatively you can take the file to a copy shop and they can print it on a single sheet for you. The rib set will print on an A4 sheet.
Download Junior Sailplane plan on one sheet as a pdf file here (337 KB)
Download rib patterns as a pdf file to print on an A4 sheet here 11 KB)
Simon Rogers was quick off the mark and built this neat example in a week, just after the plan went on-line.
I await news of its flying performance with interest.
General notes on printing the plans
The pdf files should print off exactly full size if you set your printer to the correctly sized paper - so A4 or A3 as appropriate.
This should work even if you
do not have exactly the right sized paper in the printer, as the margins have been left deliberately large.
Also, remember to set the zoom to "none" or "100%". The large full plan pdf files can also be tile printed within Acrobat, and you get the option to
decide how much, if any, overlap to have between sheets.
You will need Acrobat reader to view the pdf files, which is a free download from
the Adobe web site
Bitmap files are also provided in case you prefer to work with those. Scanning was done at 150 dpi, and most
A4 pages are 1000 pixels wide. So, for example, to print one of these out
full size, you need to set the page width in your graphics program to 6.67 inches (1000/150).
The complete Wren plan is 3375 x 2640 pixels, the Diana 4900 x 3100, the Skylark 3396 x 2607 and the Vespa 4410 x 2956 - I'll
leave you to do your own sums on those.
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