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Pacific Coast Models Hawker Hurricane Mk. I fabric wing


spitfire

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Carrying on with the RAF/PCM theme this is my second build for 2021, a fabric winged early Hurricane Mk.I, the poor old Hurricane is much neglected by the main Kit manufacturers so when the PCM kits came out my wallet was ready, I did the same for the Fly kits but that will be for the future.

 

So while the Tempest is in the paint shop for its, paint, dry, paint, dry cycles I though that I would start on this one.

 

I then assembled my reference books and dug out some AM bits and pieces.

 

After looking at the kit instructions and my references I have settled on L1909 LR*R as my subject, this is a 56 Squadron Hurricane and I will be modelling it in it’s1939 guise.

At the time 56 Squadron aircraft were coded LR rather than the later US codes and were based at North Weald.

The Squadron fought in the Battle of France, though they were not based in France, they  provided air cover for the Dunkirk evacuation and flew for the entire period of the Battle of Britain. 

 

One of the reference books that I found really useful is probably one of the oldest, the Ducimus Hawker Hurricane Camouflage and Markings RAF Northern Europe 1939-45.

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In it I found a photo of my subject which showed at the time that the photo was taken it had a three bladed propeller and judging by the shape of the blades it was a De Havilland prop but I am not a great expert on these things.

From the photo it also appears to have the later exhausts fitted and the early untapered radio mast.

It shows the B camouflage scheme and confirmed the markings that are on the profile in the same book.

The undersides paint finish is described as the night, white and aluminium scheme and looking at the profiles there was no under wing roundels. The Codes would be in MSG not Sky with  type B roundels on wings and fuselage with no fin flash.

 

The instructions would have you fit a venturi on the port side of the fuselage  but looking through my Hawker Hurricane Walk around, It gives L183? As one of the first to be built without the fuselage venturi, Hurricane batches follow each other so my subject would not have a venture either. The venturi was needed to provide a vacuum for the cockpit instruments, I found this quote on a Britmodeller thread. ' The absence of the vacuum pumps was very serious and external venturis had to be fitted on early aircraft to drive the gyro instruments on the blind flying panel "

Here are some of the books that I used for reference though some are better than others.

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This one that popped up on the Bookworld Wholesale website last week so I just had to buy it.

 

 

Cheers

 

Dennis

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So what's in the box, well for a start here is the box.

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And a look inside reveals this

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All neat and tidy

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Some Resin, looks very nice

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And on to the plastic

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Clear parts

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And the subject of my build (top)

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Forgot the PE and the decals, which I thought were missing but in fact I had removed them from the box before it went up to the loft, no problem really as I won't be using them. They do look very nice though

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Next up plastic bashing

 

Cheers

 

Dennis

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Thanks Stew, after reading all the reference material I am seriously considering starting another one, this time metal winged Mk.I, it would be a shame to waste the stuff that I have accumulated.

 

Cheers

 

Dennis

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Well I have made a start and after the experience of the Tempest I am well out of the super fitting Hasegawa mode and into the modelling required mode.

The first thing that I did was get rid of the starboard fuselage rectangular panel that my subject didn't have, this was filled with Mr Surfacer and sanded down.

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While I had the fuselage halves in my hands I toned down the fasteners on the nose a tad using a chisel type blade and then polished them.

I then spent some time cutting parts from the sprues and cleaning them up, a lot of the sprue gates were a bit industrial and took some cutting.

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Then as is my normal practice I attached the parts by their tails to clips ready for painting.

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In my enthusiasm I painted all the cockpit parts grey green (Humbrol 120) then realised that Hurricane cockpits should be basically silver with sidewalls grey green.

So a mass silver paint operation was in order, for this I used Xtracolor High Speed Silver.

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The kit does have a resin seat in it but it could be better so I ordered a seat and control column from Grey Matter, these arrived but the control column was a bit short so I contacted them and they sent a replacement.

However Royal Mail managed to shatter the replacement but with the original one I had enough bits to tart up the kit part, not perfect but I was happy with the result.

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I then did some detail painting of the various cockpit parts and dressed them up with some MDC dials and Airscale placards. The Grey Matter seat was an improvement on the kit seat.

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Ah I meant to turn that one round, but forgot so you will just have to stand on your head or imagine it.

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Other bits and bobs

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Undercarriage parts, the tyres were painted using my favourite Humbrol 67, the covers are Grey Matter items.

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More coming soon

 

Cheers

 

Dennis

 

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  • 2 weeks later...

Plodding away while the Tempest waits patiently on the shelf for it's camouflage masks and Dark Green.

More silver bits, undercarriage doors,

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Radiator scoop

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Even found time to do the yellow tips in the prop blades

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Then onto the tail planes, these are a butt fit so I decided to make them fit a tad better.

I carefully positioned them on the tail and drilled through the fuselage and into the tail plane then inserted some plastic rod and topped it off with CA.

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This seemed to work well and hopefully I won't knock them off with all the sanding that I am anticipating later in the build.

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Then back to the cockpit, this fitted together a lot better than the tempest cockpit frame, though I was a bit wary about the height of the control column..

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All the other bits ready to go, side console.

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All I have to do now is squeeze it all into the fuselage.

 

Cheers

 

Dennis

 

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On 14/02/2021 at 18:49, spitfire said:

In it I found a photo of my subject which showed at the time that the photo was taken it had a three bladed propeller and judging by the shape of the blades it was a De Havilland prop but I am not a great expert on these things.

 

Hawker%20Hurricane%20Camo%20&%20Marks_Pa

 

DH prop from the blades.  Not sure which spinner type.  The kit one looks the DH Hurricane type though. Note how the fabric parts appear lighter than the metal.  

Visible on the wings here, and if you look closely, the fuselage. 

Lots of useful detail,  if the LR-R caption is right,  then early curved lower edge windscreen, and 2 prong pitot, as seen here on L1940

2527541716_722f54a43f_b.jpgHurricane by Etienne du Plessis, on Flickr

 

 

On 15/02/2021 at 19:37, spitfire said:

In my enthusiasm I painted all the cockpit parts grey green (Humbrol 120) then realised that Hurricane cockpits should be basically silver with sidewalls grey green.

the metal panel under the cockpit are also painted aluminium, it just the uppers that are grey green. 

just visible here, the is the Dh Spitfire prop BTW

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Did just 'find' this,  if you fancy a really early 56 Sq one

Hawker-Hurricane-I-RAF-56Sqn-LRO-L160x-N

 

also, in case you have not seen it, this is worth noting on assembly and pitfalls

 

from http://modelingmadness.com/review/allies/cleaver/gb/tmch1.htm

 

"this model is not difficult, but there is a “big secret” to overall assembly which can have a major effect on the way your model turns out.

            The kit instructions and a modeler’s experience would have one build the kit as two major sub-assemblies - the fuselage and the wing - and then mate them once otherwise assembled.  DO NOT DO THIS!

            Here’s the trick to doing this kit with a minimum of hassle and a maximum of good looks when finished: You have to approach the model as a collective whole.  There are not two major sub-assemblies to this project, but rather one overall process. 

            The first thing to do is to assemble the fuselage, including the lower rear part.  While that is setting up, assemble and paint the cockpit and install the seat belts. I strongly urge that you attach the rear cockpit headrest bulkhead and the instrument panel into the fuselage separately.  Once you have the rest of the cockpit assembled, slip it inside and glue it in position.  At this point, you need to test fit the canopy if you plan to pose it open, and to sand down the area of the fuselage immediately aft of the cockpit so the canopy can sit down properly.

            Once the fuselage is done, you want to attach the upper wing parts.  You will immediately notice that the curvature of the upper wing differs from that of the fuselage joint.  You’re going to need to engage in a bit of industrial-strength bending and curling to get the upper wing to fit - don’t be afraid to stress the plastic, it is soft enough it won’t crack or break. Once everything fits nice and tight, work the joint from inside, to lessen the amount of glue that is used on the exterior.  If you trim and get it just right, you should need only a very little bit of Mr. Surfacer along the upper wing joint to get it smooth, which means you won’t be losing any of that wonderful surface detail.

            When you cut the molding block off the main gear well, be sure to dremel down the roof of the well to where you can see light through the outer areas on each end, and then round down the piece fore and aft on the top.  Assemble the interior parts for the gear well and attach it to the lower wing.

            You then need to test fit the lower wing to the rest of the model. Trim as necessary to get a nice smooth fit to the fuselage fore and aft.  Then take the leading edge gun port for one wing, test fit it to the upper wing, trimming the cutout in the wing as necessary to get good fit, then glue it in position.  Test fit the lower wing, and trim that cutout as necessary to get good fit.  Do the same on the other wing.  Then fit the lower wing and be sure the cutouts for the landing lights are aligned.  Glue the landing light parts into the upper wing, then glue the lower wing in position.  If you have done this right, you will only need a little Mr. Surfacer along the joints to the fuselage, and a little sanding down of the wingtips so they match up.

            All that might sound like a lot of work, but it is really very minor fiddling, and the end result of not having harmed all the wonderful surface detail is well worth all the effort taken."

 

 

 

 

this I wrote before seeing the rest of the post.. :doh:  as you spotted the access panel business :goodjob:

 

But I'll leave it as maybe of interest...

from what I can the PM kit retains the 3nd rectangular access panel, which is not on the L**** and N**** serial planes.

 

But it is on the P**** and V**** built mid 1940 with fabric wings, see here and keep reading,  there are a few photo confirmed of this set up, and the PCM kits looks to have all the bit to do it

 

hope of some use Dennis?

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Hi Troy all information is gladly received, feel free to post anything that you have regarding the build, I missed the early curved lower edge windscreen, and 2 prong pitot so thank you for that.

I really don't think that I could do the faded fabric look so I will leave that to the more expert modellers.

I did find the Tom Cleaver build as well so will attempt to follow his advice, I had similar fun and games with the resin wheel well insert on the PCM Tempest that I am building so will be thinning that one down quite a bit.

 

Thank you for the detailed reply

 

Cheers

 

Dennis

 

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Following advice from a build I glued the side door in place, the instruction would have you glue it onto the cockpit framing but I don't see how you would get the angle right for it to sit on the fuselage side.

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And glued the rear bulkhead to the fuselage side.

Next up was the IP with gun sight and compass in place test fitted, seems to be fine.

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And a quick check on the cockpit frame fit, which again looks good, note the added frames at the back which I fitted to give the seat somewhere to perch..

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I have removed the control column as it was way too tall and have chopped some off it.

And here is the GMF seat, though it does look small compared to the cockpit surroundings, I will paint up the kit one and decide which one to use.

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Next up is these, I've only used the RB Productions harnesses in the past, these do not look as good but I'll give them a go as the RB ones look to be OOP.

They are Spitfire ones but are still Sutton, they will just need some changes to the mounts.

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Cheers

 

Dennis

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1 hour ago, Stew Dapple said:

Nice progress Dennis B)

 

You should get on all right with the HGW harness, I've used them a few times and am always pleased with how they turn out in the end :) 

 

Cheers,

 

Stew

Hi Stew, the one thing putting me off was having to cut them out but I have managed that now so I am good to go, but the Tempest has now taken over.

16 minutes ago, mick said:

great start😀

Thank you Mick, this one is a lot easier than the Tempest that I am building in Parallel

 

Cheers

 

Dennis

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Still plugging away though it is getting easier.

Got the seat belts/harness sorted, though it needed some mods as it was meant for a Spitfire.

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Painted up the kit seat, looks better than the GMF one though that one is probably more accurate.

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The seat fitted into the frame nicely, though I had to remove one of my struts to get the harness though the seat.

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Glued the side console into the fuselage half, the instruction would have you attach it to the frame but I wanted to use it to attach the frame to the fuselage.

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And finally the cockpit frame attached to the fuselage side, this was a big relief for me as it was a difficult job on the Tempest, note the scrap plastic attachment points.

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Now back to the Tempest.

 

Cheers

 

Dennis

 

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  • 2 weeks later...

OK time to bring this one up to date.

The fuselage halves were joined and the seams cleaned up, this went very well, then I fitted the aft fuselage undersides I was a bit cautious about this but it fitted well and sanding it down I did not lose much (if any) detail. I've just noticed the CA smear on here, it's gone now.

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Then I started to thin down the resin wheel well top, this was to clear the bottom of the cockpit frames.

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All taped up and test fitting, sanding/scraping and more test fitting.

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The part just below the fuselage is a spreader bar to push the aft section of the wings up to match the fuselage wing roots.

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Then as I had seen on some other builds I attached the top wing sections to the fuselage, I had to do this in stages to to get the wing section to conform to the wing root on the fuselage. I have never tried this method before as I have always worried about the match up with the lower wing section.

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Offering up the taped up wings I found this.

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But on the other side there was this.

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This is not too bad but the raised fabric wing details did not match up, if the wing was metal I could have redone the panel lines and lived with it but I was not happy with what I had so it was back to the drawing board.

I detached both wings and will do it the same way that I approach this problem on 

old SH kits, I will make up the wings and fill the wing root gaps with slices of plastic sheet.

Just to add insult to injury the cockpit tub fell out with all the handling but that is an easy fix, I will use the opportunity though to make 100% sure that the cockpit bottom rails do not touch the resin wheel well.

So I am back to this

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Cheers

 

Dennis

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A quick dry fit shows this.

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The wing centre section is flat and the outer wing dihedral looks good, so I just need to fill in the gaps with scrap plastic and do some more sanding..

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Some sanding required here.

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This looks better.

 

Cheers

 

Dennis

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  • 2 weeks later...

It is not in the bin and I am still plugging away at it.

I decided to complete as much as possible before joining the wings to the fuselage.

So first up fitting the top and bottom halves of the wings, first up I lined up and taped the front of the top and bottom of the wing and glued the trailing edge, once done I applied the clamps.

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This was allowed to set, not long as I only use CA on my builds, then I glued the front seam.

Next up I fitted the "spreaders" to make the top wing halve rounder fit to mate up to the  wing root better.

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Once done I sat back and realised that I had not installed the landing light inserts, I was so distracted by solving the wing to fuselage joint that I forgot them entirely.

Never mind the kit inserts are solid and the area around the light on the real thing was open inside the wing, so with some tricky ship in the bottle type work I installed some plates inside the wing to take the lamps.

These plates were then painted matt black, while this dried I started to hunt for some lamps, I have a box of 1/32 Spitfire spares and in there I found some landing lights from the Hasegawa Mk V, these were then cut to fit and the backs painted silver.

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Next up was the wing leading edge gun inserts, these were a good fit, though rather than spending a lot of time sanding the leading edge back I sanded the back of the inserts until they were flush with the wing and glued them in place.

Then all the seams were sanded and polished.

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Then I turned to the fuselage, the kit has an option to build an early Hurricane without the "keel" on the lower section of the tail so for building a latter version there is a plug to fill the tail wheel bay, this would have probably been easier to fit before the fuselage bottom but it fitted fine as it was.

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A quick test fit of the "keel" showed a good fit.

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The hole to fit the tail wheel into the keel was quite shallow so after checking the drawings I drilled it out a tad.

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So happy with that a line of CA was spread on the keel position and it was dropped into place, once set the resulting gap was filled with Mr Surfacer and the excess was removed with a cotton bud dipped in Mr Color thinner.

The kit provides two lower rudder sections depending on which version you are building so I fitted the longer piece, and filled the resulting gap with Mr Surfacer, though looking at it there is still dome standing to do, on another build that I read over on LSP the builder cut the rudder off completely from the rudder post and joined it separately, this may be an easier way of doing it though too late for me.

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More soon

 

Cheers

 

Dennis

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Great progress Dennis obviously not a shake and bake kit but you are taming it,I can't for the life of me understand why we don't have

a 1/32 Hurricane from the like's of Revell (there fifty year old kit sells for a fortune).

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⬆️ Agreed. Lovely work so far. No shake and bake, but it looks like a quality product nonetheless.
 

Revell, Tamiya or Trumpy scaling down would be good.

 

Trevor

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41 minutes ago, stevej60 said:

Great progress Dennis obviously not a shake and bake kit but you are taming it,I can't for the life of me understand why we don't have

a 1/32 Hurricane from the like's of Revell (there fifty year old kit sells for a fortune).

 

5 minutes ago, Max Headroom said:

⬆️ Agreed. Lovely work so far. No shake and bake, but it looks like a quality product nonetheless.
 

Revell, Tamiya or Trumpy scaling down would be good.

 

Trevor

Thanks guys, the PCM its are a bit challenging but they do turn out fine in the end (I hope !)

 

Cheers

 

Dennis

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Crikey Dennis, it's making you work for it though isn't it? Glad you kept it going, not sure I would have done!

 

I didn't realised you had the 'cut-it-out-yourself' HGW harness set; I always try to get the laser-cut ones, they're a couple of quid more expensive but I'll (reasonably) happily pay the couple of quid not to have to do it myself :D 

 

Impressive work (and perseverance) mate, well done B) 

 

Cheers,

 

Stew

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39 minutes ago, Stew Dapple said:

Crikey Dennis, it's making you work for it though isn't it? Glad you kept it going, not sure I would have done!

 

I didn't realised you had the 'cut-it-out-yourself' HGW harness set; I always try to get the laser-cut ones, they're a couple of quid more expensive but I'll (reasonably) happily pay the couple of quid not to have to do it myself :D 

 

Impressive work (and perseverance) mate, well done B) 

 

Cheers,

 

Stew

Thanks you Stew, yes it is a bit challenging but there's only PCM and FLY making Hurricanes in 1/32 so I will persevere with it.

I built the Revell kit many years ago and while I am happy with how it turned out a more modern moulding is far better.

As to the seat belts I have been spoiled by the RB Productions ones, the HGW ones were bought ages ago and now I do look for the Laser cut ones now as they are so much better.

 

Cheers

 

Dennis

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Glad to have found this before you finished!

I have the metal winged version which is destined to be made ( eventually ) as Bob Tuck’s machine, so I’ll be watching in the hope of picking up tips as usual.

Stay safe.

 

John

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3 hours ago, Biggles87 said:

Glad to have found this before you finished!

I have the metal winged version which is destined to be made ( eventually ) as Bob Tuck’s machine, so I’ll be watching in the hope of picking up tips as usual.

Stay safe.

 

John

Pull up a pew John, it could be a while though as I am not that fast, I too have a metal wing version as well so I am toying with the idea of building that next so as not to waste the information that I have gleaned from this build.

 

Cheers

 

Dennis

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Well we are progressing, after reading other builds I was aware of a problem with posing the canopy open in that the "doghouse" was too big, so when I joined the fuselage halves I sanded it down a bit. A quick test fit gave me this.

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And this

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Not too bad, though it still does not sit right, the problem is that the "doghouse" is too fat, so out with the sanders again.

You can probably tell that I was putting off the moment of truth, that is fitting the fuselage and wings together, so I took the plunge and glued the wings to the fuselage fore and aft which was not a bad fit at all.

But those gaps were a bit frightening, however as I posted earlier I have dealt with this before so off I went and rummaged through my box of plastic card.

The starboard side was easy it only needed a thin sliver of card but the port side needed some 2 mm card, which I had to sand down somewhat to fit, so once I was happy with the fit some CA was applied to the edges and the plastic card inserted.

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I made these inserts quite loose as I did not want to disturb the wing too much, by clamping the wing to the wheel well insert and applying copious amounts of CA the wing centre section remained flat with the outer wings having some dihedral as per the drawings.

Once I had carved away the excess plastic from the fillets CA was applied to fill any gaps, as usual I did not leave this long to dry as it would have been too hard to sand and would have taken ages to get a good finish.

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And this is where we are now, coming along nicely though some detail has been lost.

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I had to dig these out from storage as I have not used them for a while, my pile of micro mesh of varying grades, I'd better leave them out for a while.

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Cheers

 

Dennis

 

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