1/72 Whirlykits (Vac-form !!!) Bristol Sycamore Helicopter

[halfwit]

EMA Plastic Weld is formulated to work with ABS, as well as styrene butyrate acrylic and perspex (I haven't tried it on anything other than styrene tho'. It seems to be well suited to East European short run kits).

[AdrianMF]

Nice work! The masking tape method is a good one - I've filed that away for future use.

 

On the subject of plastics - pure polystyrene is very brittle, and opaque plasticisers are added to it to make it less so, in varying amounts. Clear polystyrene doesn't have plasticisers in it, is brittle, and is the very devil to vac form (ask me how I know), so commercial clear vacs (eg Falcon or Pavla canopies) are never polystyrene. I could have saved you a lot of time by saying that at the start if i I had remembered then. Sorry.

 

So you will be dealing with something else, like PETG, PVC, Acetate - there's a load of different ones out there and they don't dissolve in polystyrene cement. So CA is the way forward for a solid and secure joint - I don't think canopy glue or PVA would survive seam clean up and subsequent construction.

 

Regards,

Adrian

[CliffB]

Araldite Rapid (or similar two-part epoxy), can work well on vac formed canopies too.  It's potentially (very!) messy, but with care gives a strong joint with no risk of fogging .

[AdrianMF]

1 hour ago, CliffB said:

epoxy

Epoxy might be a very good call for this because there are large portions of the fuselage that are not going to be transparent so you could slap it on there for strength.

 

Regards,

Adrian

[AdrianMF]

Just wondering - you may not need it with a white metal rotor assembly ahead of the main wheels, but do you need nose weight to get it to sit right?

 

Regards,

Adrian

[81-er]

For a little more inspiration, here's a superb Sycamore build from the (sadly late) Nigel heath:

The WIP has a lot of good reference photos, particularly of the interior:

 

James

[AlxBNE]

3 hours ago, AdrianMF said:

Just wondering - do you need nose weight

Good question Adrian and one I was debating myself today as I started to scratch build the cockpit.

Thanks for asking and prompting me to think about it.

I reckon it is better to play safe and add a little under the cockpit whilst I still have access to a logical place to hide it.

26 minutes ago, 81-er said:

For a little more inspiration, here's a superb Sycamore build from the (sadly late) Nigel heath:

The WIP has a lot of good reference photos, particularly of the interior:

 

James

Thank you James.

Nigel's sycamore build has been a huge inspiration to me since I discovered it a couple of weeks ago.

There are several Britmodeller threads that I have found really useful but Nigel's stands out as something rather special.

Sad that I can't say thank you to him in person.

[Tomcat101]

I struggle with helicopters, so I entered one in this GB, but a vacuform one?  No way!  Best of luck to you.  This looks like a tough build and I look forward to seeing your progress. 

[Ray S]

@AlxBNE, I hope things are progressing with the Sycamore for you.

 

All the best, Ray