Back to the Mountains of Madness - Part 1 Complete!

[CedB]

Seconded! Excellent work Bill  

[billn53]

The weekend is coming up fast, and I've not been idle. Most of my attention has been on getting the engine pods installed. Right up, I'll admit that I haven't yet attached the pods to the wings. But I'm getting closer, and have an approach that appears likely to succeed.

 

Let's see first what we have to work with. Here's the guidance Airfix gives us in their instruction sheet:

 

   

 

Somewhat ambiguous, isn't it?

 

As an aside, instructions in the MPC boxing are a mixed bag:

 

 

 

That's all. No words to help. The arrows at least show which parts go in which holes. But pay no attention to the part numbers on the instruction sheet... the parts themselves are numbered as on the original Airfix molds. One wonders, what were they thinking?

 

Greg (Thorfinn) posted comments on another board that are very helpful:

 

"I did, indeed have troubles with the 'floating' engine nacelles. I think the kit instructions may have parts mis-numbered, since I repeatedly found myself having to flip the 'Z' shaped braces around to get something close to a fit. (I got the kit with many parts loose in the box, so I may just have mis-connected the drawings with the required numbers.) In any case, the holes for the pegs didn't seem to match the spacing of the struts. I ended up fixing the front brace solidly to the pod...then finessing the rear brace until everything looked 'square'...then applying CA like a madman, before everything skewed apart again. I fitted the diagonal 'middle' braces last, by cutting off the locating peg from one end and gluing it where it looked right. (The unused holes virtually invisible unless one goes hunting for them.)

"All that having been said...when I had it 'on its back' while rigging, I happened to notice that one nacelle is positioned slightly farther-forward than the other. It's barely noticeable---except to me, where I can now see nothing else---so I count it as yet another 'learning experience. 😉

"I also had to trim the landing gear struts themselves to get a good fit. One 'leg' is still slightly askew."

 

So, taking Greg's experience into account, here's how I have proceeded thus far.

 

First, I glued the "Z" shaped, forward-most strut to the engine pod (part #77 for the starboard pod). The holes on the pod didn't line up with the attachment points on the strut, so I had to make do as best I could, and use putty to fill the vacant hole on the inboard side of the pod:

 

 

 

Another design issue is that the holes in the wing, to which the Z-shaped struts attach, are the wrong distance apart. Strangely, one wing is different from the other. On the starboard wing the holes are too far apart, and I had to enlarge the inboard hole as seen below:

 

 

The rearmost V-shaped strut (part #79) fits into the two rearmost holes in the wing, with the longer arm on the fuselage side. The vertex attaches to a hole near the rear of the engine pod. Here's what it looks like dry-fitted together:

 

 

Amazingly, even dry-fitted, everything looks to be pretty much aligned!

 

   

 

 

But, before I can actually glue everything in place, I must first take care of the putty on the engine pods, and the enlarged attachment hole in the underside of the wing:

 

 

 

Once the pod is firmly attached by the struts fore and aft, I will install the middle, V-shaped, diagonal struts. The vertex attaches to the wing immediately forward of the outboard rear strut. The two 'arms' attach to either side of the engine pod, just behind the forward Z-shaped strut.

 

 

 

I'll use the part provided in the kit if I can, but if I run into any problems my alternative plan is to use plastic rod, instead.

 

That's as far as I've gotten with the engine pods. Some other items I've been working on are:

 

I installed the support struts for the horizontal stabilizer. The kit parts were slightly warped, and had some irritating flash & mold lines. I decided plastic rod would be quicker, and looks a lot better to boot!

 

 

 

I've also been working on the landing gear. I borrowed stole skis from the Monogram Tri-motor kit and modified the Airfix landing gear struts to fit -- I drilled out the center hub and installed a piece of plastic rod, that will attach to the ski.

 

 

I also did some minor detailing to the landing gear strut, namely, I cut away the triangular area on the forward edge of the strut and replaced it with a piece of plastic rod:

 

 

 

Somewhere along the way, the mounting lug on one of the landing gear struts broke off. I replaced it with the corresponding part from my "backup" kit:

 

 

 

Here are the landing gear struts, ready to go:

 

 

Finally, after checking photos online, I decided the skis would most probably have been made from wood, so out came my paints for simulating wood:

 

 

 

And this is the result:

 

 

 

Still more to be done for the skis (weathering, etc), but you get the idea where I'm going.

 

That's it for tonight. Hopefully, for my next update I'll have my engine pods in place and this build ready for the final push to completion!

 

 

 

 

Edited January 12, 2019 by billn53

[billn53]

As usual with this build, it's another case of "good news, bad news". The good news is that the engine pods are on. Using the approach outlined above, and first described by Thorfinn, installing the engine pods went pretty smoothly. The kit did put up a fight, but its heart wasn't in it and I got the pods installed in short order:

 

 

 

Of course, I couldn't resist seeing how it looks with the Wasp Junior's in place:

 

 

 

 

 

Nice!

 

Now for the bad news. Although it doesn't jump out at you, the port engine pod is slightly farther from the aircraft centerline than the other pod. I didn't notice it until I took a ruler to it, but the're about 1/8-inch difference.

 

 

 

The reason for this difference is the mounting holes in the wings differ from one side to the other (something I noticed earlier -- see previous post -- and should have followed-up on instead of forging ahead blindly). Compare the pics below of the port and starboard wings:

 

Port:

 

 

Starboard:

 

 

On the port wing, you can see six corregations between the strut mounting hole and the panel to the right. On the starboard wing, only two or three. Arrgghhh!!!

 

The difference may be small, but now that I know about it, I will always see it when I look at my model. More importantly, I'm going to have to take this difference into account when I install the landing gear, else they will end up being askew. This is probably why Thorfinn had problems with his landing gear.

 

Speaking of landing gear, as promised I have dirtied-up my skis. I really didn't know what I was doing... I just did this and that until the skis looked good to my eye. Here's the "before" and "after":

 

    

 

That's all for now. It's only Saturday afternoon, so plenty of time remaining in the weekend for more work. Till then, Happy Modeling!

Edited January 12, 2019 by billn53

[CedB]

More nice work Bill, especially those skis  

I know little of the aircraft but I do wonder if the positioning of the engines might be something to do with reducing torque effects (or something). Do you have any drawings that might confirm the apparent wobbly mounting?

[Martian]

40 minutes ago, CedB said:

More nice work Bill, especially those skis  

I know little of the aircraft but I do wonder if the positioning of the engines might be something to do with reducing torque effects (or something). Do you have any drawings that might confirm the apparent wobbly mounting?

Ced has a very good point there Bill, it was something that immediately sprang to my mind as well. 

 

Martian 👽

[billn53]

2 hours ago, Martian Hale said:

Ced has a very good point there Bill, it was something that immediately sprang to my mind as well. 

 

Martian 👽

I fly single engine planes and I know both torque and P-factor cause an aircraft to yaw to the left under power, requiring right rudder to compensate. So, I can see how putting the left engine further from centerline might work to mitigate the effect. Unfortunately I don't have the kind of drawings that would be needed to check if that was part of William Stout's Tri-motor design. 

Edited January 13, 2019 by billn53

[Massimo]

I've been following this build silentlyand I have to say you're getting the best from this kit!

And those skis are just the last pearl!!!

Well done!!!

[CedB]

6 hours ago, billn53 said:

Unfortunately I don't have the kind of drawings that would be needed to check if that was part of William Stout's Tri-motor design. 

There are some on the web Bill if you click here that appear to be the original Ford drawings. (You can click on the small image to get a bigger version)

Sadly they seem to show an equal spacing of the engines from the centreline.

I should have searched before I opened my big mouth!

HTH  

[stevehnz]

6 hours ago, billn53 said:

I fly single engine planes and I know both torque and P-factor cause an aircraft to yaw to the left under power, requiring right rudder to compensate. So, I can see how putting the left engine further from centerline might work to mitigate the effect. Unfortunately I don't have the kind of drawings that would be needed to check if that was part of William Stout's Tri-motor design. 

No point me asking which side is correct then, least not until you've wrestled this conundrum to a standstill. I'll await developments on this. What @Massimo (ITA) said, those skies are stand out brilliant.

Steve.

[billn53]

I'm very gratified to see the reaction to my skis! In case anyone is interested (for future reference), here's what I did:

 

To get the initial wood effect, I followed what is now "standard practice", i.e., I first painted the wood areas with Tamiya Desert Yellow (XF-59), followed by a layer of Burnt Sienna oil paint. I used a torn section from a piece of cosmetic sponge to wipe the oil paint off the ski, moving along the direction of the planks. When everything was dry to the touch, I added a layer of Tamiya clear orange (X-26).

 

   

 

My weathering process was definitely one of improvisation. I used a brown wash on the wood surfaces (Mr. Weathering Color WC02, "Ground Brown") and after letting it dry for about 20-minutes, I used a dry cotton cloth to remove most of the wash. I followed that with a generous application of dark brown pigment powder (Abteilung 502 "Cargo Dust"). I used a clean, dry brush to remove the loose pigment, taking care not to remove all of it from the skis.

 

The center mount and attachment screws were painted with silver metallic enamel (Floquil Bright Silver) and given a coat of Future to level the surface and reduce the shine somewhat. I then brushed a generous application of Vallejo Light Rust wash, which both added some color to the metallic surface and pooled around the mount's attachment bolts.  Next, I used a short, stiff brush and Vallejo "Dark Rust" paint (barely loaded with paint, as if I were dry-brushing), to dab random areas of color onto the mount. While that was somewhat wet, I vigorously brushed the mount with my larger soft paintbrush to blend the colors together.

 

That's all there was to it!

 

 

 

Now, getting back to the engine pod discussion...

 

I am going to have to compensate for the pods being different distances from the fuselage, else my landing gear will not be square to the wing. A test fit indicates that the port gear will be OK, which implies the port pod is in the proper location. However, unless I make some adjustments, the right gear will be askew, as can be seen in the photo below:

 

 

 

The easiest solution will be to trim back the V-shaped fuselage brace to allow the landing gear to stand vertical to the wing. But, I have a little more work to do on the landing gear legs before I'm ready to install the gear.

 

 

Edited January 13, 2019 by billn53

[CedB]

Thanks for sharing the technique Bill - filed!

Good plan for the u/c  

[AdrianMF]

I can't work out what I admire the most about on this build... I will just have to pick everything!

 

(Needless to say I would be quietly trimming one of the v-struts)

 

Regards,

Adrian

[billn53]

1 minute ago, AdrianMF said:

Needless to say I would be quietly trimming one of the v-struts

Ha ha! You caught me just as I was taking my snippers to the guilty strut!

[billn53]

I just finished a few hours work and am feeling a bit too fatigued to continue, so thought I'd bring everyone up to speed with today's accomplishments.

 

To begin, I trimmed the starboard fuselage brace in order to achieve the proper angle for the landing gear legs:

 

    

 

With that attended to, I next added the diagonal struts to the engine pods. I knew this would be very tricky business, and thought it wise to proceed before attaching the landing gear. Instead of the kit's "V" brace, I used plastic rod cut to appropriate length by trial-and-error:

 

 

Recall that I had modified the landing gear by adding a diagonal rod at the front of each leg.

 

 

 

Well, I learned that this is a brake tensioning rod, and since this bird is on skis, not wheels, I reluctantly took the scalpel to the landing gear, removing said rods:

 

 

 

After all that work, the landing gear legs went into place without any problems. I'll show pics a bit later, but first, let's finish off the skis! The task at hand was to construct a means to attach the landing gear to the skis. I started by cutting some aluminum tubing sized to fit the posts on the landing gear. This gave me an excuse to try out the latest addition to my tool collection, a mini-miter box:

 

 

 

I ground out the top of the skis' mounts and inserted the aluminum tubes. These I fixed into place using CA and baking powder:

 

 

 

Voila! The shoes fit! I'll wait until everything else is done to glue the skis to the landing gear -- There's enough play in the aluminum tubes to allow minor adjustments to the skis position.

 

 

Although there's still much to be done, I can now see the light at the end of the tunnel for this build. Here are my latest pics to whet the appetite:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

BTW, I want to express my great appreciation for everyone's comments and encouragement. Keep following, there is more to be revealed. And don't forget that after my Tri-motor is finished, I still have an ambitious diorama in mind for the Mountains of Madness!

 

 

 

Edited January 13, 2019 by billn53

[billn53]

I've been thinking about what's left to do for the aircraft part of this project. Here's my "punch list"

 

Final Assembly Sequence:

1. Drill hole for wing pitot tube
2. Assemble wing landing lights
3. Finish wingtip & rudder nav. lights
4. Add luggage door handles under wing
5. Build tail wheel/ski structure, do test fit
---------------
6. Install rudder & elevators
7. Rig wing (aileron) control lines
8. Rig fuselage control lines for rudder & elevator (don't forget the line guides)
9. Add & rig tail ski
10. Rig horizontal stabilizer
---------------
11. Drill out & test fit props (remember they must go on "backwards")
12. Build up engine exhaust outlets
13. Install engines & exhausts
---------------
14. Paint & detail passenger door
15. Install passenger door
17. Drill rigging holes in skis
18. Install & rig skis
---------------
19. Paint, decal, & install props
20. Install wing pitot tube
21. Install Venturi tube (port side, under canopy)

22. Touch up paint as needed

 

It's a long list, but most items are pretty straightforward. I have very little experience running rigging lines, so that may be a problem. The kit's tail wheel strut looks terrible, so I have to scratch up a better one for the tail ski. Otherwise, I expect things to go smoothly to the finish line. 

 

Did I miss anything?

[CedB]

Looking very smart Bill  

Nice work on the ski mounts - and, as you say, a good test for the mitre block; worth the money eh? I certainly like mine, a lot.

[Martian]

Its all looking rather impressive.

 

Martian 👽

[Brandy]

It's looking very impressive indeed in those "teaser" pics! Love those skis!

What are you going to use for the rigging lines?

 

Ian

Edited January 14, 2019 by limeypilot

[billn53]

47 minutes ago, limeypilot said:

What are you going to use for the rigging lines?

 

Ian

 

My first thought was invisible thread, but the holes in my control horns are very small (#80 drill) and even invisible thread won't go through them, so I will instead use Uschi's super-fine rigging line:

 

https://www.uschivdr.com/products-in-detail/rigging/

 

For the skis, pics I've found indicate a thicker line is appropriate -- I haven't yet decided what to use there (but I have plenty of options to choose from in my supply drawer)

Edited January 14, 2019 by billn53

[Brandy]

My suggestion would be to secure one end in the fuselage, let it dry, then thread it, tension it, and secure it somehow (I use dolls house clothes pegs, but tape or a small clip would work). Then add a drop of thin CA to secure the other end. Don't try to hold it taut while the glue sets! Trim the excess off when dry with a new scalpel blade.

 

Ian

[billn53]

I've been making steady progress on my "punch list".  

 

Glued on the lenses for the wing landing lights. I used the same UV-activated resin that was used to create the lenses, much earlier in this build:

 

 

I also used the UV acrylic to create lenses for the navigation lights on the wingtips and rudders. Transparent paint added the color:

 

     

 

I added the "handles" to the under-wing luggage doors, they were trivial to make from plastic rod:

 

 

 

The mount for the tail ski was quite a different story. This is what Airfix provides:

 

 

Here's the real thing:

 

   

 

I started by soldering some brass rod to create the main post and fork:

 

 

 

My soldering skills are basic, at best. Fortunately, the assembly won't need to support much weight. After a couple of hours work, here's what I finally came up with:

 

 

 

Very satisfying, and well worth the effort involved!

 

With the tail ski mount sorted out, it was now safe to give this Tin Goose some tail feathers:

 

 

 

My next task will be to add the various control cables that run alongside the fuselage and on the upper & lower wings. At that point, handling the model without damaging my work will be problematic, so in preparation, I constructed a simple frame to hold the aircraft steady as I install the various cables:

 

 

 

Hopefully, in my next progress report I'll be able to show you good results from my rigging exercise.

 

 

Edited January 16, 2019 by billn53

[billn53]

I've spent yesterday and today getting my control cable rigging sorted out. It's mostly done, as you will see. There's still some tidying up to do, a couple of items to add, etc.

 

First off, here's what I'm using for the rigging (Thanks, Limeypilot!) :

 

 

 

It's very fine (small enough to fit through the #80 holes in my control horns), and stretches (so it's easy to get the lines taut).

 

Here are the pics!

 

    

 

    

 

The Ford Tri-motor has fairleads on the rear fuselage side for the control cables running to the rear:

 

 

 

I haven't yet decided exactly how to build those, but in anticipation of that, I added short sections of thin tubing on the rear control cables:

 

 

 

There's also an additional fairlead for each rudder cable mounted further aft. No mount needed for these, they attach directly to the fuselage:

 

 

 

Tomorrow I plan to carefully trim the bitter ends and see if I can create a suitable mount for the fairlead tubes. I'm pushing hard to get this build finished by the weekend, as I have a back-to-back business trips scheduled over the next two weeks. I also still need to rig the aileron control cables, and add the strengthening cables that attach to the vertical and horizontal stabs.

 

 

Edited January 18, 2019 by billn53

[TheBaron]

As the other boys have quite ungraciously used up all of the available stock of superlatives Bill, I'm merely left with a heartfelt WoW as a response to those last few updates. Patient problem solving with those engine alignments and - something I don't usually say to other men - you have excellently dirtied your skis.

 

Surely only a mater of time before an honorary doctorate from Miskatonic University is in your clutches for distinction in the field of 'uncanny aviation'....

 

 

[Brandy]

Very nice work on the control rigging, it looks great. As for that tail ski assembly, I hope I can get close to that when it comes to the tail wheel on my Battle!

 

Ian

[GrzeM]

That looks cool!

BTW, is this Ford a child of Junkers (corrugated metal) and Fokker (tri-motor and general configuration)???

Edited January 18, 2019 by GrzeM