Welcome to JADE Aircraft. Below you'll find some of the radio controlled airplanes we've enjoyed designing, building, and flying. Plans are available for the designs you see here. They're all fairly conventional in terms of construction – mostly balsa and plywood. And they're all fun to fly. Cowls, canopies, and wheel pants are plastic or fiberglass, and while we'd also like to supply them, at this point we don't have the facilities, time, or know-how for high-volume production of these parts. The plans prices shown below include shipping within North America only. For other shipping destinations, contact us.
PITTS S-2B
| WINGSPAN: 44" | WING AREA: 595 in2 |
| WEIGHT: 5 – 5.5 lbs | CHANNELS: 4 |
| POWER: .46 2-stroke and 10x7 or 11x7 prop | |
The JADE Pitts S-2B is a 1/5.5-size aircraft designed around a .46 2-stroke engine. It's a sport-scale airplane; some deviations were made from true scale so it's a little less complex to build and set up. However, from a few feet away it looks very similar to the real thing. The model's flight characteristics are also quite realistic, and it requires at least intermediate skill to fly it well.
Even though the Pitts is a biplane, it's relatively easy to build and set up for the modeler who has a couple of plans-built projects under his belt. The screws attaching the wings to the cabane and interplane struts are hidden in the structure to give a clean and scale-like appearance. The four ailerons are driven by two micro servos - one in each bottom wing panel, with interconnect rods linking the bottom and top ailerons on each side. Cowl and wheel pants are designed to be fiberglass or vacuum-formed plastic and the canopy is plastic. Main gear legs and the cabane strut must be fabricated from aluminum sheet. I'm not really supplying any of these specialty parts at this time.
Plans and instruction manual available.
$35.00 plus shipping.
VAPOR
| WINGSPAN: 41" | WING AREA: 331 in2 |
| WEIGHT: 3.5 – 4 lbs | CHANNELS: 4 |
| POWER: .25 2-stroke and 8x8 or 9x6 prop | |
The Vapor is a small high-performance aircraft. Designed for a strong .25 engine, it has an estimated top level speed of around 70 mph. The airframe is conventional balsa and plywood and the wing is permanently attached to the fuselage. Cowl and wheel pants can be made from vacuum-formed plastic or fiberglass, and the main landing gear must be fabricated from .090”-thick aluminum (not supplied).
The Vapor has nearly neutral stability in pitch and roll – it will pretty much go where you point it with no natural inclination to return itself to straight-and-level flight. With no dihedral and nearly full-span ailerons, its roll rate is in the neighborhood of 1400 degrees per second (about 4 rolls per second) or more. It's a fun, fast, nimble little airplane for an intermediate to advanced pilot.
Plans available.
$30.00 plus shipping.
AEROBAT IIB
| WINGSPAN: 48" | WING AREA: 394 in2 |
| WEIGHT: 3 – 3.5 lbs | CHANNELS: 4 |
| POWER: .25 2-stroke and 9x4 or 9x6 prop | |
The Aerobat IIB is a simple .25-size airplane with straightforward flying characteristics. Designed as a capable aerobatic performer, it could also serve as an intermediate trainer. No dihedral and a relatively thick symmetrical airfoil help give the Aerobat near-neutral stability both right side up and upside down, while still maintaining good low-speed handling. Big 2.75” wheels mounted on commercially-available aluminum gear allow easy operation from grass fields. The engine sits out in the open for ease of setup, starting, maintenance, and cooling. Construction is conventional balsa and plywood.
Plans and instruction manual available.
$25.00 plus shipping.