1/48 CP-140M Aurora -

[Aurora Mark]

So, I briefly had mentioned about gaps in the fuselage that I wanted to take care of first before anything inside. Here is a good example, where the vertical stab spine comes to join the fuselage; just forward of it, I sanded a bit too aggressively, so I'll need to fix my error:

Periodically you'll see me using various strips of plasticard. Evergreen offers a wide variety of strips and sheets. For some things, I'll use the strips, like in this update. But that is using up old stock I had left over from a while back. Frankly, looking at the prices, if I can, I'll get the sheets, based simply on cost. 10 strips vs. the cost of three sheets that I can trim:

Just something to keep in mind if you are using a lot of plastic. Unless you need a special shape, rod, tube, or very fine, fine strip, I do recommend taking the more cost effective route. So, what I wanted to do here was to make those alignment tabs that would allow me to very quickly and easily slap the fuselage halves together. Simple little tabs would however still allow for the fuselage to slide forward and back. More over, if they were just on one side (male/female setup), it would work, however, there was a possibility that the side with the male end of the tabs could still easily slip inside the other fuselage half, or the female side slip over top of the male side. This is why I opted to go with tabs on both fuselage halves, ensuring that they really locked into each other.

These were the tools I used for this part of the build:

The first step was to cut the strips from the sheet. I used thinner strips around the top of the fuselage which was rounded, to ensure that the tabs wouldn't be so wide that they pushed on the inside of the other fuselage half. I just wanted them big enough to hold the fuselage in place. These were cut to about 3-4 mm thick. For flat areas, like the bottom of the fuselage under the wings, I used wider strips, just about 10 mm wide:

Once the strips were cut, to make them easier to manage, they were cut in half length wise, and now I was ready to start planning the strips out:

Areas like the fuselage stretch were marked off, cut away, and the first starting strip was determined:

After sanding the strips and the inside of the fuselage halves with 220 grit for better adhesion, the first strip was glued onto one half with just a few dabs of medium glue - making sure not to get any glue on the exposed side:

You can see the marked off point on the previous picture, but once the first tab was in place, I marked off where the next tab would begin, with a 1 mm offset to ensure that I didn't inadvertently overlap the tabs:

[Aurora Mark]

From here, all the way around the fuselage, this was repeated, alternating the tabs I was gluing in from port to starboard all the way around. Here is the second tab glued in:

And here is the whole job completed:

Now it was time to match up the fuselage halves and see how well they sat, and to see where the work would need to be done.

The section pictured above really wasn't a surprise, so a bit more work will be done here by adding some plasticard underneath. I wont worry too much about it until it is time to mount the vertical stab, then I can do it all at once:

The fuselage section below really fit together nicely from tip to tail:

The front canopy will be completely redone, as the angle for the windscreen is a bit steep, and the shape of the top of the flight deck aft of the windscreen is off as well:

While I was looking at the nose, I noticed the cheeks up on the nose were oddly shaped... the port side bulges out a bit more than the starboard side. So, before anything with the flight deck is added, I'm going to need to take care of this. Not 100% Sure exactly how I will approach this. I may simply glue in thin strips of plasticard on the inside, and then sand it down to match up the shape of the starboard side:

But, the fuselage is nice and strong. Problem areas were noted, now it was time to mount the guides for the flight deck floor.

Thanks for looking,

Mark.

[Aurora Mark]

For this part of the build, I used these tools:

The first thing I needed to do was measure the thickness of the floor - 1 mm. As the line drawn on the fuselage was the top of the floor, I needed to add the guide strips low enough to make sure the top was flush with the line:

Then it was simply dabbing some medium glue on one end, and rolling out the strip so that it was good and level:

I only added the strips up to the stretch section, as the area that tapered in needed a bit more attention, and I wanted to make sure that the forward area of the floor was level first. And here is the test shot to make sure the floor was level. It squared up nicely with the level on the starboard side nice and flush against the fuselage half. The port side, though it doesn't look it in the photograph, is level, just not completely flush with the fuselage:

So, although the floor wont be mounted right away, having the guide strips in place at the wing section will also ensure that I don't mount the spars or spar box too high up. My hope is to prevent the floor and spar from touching at all.

The next steps will involve the spar again. I will be sanding off the wing halves, taping them up together, and using them to line up with the fuselage in some likely convoluted over-complicated jig that had me glue my fingers together a dozen times. Once I've freed my finders, it'll be cutting into the wing root faces, and sliding in the spars. This will help me determine exactly how high, or low the spar box needs to be mounted inside the fuselage to fit properly within the wings and also having the proper dihedral angle.

Edit: I forgot to mention, that once all the tabs in the previous entry, and the guide strips were confirmed as fitting and being in the right spot, thin CA was applied from inside the fuselage for the tabs, and underneath for the guide strips, making it all solid and strong. Cheers.

As always folks, thank you for looking. Questions, feedback, advice and suggestions are always welcomed.

Cheers,

Mark.

Edited January 5, 2015 by Aurora Mark

[Joel_W]

Mark,

Your method of joining the two fuselage halves via alternating tabs is another method that will come in very handy for some of the limited run resin kits and resin conversion sets I have where fit isn't exactly perfect, but rather a trade off.

As for the Evergreen strips, I've slowly been an ever growing quantity of various thicknesses and widths, because I've found that at 1st cutting long strips from sheet stock resulted in crooked strips that I corrected by taping down the sheets to a piece of glass and using as small steel square. Free handing it with a steel straight edge just never consistently worked for me. All the strips ended up with raised or should I say curled lips resulting from the cutting pressure of the knife blade as it seems to cause a "V" type of channel while cutting into the plastic. The time it takes to sand and clean them up just made it more convenient to use precut strips. How do you handle this issue?

I also prefer to glue all Evergreen products with Extra Thin rather then CA glue. I found that it gives me a little more time to align parts, the capillary action always works to my benefit, and the bond is not only much stronger, but is permanent. CA glue in reality doesn't glue the parts together, just bonds them where a twisting motion will cause them to separate. That's why it works so well with dissimilar materials.

Joel

[Aurora Mark]

Mark,

Your method of joining the two fuselage halves via alternating tabs is another method that will come in very handy for some of the limited run resin kits and resin conversion sets I have where fit isn't exactly perfect, but rather a trade off.

I really like this method because of the locking teeth. I would suggest shorter lengths for smaller kits, for sure, and they don't need to be along the entire length of the fuselage. The down side to this method, is that it does not lend itself well to sharp turns/curves, like the leading or trailing edge of a wing for example.

As for the Evergreen strips, I've slowly been an ever growing quantity of various thicknesses and widths, because I've found that at 1st cutting long strips from sheet stock resulted in crooked strips that I corrected by taping down the sheets to a piece of glass and using as small steel square. Free handing it with a steel straight edge just never consistently worked for me. All the strips ended up with raised or should I say curled lips resulting from the cutting pressure of the knife blade as it seems to cause a "V" type of channel while cutting into the plastic. The time it takes to sand and clean them up just made it more convenient to use precut strips. How do you handle this issue?

There are certainly times when straight perfect cuts aren't needed, like the locking tabs for example. An approximate width (as you can see from the shot looking inside the fuselage) is definitely close enough. But for areas where very straight cuts are needed on the strips, I mark off everything with a fine tipped marker first on the top and bottom of the sheet. Using the straight edge and a sharp X-Acto blade, I start lightly going over that line, with very little pressure. Sometimes it will be 3-4 passes on the top, then I flip the sheet over, and do the same on the bottom side until the strip releases.

By lightly going over with very little pressure, I prevent the risk of the blade bending and then shooting off in a random direction, leaving me with a huge curved cut line - ask me how I know... ...but it also cuts the plastic, rather than forcing it apart and leaving that "V" type channel you mentioned.

But yeah, if it is a very, very fine strip, along the lines of say 1 mm or narrower, I will opt for the strips. It is just too difficult to get a straight cut like that, without the plastic warping or twisting.

Another thing Joel that I find that helps with the cutting of the strips though, is the straight edge that I use. I have ones with the thin layer of cork on the bottom. Any straight edge that has some gripping material, that really helps. First, it gets a good grip on what I'm cutting to prevent it from slipping. Secondly, it also prevents the ruler from scratching up any of the plastic I'm working with.

I also prefer to glue all Evergreen products with Extra Thin rather then CA glue. I found that it gives me a little more time to align parts, the capillary action always works to my benefit, and the bond is not only much stronger, but is permanent. CA glue in reality doesn't glue the parts together, just bonds them where a twisting motion will cause them to separate. That's why it works so well with dissimilar materials.

Joel

There are definitely times when I like using cement, rather than CA Glue, and you'll see that when I join the fuselage halves together, that the actual seam will be cemented together, rather than CA glue. The tabs will be strong, but the cement will really... ...I want to do it... I want to say it... ...cement the deal. The same will go with the wing/fuselage joint, as well as the horizontal and vertical stab/fuselage joints. The actual plastic-on-plastic will be cemented. But the larger majority of pieces will be CA'd.

The big advantage I find is the quick cure time. Once I get going, aside from stopping to take pictures, I don't stop. Having the ability to pick up two pieces, dab a bit of CA on them, and move onto the very next step without worrying about the glue being set, that really helps. Small dabs of the Medium CA to get everything together, then once the work is all done, the thin CA and tweezers come out, and everything is given the appropriate amount of thin CA to hold it all together.

When I say appropriate, that means I avoid an excessive amount of it. As you mention, one single twisting motion and it may cause them to separate. I learned that the more CA you use, the higher the risk of this. Just as thin vs. medium.

No glue is perfect, but as you mention Joel, there is a right glue for the right job. Dissimilar materials, yes, CA is the way to go. Strong plastic on plastic, cement for sure.

Thanks a lot, I hope this answers any questions, and thank you for your comments, I really appreciate you taking the time to write.

Cheers,

Mark.

Edit: I also want to quickly mention that the tabs were used because the fuselage will be open and will have the main cabin built. If it were to be closed, I would have certainly gone the same route as Tom did with his C-17 and built the internal frame work like he did.

Edited January 5, 2015 by Aurora Mark

[Joel_W]

Mark,

Thank you for your most compressive instructions and suggestions. I'll try scribing with even lighter passes as I don't try to make a cut in one or two passes.

Joel

[Aurora Mark]

Joel,

I'm really happy that they help. Again, it's not THE way to do it, but just simply one way of going at it. It helps as well to have fun with these posts, as it takes away from the monotony and boredom of continually working with white plastic, on white plastic, to get the white plastic ready for the internal scratch building - something I truly am looking forward to. Such a huge part of me wants to simply start building the guts of this model... ...but, the more I can get done right now getting the fuselage ready, the less of a chance that there will be difficulties later on. My approach is to simply to get this stuff done first, and then go at the fun stuff later on.

I think I've gathered about 200 photographs of the flight deck alone. Every little detail, gauge face (which will need to be printed) and circuit breaker has been captured with a photo and a ruler. None the less... the structural work will continue, as I also go about gathering up all the measurements for the main areas (like the bomb bay, nose gear well, HSC, and other key "boxed" areas that need to be constructed first...)

Soon though... very, very soon I hope.

Tomorrow though, a couple of small projects. Building a small vac-form box, which will be used for the curved pressure bulkhead at the back of the main cabin, along with what I will be using to create the blisters, possibly the engine nacelles, as well as the top of the flight deck/nose area (and possibly the bomb bay door outer skins). The more I look at the resin engine casts, the more I'm thinking that I may use the pieces as a master for the vac-formed pieces. It'll save a heck of a lot of weight, and will also allow for a nice open area for the No. 1 engine that will be opened up, as well as the No. 2 and No. 3 Nacelles for the wheel wells. The resin plugs will be fixed up, and then a resin casting will be made of the negative of each side, which will then allow me to make a female vac-form of the parts, allowing for panel line details, and what not. The actual intakes will still need to be made from something else, but I'll focus more on that planning as I get there.

I'll post again when I have some more pictures, rather than just a big ole block of text.

Thanks again for looking.

Cheers,

Mark.

[Joel_W]

Tommy,

You might want to take a look on ebay for the old Mattel Vacuum form machines, especially if you're going to be using one every so often. I had one, worked great, but unfortunately, it never made the more to the house 35 years ago.

Joel

[Aurora Mark]

Joel, I've been called many things, but never a Tommy... ...actually, wait, no, there was that one pub up in Lossiemouth... ...right next to the golf course on the approach, overlooking the water. Neat little place with a bunch of photo's of aircraft on the wall. I was hurt that a French aircraft was up there, but none of the Aurora. As the story from that night goes, she thought I was Tommy, Tommy thought he was a Yankee, and that bloody Victor in the corner swore his name was Oscar.

Thank you Joel. I'm laughing, because the glue on the plywood is drying as we speak, lol.

Cheers,

Mark.

Edited January 6, 2015 by Aurora Mark

[Aurora Mark]

So, this post has both good news, great news, and some bad news with progress.

To get started off, the wing halves were sanded off the backing sheet, and the parts were ready to be mocked up. I want to apologize for the first group of photos. The usual lamp that I have for lighting when I take photos was left on the floor, as this mock up needed some space, and I didn't want to have a round of "Aurora Vs. Desk Lamp" happening.

Here are the parts I started with:

The wings were taped up along with the fuselage:

And here is where the bad news starts - the wings are an absolute disappointment, especially compared with what I feel is a fantastic fuselage. The leading edge was very sharp. Where the front of the wing has a nice curve on it, like, say, a B-17 or a PBY wing, this wing looks like it was meant to cut slices of banana bread cleanly:

I'll touch base with the actual wings later on, but the main focus here was to get them assembled, so that I can mock up the fuselage to determine exactly how high or low the brass spar box will need to sit. I'll say right now that the goal was to have the box sitting on the bottom of the fuselage, with the angle matching the top of the wing, rather than the bottom of the wing. Despite my earlier thoughts, I wanted the top of the spar to allow the top of the wing to rest on it. Not for weight, but rather to prevent any sagging in the wing.

There are some very important measurements I have from the actual Block III Aurora. I waited until there was one fueled up, and ready to go with a SKAD (Survival Kit Air Droppable) hung in the bomb bay ready to roll out. I measured the straight line distance from the wingtip to the ground, as well as from where the dihedral angle starts to the ground. This would allow me to not only get the dihedral of the wing in the state that I would build the model as, but also give me a set baseline for a solid, easy to measure point, and how high off the ground it actually is. This measurement will be used many times later on, for things such as how much the MLG and NLG are compressed. So, from the wingtip to the ground, both port and starboard were 300 cm. From the wing root where the dihedral begins measured out to be 170 cm from port to starboard.

Using this number, and the thickness of the wing root at that area, I was able to get true dihedral angles. From the bottom of the wing to the wingtip, 5.97 degrees (going with 6). From the top of the wing to the wing tip, 3.89 degrees (and I'll be going with 4), and from the true dihedral angle through the wing was 5.02 degrees. Success! Despite what I had thought before about the space issues of aligning up the spar with the top of the wing, it will work. And It will work because of something I did wrong. Rather than measuring the thickness of the wing at the wing root on the fuselage, and saying "hey, it'll fit!", I measured the top and bottom half individually... which, as you'll see later on, is far to shallow.

Anyway, I'm getting off track here... but, happily, flexibility prevails!

So, with 1.70 meters, in 1/48 scale, that means the flat belly of this bird needs to sit 35.42 mm off the deck. I was happy with 35.5 mm, and so from here it was time to construct a table. Literally just that, a 35.5 mm flat table for the fuselage to sit on:

Supplies needed - assorted stacks of balsa, the fuselage, and coffee. This update had a lot of coffee go down range:

A reference mark was picked to line everything up with:

After the balsa legs were sanded smooth and level, it was all measured out to confirm that she sat level. I needed to put up a prop piece at the end to get just the right angle, a very, very slight angled down nose:

All that was left was to construct markers for the center of the wing tip at 300 cm, which in 1/48 gives me 62.5 mm:

Now I was ready to tape up the wings to the fuselage, butting up nicely against the wing roots, and check out the awesome positive dihedral I had to work with!

[Aurora Mark]

My first words were "you have to be #&@*%&^ kidding me!"

At first I thought maybe the wings were heavy and the tape didn't hold them tight in place. So, I took a thin strip of balsa, placed it onto the table I made, and using the spar as a counter balance, I had the aircraft balanced on the bottom of the No. 2 and 3 nacelles... nope, not the plastic or the weight; the kit comes with its own negative dihedral:

This is where I started to see how bad the wings actually were. I've pulled back the tape - the top of the wing is about 5 mm lower in its profile (shallower) than the wing root on the fuselage pieces (which IS the right shape AND size):

And so, I opted to go at this a different route. Rather than trying to match the dihedral to the kit, I'm going to make the kit sit with the right dihedral. I had the measurements in my previous post, along with the height indicators. So, I cut the bottom tape pieces, effectively giving me two hinged wings, and lifted them up to the right dihedral:

This is where a lot of the problems with the wings began to be seen. In the above pictures, do you see a problem with the nacelles? They are perpendicular with the wings leading and trailing edges... so when you put in a dihedral, the engines tilt inwards. On the real aircraft, they are perpendicular to the ground. So... some plastic surgery will need to be done:

Taking a very close look at these wings, I found that the bottom profile is very nice, but the gap between the top of the wing and the bottom of the wing, with how thick they should be, well, it's 5 mm. So, the wing is FAR too thin. Rather than simply moving these wings to the kitchen to use as a break knife, all is not lost.

First, the upper wing half CAN be moved up to match the top of wing root. As the bottom half will have the flaps cut away, and the ailerons made separately, there is no need to match up trailing edges. Basically, I plan on splitting the wing at the trailing edge to match up with the right contour.

The bonus of this though, as I mentioned before, was that I had an extra 5 mm height of the wing to work with, and the spar could be used to line up with the top of the wing, rather than the bottom. I'll show a picture of how close the fitting is later on.

As for the engine nacelles, given that they have the nice tapered shape above like the actual nacelles, I'm just going to cut into the inside edge of each nacelle, separating it from the wing, and then put a thin plasticard shim to "lift" the inside edge of the nacelles, until they are properly perpendicular with the ground. No bid deal.

So from here, I'm putting the wings aside and ignoring them for now. I'll work on the shortcomings later on as I get to that stage of the build. Work then continued, with my focus back on getting the spar box inside the fuselage. I picked two strong points for the spars to come through at, keeping both the thickness of the wing, along with the landing gear location in mind:

The cut locations were marked out:

And the fuselage was ready to try out the spar box:

FINALLY!

[Aurora Mark]

How much room did I have? Well, here is the box centered and level inside the fuselage:

It sits just as I hoped it would, with very little room to play with along the top of the cut outs. So, a little less room that I had initially planned for, but, it worked out better than I expected in the end:

So, the spar fits, no worries now. All that is left to do at this stage, is to use the blue template pieces from a few posts back, cut out some 2.0 mm plasticard, cut out the slots for the spar exactly where it will be slid through, glue those in place, and then work can confidently continue with the remainder of the fuselage. Happily, VERY HAPPILY, the horizontal stab will be much, much easier to do than all of this.

Thank you so much for looking. Any questions, comments, concerns, advice, well folks, as always, it is more than welcomed.

Cheers,

Mark.

[Aurora Mark]

As one last quick post tonight before I call it a night, the weight of the fuselage will be supported at the wing roots molded into the fuselage halves, with the 2.0 mm plastic. Although the spar box is sitting on the fuselage floor, once the spar is firmly mounted, it might be a slight bit raised, or touching, but it is in no way intended as any kind of load bearing setup. The kit plastic here is paper thin, and would end up splitting, cracking, or bending. I'm honestly thinking of laying down some thick plasticard on each side of the join just to strengthen the belly a little more.

Again, thanks for looking,

Mark.

Edited January 7, 2015 by Aurora Mark

[Joel_W]

Mark,

Simply an amazing journey to this point.

The negative wing dihedral was certainly something that I wouldn't have anticipated, but with the use of those jigs, it wasn't a major issue . I'm assuming that your filling the gap with pieces of sheet, then blended in with filler.

Honestly, I thought that the engine nacelle issue would be a major obstacle, yet your fix is just a simple cut and a plastic shim, which never occurred to me.

As for the metal spar assembly, the picture certainly shows that the load would be focused directly on the fuselage joint. You idea of some sheet plastic under it, would move the load out to the sides of the fuselage walls.

Looking forward to seeing the re-engineered wings glued up the fuselage.

Joel

Edited January 7, 2015 by Joel_W

[Aurora Mark]

Mark,

Simply an amazing journey to this point.

The negative wing dihedral was certainly something that I wouldn't have anticipated, but with the use of those jigs, it wasn't a major issue . I'm assuming that your filling the gap with pieces of sheet, then blended in with filler.

Honestly, I thought that the engine nacelle issue would be a major obstacle, yet your fix is just a simple cut and a plastic shim, which never occurred to me.

As for the metal spar assembly, the picture certainly shows that the load would be focused directly on the fuselage joint. You idea of some sheet plastic under it, would move the load out to the sides of the fuselage walls.

Looking forward to seeing the re-engineered wings glued up the fuselage.

Joel

Hi Joel,

The negative dihedral was a bit of a surprise. I honestly don't know what I will be doing for the wing joint. My hope is that I will be able to build the wings separately, and in a way that will allow me to slide them onto the spars sticking out of the fuselage. Ideally, the landing gear wells would be completely built by this point, and once they slide in, the bridge plates between the spars would sit directly above the wheel well ceiling. Unfortunately, that is a simple way of looking at a complicated operation. Another option would be to remove the lower portion of the nacelle, build the wheel wells separately, and then install them once the wings are installed. At this point, I'm shrugging my shoulders and will try to figure it out over time. My focus right now though is mainly on the fuselage. The wings, as it were, that bridge will be crossed when we get there...

The Nacelles, it may be a matter of just that, or cutting the outside and shaving it down by a bit, or a combination of both. Having the problem on both the upper and lower wing halves isn't making it easy, but, as mentioned above, I'm going to hold off on the wings until much later on. I have had a lot of fun so far, and have really stayed far away from any urges to make this one fly across a room, and hope to continue doing so, hahaha.

I do want to explain myself a bit better. The spar itself will be mounted to the wing roots, and the weight of the fuselage will be coming down onto the spar at the outer edge of the upper and lower brass plates that are in the center of the construction. The spar assembly wont actually be connected to the bottom of the fuselage - at least I hope not. Physically, I want to keep these two things separate, to prevent the bottom of the fuselage from cracking along the joint. The extra piece of plasticard I am thinking of laying down there would be to prevent a finger puncturing the belly of the aircraft if I were to move it around... the plastic there is quite literally paper thin.

Work will continue soon - I'm just about to head out to work here in a moment, but the wing root pieces should be completed at some point tomorrow, and once that is all sized up, the spar will be packaged away with the wings for a while, as I start the long haul on building up the fuselage. Work will begin with the horizontal stabs and the vertical stab mounts! Yay! Modular building. Like lego, but cooler!

Mark.

Edited January 7, 2015 by Aurora Mark

[Joel_W]

Mark,

Thanks for the clarification on where and how the load weight will be. I would assume that as for the fix to the nacelles, it would all depend on just how much you would have to lower the the inside edge. Too much and it would make sense to also have to adjust the outside lip.

Joel

[Aurora Mark]

Thanks Joel. Yeah, 5 degrees isn't much for that short distance, it may be a matter of getting to "look right" rather than having to get it perfectly back and having it sit accurately. Time will tell. I've had a few ideas as to what I could do to it, and a few that have me thinking why the heck not go all out on the wings? One idea is to have No. 1 completely exposed, including the over-wing nacelle panels as well. If I'm going to do up the turbine, there really isn't that much more work to get the rest of it exposed as well. But, hey! I'm friggin nuts!

So, no work at work, means I'm coming home to work on this some more. Still kind of a work related project...

Very quick update here tonight. Getting the spar ready and set up, I lined up the fuselage with the long cm lines, and then lining up the spar exactly where I needed it, I lined it up along the 49th cm line, and then marked off on the fuselage where I wanted the spar to come through:

With that done, it was time to get those inserts done. I looked at 2 mm plastic, and it was a little thicker than I needed, so it'll be 1 mm plastic being used here:

Then they were sanded with 150 grit paper on the inside for the glue to have something better to stick to, and the starboard side was started with first:

[Aurora Mark]

The next step was to trace out the rectangles to be cut out as tight to the spar width as possible. Once done, I started to cut them out. Rather than use a knife to scribe away and risk any number of things (especially when dealing with thicker plastic), I first drilled a hole:

From here a piece of thin heavy duty thread was inserted through the hole:

Using a motion much like flossing your teeth, I just worked the string vertically around the traced box until I made it all the way around. About a minute worth of flossing, and voila!

After that, it was just a slight bit of trimming with a knife, and then over to the other one:

And here is the spar, as tight as it could be in that opening (width wise). Once the fuselage is fully assembled and put together, small pieces of plastic will be glued in place below the spar to "wedge" it into place, and glue it down:

So, that is the starboard side, with the super glue added for strength and now is drying overnight. The port side will be done once the first side is dry, so that I can make sure that they are completely lined up and true from port side to starboard side.

Thanks for looking.

Mark.

[Aurora Mark]

Not much to report on today. The port and starboard sides are now done, and the spar fits in like a glove:

I thought I might try to see if the clear pieces were any good that came with this. My thought being that perhaps if the fuselage halves had poor windscreen and upper cockpit shape, than perhaps the single piece clear parts could be the correct shape. Nope!

More out of it than the fuselage halves ever were.

So I went through and decided to clean up the box of kit pieces... the trash pile got bigger and bigger, and I soon realized that I paid 50 pounds for 10 pieces of plastic:

Relaxing a bit, I thought I would take the time to build up the vertical stabilizer and possible mount that to the fuselage, rather than a plug piece... the vertical stabilizer is nearly as thick as the wing should be, bulged to one side, and the spine on the port side is about a 1/2 inch difference in length than the starboard side...

On the good side, I'm happy to say I was vote number 540 today: Revells Saving Grace?

I'm getting close to boxing up this piece of... ...plastic... ...for a short while at least.

Mark.

[Emvar]

Love those interior shots.... GoPro?

[Joel_W]

Mark,

What a great idea with the thread. Will have to give it a try to see for myself how it works.

Joel

[82Whitey51]

So what's your plan for the windshield? Do you plan to cut out the areas on the solid plastic and use individual clear pieces?

Hang in there and keep pressing, it's all about solving problems one at a time...thus far you're doing a fine job of it.

[11bee]

Amazing work, can't believe you keep plugging away at this thing.

A lesser modeler would have thrown in the towel and headed to the local pub in tears.

[Aurora Mark]

Love those interior shots.... GoPro?

They are fun, aren't they? Not a GoPro, with the nose cone of the radar cut away, I was able to just bring the lens of the camera close in and snap those shots. They are fun though! As the nose cone will be the very last bit of the fuselage to go on, it'll be interesting to see how things progress. For you my friend, I'll keep posting those types of pictures up as progress moves along.

Mark,

What a great idea with the thread. Will have to give it a try to see for myself how it works.

Joel

Thanks Joel. Yeah, years ago, this young kid at one of the local model club meetings out West showed us how he cut flaps, ailerons, and other pieces off without having to scribe with a knife. He had a small table vice, and with the wing in place, and some dental floss, he went to town on it, and in a matter of a couple minutes at most, any cut was achieved. He had perfected it quite well, able to get nice angled cuts by keeping one hand perpendicular to the cut, and the other one could be at whichever desired angle. Fantastic work. For spots like this, it's absolutely perfect, easy, and never any fuss.

If doing it though, be sure to secure the piece you're using down, and although the thinner the thread, the thinner the cut, the thread is also prone to snapping, so after ever few mm's, I pull new thread into cut the plastic. With a bit of experimenting on some spare plastic, you'll get it in no time I'm sure.

So what's your plan for the windshield? Do you plan to cut out the areas on the solid plastic and use individual clear pieces?

Hang in there and keep pressing, it's all about solving problems one at a time...thus far you're doing a fine job of it.

Amazing work, can't believe you keep plugging away at this thing.

A lesser modeler would have thrown in the towel and headed to the local pub in tears.

Thanks guys!

The plan for the windshield? Well, what I think I'm going to try and do is to go at fixing the shape of the top of the fuselage first. I really want to make sure that all the fuselage shapes are good to go. And this includes the fat cheek on the one side of the fuselage up on the nose by the front. It'll be a matter of sanding down, and carefully checking the shape to make sure it is as close to true as possible. The smartest thing for me to do I think would be to wait until that is done, and then go at the windshield.

Yep... this is going to be one long text response, I can feel it now.

So, for the nose shape up front, the plan is to make a few cross-cut profiles for the exterior of the fuselage in that area. Just as I did for other areas, taking cardboard paper, and cutting out the templates based off the blueprints. This will help me see where the problems with the shape are. Right now I'm under the impression that it is just one side of the fuselage, but it could be both. Once I see where the shortcomings are, I will be able to sand down the plastic. There is an advantage here to the vac plastic being very thick, in that there is a lot that can be sanded down. In areas where I need to build up the plastic on the outside or the inside, I can glue in strips of thin plasticard and then continue to work the shape there. It will be a long, tedious process, but hey, sand paper is cheap, and I've got a good breathing mask, so what is stopping me?

Once the shape on the nose is one, the same will be done for the top of the flight deck, working the shape issue exactly the same as I described in the previous paragraph. My honest hope is to keep the plastic of the fuselage thin. Although there is a lot of padding and frame work that would cause the scale thickness to be upwards of 3 mm thick in some areas, and the flight deck has sound proofing padding inside of it, keeping it thin will really aid in building up the overhead panel, and the rest of the details.

Once that is done, and I'm really happy with the shape, I'll also go across the remainder of the fuselage to see if I've missed anything. Until now, I haven't found any other hints that there are problems, but I'd rather be sure of it now, rather than have a surprise later on.

At that point, once from tip to tail it is all taken care of, using the method above, and then finally going at it just as Tommy did with the C-17 with the sandable primer, I'll then go at cutting all the openings needed. I do have the exact measurements of all the openings to be cut into the fuselage (from front to back: Auxiliary Escape Hatch on the Port Side of the flight deck; Overhead Escape Hatch on the top of the Flight Deck; EO/IR Camera Opening; Nose Gear Well Opening; Bomb Bay; Starboard Overwing Emergency Escape Hatch, Port Overwing Emergency Escape Hatch; Main Hydraulic Service Center (both bottom of the fuselage and the Main Cabin Floor); and Main Cabin Entry Door). Once those are cut out, I will also be going at the front windscreen.

Using the dimensions of the frame of the windscreen, I will be cutting the old shapes out, and then starting from the center windscreen window frame, I'll be building up the remainder of them bit by bit, with the plan to install the glass at the very end by sandwiching them between the inside of the frame and the outside, which I think I will make from brass pieces sanded smoothly into the outside of the fuselage. But, the glass wont go in for a bit still, just to prevent any possible scratches or damage.

From here, the next step will be building up the mounting for the horizontal stabilizers. The elevators will be cut free, and although they will be in a neutral position, if you ever walk around the tail of a P-3/CP-140, you can easily see the hinges and the rear most frame pieces inside the horizontal stabs. So, I hope to build up the stabs just as the actual ones would have been, including the front inner quarter that was molded into the fuselage. Luckily, the horizontal stabs are pretty spot on with the thickness of the actual ones. But, the shape hasn't been looked at just yet. Then, once done, they'll wait for just a bit, until the vertical stab is installed.

The vertical stabilizer halves are very different from one another:

With the trailing edges lined up flush with each other, here is the 12 mm difference between the two halves at the front of the stab:

When looking the bottom of them, here you can see one half is very straight, while the other bows right out at the mid point. I thought maybe it was warped, explaining the short front tip of it, but when pressing down on it, the front only lengthens out by a mm or so:

And the overall thickness:

It is 22 mm thick, which is about 1.06 m or 3.5 feet thick. Like I said, it is thicker than the wings... a bit off...

So my plan with the vertical stabilizer halves will first be to see which one is correct based on the Lockheed prints for overall shape (when looking from the side). Then it'll be determining how thick the vertical stabilizer is actually supposed to be, and then it'll be a lot of fun with a heat gun & hot/cold water to work the shape back in. Once that is done, I will laying the fuselage halves flat down, and matching up the vertical stab halves with the fuselage, and making them once piece again. It'll be a bit of a pain to work with the fuselage halves with a big ole vertical stab on them, but, this way I can ensure it'll be good and strong. Once in, one side will have a brass frame piece made up, mounted into a balsa block that will be used as a "plug" for the horizontal stabs as well.

Once the vertical stab halves are complete, the two horizontal stabs will be mounted onto the fuselage halves as well.

From there, that should hopefully be everything. From there, it'll be a matter of building up the interior of the fuselage, which, no doubt is going to be the greatest fun of this entire build. I just love scratch building, and being able to combine the scratch building with a few things I've never really done before (like the electrical lighting and other features), it's going to be a blast.

Once the fuselage is pretty much complete, it'll be fully assembled, the openings taped up good and tight, and then the centre seam will be worked over, and the fuselage will be set aside for the construction of the wings. Those, those will be fun. Scratching up the flaps, wheel wells, No. 1 engine will be completely opened up (including the over wing access panels), the fueling panel will also be opened up, and the remainder of the details for the wings will be made. The landing gear will be fun, a combination of resin casting for the first time for the tires (yeah, I only plan on actually building up one tire, and casting the others for the mains, and the same as the nose wheel). The landing gear will be holding up a few other items inside of them, such as electrical wires. I thought about scratching up a power cart as well, including the flashing lights that normally are going whenever the GPU is giving off some power, which I think would be a great touch.

Throughout this build I want to throw a thank you out to all the folks who make these birds fly - the maintainers. So, things like the engine and prop exposed on the No. 1 is my way of giving something to the Prop Techs. The Bomb-bay with the Torp and SKAD for the Armourers. GPU for the Ground Techs. And the ACS logo inside of our 405 Squadron Eagle, well, that for the Finishers (who are helping me a great deal with this project as a whole). The GPU and Chalks under the wheels for those poor guys and gals who stand out in the cold every time we fly out and come back at all the ridiculous hours of the day.

Thats the plan. I'm not giving in. I just boxed it up today. Honestly, I pulled out the Il-2, and nope, didn't want to get into that one just yet. Same with the Spit, MiG-21 and -15. I just needed a day to think this one through. A lot I think goes back to putting so many hours in, and still only having white plastic with very minor differences visible from where I started.

Thanks for reading. Any suggestions, comments, advice, "have you thought about it this way" input... well, especially now, it is very welcome.

Cheers,

Mark.

Edited January 9, 2015 by Aurora Mark

[phantom]

You sir, are a MADMAN!!! Outstanding amount of work!!