Sig Kadet LT-40 kit

I bought this trainer because it is supposed to be the most gentle, most stable, largest 40 size trainer you can get. I also bought it because I was very impressed with my four star kit, and I wanted to build another Sig kit. I wanted a glow trainer to become more comfortable with glo flight, and get me ready for the kadet. After flying it for the first time yesterday and having 3 solos, I am very impressed with it.

The construction was pretty straight forward. I did have to send off for 5 sheets of wing ribs because some of them were horribly crushed. I also had a problem with the wing spar webs being too narrow. With the ribs in the slots cut out in the TE and matched up on the plans the ribs were too far apart for the webs to connect, by about 1/16". I ended up making little spacers for each rib and I glued them in that way.

My covering scheme was based on ease of visibility and great looks. I took some ideas from the Rascal Arf series and added my own twists. I painted the engine compartment and around the fuse opening with lusterkote, but the covering was Ultrakote which was very nice to work with and I think I'll be using that instead of monokote in the future. I routed the anteanna through a spare pushrod I installed in the fuse for a clean look. It turned out very nice, and I received several compliments at the field. One of the veteran members thought it was "the nicest kadet he's ever seen" which was great to hear. It took about 4 weeks of building to complete, working in the evenings and on the weekends.

Its really large, it makes most 40 size trainers look pretty small, since it usually has at least 8" larger wingspan. The tailsurfaces are pretty large too, adding some stability. The airplane is very smooth and stable in the air and looks great flying around. The landings are pretty easy, though it does want to float and you have to give it some down elevator to get it to meet the earth again. I might try a prop with one pitch less to help slow it down at idle, and it might help it throttle up from low to mid rpms because it seems to lag there a bit. It flys easily at 1/4 throttle and we were flying around 10-15min at a time with some fuel left in the tank afterwards.

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