1) Gather your materials. You'll need the plans, a 1/16" balsa sheet, just a mere scrap 4"x12" to 15" will do. An X-acto, some glue (I love Elmer's), and a straight edge of some sort. Oh-- and a surface you can cut on.
2) Cut out all the parts. Don't worry about making the curves beautiful. I just hold the template in place with my free hand; some people like to tape or pin it in place.
3) I use the first fuselage half as a template for the second half.
4) Glue the two fuselage halves together.
5) As the glue sets up, align the fuselage template to the fuselage, and using the straightedge and the knife, cut the slots for the wings. Note that we're doing this AFTER you glued the fuselage together, while the glue was still soft.
6) You want to hold the knife just as straight up as you possibly can. 90 degrees is perfect. Cut the slots slightly small, and they'll hold on to the wings really tightly. You can always open them up wider with a bit of sandpaper.
7) Use the back of the blade to clean out the slot.
8) You don't have to try to cut those crazy small ends, of the slots. The back of the knife will clean them out just fine.
9) Insert the main wing.
10) Slight beads of glue are all that's required to attach the vertical stabilizers. As you line one up on the wing, you'll see there are corners to help you get it into the right position.
11) Checking vertical, sighting along the back. Looks like I held the knife pretty straight!
12) Insert the canard, and you are done! I built this one in 20 minutes, and was flying in under an hour. Elmer's glue sets real fast on balsa.
As you fly it, you'll discover that canards are very forgiving about their center of gravity. This particular model required absolutely no weight in order to fly beautifully. If you are used to flying models with the wing in front, you'll be surprised at how far back you have to put ballast in order to achieve level flight.
That's it! I hope you have fun, and if you build your own, please send me a picture!
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