rob Lyttle

Sometimes wonder about that, Bill. I come to the conclusion that you have to divide 3 times by the scale. So in 1.48 for example, divide 1st time for length, divide again for width and again for height because the model is reduced in all 3 dimensions. Well, that's my thought for the day 🤔 These locos definitely feel better for a bit of ballast

Ah there's another couple of weeks to run anyway, walk in the park...🤭

Airframe no1- the one that still has the engine assembly- turned out to be the tricky one for cowling fitting. That little Lycoming has been in and out several times and more than once was considered for permanent removal. But, after an undue amount of time and effort, I think I have something for my troubles. In addition to getting the cowling bottom secured at the right angle to give the right opening for the top, I noticed that the parting line between top and bottom pieces is too low on the kit compared to photo refs. So I trimmed 5mm strips from the top piece and glued them to the bottom piece and fuselage. Believe me when I tell you, this is just a few bullet points, the highlights in edited form, and does not reflect the amount of aggravation and hassle presented by this assembly...🫢 Showing on that photo is the current state of things with strips of skinny styrene glued to build the surface to be more in line with the cowling top and fuselage sides. No2 airframe is a simpler arrangement as the cowling is glued to the fuselage and no engine to be out of alignment. Reg is composed from the Academy Minicraft decals and getting them straight and aligned was easier than feared, thanks to the paint Demarcation lines. So, get no1 nose area tidied, painted and decaled with stripes, and I'm just about there. 😎💃👍

You know I'd only regret it.... Let's have another go 👍😇

Thanks for that, but I'm afraid it's too late, without a load of scraping and paint repairs 🫣 Never say Never, but..... Wouldn't be that difficult i guess And I know what Marvin' would do.....😎

I'm on a bit of an interlude with a couple of Piper Cherokees elsewhere in this honourable GB, but fear not for the Norseman float plane 😎 Little bits of progress have been made over time and it's edging forward. The aircraft itself is pretty much completed, I'm adding a few figures and stuff on the jetty... oh I did hang the cockpit door and I found a lost control arm for a water rudder which had gone awol. I'm pressing some homemade decals into service for the Canadian reg and "Manitoba Air Services". That's the main text applied. I have the capital M, A and S printed separately slightly bigger and different font, they'll go on next. I tried inserting some fish cut from ali foil under the water surface. Not that convincing... Coupla barrels, coupla kit bags, coupla old tyres, that kind of thing ♥️

Oh, well in that case....😅🤭🤣‼️

Somewhat better decaling experience this evening having treated the sheets with a coat of clear acrylic rattlecan gloss. They were still slow to release but held together better. That long stripe though was still tricky and is pieced together as 4 separate bits. Still floating them onto a wash of Kleer. Patience, and one at a time, is the order of the day. I need to make plans for no2 airframe. 😎

With no1 Cherokee painted white i thought I'd try my luck with a decal sheet. Not too good. The items on the paper are stripes for the tailfin and they are breaking up for a pastime 🫢 The stripe along the fuselage has been pieced together from 4 parts, I think it'll be okay. It was floated on to a wash of Kleer. Not to worry, I have 2 identical sheets and they're all drying under a layer of spraycan clear acrylic gloss to enhance the carrier film,ready for another go. The 3rd sheet- the Academy one- is a bit of an oddball. Mostly a series of letters and numbers in italics, in black and white, from which a registration can be composed, and a few other details in black. It's getting the clear gloss treatment too. I was hoping to get a reg set for my Norduyn Norseman Floatplane out of this sheet but unfortunately there's no C or F, nor indeed is there a G for UK reg. I've got a J though and even a Q...😲

Cherokees progress with wings, fuselages and undercarriages all fixed. I've dealt with some enthusiastic tailsitter models and tamed most one way or another, but THIS is in a class of its own 😲 ⁉️ The kit supplies a little prop stick to fix under the fuselage and it or something similar will have to be used. No way is my effort with 2 big washers going to sort it. There was also a crisis or two in fitting the cowling parts around the engine. The engine mount assembly defines how the engine aligns and that defines how the cowling underpan and front attaches to the fuselage. The one-piece cowling top then has to fit neatly and precisely into that gap between firewall and cowling front 😳 You know that's not going to pan out easily... Both my engine assemblies needed breaking off the firewall and another approach tried. Here's airframe no1, Getting there but some finessing required. But good enough to get some primer on. She's well propped up with a clothes peg there. With airframe no2 I decided to take the one chance available to balance the wee plane. With the engine installation removed, I've left it off and fixed the cowling top straight to the fuselage. This got filled with plasticene. I ought to mention the front gear leg was already assembled to the firewall and well set. The underpan gap was blocked off and a slot cut to fit around the leg. And a length of Ali tube inserted into the plasticene. Put it together, insert the wire prop shaft into the tube and... She STANDS 🤩💃🤹‍♂️🤼☘️!! And the cowling fit is better, and easier to achieve. So, one with and one without, that seems like a reasonable and well-balanced solution 🤩

Steady progress here, if a bit slow. No1 Piper with the intact and unmolested fuselage is making progress with windows installed before joining sides and masked. With the wings added and the windscreen installed, the whole assembly will get primed in white. No2 Piper is following a different course due to the fuselage sides being already joined. Windows installed up through the bottom of the fuselage which has already been primed and worked on to improve the random joints. It has come together better than I dared hope. The red is brushed on and everything from here on will be a brush job. Interiors are much the same, assembled onto the wings mid-section, with paper antimaccasers for a bit of detail. (No point relying on predictive text for THAT one- i can't vouch for my spelling but I had a go. Which is more than can be said for this phone's keyboard 🤣🤔) Instrument panels are pretty much ready to go in, and there are a couple of standup name plates supplied that have ridiculously fine etched details on the surface. I managed to reveal the "hidden secret" message with a technique I used when etch printing many years ago 😄... 👍

Anyone who has read "The Phantom Tollbooth"-- (highly recommended 🤩...) will know that the gap between the largest small things and the smallest large things is conceptually very dodgy ground 🤔 You're heading into tricky and unpredictable territory, I forsee many appeals 🫣

Were there many of us competing in that particular category⁉️🤩

A couple of things have been investigated about the Cherokee type. First, there's a wide selection of subtypes as indeed listed by Minicraft instructions. All developments and upgrades over the years. Some have 6 windows- 3 each side- which might indicate a stretched fuselage?. The most recent version has retractable undercarriage. So the previous hatchet job may have been intending to make a later version of Cherokee. I got some primer on no2 fuselage to see how my reassembled parts are looking. Work-in-progress would sum up the situation 😋 I spotted an potential snag on the wings. There's a walkway on the starboard wingtop which is represented by a raised panel. I'm not unduly worried about that but it extends back over the flap area... I've tried honing away the raised area and scribing the hinge line across. Also the tailplanes are all-moving and what looks like an elevator is a copious trim tab. It's known, apparently, as a stabilator 🫣⁉️

I spent a mad hour and more trying to make a Lycoming engine installation for a Cherokee. The kit's makers have made an effort to supply what's under the cowling but the instructions are a bit vague and the moulded parts just don't have the quality for this to be a simple process. I've got this for my endeavours so far... 2 decent sized washers have been glued to the back of the firewall in an attempt to balance what is bound to be a keen tailsitter. The firewall is angled back in the fuselage and the engine mount needs to compensate, like this, I've got a brass tube installed through the engine block and back to the firewall which has steadied the assembly. Here's what I'm working from... Really they should have printed "Good Luck" at the bottom of the page. ☘️ Anyway, I did get a piece of Ali tube fixed into the exhaust system for the tailpipe. I spent another length of time pitting my modelling skills against the remnants of fuselage no3, just to see what I could make. I enjoy a scratch challenge but really I don't think I can see it through to a decent Cherokee 😅