The Sea Cruiser II, by Hanger Designs, is a true seaplane. It features the main hull, 2 outrigger pontoons and a pod mounted engine over the wing. There are no provisions for wheels on this particular model. The manufacturer claims the Sea Cruiser was designed to give relaxed, easy flying but is capable of some good old fashioned "hot dog" flying. Most of the components are of standard construction so it should not present any problems to someone who has built a few aileron airplanes.

The kit is well packed. One unique feature is that the parts are not only packaged and grouped by structural component but many of the parts are ink stamped as to the purpose. The plans are only average, having many notes and comments on them arranged in no particular order. The instructions are extensive but are not very well organized. There are many black and white photos but they also are rather unorganized.

Construction is relatively simple. The fuselage is built first utilizing 1/8" lite-ply and balsa. The servo rails and pushrod tubes are built into the fuselage during the initial construction to further ease assembly. The instructions give several methods of insuring that the fuselage is built straight. Waterproofing all components is also discussed at length and this part of the instructions should be followed closely. A water rudder is also supplied in the kit.

The engine pod is built of 1/4" plywood and balsa. The pod contains the throttle servo, eliminating the need for complicated linkages. The pylon has a built in tube for routing the throttle servo wire into the main fuselage.

The wing is also of rather simple construction. It utilizes 2 - 1/8" plywood wing spar joiners at the center. There were some reservations about the strength of the wing dowel. The 2 - 1/4" dowels are simply epoxied to the bottom of the wing. The pre-shaped wing tips are large and were difficult to cover with plastic film. Again, water proofing is stressed in the instructions at this point. The tail section uses solid balsa elevators and rudder while the horizontal and vertical stabilizers are built-up balsa and present no particular problems.

A special method fiber glassing was used on the fuselage and the pods. This procedure uses .6 ounce glass cloth and Envirotec epoxy. It produces a very smooth, paintable surface with virtually no weight increase. The wing and stab sections were covered with Ultracote.

The test flight was off of a small (70’ x 55’) pond at the edge of the flying field. Water taxi tests showed that the model would come up on the step very quickly with the application of up elevator so the decision was made to attempt to fly it off the small pond. The Sea Cruiser lifted off nicely in about 60 feet. The model displayed no bad tendencies in the air. The landing also was routine, thanks to the skill of the test pilot. The water rudder was very effective. This small pond would be difficult to utilize for everyday flying. There was some water seepage into the hull over the front of the wing but this was easy to eliminate.

The Sea Cruiser proved to be a very nice model. It was easy to build and it looks good and flies fine.