Cheers guys.
worked out that that she has about 630in/sq of wing area, and at 5lb ready to fly will have a wing loading of about 18.34oz/ft square.

Craig

not a lot to report, been busy in the garden weeding, oh and a bit of flying so not all bad! installed the fuse servos, using HS82mg's for the primary controls, fitted 2 small pieces of plastic tube at the rudder cable exits up the back end. i ran the plastic coated beading wire through the fuse to the servo to check the cable run for fouling before i closed the back end up, gave myself plenty of extra length which is coiled up and stuffed in the elevator exit to keep it out of the way for the moment.
made a bit of a start on the covering with the tailplane and stringered fuse section done in polyspan. i was going to do the whole model in this but decided that by the time i doped and filled the weave sufficiently to get a smooth finish for the aluminum clad section i had might as well just use profilm or what ever plastic style film i can find locally, hopefully i can find some silver coloured stuff so that i can chip some of the red paint of for weathering.

Craig

Enjoying your work mate, it was a good day to be home today with all the wind and rain. I for one am looking forward to your maiden

Shaun.

a while to go yet for the maiden mate, hoping i can find some suitable covering tomorrow in my travels, i seem to have every colour here except silver!
had a great mornings flying yesterday down at southern river, it was beautiful, filmed Ingo's Me262 maiden, went quite well, I and got one flight in with the 109 this morning before bad weather stopped play, we hung around until about 10am while Chris got his giant octocopter airborne for the first time, heck those 8 x 2820's sound like a very large and angry swarm of bees!

Craig

Bugger I wanted to see Chris's copter, I debated on SR but the bed was better nudge nudge , I flew Sat arvo and the Vamp crashed, all was flying well (3rd for the day) she all of a sudden went vertical until she could not go anymore and then death spiralled in to the ground, when I got to the wreck the receiver light was not on and about a minute later as I was picking the bits up the light came on but not blinking I think the bec shutdown but not sure or maybe it was one of those unknowns.

Shaun.

fantastic plane

Craig,

Your trial with polyspan is why I use film for most of my builds. I've looked at full size up close and most are doped so you can't see the weave at all. Some are even better finishes than I could ever get on a model, regardless of scale. The GB factory finish was done with 600 grit and finer hand rubbing. It is only on the earlier planes and especially military models that you will see any weave at all. And when you scale that down, it has a look of flat paint. So, painted film works as good as anything unless you're doing a 1/4 scale or larger.

charlie

well, its official, me and Solafilm don't mix! after prepping the forward fuse section, and giving the sheeted areas a dose of balsaloc to help the film stay stuck down i covered with silver solafilm, easiest film to use the lable says, well not for me, i really wasnt happy with the finish! i think it was probably more the fault of the balsaloc than the film as i could see stripes from where the it was appied. probably just need more practice. i removed all the film, in short order, forgot to take a photo of it, but it wouldn't have made impressive viewing anyway.
while removing the film i was thinking to my self that the 1/16 fuse sheeting wasn't going to provide much support for the exhaust stubs, i decided to cut out some of the sheeting and put some 1/2'' balsa block in it's place and then blend the blocks to suit the contour of the nose area.
instead of messing with the film again i decided to use my old friend automotive spray putty, i gave the area a couple of coats and when dry sanded it back with 600 wet and dry (wet). the putty is sanded back pretty thin and in a lot of places you can see through it so shouldn't add too much weight over traditional covering. i will take to it some more tomorrow with the 600, and when happy with the finish i will go over it with some 2000 grit, then it will be ready for paint.

Craig

Silver Solarfilm is the only film covering material I have had trouble with. I could not get it to stick to anything. I tried it a couple of times and it frustrated me totally. Any other color Solarfilm works great.

When I want silver I either use Parklite or Solite. The Parklite is about the same weight as Solarfilm, but, works better. Silver Solite is not opaque enough for some applications.

charlie

Ah, cheers Charlie, unfortunately it was all I could find locally. I tried a test piece and yes as you say it just doesn't really want to stick, that's why I put down a coat of balsaloc, this made it stick ok but left a less than perfectly smooth finish, definately not good enough to represent metal sheeting.
Another benefit of doing it with spray putty is that I should be able to easily etch in some panel lines and such where needed.

Cheers
Craig

Originally Posted by trumps

well, its official, me and Solafilm don't mix! after prepping the forward fuse section, and giving the sheeted areas a dose of balsaloc to help the film stay stuck down i covered with silver solafilm, easiest film to use the lable says, well not for me, i really wasnt happy with the finish! i think it was probably more the fault of the balsaloc than the film as i could see stripes from where the it was appied. probably just need more practice. i removed all the film, in short order, forgot to take a photo of it, but it wouldn't have made impressive viewing anyway.
while removing the film i was thinking to my self that the 1/16 fuse sheeting wasn't going to provide much support for the exhaust stubs, i decided to cut out some of the sheeting and put some 1/2'' balsa block in it's place and then blend the blocks to suit the contour of the nose area.
instead of messing with the film again i decided to use my old friend automotive spray putty, i gave the area a couple of coats and when dry sanded it back with 600 wet and dry (wet). the putty is sanded back pretty thin and in a lot of places you can see through it so shouldn't add too much weight over traditional covering. i will take to it some more tomorrow with the 600, and when happy with the finish i will go over it with some 2000 grit, then it will be ready for paint.

Craig

Getting there indeed. Fine work.
Robert

just about ready for some paint, have to decide how i wan't to do the panel lines first though, i am thinking that i might use the back end of an exact blade and lightly etch them in before painting. i will have to mount the tailplane, and do a little bit of gap filling around the fillets.
the rear end of the fuse, and the fillets were covered in Polyspan, and doped, they were then sprayputtied, and as with the front end sanded back with 600, followed by 2000grit wet and dry, the fillets were then glued to the vertical stab, and blended around the leading edge.
also need to decide on a decent method of mounting both the battery cover, and the belly access hatch, probably just use magnets for them both, although if i was clever i might be able to use a couple of the exhaust stubs as pins, mmm....another one to sleep on!

Craig

it's that time again, back to work. i didn't get all achieved that i wanted for the week, but progress was made none the less.
i spent a fair bit of time messing about blending the fin fillets, got them reasonably good, but not perfect. i marked out my panel lines using a flexible plastic ruler and sharpie, then etched them in using the back side of an exacto blade, they are not huge deep and wide craters, but are still noticable which is what i was after, not the full compliment, just the main ones were done, the panel work screws/rivets were just done with a sharpened bit of brass tube pressed into the relevant areas, again not perfectly scale but rough enough for the bush as we say
the Radiator assembly was then glued to the fuse underside using medium CA and the whole shooting match given a lightish coat of paint. the grey might be too dark, it depends on which of the many interpretations of schemes i look at, the weather was heavily overcast when i painted, so am hoping in better light it will be noticably lighter.
i have been looking around for a suitable guineapig to attempt to pilot this beast when the time comes. i have my eyes on a certain Johannes Patzer, a 1/6 Dragon models Me110 tail gunner, he has a suitably determined/mad look on his face, and looks appropriately equipped with regards to flying gear to take on the task. for the privelage of being upgraded from a mere air gunner to pilot status he will unfortunately have to sacrifice his body below the neck in the name of weight saving, he would have to make do with a light weight version that i will come up with in due course. definately will be a step up from my foam fishing foat carved jobby.

anyway time for work
Craig

Except, of course, this is a 1/8 scale model, not 1/6.

Pete

Cheers for the reminder Pete, I knew that it was 1/8, but for some reason became fixated on 1/6. Had a death in the family this week unfortunately, and it has thrown me a little off kilter it seems, thanks again.

Craig