This fall Peter asked for some help finishing models that needed proving, and I gladly shelved my current winter project plans and contacted Peter. I have a soft spot for original airplanes, and opted to give the Antoinette a whirl.

Some may recall an earlier attempt at Peter's Antoinette that resulted in the aircraft being sold and, while it flew, Peter never really got the feedback he was looking for on his plans.

Vitals:

72" Wingspan
45oz
3-4ch
AXI 2817 or equiv motor


History

Antoinette Manufacturing started as a private venture, creating the V-8 engine which powered many speedboats in the early 1900's. This led the company to build it's first airplane in 1906, whereupon vice president Louis Bleriot left the company.

With some early successes, in 1909 the company was convinced that their chief pilot should compete to cross the English Channel in the aircraft. Two attempts later, both ending early as the result of engine failures, Bleriot made the crossing in his own aircraft.

There were at least 7 variations of the Antionette aircraft. Notable achievements include:

Wing Warping on versions I-III
Ailerons on version IV (arguably the first ailerons ever)
Back to wing warping on versions V-VII
Highest altitude record on Version VII: 509' and 42mph


Peter's model is a combination of the versions, and I've opted to include the optional ailerons that Peter designed.

The other notable feature being that it was possibly the most awkward plane of all time to control. There was no control column, with most of the steering being done with those prominent wheels near the cockpit. Constant adjustments were required, which must have made changing the throttle setting an exercise fraught with peril. Let go of a wheel and the plane does what it wants.

I must point out that the design has changed slightly from that first build. I always thought it sounded strange to take-off and land, so looked closer at the drawings. I've no idea how they managed with the real one, but a balance point actually in front of the wheels doesn't sound like a good idea to me - so I moved the wing back a bit to put the wheels in front of the balance point. As it was that skid was all that stopped it sitting on its' nose the whole time.

Pete

Looking forward to it - I hope it is easier to fly than the original

Pat

I promised Peter that it probably wouldn't be until April or so before this project was finished, which makes it the longest build I've ever done. It's also the largest airplane I've ever built, which is proving to be much easier than some of the other 48" kits I've built.

Anyway, I ordered the parts from Manzano, and within a week they were on my doorstep. This happened much faster than I had thought, and I hadn't even had a chance to clear my workspace!

Once that task was completed, I carefully unpackaged the contents of the kit. There were numerous sheets of all type of wood. None of the individual pieces were marked, but it didn't really matter as the plans are pretty straightforward, and the plane is a simple setup. It's worth quickly noting that this is a short kit, and the long pieces of wood aren't included. Basically, if it isn't laser cut it isn't included. I found that looking through the plans highlighted what my shopping list of Bass and Balsa would be.

Manzano also included a set of plans, so I didn't need to have a set printed. Peter also sent me PDF's of the cut sheet and the plans, so I had plenty to work with.

As I've gone through the build, it's apparent how well thought out not only the plane is, but the plans also. There are no step by step instructions on these models, but all the questions you could come up with can be answered by looking at the plans.

The laser cutting was really well done, even in the thick ply. The only feedback I would have is from the compression dings that were present from the little 'rings' that were cut from the ply wing ribs, which then got squished in between the balsa sheets for packaging. The dings, while deep, are trivial though, and mostly popped back out with a little steam from my stovetop teapot (which I use a lot when building with balsa!)

Next up we start building the incredibly looooong fuselage....

This looks like an interesting subject to watch!

Derek Piggott, who flew the replica Antoinette in "Those Magnificent Men in Their Flying Machines", said it didn't much care to alter its chosen course. Stick control was substituted for the warp and elevator wheels, but it offered little or no improvement, while the inset ailerons added to the replica simply tended to act as tabs and bend the wings in the opposite direction! No wonder the original stuck to wing warping after trying ailerons, albeit triangular and trapezoidal ones at the trailing edge.
Mr Piggott deserves every award in the book, and then some, for putting that flying Spanish galleon down on a driveway not much wider than the undercarriage, after hopping over a vintage car! He also flew a Fokker Triplane under a railway bridge in "The Blue Max."

Originally Posted by Welsh Dave

Derek Piggott, who flew the replica Antoinette in "Those Magnificent Men in Their Flying Machines", said it didn't much care to alter its chosen course. Stick control was substituted for the rudder and elevator wheels, but it offered little or no improvement, while the inset ailerons added to the replica simply tended to act as tabs and bend the wings in the opposite direction! No wonder the original stuck to wing warping after trying ailerons, albeit triangular ones at the trailing edge.
Mr Piggott deserves every award in the book, and then some, for putting that flying Spanish galleon down on a driveway not much wider than the undercarriage, after hopping over a vintage car! He also flew a Fokker Triplane under a railway bridge in "The Blue Max."

Oh man, now I'm going to have to go find a copy of that movie!!

Next up came my favorite part of building: The fuselage!

There's really not much to report here - this section goes together like a well cut puzzle.

The only oddity that I've found in the entire build so far was the upper decking not matching up correctly with the plans. See the picture. I emailed Peter and he verified the cut plans were correct. Indeed, they were. The plans matched all the other pieces, so the idea of the plans being incorrectly sized was out. This is still a head scratcher, but it really doesn't matter. The pieces all fit together like they were supposed to, and I triple verified all the fittings before I glued.

About this time I had thoughts of the dummy motor running through my head. After a lot of searching, I found some wood blocks at Hobby Lobby that seemed to match with what I was envisioning. After mocking them up, they fit the plans perfectly! I spent the next few evenings filling the gaps in each cylinder with wood putty, then sanding them smooth.

Next up was deciding how to plank the siding, as well as running the empennage longerons!

It's funny how these things go, you look at something for ages and then the penny suddenly drops.
Comparing the photo with the plan it's quite obvious what the fit issue is - there isn't one. That decking plate fits between the full length longerons, precisely as shown in the photo. It's nice to know that there's a reason for these things - and what the reason is.
Basically the idea is that the longerons stand high of that plate, and all the structure, so that the mock open structure top decking parts can be built up flush with them and any underlying parts painted a neutral colour to hide them and give the impression there is nothing there. The longerons themselves get planed away to match the triangular shape of the basic fuselage before the ply skins that extend to the rear of the cockpit are added.
The underlying parts mentioned and the ply skins shouldn't really be there, but it seemed a good idea to use them to hide all the internal equipment that also shouldn't be there. Hopefully the mock top structures and side radiators will hide most of what shouldn't be there. Well, that's the theory at any rate.

I'm looking forward to seeing how things progress from here because I've seen more current photos of the model, with all the basic assemblies in one piece. Very nice it looks too. Obviously the longerons went ino place okay and brought the fuselage top up to its' intended width.

Pete

Originally Posted by Rightseater

Oh man, now I'm going to have to go find a copy of that movie!!

Feast your eyes too on Joan Hughes taking the Demoiselle over a haystack and embedded camera with mere inches to spare, and the "runaway" Eardley Billing charging straight at the priceless original Deperdussin, swerving at the last moment! The EB was steered by differential brakes, but the Shuttleworth people must still have been bricking it...

Once the main fuselage was glued up, it was time to run the longerons.

The plans have these start at the firewall, running all the way to the end of the empennage. Laying out the plans for the length of the fuselage takes 2 sheets, so one must be careful to line them up correctly. Total length of the fuselage should be 57".

It takes 4 basswood longerons on the top and 2 on the bottom to reach the end of the fuse. I joined each longeron with a diagonal half lap type joint, and glue them up. Once dried, they fit into the cut slots on the formers easily, and again I warmed up the teapot to steam the front section to shape (leave them a little long to help lever the shape while steaming).

Once the glue had dried on the front end I cut the overhanging bass and then went to work on the aft end. Matching up the longerons on the aft is as simple as laying them over the plans and cutting them to mate evenly. If done correctly, there will be no twist in the empennage.

From there I put the aft formers in place and glued it all up.

This is where I started doing damage to the aft end.

The bass longerons are square, and as you can see the fuselage is canoe shaped. This meant that the length of the longerons needed to be sanded/trimed/shaved to match the canoe shape. The only tool for this job is the razor planer - which worked wonderfully. The razor plane literally cut hours off of what could have been a sanding nightmare.

The flip side of this coin is that the planing action left no former intact. They're soft balsa, and simply looking at them wrong will make them break. Which they did. A lot.

Even with broken formers, the whole thing went together great, and for the first time in my life I had no twist in the aft end.

About this time visions of landing gear danced through my head.

The plans call for CF tubing as the main gear strut, but alas what is life without a lack of resources? CF tubing is rare here, and when it is available it's unworldy expensive. Peter strongly suggested I stay with CF for strength, but life is all about compromises....

So shopping I went. I looked at steel tubing. I looked at brass tubing. I looked for CF tubing. I even thought about hardwood dowels.

In the end, though, weight was still a concern. Steel tubing weighed too much, brass was too soft, CF is non existent, and hardwood would not be strong enough. In the end I opted to use an aluminum tube with thick walls. My plan was to reinforce the inside with epoxy or gorilla glue, but with the benefit of hindsight I'm not sure that would be required. The thick aluminum tube is plenty strong enough for me to drop the fully loaded airplane, and other things will break well before the aluminum.

This is where I introduce my 3rd favorite plane building tool (after the teapot and the razor plane): My dad.

I had Dad drill the holes in the tube in his shop (if you've ever drilled a hole through a tube you know how frustrating it is), which worked well. I cut brass sleeves to cover the holes cosmetically (and to provide a little structure), and had Dad drill them at the same time.

The main landing gear was pretty straightforward. If I had to do it again, I would probably go with a little heavier piano wire, but as it is I think it'll be fine.

There's a couple of items in the build that I was putting off, if only for the simple reason that I wasn't sure how to do it.

The planking/siding was one of them. The plans note that you can plank the side, and then build up the nose area....or you could plank it up as well.

Well, I like woodworking, and I love full grain without breaks in it, so I really wanted to plank the main body from front to back, but was really concerned about having it work out ok.

I started with a 12"x24" piece of 1/32" ply, and carefully cut it to size. After dry fitting the siding a few times, I took the plunge and tacked it down with a bit of CA. After getting comfortable with the idea that maybe this would work, I glued the main side down and steamed the front end over the teapot again. A few minutes later I glued up the nose area, clamped it down and called it a night.

The next day I pulled the clamps off and carefully cut the round of the nose to match the ply keel. It really looked great having a 1 piece side and the curves were gorgeous.

I repeated on the other side, and the results can be seen in the picture.

If this model is anything, it's an exercise in woodworking (which I love). There's so many ways to approach the siding, trim, decking, etc that require basic cabinet making skills to make it really stand out (and cover up those inevitable boo-boo's)

Nice job!!

Did the original use plywood for the fuse as well? Seems probable. Which would mean you have stumbled on more scale 'points'.

charlie

Oh what a pretty ship! This will be awesome!