Ford Tri-motor +++FINISHED+++

[Ray S]

The Tri-motor has made good progress  since the last post. First, I checked to see if I could get the wing on if I fitted the fuselage top and canopy first, and it went on okay during a test fit or three. However, the top panel was rather banana-shaped. So it needed some persuasion, as did the canopy:

 

 

The sticky-out thingy at port midships is a paper tube stuffed into the lavatory window to act as a mask (honest!). Despite all the bracing, especially on the canopy, I needed to use some filler. I mixed up some Perfect Plastic Putty and Humbrol 64 Light Grey as a filler for the fuselage/canopy, and this time I masked off the fuselage to help preserve the corrugations (thanks for the tip Bill!). A quick swipe with a damp cotton bud and the seam was as good as I could expect. It is a shame the canopy is blemished on both sides.

 

Yesterday I had tried three or four times to mask the canopy, and failed dismally. I am not sure if it was me being ham-fisted or the excitement of listening to the England/Pakistan cricket match (I always loved playing cricket, I must see if any local clubs want a 63-year-old on their team!). Anyway, today I tried again, and it worked like a dream:

 

 

For want of doing something simpler, I added some rod to the fronts of the propellers, which are actually the backs as Airfix had moulded them back to front. Thankfully I had some Contrail rod which was the correct size, and I found a good way of cutting the rod vertical! I usually manage to cut it at an angle. I had a large (relatively) rectangular metal plate which I put down onto the rod which was taped to a cutting mat along one of the guide lines. The plate was aligned with more of the guides, and a razor blade was (carefully) slipped down the side of the plate, resulting in a nice straight cut. And my fingers survived. The fronts will be trimmed later, and hopefully drilled out as per online images. 

 

 

Then came a bout of masking using tape and foam (and the rolled up paper in the toilet window), and I sprayed the fuselage with Humbrol Aluminium spray, which coated very nicely.

 

 

The surround around the cabin windows has come up nicely, having brush painted them earlier with Revell 90 Silver, but even more amazingly (for me) was that the canopy frames came up pretty well, but I think the vertical frames on the side are too wide, but I may be able to adjust them with a sharp cocktail stick later. I know that frame was very narrow.

 

 

The second engine pod went on okay too, but still took quite some time to get aligned, and again I had to re-drill a hole, but it was not the mirror-image hole that I needed to do last time. Some of the struts are not quite positioned 100% but they are as close as I could get. I have also added the control wires to the wings. I used InfiniModel rigging thread for this. I cut off 6 threads about 12" long, glued a piece of wire to one end which then acted as a threader, and put them through the three holes I had drilled under the wing, and then got them through the boot-less openings at the back of the wing. I tapes each end up  and taped them to the wing to keep them out of the way for the time being. It was while typing this that I remembered that I needed to paint the underside wire boots red (if I go by the walkaround and Bills images) - I will see if I can do that later. Or leave it aluminium.

 

Having got this far, I thought I ought to see if the top wing still fits (yes, I know I had tried three times before gluing the canopy and upper fuselage in place) and found it did not! A little sanding on the wing/fuselage cutouts on the wing, and on the front of the wing'canopy part sorted that out.

 

Hopefully I can get the wing on tomorrow, and start playing with something to hopefully make the control horns. I would prefer to use brass, but for some reason I find it difficult to drill through with a pin-vice drill.

 

Thanks for looking and all the likes, advice and comments.

 

Ray

[clive_t]

Looking very nice!

[billn53]

Superb progress! And, thanks for the tip on cutting rod at the right angle... that has always been a problem for me, too.

[Ray S]

23 hours ago, billn53 said:

Superb progress! And, thanks for the tip on cutting rod at the right angle... that has always been a problem for me, too.

Hello Bill, no problem! I am glad I have been able to pass something on which was useful!

 

I bit the bullet today and got the wing attached. Thankfully, this time all went well and I ended up with:

 

 

The fit was reasonable, there is a bit of a gap at the aft end of the wing, but the fit was pretty 'interesting' on the real thing anyway. There is a small gap too just behind the back edge of the canopy (the curved section by the wing root) which is in a position which is very awkward to solve. I will try and sort that when I do not shake quite so much.

 

I had a go at dry-fitting the undercarriage legs, and got a near-vertical finish on them:

 

 

I  think they are just slightly canted inboard on both sides. The cross braces from the fuselage are quite warped as I needed to pull them up (or down) by about 1/2" to get them into the location holes in the undercarriage legs, and that may be why they are slightly 'short' preventing the legs being perpendicular to the ground.

 

While the wing was drying, I underwent a severe, exhausting and lengthy decalling session. Half of them are done:

 

 

I write only half in jest. The first transfer I settled down was the serial number. It went down skew-whiff and would it move? No it bloomin' would not! No matter what I did, it stuck like a limpet. Eventually it seeped into my brain that I could pick it up with a pair of tweezers. I did, placed it somewhat more accurately first time (it is still slightly out along the corrugation line I notice on the image), then wet-cotton-budded it into the corrugations. The 'Ford' logo was placed much more accurately, I pressed it into place with a tissue, then cotton budded it and it slipped! I used the tweezers again and this time it stayed where it should have stayed. I will let them dry overnight before adding the final two transfers to the model.

 

That is it, thanks for looking,

 

Ray

[billn53]

Everything is coming together nicely. You make it look almost easy!

 

-Bill

[Ray S]

Hello all!

 

Only a little progress today. I managed to get the final two transfers/decals/stickers/markings on. I tried an alternative method this time, using Pledge/Future to try and pull them down into the corrugations (I had used Micro Set/Sol on the other side). It did not work, and the red bottle Micro whatever had to come to the rescue. Thankfully, this time I did align the serial number properly along the corrugations.

 

I then had a small painting session for the undercarriage and after the acrylic paint had very rapidly dried in the heat I was able to attach the legs to the engine pods and the support struts from the fuselage. I was unable to get them to be perpendicular to the ground, they cant inwards slightly as the support struts are not quite long enough. I strongly suspect that the nacelles are just a little too far outboard, despite struts being in all the holes.

 

 

The instructions are interesting again. Looking closely at the original written instructions, they show the undercarriage legs the right was round, that is with the brake actuators forward. The pictorial set show them with the actuators aft, so they have swapped the legs over. It gets confusing as there is an aerofoil shape to the legs, but one in the opposite direction on the wheel mounts.

 

I have started on the first two of the control horns. I decided against brass shim as I am rubbish at drilling brass for the mounting pin, and as there will be rigging at both ends of the horn, CA might well sheers off with the tension. I used some .5mm rectangular plastic rod, trimmed it down to size (about 7.5 x 2mm) and shaped them:

 

 

Oh, and yes, my cutting mat was upside down, so you do not have to look from the top of your screen and strain your neck! I may well re-do one of those, but to the naked eye they look fine. I just have to do two more of a different shape now.

 

I am wondering about the control wire guides on the fuselage which the wires go through. I know they are distinctive (once I knew they were there!), but I am considering leaving them off as it will be very tricky to get them to look not over-scale, let alone how to attach them to the fuselage. I will sleep on it, and if past experience is anything to go by, at 3 tomorrow morning I will probably figure out how to do it!

 

That is it for now, thanks for looking and the responses, take care all.

 

Ray

 

 

[AdrianMF]

It's a very involved build. I guess going for a corrugated surface forced some odd decisions on the mould makers. It is looking splendid on its legs though, and the canopy has come up a treat. Glad to see someone else colour-codes their left and right bits too...

 

[PS Revell aluminium is much less shiny than their silver, at least in the acrylics. But your chosen metallics look great together.]

 

Regards,

Adrian

[TheyJammedKenny!]

Just joining this now.  Amazing work, this, and the results are looking quite good.

[billn53]

1 hour ago, AdrianMF said:

I guess going for a corrugated surface forced some odd decisions on the mould makers.
 

Indeed! For example, the corrugations should wrap around the wing leading edges... Airfix didn’t even try, which is probably for the better.

[Old Man]

Good work, Sir!

 

Nice to see one of these being built, and built well.

[Roger Holden]

47 minutes ago, billn53 said:

Indeed! For example, the corrugations should wrap around the wing leading edges... Airfix didn’t even try, which is probably for the better.

Not sure where that comes from.  I've  just looked at about a dozen different contemporary pics of Fords which have the plain outer leading edge exactly like the Airfix kit.  Airfix kit is based on the Wylam Model Airplane News plan, which it faithfully duplicates, for better or worse.

[billn53]

1 hour ago, Roger Holden said:

Not sure where that comes from.  I've  just looked at about a dozen different contemporary pics of Fords which have the plain outer leading edge exactly like the Airfix kit.  Airfix kit is based on the Wylam Model Airplane News plan, which it faithfully duplicates, for better or worse.

 

See below, the corrugations clearly wrap around the leading edge.

 

 

 

[Roger Holden]

14 minutes ago, billn53 said:

 

See below, the corrugations clearly wrap around the leading edge.
 

 

Now I understand. Thought you meant the outboard portions, which were smooth.

[billn53]

2 minutes ago, Roger Holden said:

Now I understand. Thought you meant the outboard portions, which were smooth.

Roger. I was aware of this deficiency in the Airfix kit when I built mine, but fixing it would have been a bridge too far for me.

[Ray S]

Thanks for all those comments, they are all appreciated!

 

Again, not much done today, it has been too hot, and I have been thundercloud watching! Yesterday, I said I would probably think about the control wires and come to a conclusion as to what I would do at about 3am this morning. I can announce that I was thinking about them, but in the form of delirious dreams of strands of three control wires which I needed to straighten but never could! Every dream I had had the same theme! Okay, I need serious help...

 

On a more productive note, I utilized some 1/350 photo etch from a WWI battleship (Dreadnought), for the triple fuel tank filler caps:

 

 

They are better than the recessed circles moulded in, and look similar to the plans I have. The etch parts were originally meant to be coaling scuttles.

 

I have trimmed some more plastic and got all four control horns made up now. The elevator ones (2mm wide) are attached to some .5mm plastic rod, but the rudder horns are only 1mm wide and I needed to use some .4mm brass rod for their mounting pins, as, try as I might, I could not drill the attachment hole central, despite using a needle to set the hole position - my drills (or me!) always drill off-centre even when I put the drill into the pin hole, which IS central. I made a spare just in case too.

 

 

These will be painted tomorrow, and I will need to study the planes carefully to position them correctly.

 

That is it for now, more soon, with luck. Thanks for looking.

 

Ray

[Ray S]

Hello all! Only a couple of small things done today.

 

First, I decided, after quite some experimenting, to not do the fairleads for the rigging wires. I tried cutting off some small brass rod, but could not get it cut to a sufficient standard, then I thought about other small tubes I could use, and found some old telephone wire. I stripped the core out and tried with the plastic sheathing, but no luck. Getting that option out of the way (and hopefully leading to delirium-free sleep!), I attached the four control horns. I had pre-threaded the rigging cables through the wing and taped them down onto the wings for safe-keeping. What I had not appreciated was how these strips of InfiniModel rigging thread got twisted and wrapped around each other. While I was trying to work out which cable went where, they pulled through the under-wing holes, so scratch that idea! I said 'Whoops!' or something like that, and then rigged from the under-wing holes to the control horns with the thread, CA and accelerator. 

 

 

I have only done the port side so far, but it looks okay to me. I suppose tonight's sleep deprivation thoughts will be how to get the three remaining threads into the open rectangle on top of the wings and make it look feasible.

 

The second thing I tried to sort out today was the tail wheel. It did not look right, it had a triangle of plastic which was supposed (I think) to fit at the aft end of the fuselage, but the images of real Tri-motors so a caliper type thing instead. I sliced off the triangle, scraped away the remnants off the hub and tyre, and formed a 'caliper' with some .45mm brass rod and CA'd it in place. A dry fit shows it to look not too far out.

 

 

I have sprayed it with primer now, and hopefully get it fitted at the end of the build.

 

That is all for now, thanks again for looking.

 

Ray

Edited August 13, 2020 by Ray S
Tidy the post

[clive_t]

Great progress Ray

[bigbadbadge]

Looking great so far

Chris

[billn53]

Yeomanlike work going on here. I’m enjoying the show!

[Ray S]

 

 

Hello all! Thanks all for those great comments.

 

Yesterday I solved the control cable issue. I had accidentally pulled one set of wires through their holes, which went into the front area of the wing and out the back end, so I could not re-thread them. When I rigged the other wing, I carefully separated the cables and taped each to the wing. I glued the front ends to the control horns, then pulled that wire through and then glued to the horns on the tail plane and rudder. This showed me were the wires would exit the wing rectangular cut-out. Then, I got some plastic rod, glued three rigging threads to it and wrapped some more around the rod, CA'd the lot and painted the rod black. I then put lots of glue onto the rod, got it into the slot and pressed quite hard on the rod and let it set. That worked well, and shortly afterwards, I was able to glue the wires to their control horns aft.

 

Today, I finished the rest off. I added bracing wires to the tail plane, made support struts from .8mm plastic rod (easier than cleaning up the kit parts), added the engine fronts (do you remember I colour coded them? - well, I got the red on the starboard engine pod and the green on the port!). Props fitted well, so I did manage to get the replacement shafts right. I added wing control rods made out of silver speaker wire, and then finally added the modified tail wheel assembly.

 

I say finally, but when I posted the image to show the Tri-motor in all her glory, I noticed a hole in the front of the port wing. Doh! Pitot tube! I checked in the box, and there was no pitot tube. It was a quick job to make one up and paint it silver, and now, hopefully, the 'Bolivian helper-outer' is complete.

 

 

 

I will pop some more photographs into the RFI section.

 

I would like to say a big THANK YOU to all who have commented and encouraged this model, and especially those who provided links which helped me out so much! It was all very much appreciated.

 

All the best everyone,

 

Ray

[clive_t]

A fantastic result from a very old kit, well done sir!

[TheyJammedKenny!]

Ray: that's a really sweet-looking Trimotor!  You've captured the look and feel of the real thing nicely, despite the limitations of the old Airfix kit.