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White Knight - Short Crusader


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21 minutes ago, greggles.w said:

Thanks for your interest gent

Not in any particular hurry to see it finished as I am enjoying the build.

 

Macchi factory going full bore. I’ve done a few things on the M.67: floats, re-worked M.39 fuselage mould to M.67 shape, etc.  Still haven’t solved the radiator problem but I’ll deal with that later.  

 

Cheers 

 

Dennis

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4 minutes ago, DMC said:

Macchi factory going full bore. I’ve done a few things on the M.67: floats, re-worked M.39 fuselage mould to M.67 shape, etc.  Still haven’t solved the radiator problem but I’ll deal with that later.  

Ah yes! I confess life got a little busy a few months ago, and as I was being swamped I rashly cancelled all my ‘follows’ here on BM .. thanks for the reminder .. I’ll take a look (& re-subscribe!)

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  • 1 month later...
8 hours ago, greggles.w said:

White

Looking quite pristine.

 

Not sure if I’ve put this link up before or if you’ve got it but here it is anyway.  I’ve been through all the back pages but couldn’t find another image of yours.  Must be a complete pic of it somewhere.  Good stuff on it anyway.

 

Cheers

 

Dennis

 

http://doz.jp/wordpress/blog/category/macchi-m52r-and-52/

 

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How’s this ... ?

 

Buffing

 

..just what are you looking at?  A bit of an experiment.  Given this is near to final coat I thought I’d try a planned approach to surface finish variation within the white.  In particular to subtly (?) distinguish between the majority surfaces - enamelled fabric over timber - from the select sheet metal elements.

 

So on the fuselage above I have buffed back the white all over, down to a certain grade of micromesh.  Then I masked the headrest, behind & under the cockpit doors, extending along that raised panel line toward the nose.  Then the exposed forward upper spine was further buffed down through to the finest grade of micromesh.

 

Hopefully suggesting a shiny metal spine over satin fabric fuselage?

 

Have also learnt a lesson or two re being too aggressive over raised detail ..!  I guess a few coats of clear over the topcoat will give me more to buff into without chewing into detail.  Thinking particularly of the riveted metal floats...

 

Time’s up!

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Time tonight to work on a little detail for the fuselage - the port side air intake.  It sits just behind the cylinders, just above the wing leading edge. A single large opening with a conical fairing behind:

 

image_zpsazsx8spt

 

The kit version was twice as long & duplicated on the starboard fuselage.  In any case it came off when I split the wing roots & centre section from the fuselage.  Should have reinstated it then I guess, but I couldn’t turn my

mind to it with so many other things to attend to.  Now I have faced it, it wasn’t too difficult, quite satisfying actually.

 

I’ve scratch built from two parts.  First a suitable diameter spruce rod (from another Schneider racer donor kit!)

 

Air intake

 

This forms the basis for the fairing:

 

Air intake

 

Tapered, scalloped a bit to the back face to fit against the cylindrical fuselage, something like so:

 

48445839612_d13c4f82d0_b.jpg

 

The second part is fashioned from a two inch off-cut of the brass tubing I used for the float struts.  This was selected for the intake opening, as it will allow me to produce a thin rim while holding shape.

 

First micro-saw to angle cut the end...

 

Air intake

 

Then the inner wall was reamed out...

 

Air intake

 

Next task: bring the two parts together.  For this I grabbed some balsa to hold the brass perpendicular & protruding, as it will from the fuselage...

 

Air intake

 

... to allow me to align & shape the fairing to suit ...

 

Air intake

 

... which was done with help of a circular section file ...

 

Air intake

 

Test fit ..

 

Air intake

 

.. & several repeats!

 

Air intake

 

Air intake

 

Now CA glued together, & a little Mr Surfacer applied ...

 

Air intake

 

To be sanded to finish tomorrow, before fitting in place on fuselage.

 

Till then, G’night!

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On 8/4/2019 at 12:54 AM, limeypilot said:

That's a very interesting solution to the angles. Nice job!

 

Ian

Thanks Ian- those angles had my head in knots thinking it through in advance!

 

On 8/4/2019 at 2:33 AM, DMC said:

As usual, Greg, very neat work.

 

Dennis

 

Thanks Dennis- neat work in the present perhaps, but the challenge is maintaining that which has already been carefully done .. the white below hides an unfortunate amateur CA glue fingerprint to the side of the fuselage!!

 

On 8/4/2019 at 5:29 AM, Courageous said:

:ditto:

Good deduction, well thought out and well executed.

 

Stuart

Thanks Stuart- most appreciated.

 

So picking up where I left off, here follows the installation of the air intake.  Here’s the rough wound on the fuselage, left from removal of the moulded-in air intake way back when ...

 

Air in ...

 

Much fettling later, tentatively shaping the opening & shaving back the raised strap detail, it sits like so ...

 

Air in ...

 

.. looking reasonable out here, if a little strange under here!

 

Air in ...

 

I left as much length to the brass tube as would fit, then crimped it off, so a view down into the opening will just diminish to darkness.

 

I think that’s done! Here in context, with a first brush-coat of white primer / surfacer ...

 

Air in ...

 

 

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Tinkering as time passes ..

 

Tonight was shaping & starting to paint a tiny leather headrest, and turning a snip of easter-egg packaging into glazing ...

 

Glazing

 

.. fashioned into a clear horseshoe to fit into the arched frame from below ..

 

Glazing

 

Glazing

 

Not to be fixed in yet, must wait for a few other finishing & painting tasks to be finalised, but now was the time to get it ready & on standby.

 

g’night

 

 

 

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  • 2 weeks later...

 

1 hour ago, greggles.w said:

Time for some colour

Blue would look nice.  Caught me off guard there, until I remembered only the headrest fairing and cowling top are blue.

 

Dennis

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Mask off ...

 

Mask off

 

Mask off

 

Happily fully contained by the masking.  Unfortunately I was a little too heavy handed with a micromesh after unveiling .. rubbed through in a few places .. so now to calm down & consider a touch-up or re-mask for an additional coat ...

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On 8/21/2019 at 11:55 PM, DMC said:

Nice. Blue prop and struts as pictured in Pegram’s book?

 

Dennis

 

Thanks Dennis, no that should be it for blue for me.  This little plane had an evolving, if short-lived life. I’m electing to show the later version with metal prop & rebuilt white float struts ..

 

More on the colour changes back here, from this early post way, way back in 2016 !!!!:

 

 

 

Tonight’s lesson for all .. should you go to the trouble of building a ‘single-use’ jig, don’t be too hasty to throw it away.  I clumsily managed to snap off the starboard horizontal stabiliser ... thankfully the jig was still at hand, so back in it goes:

 

Two steps forward, one back ..

 

 

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Hi anyone who might still be loitering, with faith that this might be brought to a conclusion ...

 

Just a post to advise I’ve mucked in with the Floatplane Group Build (round 2) which launched this weekend.  I’ve started a thread over there, & will update that one only for the duration:

 

 

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  • 5 months later...

Alrighty, returning to this thread as I return to the bench!

 

The sorry end to my participation in the Floatplanes Group Build was an undignified fumble & drop.  It’s taken a while, but I have now addressed all the damage:

 

- starboard tailplane & elevator snapped clean off;

- paint chips & gouges to the white fuselage belly, two wing leading edges, one aileron & wing tip;

- as above for the blue tail fin tip;

- and a big superglue smear across a upper wing surface when setting about fixing item one above!!

 

Back in business

 

All fixed.  Time to move ahead please.
 

So now I’ve put some tunes on, & I’m going to mask up the wing surface oil radiators for paint.

 

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