17oz (480g) “Swiss Fish”

The 17oz Swiss Fish from surfimp on Vimeo.

My friend Swiss Peter has done it again! He’s built the standard 66″ Le Fish to a finished flying weight of just 17oz (480g)… certainly a new record for the design and truly impressive as it’s less than half the weight of the original prototype.

The maiden flight took place in far-from-ideal 4-5mph conditions at Ellwood Mesa. Despite the very light (basically unflyable) lift, the Swiss Fish was able to hang in there well, and wouldn’t have needed much more – probably 6-7mph – to start getting really fun to fly. The future looks promising!

The build was a radical departure from the stock kit and really only the fuselage and wings remain. 5mm Depron was used for the tailgroup and flaperons, some very small ribbon spar top & bottom for the wing spar, and 1mil “New Stuff” laminating film covered the fuse, wings, flaperons and elevator (the fin & rudder were left raw). There is no longeron in the fuselage, which saw heavy slimming and trimming during the shaping phase.

Below you’ll find some photos of the finished plane. I can’t wait to fly it in some better conditions – this is going to be quite exciting 🙂