Traditional balsa wood free flight aeroplanes.

[chriswoody]

Looking good!

It's a right old headache when things start curving / bending in multiple planes. (Pun not intentional, might I add...)

It is a real pain, especially when you're dealing with a medium as fragile as balsa. It's not quite as perfectly true as I'd like, but I think I might get away with it. (It was a good pun though to be fair)

It's becoming gratifyingly three dimensional.

The one downside to this kit that so far, is that it's been a group of rather flat two dimensional shapes that don't come together until after the tissue covering. So as you say, it's gratifying to actually see the fuselage take a three dimensional shape.

 

[Reynard]

It is a real pain, especially when you're dealing with a medium as fragile as balsa. It's not quite as perfectly true as I'd like, but I think I might get away with it. (It was a good pun though to be fair)

I bet... One slip and it's down the pan. More so with it being a kit.

This is where scratch modelling has its advantages over a kit, as you can always re-make a part if it breaks or it's not quite right. Though I've had similar issues with the roll cage and the rear wing mounting struts on my Higman model, and it's a bit of a headache.

 

[chriswoody]

So I've not abandoned these planes, just been a little busy. Last time I'd completed the lower fuselage assembly on the Tiger Moth and it was now time to turn my attention to the upper fuselage and the stringers.

The stringers are comprised of square strips cut to length from both the lighter, softer balsa sheet and the harder balsa sheet, so it's important to get them right. The plans are quite detailed as well as the instructions, but you do need to read them several times and make sure it's clear in your head.

I found it best to do them out of order, because once you trimmed the stringer to the correct length you were invariably left with a piece that could be used elsewhere ad it was easy to lose track on whether it was a soft or hard piece of balsa. Some of the stringers also needed to be "Cracked" and bevelled so they could conform to the shape of the fuselage as it tapered in.

Once finished, it's made the whole structure really light, but crucially, really strong. Quite a satisfying piece of work overall and much closer now to finishing the construction part and I'm starting to think about covering with tissue paper.

 

[steveindenmark]

It looks like an aeroplane. You are heading in the right direcrion. 👏👏👏

 

[chriswoody]

Thanks @steveindenmark I'm glad it's looking like a plane, that's half the battle!

So moving forward, the next job was to build the nose block. This will be removable so that you can wind up the rubber band and also needs to look like the distinctive cowling of the Tiger Moth. First job was to glue together the various layers that make up the block, a drill bit was used to make sure the central hole lined up, later a plastic grommet will go through here and the main motor hook, so it needs to be straight.

Once the laminate structure is finished, it's out with the sand paper and a very satisfying few hours pass, as I shape the block into the distinctive nose of the Tiger Moth and I'm really pleased with the final result.

As well as working on the Tiger Moth, my Son and I, sat down with the Pilot for a couple of hours this afternoon,as the wind and rain lashed the windows outside. We built up the Starboard wing on the plan, which curiously, was slightly undersized compared to the actual wing. We managed to get there though, lining it all up before committing to glue and it came out quite well.

 

[Oldhippy]

Brings back memories of watching my dad building those kits.

 

[Mark Grant]

I took a bit of a break from aircraft to build these.
Hopefully be ready for when the weather is a bit warmer.

 

[chriswoody]

I've spent a few evenings now wrestling with the undercarriage which is quite a complicated construction. Unlike the Pilot which has the undercarriage wire pre-formed, with the Tiger Moth all you get in the kit is a long straight piece of Piano wire. The is a template to follow on the plan, but it's a tricky job to make sure that the wire stays in two dimensions as you fold it.

The main undercarriage is formed from four parts and creates a strong 3 dimensional shape when it's all connected. In order to connect it together, VMC recommend using either solder or cotton thread. Being as I don't have a soldering iron, I used the thread method. Wrapping each joint in thread was fiddly to say the least and when finished some superglue was dripped on to the thread's with a pin.

So far, only two sections are joined, the two stabilising struts will attach when the final assembly occurs. The wire is also attached to a wooden cross member and here whilst supergluing the thread to the wood, I had to be careful to not touch the wire with the superglue, so that the whole assembly is free to rotate fore and aft on the beam.

 

[derrick]

[/QUOTE][
I took a bit of a break from aircraft to build these.
Hopefully be ready for when the weather is a bit warmer.
[/QUOTE]
Been building this over the last few weeks.

 

[chriswoody]

So my son and I have been busy building the wings on the pilot. The rear tailplane is a simple affair, consisting of only three pieces. The only challenge is making sure the vertical stabilisers are at 90 degrees to the horizontal stabiliser. Using an old off cut of wood and a small off cut of slate, we managed to get the three pieces aligned pretty much Bob on.

The wing was fairly straight forward and the two halves were built up indepentaly on the plan before gluing together after it was all dry. Just before I glued the sections together, the leading edges were rounded off and the trailing edges sanded down.

So with the wings placed on the top of the plane, the construction of this one is finished. We just need to cover the wing in tissue and dope it. It's quite a size and I'm quite excited to see it fly, just need to get my head around the next steps, it could still easily all go wrong!

 

[midlife]

[
I took a bit of a break from aircraft to build these.
Hopefully be ready for when the weather is a bit warmer.
[/QUOTE]
Been building this over the last few weeks.
View attachment 631062
[/QUOTE]

Is it Bluebird?

 

[derrick]

[
I took a bit of a break from aircraft to build these.
Hopefully be ready for when the weather is a bit warmer.

Been building this over the last few weeks.
View attachment 631062
[/QUOTE]

Is it Bluebird?
[/QUOTE]
It's a bit quicker. Will post another pic later.

 

[chriswoody]

So I've still been pottering away at these planes. With most of the major sub structures built the next step is covering them. The moment I have been quietly dreading, but nothing for it but to plunge straight on in. First up, was to cut a section of tissue and with a glue stick, then glue the part on to the tissue. I had to be careful to only glue the edges of the part, or else the tissue wouldn't shrink properly later on.

I thin trimmed the tissue to within a millimeter of the wood and then using a 50/50 wood glue/water mix, I gently painted the edge of the tissue and folded it over the edge of the part.

With drying time as well, this has been a long process, to cut, trim and apply all of the tissue. I then decided to move on and attempt to shrink the tissue and for the first attempt I decided to try the rear tailplane, not my brightest idea. I've subsequently discovered that they are amongst the hardest components to shrink properly because of their light structure it hard to stop them warping. Yep I created a Pringle! To be fair there were a also a number of issues in my technique and equipment, so it was of to do some research.

I then stumbled on to a website which advocated the spice pot method, which looked interesting and more likely to create a straight outcome. So with some trepidation, after a dry run, I sprayed one of the wings with water and set it down under the spice jars.

Several hours later, I was over the moon to see a tightly shrunk and warp free wing emerge from under the spice pots.

I've also covered the fuselage, as much as needed at this stage, so I just need to shrink and dope the rest of the main components, then a myriad of small components need finishing before assembly can start. I might have mentioned at the start, I can be a little slow with these things!

 

[midlife]

Coming along , did you pre shrink with some water first?

 

[chriswoody]

That's all I've done so far with the wing and fuselage in the last picture, is to pre-shrink it with water.

I have used dope on the "pringled" tailplane and whilst it was wet from that, I weighed it down again and that seems to have flattened it out to a relatively straight profile. I've yet to use dope on anything else though.