Wizzoplanes

WOW Where did all the days go to !!

2011-11-28T10:42:00.000-08:00

Here we are in November well almost December ! Work won and model aircraft to very much the back seat this year! I am sitting in the hotel reception in downtown Lagos ( Nigeria) so I could not get any further from a model if I tried. All being well over the Christmas break I will get stuck into the Heinkel and the Triplane I hope !
Some more panel lies and rivets have gone onto the Heinkel since the last post and my mate John is machining the new landing gear so hold your breath for a coupe of weeks.

Out with the old !!

2011-07-29T06:30:00.000-07:00

Well, if you have seen the web page you will know the Pup is no more. The tragic event took place at the Greenacres site near to Walsall. I had just had what had to be my best flight ever with the Pup, no nerves, no worries and she just felt right, this resulted in a flight which included loops , stall turns and some nice tight turns into low passes. The landing was a real greaser floating in nice and level with a straight roll out, back in the pits a visual check of the fixtures and fittings failed to pick up a couple of clevis's. Next flight with the rest of the Dawn Patrol team and a steady flat routine no loops ,etc, but whilst making a tight left banked turn to get onto the rear of the group, one or two flying wires gave way resulting in the loss of both Lefthand wing panels and terminal nose dive from about 100 ft.

The impact being great enough to bend the reduction gear box and the crank of the zenoah. to be honest all that is left of the model is the rear fuselage section !

I then flew the Camel, but have to admit I never felt very happy with the aircraft, it needs a better pilot than me. Luckily Steve who is a better pilot then me agreed to swap the Camel for his Albertross.

Steve had had a mixed bag of luck with the model and she got quite heavily broken at one of the shows. But he glued her back together and tried again, next up he was loosing power during the flight.
This we think is due to the 62 Zenoah overheating, so I have fitted a 90 degree carb outlet and a trumpet onto the back of the carb. We have had two test flights and thinks seemed OK but the engine lugged down in a climb out, this we think is due to the Prop size so a couple of inches are going to be lopped off and we will se if that improves things !
There is some lovely detail on the model.

I hope to do some rivet and screw detail on the upper engine panels later.

We have a final test flight at Greenacres this Saturday, and all being well we will be off to the Eurofluge Tag in Germany on Tuesday morning.

Rougham

2011-05-09T23:45:00.000-07:00

Well What a weekend that was, winds getting up to 21 knots so no WW1 flying on the Saturday or Sunday, we had to make do with a bit of glider towing, but it was a good relaxing weekend and I did get to take and pass my LMA proficiency on the Friday, so as far as I was concerned it was a top weekend. I have some photo's which I will add to this post once I find my camera !.
Some nice models there, Ken Bones brought along is 1/3 Se5a which is a fantastic looking model with loads of detail. so much so that even I was inspired to "bling" up my Pup as soon as I got home.

Halfpenny Green Airshow

2011-04-26T10:23:00.000-07:00

Had an absolute cracking weekend, Saturday did some practise flying with the Pup. had 4 good flights and very good landings, but on my final taxi out, I was holding up elevator in and as I turned into wind she ground looped, resulting in knocking the hinges loose on the rudder. All repaired by Sunday morning and safely loaded into the van for an early morning run to Halfpenny Green just outside Wolverhampton, had some good flights despite a very tricky crosswind landing but no mishaps, did I enjoy myself ? well I think the photo below says it all !

A fantastic mixture of full size coming and going all day, here are a couple of my favorites of the day.

Imagine just how good this sounded !

And then multiply that by 2!!

from a far far distant Galaxy ( Ghana actualy)

2011-04-12T11:20:00.000-07:00

Well work stepped in again and stopped progress on any fun related projects, however I did manage to get a bit more done to the frontal fusalage section before "leaving on a jet plane". main focus has been on getting a good outer finish to the section and the application of panel lines and rivets. Mr Redshaw has taken a look at the end results and OK whilst not as good as he can produce he did not pronounce my attempts as being "crap", well not too crap anyway !

I have as you can see added the two "blind " hatches which feature on the early He111 models. once these are flatted down and the final colours applied it should look pretty good.
Next area of attack has been the cockpit floor and rear cockpit bulkhead, it looked pretty dog so. new floor panel .

then with a fine ply panel and a little more Lithoplate we now have a much more acceptable rear cockpit wall. I can afford to put weight forwards of the G of G as we expect the need for a lot of ballast.

Next up I want the upper gunner positon to be much tidier than it currently is, I have the panel lines in but I am now experimenting with the canopy rails, this is a length of gas welding rod with a Lithoplate slide, given some fake rivets and a bit of paint it will look pretty smart, I next need to have a look at how the gun was mounted and of course make a gun !

I have included a shot showing the underside of the main wing section showing where the landing gear mounts, we are a bit concerned that the units are man enough for the job, it would be a real bind if the things folded up on landing. It would prove an expensive exercise if it broke two props every flight. You can also see there is a lot of cleaning up and making the overall finish a lot better. So plenty to do yet !

And just so you can get an idea this is what we started with..

Bradford Show 2011

2011-03-29T11:21:00.000-07:00

This was the first year the LMA used this venue,whilst I felt that the attendance was slightly down on last years Wigan event, the venue certainly has promise, so we should expect this to quickly grow in popularity.
Some wicked models on show.

Very tidy British electric lightning, twin turbines I believe. I am pretty sure the model as flown and is going through its exemption certification.

Very clean and well detailed Me 110 from the stable of Mr Buzz Lightyear, ( Neil Armstrong) I have to mention that the detail and excellent weathered paint job was all done by Neils very talented dad. He made the cannons from dowels turning them down in an old Black and Decker drill strapped to his work bench!
Neil is now the owner of a very good 1/6 scale laser cut kit for a JU 88, which if the Me 110 is anything to go by will be a spot on model. Neils dad is busy working out how to install a full detail cockpit and make all the canopy panels open in a scale manner !

Well this just looks right so I just had to include it, this is going to look majestic around the circuit !

Dave Johnsons new Vulcan coming along fast, hopefully this will maiden during 2011 and will become the "Bad Boy " of the show season in 2012, 20ft wingspan and 4 turbines this is going to look, sound and smell awesome in a vertical climb on full chat !

Nice 1/3 Roland getting close to a DP debute, should look nice with the group.

And this "little toot " just looked so nice, I have not seen this in the air yet hopefully I will come across it on the show scene this year

Project Heinkel is moving along slowly, center section undergoing some experimental scale effect work, here you can see the start of the process to create panel lines and rivet detail.

This is what she looks like after a light coat of primer and an initial flating down, I now need to apply a second coat and then flat it all back with 400 grade wet and dry to get a good base prior to painting.

Heinkel upate

2011-03-06T01:59:00.000-08:00

Well before leaving on my latest travels, I managed to get a bit more done so here is a picture of the front end. Its going to take a long time to get this thing sorted but it will be worth it when its done.

With the front end, back on the fuselage the rivets and lithoplate surrounds do not look to bad, once they have been rubbed back and painted it should look about right! might need a bit of in cockpit detail though, i,e seats , controls, etc.
I have a small MG which, I will "once I find it" offer up to the front end to see what she looks like. If that fails I will need to fashion the forward and upper machine guns. Check out the video on the left, like the title says "Dream on" but then again if it all comes together and with a smoke generator in one wing it could all come together nicely.

Heinkel Progress

2011-02-20T09:27:00.001-08:00

So finally down to a bit of balsa bashing, in this case dusting !]
first of this is what the model looked like when I got my grubby mits on her.

Ok I admit she doesn't look to bad , but, no motors, no panel lines a fair bit of Hanger rash here and there. but in principle a good model to get stuck into. First off I wanted a good, safe flying model and also one that looks pretty good on the ground, I am not talking museum standard but at least panel lines and rivets should be visible!
I made a start on the front end removing the aluminium tape used to make the window framing and replaced this with riveted on Lithoplate, The rivets are not exactly to scale but the effect is pretty good.

Above is the top hatch, you can just see that the perspex window is held in with a couple of screws, and even closer you can see the ally foil under the paint.
Below is the front glazing with the Lithoplate and rivets in place.

You can also see the top two roof windows with the Lithoplate surrounds fitted, once its all painted it should hopefully look a bit more scale.
Work is also on going on the panel lines on the front fuselage section, I wanted to get the base done as I am of to sunny Nigeria for a couple of weeks so that will give the filler a good chance to dry !

EXTRA EXTRA

2011-01-16T06:29:00.000-08:00

Weather was a bit dogey this weekend, but having been travelling for the full week I was keen to have a twiddle on the sticks. I really want to get my LMA proficiency under my belt and to do that I need practise and loads of stick time. So Molly the dog and set off under a dark sky but were pleased to see by the time we passed Redshaw towers the sky was clearing. At which point I decided we should call in and let Ian have a look at the Extra, it was then that I discovered I had left my transmiter at home, so forget Ian and back home to collect radio ( BUGGER) anyway as we passed Redshaw Towers again, the sky was still clear !!!
Got to the flying site and the entry road was like a marsh, mud everywhere but managed to get parked and unloaded. Pretty strong wind but the extra flew "ace" had 4 super flights until the wind was just too much so I thought best to call it a day.
Molly the dog had a great time running through all the wet and muddy compost so the journey home the van smelled of wet dog and fresh cow poo "Lovely"

New Bird on the Block

2011-01-12T02:06:00.000-08:00

Over the Christmas break, I was made an offer I just could not turn down, my number 2 most favorite aircraft at 1/5 scale. only problem is its one of these !

At this scale she has a wingspan of around 17 feet so she is a big model.The model has been sitting around in storage for a number of years and I understand has never flown. Being well over the 20KG limit she will need to be inspected and registered. I will post some photo's later but to let you have a feel of where I am with this one here is a brief outline of work being done.
a) remove rudder and elevator control snakes and replace with steel cable "pull, pull" system, remove all elevator hinges and replace, and design new control horn system ( Metalic) to allow use of cables.
b) rub down center fusalage section prior to applying panel lines etc,
c) re model front cockpit area.
d) replace and strengthen tail wheel.

Etc,etc , etc probably be ready to start the engines towards the end of 2011 !!!
History: When World War I ended, the German Air Force was disbanded under the Treaty of Versailles, which required the German government to abandon all military aviation by October 1, 1919. However, by 1922, it was legal for Germany to design and manufacture commercial aircraft, and one of the first modern medium bombers to emerge from this process was the Heinkel He 111, the first prototype of which an enlarged, twin-engine version of the single-engine mail-liaison He 70, which set 8 world speed records in 1933 flew in February of 1935. The second prototype, the He 111 V2, had shorter wings and was the first civil transport prototype, capable of carrying 10 passengers and mail. The third prototype, He 111 V3 also had shorter wings and was the first true bomber prototype. Six He 111 C series airliners were derived from the fourth prototype, the He 111 V4, and went into service with Lufthansa in 1936, powered by a variety of engines, including BMW 132 radials. The first production models had the classic stepped windshield and an elliptical wing, which the designers, Siegfried and Walter Gunter, favored.

As a military aircraft, it took longer to gain favor, because military load requirements and underpowered engines kept its cruising speed down to less than 170 mph. However, in early 1936, the plane was given 1,000 hp Daimler Benz DB 600A engines which improved performance dramatically enough to bring in substantial orders. The first two mass-production versions, He 111 E and He 111 F experienced great success during the Spanish Civil War, where they served with the Condor Legion as fast bombers, able to outrun many of the fighters sent against them.

In fact, the experience in Spain generated a false sense of security in which the Germans thought that the He 111's light armament and speed would be sufficient in the coming war. Thus, although it was out of date, the large numbers in which it had been produced made the He 111 the Luftwaffe's primary bomber for far too long in the war, availability being more persuasive than practicality for this serviceable, but highly vulnerable, aircraft. Modern fighters like the Supermarine Spitfire and the Hawker Hurricane proved the He 111's inadequacy during the Battle of Britain. As soon as possible, the Luftwaffe replaced the Heinkel with the Junkers Ju 88, reassigning the Heinkel to night operations and other specialized tasks until, by war's end, it was being used primarily as a transport.

More than 7,300 had been built for the Luftwaffe by autumn, 1944, with another 236 (He 111H) being built by the Spanish manufacturer, CASA, during and after the war (as the CASA 2.111), some with the traditional Jumo 211 engines, some with Rolls-Royce Merlins. In service with the Luftwaffe from 1937 to 1945, the Heinkels remained in Spanish service until 1965.

One of the more bizarre adaptations of the Heinkel by the Luftwaffe was the He 111 Z-1, in which two He 111s were joined at the wing with a special section containing a fifth engine. Two prototypes and 10 production models were manufactured, their purpose being to provide the power to haul the huge Messerschmitt Me 321 transport gliders.

The sole remaining He 111 in regular use was owned by the Arizona wing of the Commemorative Air Force in the USA. It was a Spanish-built CASA 2.111D that was used to transport VIPs during the Franco regime. Unfortunately, it was destroyed in a crash in July 2003. Another He 111 is currently under restoration in the USA. [History by Kevin Murphy]

Nicknames: Pedro (Condor Legion nickname).

Specifications (He 111H-16):
Engines: Two 1,350-hp Jumo 211F-2 inverted V-12 piston engines
Weight: Empty 19,136 lbs., Max Takeoff 30,865 lbs.
Wing Span: 74ft. 1.75in.
Length: 53ft. 9.5in.
Height: 13ft. 1.25in.
Performance:
Maximum Speed at Sea Level: 227 mph
Ceiling: 21,980 ft.
Range: 1,212 miles
Armament:
One 20-mm MG FF cannon;
One 13-mm (0.51-inch) MG 131 machine gun;
Three 7.92-mm (0.31-inch) MG 81Z machine guns;
Internal bomb-load of 2,205 pounds

Finally I am Back !

2010-12-15T00:04:00.000-08:00

Sorry but no pictures at the moment , but at least I am back on line and will get down to updating the blog and the web page. Life at work became just to hectic and I have been travelling to the extent that my modeling took very much a back seat.

However there is some light at the end of the tunnel
The large Extra I swapped for at the BMFA nationals has flown again and it was a most pleasing flight, Ian Redshaw the original owner and builder of the aircraft had fun showing just what it can do, so I have a clear image of what I need to aspire for ! the model had over the years become very tatty, so Michael sat down and came up with a nice colour scheme which has led to the aircraft being named the "Raster Rocket" when you see the pictures you will know why!

A lot of scale work has been done on the Wilga and only needs the Rudder push rod to be modified and she will also be ready to fly. I have been putting hundreds of rivets on to the entire aircraft to give it that "lumpy bumpy" look the Wilga is known for. The leading edge of the wing has been covered in a aluminium foil tape, sprayed black and then weathered back with a scotch brite it gives the image of faded paint and bare metal showing through, she should look great once finished. I recently watched Chris towing Ian's glider with his large scale Tri Pacer, it looks like great fun and I can not wait to have a go!

Speaking of leading edge's we test flew the Pup and found her to be a horrible aircraft to fly ! those who have stuck with the Blog will know she was built to be robust to handle our continued "tour of the globe" so the wing leading edges were basicaly left "blunt" in order to withstand constant shipment in containers. However I probably left them too blunt as in flight the slightest change in pitch or angle starts a sort of up/down wobble which looks terrible and does not give much confidence, my intention is over the Christmas break to peal back the covering and sand the leading edges down to what they should be, hopefully that will sort her out!

The Saga of the caravan is still on going. I took it to two shows over the year and it survived the journey, however it is at best "very rustic" inside. but I did manage to get a better nights sleep in it thatn I did in the back of the van!

And finally if all goes to plan I might be taking a large twin engine project on but then again maybe not

quick test

2010-09-14T09:18:00.000-07:00

If you can read this then I have recovcered my Blog settings

Oh Wot a Cock Up

2010-08-03T09:37:00.000-07:00

Have you ever started a project and wished you had not even bothered ?
Well I though I was on to a good cheap way of getting a caravan to go to the shows with, somewhere nice and warm to have a coffee and biscuit whilst the heavens are dumping on us again. Well to cut a long story short my "cheap" caravan delaminated whilst coming down the motorway.
in the first photo below it does'nt look so bad and with a bit of work it could be fixed up ??

Well we got that wrong !,once we tried to tidy the little bits up we discovered the walls, floor and roof were buggered!!!

As you can see the walls have come away from the floor fixing, everything was waterlogged, to the point that if you squeeze the wood water came out !
Well Junior decided we should attempt this as a joint project, what he failed to say was for how long ! after one day he had lost interrest and I now had a pile of crap on my drive which could not be moved. Anyway I have to now get this thing sorted out before any model building can be done !
I have made a good start on the front end.

And tomorrow will be making a big run to the local tip with all the crap out of the inside so hopefully I can get on with it !
Hopefully the cooker and oven and fridge work so we can finally cook in style rather that as Chris and John demonstrate cooking Al Fresco at Cosford this year !

And speaking of Cosford !

Rougham is coming up this weekend

2010-04-27T14:25:00.001-07:00

The Annual LMA show at Rougham , (last year)was my first UK show since returning to the UK. This year I am going again but as the MC for Dawn Patrol. Basicaly I stand on the flight line and shout at people, Ok the shouting does have a function, I basically tell the pilots what they are going to be doing in the air and also if needs tell those pilots who are out of shape, to either sort it out or land. Of course I only repeat loudly what the lead pilot says, well lets hope it all works !The show is a two day event Saturday and Sunday, but Friday is set aside for setting up aircraft, practise flights and if anyone wants to you can take your LMA proficiency test. Not sure if I will be taking my test , but my intention is to fly my trusty Neuiport on the Friday. I am also taking the Camel B6339 along. we will probably give it a flight or two on the Friday, but at the moment she is having some pre show work being done.

Bigget job was to replace the wing end dowels, which locate into the top wing. It looks like the aircraft had a heavy coming to gether with the ground at some stage as the dowels have had a bit more glued on the end, so I suspect the originals got broken off. possibly when this video was taken.

Some nice detail work on the Camel,if you look close you can just make out the belt drive for the reduction gear through the small cut out in the dummy motor.

The Zenoah 62 was a real bugger to get started and to be honest I was having doubts over whether I would be able to start it up in the time given at a show. Luckily with the fitment of an easy start system that problem is now cured, once the engine is choked and has fired, the engine will come to life on about the the third flip of the prop.

SUNDAY 18th April

2010-04-19T12:39:00.000-07:00

What a perfect day!
Well today was the day I passed my B certificate ! I am really happy as I can now fly all of my over 7kg aircraft and get down to practising for my LMA proficiency certificate. The PUP is now my chief practise aircraft and the Camel is designated as my Show aircraft. I have a bit more work to do before both are fully airworthy but a test flight is pretty much on line for one evening this week.

So there is still a lot of practise flying to be done , but if all goes well I hope to take my Proficiency at the Rougham LMA show in about two weeks time !!

Oh Dear

2010-01-24T14:32:00.000-08:00

Oh Dear what can the matter be,,,, well I seem to have buggered up my web page. Whlst I can see everything there seems to be some kind of problem preventing me from updating the page , so I am going to need to find an expert to put it right again !!

HAPPY NEW YEAR !

2010-01-09T10:06:00.000-08:00

Well we made it into 2010, Its a big year this one, first large scale WW1 Biplane to test fly, my first attempt at a big totally scratch built 1/3 scale Sopwith Triplane and later on this year the glorious fe2b will find its way onto my building board and Oh yes I will be 50 in a few days time. What a bugger ! where does all the time go to ?

I also hoped to get stuck into the Wilga over the break, but again that got side tracked, anyway as you can see the workshop at this time was just a little to cluttered, so various trips to the council tip saw a "painful" downsize of some of my "useful in the future bits" and Her indoors found me a couple of solid oak work tables ! I have my central heating working, PC playing music, what more could I want ( I am making a list)!!

So with a bit of cleaning and setting things where they should be I now have a nice work area to fill full of clutter! As you can see I have already made a start of messing the work table up, with one of the Tripehound wing panels.

Getting Back to Ian and his Wimpy, the exercise was to check the C of G, this being prior to him going to town with his maintenance plan. So what ever he does which may change the balance of the model, once its ready to fly we can just recheck the balance and add or remove ballast weight as required.

LMA SHOW GAYDON 25th October

2009-10-27T12:27:00.000-07:00

This Sunday I loaded up the Pup and headed off to the National Motor Museum at Gaydon, This was to be her first public showing so I was more than a bit nervous, here we were up against some seriously skilled model engineers. Well as usual I was met with some highly positive comments from all the guys, and "Baby Mine " looked perfectly at home on display with all theother Dawn Patrol aircraft.

Here she is "hiding" behind Chris Poysers Mildred Both aircraft are in Naval 3 squadron colours, looking forward to flying my Pup alongside Chris sometime soon!
Some other serious models on display.

Now I do not care what anyone says this really is "the Dogs" fantastic detail some very good "tin taping" rivet detail and inside the cockpit just perfect. the photo's fail to do this model justice!

Now I am not a big fan of the jets "excuse the pun" but this lightning is going to a pretty exciting model to watch when she gets up in the air, I anticipate we will see her at Cosford for 2010!
Now as those who read this site you will have seen the fantastic Junkers 52 which Ian Redshaw having returned to flying conditon has flown at several shows through the summer, Ian also intends to show her off next year at a number of suitable events. Well as I was going to Gaydon I agreed to pick up a trailer for him at the show and deliver it to his house, no big deal as I was going anyway. BUT if I had known what was in the trailer I would have kept going and denied knowing anything of the trailer or its contents , just take a look at this !

In the words of Monty Python,,,, "You Lucky , lucky Bastard" !

As with the LMA Wigan show there are a number of displays to check out lessons on how to work Lithoplate, a start up and run of a Wren jet engine, personally I will not get into this branch of the hobby but all the same these little Hoovers are always impresive to see running , but for me the best was this luvvilly little rotary engine and ran so smooooooooooth I want one and I want it NOW!!!!!

update 3rd October

2009-10-03T09:29:00.000-07:00

Well that big year clock is running at a ridiculous rate, dark nights and dark mornings are only just around the corner!, I have been spending a lot of time sorting out house problems recently, not a one sided affair has her in doors has had to hang up her quilting and take up decorating, I think we will be well ready to get back to normal !
I was granted a 24 hour pass last week and travelled to Osbournby, I had been in two minds whether to go or not, but she who must be obeyed decided I should have a day off ! Ian was going so we pooled the fuel money and I towed his trailer, my van did not seem to know the trailer was there as it pulled really well. The Osbournby fly in, is an invitation only event and comes with a free BBQ, I took the opportunity of taking my 1/4 scale Sopwith Pup and the Nieuport along for the day.

This was also my first flight at a UK event so the nerves played up a little, but a couple of cups of coffee and a hand full of extra strong mints made everything kick of nicely. Ian had the Junkers and his Sopwith Camel for a flight later in the day, Missed a very good photo opportunity of Ian and Matt Sopwith and Fokker doing a nice little routine, Matt having a good smoke system fitted to his model. ( maybe someone can send me a photo or two?)

The 1/4 scale "Dwarf Patrol" had a very good turn out, not sure how many in total but it was great fun, here are some of those I managed to grab a photo of. Ian flew the Pup, not having flown her for a couple of seasons, I prefered she got broken in his capable hands rater than mine !, after complaining about washout and wash in, how it all looked twisted,etc,etc ( Bloody perfectionists) he had a couple of really good flights with her. I will now take her into the workshop and make the flying wires functional so that we can pull the warps out of the wings !

This being Matts Pup

Not sure who's this is

Alan's Fokker

Stuey Sheeps Camel.

and Norfolks Pup, taking a rest.

There were some tasty WW two models.

Finally Ali was there with a selection of jets, and crew, but I still think his 1/2 Piper Cub takes a lot of beating.

Its been a hard week

2009-09-20T00:36:00.000-07:00

What a week! its that time of year when all the kids go back to school, catch a bug, take it home, their parents catch it and take it to work, and give it to ME!! I have had a terrible week with Man Flu, but the light is now at the end of the tunnel. One flash in a bleak week, was the testing of the JU52 by Ian.

The entire model is covered in lithoplate panels, each panel has the corrugated effect which was created after the modeller made three sets of roll's. The initial take off roll seemed to be very , very slow, in fact I did not think she was going to get away, but she lifted off and contiued to sedately climb away, once aloft engines were pulled back to about 3/4 and she seemed very happy, giving a very realistic looking flight together with a fantastic sound from the three motors.

In the air she has a very convincing presence about her , there are 6 parachutes which can be dropped through an underbelly hatch, Ian is currently working on a sequencer to give the "drop" a bit more realism.

Ashbourne scale day We Went, We Saw ,We Flew ,and YES we crashed

2009-09-06T11:15:00.001-07:00

Great day out today up at the field, the annual scale day kicked off today. Bit of a blustery day as Pooh would say and it there was a bit of a nip in the air, ( no Japanese WW2 aircraft there though). Anyway I took the Neuiport and the Extra, the later suffered a dead engine on take off and the resultant turns to try to drop it back onto the patch resulted ina stall and a broken aircraft. Damage not to bad and certainly repairable, but looking at the wood used in the model a bit of strengthening was needed anyway ! Couple of models on OS 160 twins LUVILY! think I will get mine out an bolt into something.
Well here is one of mine , flew very well despite the lack of stick time I had hoped to have run up by now, I was well pleased.

Shot of the flight line shows a nice turnout of some very tidy models.

Some good flying and only one broken aircraft all day (MINE, I must try harder !)
Check this little beauty out.

Ian was working on this lovely Junkers, fitted with three aging open valve fourstrokes, depsite the engines not running for around 7 years, he managed to get two of them running, Looks like this is going to be a flyer soon, I would love to see it go, the corrugated panels are made out of Litho plate, the builder made three sets of diferent size rolls to make them, Really is a tidy model.

And finaly this lovely looking "Messanger".

Ok I did break my model, but that didnt darken my day in the slightest, it's one of those things, all in all a cracking good day out watching some very good models in action Ian and Chris flew their 1/3 Sopwith Camel and Pup in somewhat windy conditions, and made it look to easy, what more can you say,,,,,"Twats"!

Update time

2009-08-19T00:04:00.000-07:00

Ok So where are we presently.
We have now completed the move back to the UK and started to get the house in order, this turned out to be a bigger job than anticipated, so both she who will be obeyed and I did not get any hobby time during our three week annual holiday, infact we seem to have spent all of it either up a ladder or painting / fixing something. Good news is we are now settled in.
Bad news is that the models suffered some damage whilst in transit. The Triplane was packed with something on top of it and as a result, the rear section of the fuz was badly bent. I have since reduced the construction to a pile of wood, replaced parts and made everything straight again. The Pup faired a little better, slight damage to two wing panels, which required a solartex patch to be put on, the ailerons and outer wing struts seem to have gone in a different direction as to date they have not arrived in the UK!.
The Pup is currently being painted and the final "small " jobs being completed so once done she will be ready for testing in a about a months time.
I have also received a 1/4 scale Fairey Swordfish. a lovely big model, but she needs loads of work before she will see the sky again.But I hope she will end up looking something like this.

The new van man

2009-06-08T10:50:00.000-07:00

Following a certain amount of piss taking at Wigan, I am pleased to report the Ian now appreciates the positive side of my van design!

2009-06-07T14:01:00.000-07:00

I had a cracking day at Greenacres, pissed down with rain until about 2.00pm and nearly everyone had gone home. Then the sun came out and we had two maiden flights !
Ian Redshaw with his 1/3 scale Sopwith Camel and Chris Powyser with his 1/3 Scale Pup. Both machines still have a little more work before being fully complete, but even at this stage in the game both are built to a very high standard.
Two very happy chaps after two very successful flights, ( Hope mine flies as good!)

Camel on slow low pass

And the Pup just as she lifts off for the first time.

Bugger and Bugger it

2009-05-26T14:26:00.000-07:00

I had planned to fly all week and take my BMFA A and B certificates, but as we know all great plans can go pear shaped and this one did !
I was trying to get some stick time on my Filton Inspire. Having not flown for some considerable time , I though it best to get up to speed before starting the process of the certificates. Unfortunately somewhere along the route I seem to have forgotten how easy a good flying Aerobatic aircraft can make you look. Thinking I was well in control of the situation I simply pushed my comfort zone a little bit to far ! flying two consecutive rolls down wind, I pulled up elevator when the aircraft was inverted, the result was a very high speed impact resulting in a total write off of the airframe, Totaly my fault, I am now busy trying to get something flyable together so I can at least fly my A certificate before the end of the week. What a Bugger !!!
I will try to find some Pre crash photo's and post them later.
So here finally are the photo's, Oh yes I can hear you say it flies like a dream !!

And yes after a couple of good flights the "fat lad " was well happy
SO ! why did I crash it ??? to be honest I have'nt got a bloody clue ! Good News is that I have now passed my A certificate, I am now going to move on to the LMA Proficiency and then do the BMFA B

2009-05-17T11:02:00.000-07:00

I have been having a bit of trouble with Blog link of late, hopefuly it is now resolved. Here are a few photo's from Rougham and RAF Barkston Heath.

its one of those "magnificent men" in his flying machine,,,,, think he was French,,

I think this is when you say " Oh Bugger !"

Very nice model, and with 4 Zenoahs on song

Now this model is ABSOLUTELY HOOOOGE

But at 1/3 scale this Albatross takes a lot of beating

This little sweetie is owned by the "Jolly Greyflyer"

And this one is Mine ,,waiting for the off at Barkston Heath

VAN UPDATE

2009-03-15T14:05:00.000-07:00

Following a weekend of graft the van is almost there ! I have built a false floor into the rear of the van, this contains a pull out work table,, I still have to work 0ut a support leg, but I pretty much have this sorted, the leg will store on clips to the inside of the rear door.

So the idea is fold the doors all the way back, pull out the build table, The fusalage then runs out to the pullout handles which act as wheel chocks. Then I can stick the wings on and "Bobs your uncle" we are ready to fly. Trouble is I need to find a way to hold the doors back in case of wind.

The van succsfully completed its first show run, going to the LMA Wigan Synopsis, returning a good 38MPG which was around what I was aiming for. I think sleeping in the van is going to be a half way house, If I can I will try to convince the better half to let me invest in a used caravan !

Albatross

2009-03-10T15:02:00.000-07:00

360 degree 3 D tour of Sopwith Pup

2009-03-10T09:06:00.000-07:00

Have a go at this, probably not "Scale" but gives a good 360 degree view of the type

If this works I will put more on the web site, once I have the PC in the UK

Wigan

2009-03-08T12:58:00.000-07:00

Well today, with the new van ready to go , Ian Redshaw and I headed up to Wigan for what is the annual LMA Kick off event. This is a non flying event, being held inside a hotel, it is the LMA shop window of what is new to be seen on the show scene in the coming year. Ian was showing his new Sopwith Camel, other members present included Chris Poyser with his almost rebuilt Sopwith Pup, this aircraft suffered a catastrophic failure of a flying wire at Cosford last year, Chris has not only rebuild but vastly improved on the original Balsa USA kit. Big A had his Sopwith Camel on display , but I seem to have cocked the photographs up again and have lost it!

There were a number of exciting projects to view so here is a taster of whats coming up at the shows soon,
Tony Hooper will be flying this very nice Lancaster this year.

Nice little Fokker

And this is what a 20ft long TSR 2 looks like !

I must admit, personally this is for me one step to far, this is going to be one very fast bird !

A beautifuly put together model, but look how small a wingspan.

All in all it was a cracking day out, and more than a few tips and tricks were learnt from some very skilled model builders and designers. The only problem is that having seen the standard of models now in build, I am now asking myself , " does my model measure up to the bar"? well I supose we will have to wait and see..

Whats going on

2009-03-02T13:58:00.000-08:00

Well I have now got the van at home, Obviously its an ex works vehicle so a lot of cleaning has been needed. The cab came up very well and the fitment of a new radio CD player has solved the en route entertainment problem, It is also a bluetooth radio so we can avoid any potential telephone usage issues with the law.
Next was the back of the van, I purposely purchased a van with no rear or side windows, there seems to be a growing population of Tea leaves ( Thieves) and a couple of models, radio gear etc left on show would be a little to tempting. Also when at the shows, I will be kipping in the back of the van so no windows means it will be nice and dark and perhaps a little warmer. I have sketched out a false rear floor, the idea is that with the rear doors open a draw will slide out so the model can be assembled at a more comfortable working height, in fact if I have got it right I can sit on a folding chair and get the job done. Once all the woodwork is completed I will cover the floor and sides with carpet. I will post some photo's so you can judge the outcome for yourselves.

Where are we now

2009-02-23T13:45:00.000-08:00

Well the Blog link is working so we can try to get back on course with this internet business. Unfortunatly I do not have any recent photo's of the Pup with me and considering that it is now living in a large packing case in Portugal, I am not likely to get any for sometime yet ! So here is one with the wings still in their bare bones.
The Suzuki lends itself nicely to give a bit of scale.
So I am now back in the UK and busily trying to get things in order. First off I have purchased a VW Transporter Van, this will serve as my prime model mover and of course to help move the various items of furniture whilst setting up home. So my first blog update will focus on setting up the van ready for its new role in life.
Next we will be going through the setting up of my new workshop, something I am really looking forward to. I will also be travelling up to Wigan on Sunday the 8th of March for the LMA show. I will take the opportunity to get some photo's of the various new models which are either ready to join the show scene for 2009 or are already well in build.

* UPDATE*

2009-02-22T01:16:00.000-08:00

Well, whilst not a lot has been happening on my Blog, things have been moving elsewhere !
We are now programmed to up root and ship to the UK at the end of June. So in the meantime I am going to be updating the Blog more than the web site, this being due to not having a PC in the UK with the required software ,etc.

Pup moves on

2008-08-24T11:45:00.000-07:00

Today got off to a bt of a bump, Either a TX or RX problem caused the loss of airleron control on my 1/4 scale Taylorcraft. Take off was spot on, but once I turned onto the down wind leg everything rapidly went pear shape. What ever was going on caused the failsafe to keep kicking in, after some seconds ( felt like hours) we managed to get the aircraft on a course heading back to the runway, and as it was flying level brought in for a landing, of course just before touch down the wind gusted causing a wing to drop, resulting in the wingtip digging into the runway and the aircraft cart wheeled to a halt. Not to much damage done, prop, wingtip, wheel axle. but until prove wrong will consider both the TX and Rx as suspect. Living in Portugal getting this serviced will be a problem so it will have to wait for my next visit to the UK.
The upside was, that I was back in the garage earlier than expected, so I got stuck into the Pup. Front fusalage sides and rear deck being the objective for today.

Other side of the fusalage, I have offered the cowle up just to get feel for the "girl"

I am also moving the front deck formers around a little, the reason being is that I intend to make the top decking removable for easy access too the electronics, which will be sitting down either side and the rear of the fuel tank. On the Balsa USA kit, one of the bulkheads sits in the cockpit area, this has been moved and an aluminium cross brace will be fitted just behind the instrument panel, the last thing I want is to remove any of the structural strength.

(and NO, the rear stabilser is not on the piss, it is just the camera angle.)
And finally here is a shot showing the work on the rear decking. It needs to be cleaned up yet with a bit of sanding to take off the sharp edges, bit all in all she's starting to look like an aeroplane.

Next part of the project will be to clean up the rear metalwork, this will then be smoothed and paint. the rudder mounting is abot 80% finished, just needing cutting to length, I have also machined up a thin brass washer to act as a pivot bearing so the rudder turns smoothly. I am still trying to locate a good photo of the full size rudder, to give an idea of the profile. I have Mick Reeves 1/3 scale instrument panel but I do not like the plastic clock surrounds, I think I will probably machine up some brass ones on the lathe. The general idea is to get something that looks as much like this as possible

Must say I also like the idea of a wicker seat,

infact I might just have a go at making one! Then we will move on to the main landing gear, my intention is to make up two sets, one for the Pup and one for the Tripe, both aircraft used similar if not identical units, though the rigging wire mounting points are diferent, but we will sort that out when we get to it !

Bit of a Bugger

2008-08-23T00:07:00.000-07:00

Well it turned inot a bit of a bugger this last week, first off was that during one of my regular airframe inspections, I took the painful decision that the fusalage of my long serving Ryan STA had reached the endof its usable life. This is was a Great Planes ARTF which I purchased whilst on business in Panama City, then hand carried to Mexico City, where I was then living. Over the last 7 years this aircraft has been my flying engine test bed, its had 120 fourstrokes, 160 fourstroke twins, 23cc Chinese petrols, and a couple of big old 2 strokes in it and and has flown perfectly everytime. The only issue I had with this aircraft was on its maiden flight, on landing one of the wing panels colapsed. After further information, I discovered that nearly all the joints had no glue !

Whilst the Ryan is not an overly large aircraft, when compared to the 1/3 scale Pup or Triplane, it could in the event of a cause some serious damage if things went wrong. So I check my aircraft on a regular basis, for cracks, fittings and fuel ingress, When I consider the aircraft dogey, the aircraft gets stripped and then the airframe is destroyed.
The Pup build came to a sudden halt theis week, whilst discussing the project with one of the Dawn Patrol guys, he remeinded me that I am also building the Triplane, this in itself is not a problem, the problem is with the car both aircraft will not fit in ( at the same time). So the rear stabilizer and fin need to be removable, I am working on modification to the plan so that the entire unit can be mounted and removed with four Allen screw bolts.
I will take a few photo's and post them later.

Pup moving on "Slowly"

2008-08-20T09:30:00.000-07:00

Ok , I managed to make a bit more dust this evening and got one half of the elevators made. I have used a slightly diferent dowel for the center of the two halves. I first machined a small steel tube section on my lathe, this will look similar to the tube joiner used on the full size, I then machined down the ends of the dowel to fit into the tube, a nice easy rotation when fitted. the halves should only rotate independantely if one of the servo's or cables packs up.

Now if you look at the full size and compare to the Balsa USA plan, then there is a big diference in the chord of the rear stabiliser. I have increased the overall area it make it look a bit more scale. The machines sections of dowel are now bonded into the stabiliser leading edge, I will build up the area around the dowel slightly to make it more secure, but to be honest this will not be subject to a great deal of stress so it will mostly be cosmetic.
If you look closely at the below photo, you will see some text in a blue circle, this identifies where the control horn should be fitted, if you look on the left hand elevator there is a similar blue line, that is the position of where my control horns will be fitted, I will also fit hard wood blocks to which I will mount the stabiliser support wires and will also fit additional gusset plates into the corners of the stabiliser.

And finally today, I test fit the "lump up the front" looks very nice !

So the target for this week is to complete the tail section,this will require a bit more work on the rear metalwork, there are two more support plates to be fitted to the base of the stern post,I then need to mount the full assembly and epox it to the fusalage rear ( of course the trick here is to make sure everything is in line!)
Next fit my own hard wood blocks for the stabiliser support wires. On the full size you can see the reinforce plates under the coveting fabric, to achieve this effect I will use a bit of profilm glued to the hardwood blocks. Then to finish off I will cut the skid to shape sand, varnish and mount...

Finally some photo's

2008-08-19T03:45:00.000-07:00

Finally I found the card reader hiding in the bottom of a box so.
Here are some shots of the progress of the 1/3 scale Pup.
I have to point out that I am not following the instructions which came with the parts, for the simple reason they are a waste of space,I will try to explain in step by step terms how my build progressed, so it might help future Pup builders.
First I measure and drill the firewall, this is because I work backwards from the firewall to ensure everything is in line with it. The Zenoah 38 and reduction gear only need three mounting holes. You must take into consideration side and down thrust but this will be built in as we mount the fire wall to the rest of the fusalage.

Next we start to cut and lay into place the fusalage sides. First spread your plan out "flat" on your building board, OK I know it sounds a bit anal , but yes I actualy iron mine flat, then cover the plan with a sheet of grease proof paper, again making sure that the the greaseproof paper is flat, next I rub a candle over all the points where I intend to glue, this helps stop the wood sticking to the paper.
Next I lay the wood out on the plan and mark where I need to cut it, I measure the angles directly off the plan and then set the guide on my bench sanding machine to suit. This ensures that I get a nearly perfect fit between the longerons and the vertical struts.

Once you have the longerons etc in place you need to fit the sheet fusalage side, note, this pokes out the bottom of the fusalage a little to match up to the fusalage belly sheet.
Now do not move remove the side from the plan, lay up the other side directly on top of it, this way you will have ( should have ) two identical sides, I again slip a layer of grease proof paper between the two sides before the final gluing so that I do not end up with one "BIG" side.

Next thing is to set up the Firewall central on the plan, at this point I use a large protractor to set up side and down thrust, to make sure nothing moves during the build I make up a small ply wood support and clamp the firewall too it, this keeps the desired angles.
With the plan, I check the center line of the fusalage and cut the cross pieces working from the front to the rear of the fusalage mounting the bulkheads, etc as we progress.

At the front of the fusalage, I made a slight change, and built in a floor to which I mounted the Fuel tank, to either side of the tank I will fit the two 3300, 6 volt batteries. The rear "tongue" of the floor is where the Reciever and the SM services electomagic bits will live.

Underneath the floor I have increased the size of the undercarriage mount blocks, and have fabricated two aluminium cross supports, to these I will fit my servo's.* in the "instructions" they say to fit the servo's in the cockpit area, I did not like this idea, I tested my servo, engine installaton for interference and found everything working OK. Note the plan also uses a one piece elevator, I am using a split elevator with a servo for each side this should give a bit of security in the event of a servo failure.

You can see below a mock-up of the servo - Belcrank set up for the elevator,the push pull wires will then run through tubes secured to the fusalage sides.

Next the Tail end, the Balsa USA kit is about as far removed from the full size as you can get, whilst in the UK I studied the examples built by Ian Redshaw and Richard Curry Peace, both aircraft having similar rear build ups except, Ian included a steerable tail skid, having seen how effective this is during taxiing, that is the way I have gone. So after few hours of scribbling with my crayons I cut some thin mild steel channel and this is what I came up with.

The tail poset will be a dowel located into the vertical tube. The Tail I noted seemed a bit thick when compared to my photographs of the full size, so I have only used the outline off the plan and have used Profilm and a lite ply inner to come up with a very thin tail, It is surprisingly rigid and I think might prove to be stronger than than that provided in the kit.

Next up I will fabricate the support pivot for the tail skid and then install it with the associated bunggy rubber suspension unit.

Update time

2008-08-18T12:00:00.001-07:00

Ok
so things are not going as fast as we anticipated ! The move to the new house is taking way too long. I have managed to move the contents of my garage , but as yet do not have the office up and running. I Also appear to have mislaid my card reader so I an not at this time update pictures.
I have started to build up the 1/3 scale Pup. So far I have the basic frame of the fusalage built, the firewall is fitted and drilled to take the Zenoah 38 cc engine along with the reduction gear unit.
I have moved away from the Balsa USA kit at the rear of the fusalage and have fabricated a mild steel frame along with tube fin post support, as per the full size. During my visit to Cosford this year, I managed to get a good look at all of the Dawn Patrol aircraft, many of these use my intended power unit and have needed to put a lump of ballast in the front. To try to reduce the amount of "dead weight" needed, I have slightly moved some of the bulkheads and have fitted Aluminium angle bearers right up to the fire wall, to these I have mounted 3 large scale servo's . Hopefully I will be able to feed the closed loop wires through plastic tubes which, I will then hide under a false floor in the cockpit. my intention is to use split elevators with one servo per side. the rudder will have a single large scale servo.
I am also changing the skid so that it has suspension and will be steerable. The Kit uses piano wire for the main landing gear, this is also doomed to be scrapped and a tubular steel unit will be fabricated in its place.
Once I have the "big Computer" up and running we will have some photographs.

Update

2008-07-29T14:08:00.000-07:00

Hi Everyone
Well we now have new house to move to. Bad news is that will not be until the last week of August.
I traveled to the UK last week and spent a glorious 2 days at RAF Cosford soaking up the 2008 LMA show. it was FANTASTIC, I managed to get the video camera to work and shot a bit of footage, (which will appear on my web page soon) I also rattled of a few shots of the aircraft both in the air and on the ground. I was very lucky to be recruited has a helper for the WW1 display team, great fun and very educational, all of the aircraft are at 30%and to a high standard, even better is that the group has a very high concentration of highly skilled modellers who are more than willing to pass on their "black arts". The knock on effect of hanging around with these guys for two days, is that I have raised the bar on the quality of my own aircraft, "good" simply is not "good enough"
I already have both fusalage sides for the 30% Sopwith Pup glued up, even on this simple part of the build, I have spent a considerable amount of time ensuring that all the vertical and diagonal spars fit together perfectly. I want to make some modifications to the rear end of the fusalage, so that will slow the build down a bit, the problem is not working throught the design change, but finding the materials in Portugal. I also need to re-work how the rear stabiliser is fitted to the aircraft, the Balsa USA plan shows the stab glued to teh fusalage, I want mine to be removable, so I need work out a nice way of locating and securing the stabiliser and then work on a more scale fin arrangement.
Well must get on.

Update

2008-07-04T04:21:00.000-07:00

Hi all

we have now located a new "humble abode" so once the contracts have been signed we can get the move underway. I need to get to grips with my workshop so I will take this opportunity to get the building table up to scratch. I have two Ace builds to go through these are a 1/3 scale Sopwith Pup and a 1/3 Scale Sopwith Triplane. I am off to Uk on business on the 15th and will stay over for Cosford
Looks like being the best show to date.

Things are getting Hectic

2008-06-24T00:08:00.000-07:00

Firstly, sorry for the low number of posts. But I have a very good excuse. Unfortunatly our landlord wants the house back, (we have reached the end of our contract), so much time, is currently being used to find a new shed to live in. As a result the modelling has again taken a back seat. Though I have now completed the Fiesler Storch. We tried for a maiden flight this weekend, but the RCV engine just was not big enough to get the thing of the ground. I will once the move to new living quarters is completed change the engine to an OS 120 4-stroke. I must admit that I have run out of patience with the Storch, it is dificult build to get right at the best of times. In my case the boxes of fresh Balsa which will grow into a 1/3 Scale Sopwith Pup proved to be to much of a distraction! So unfortunatly for the Storch ,it will either fly or die.
I will try to update, but hope to have moved house by end August.

Back once more into the breach !

2008-05-30T10:56:00.000-07:00

It has been a busy month or two of late, Portugal and Spain decided to go into economic colapse, which meant work became a little intense, which in turn meant blogs, web pages and model aircaft went very much on hold ! However we now seem to have the situation at least for the time being under control!

WWW.wizzoplanes.com is very much up and running, videos and research sections have been added and as time go's by the page will get some depth to it.

I have done a bit more to the Fiesler Storch, we now have both wings almost finished , it will then be a matter of finishing off the flaps and general radio installation and hopefully we will have a bird that flies!

I am slowly coming back on the boil again, I have not flown for around a month but hope to go and twiggle the sticks this Sunday, nothing spectacular just a little Trainer for some nice gentle flying.
Once the Storch is out of the shop I am gearing up to start the 1/3 scale Pup, this is what I consider my first major build and really want it to turn out right I am doing a lot of research, (all can be seen on my web page) and will be going for a good scale model. We now have the plans for the Sopwith Triplane at 1/3 scale. I will use the 38cc Zenoah from the Pup to fly it. I found this video of a 1/3 model built in the USA, "if anyone knows the builder ask him to get in touch as I have a thousand questions!

Mrs Snipit had a quilt show this week, very well attended, some of the old birds wandered into my workshop to check out my collection of wooden birds ! I think they liked what they saw , but then again RC models are not a girly thing!

Time for a breather !

2008-05-10T12:31:00.000-07:00

Well , what a busy few weeks!.
First off, I have a new computer, the trouble is it is loaded with Vista which means it will not talk to any of my hardware !, Scanner , printer etc " Computer says No!"

THe new web site is moving along slowly, I have almost got the hang of posting videos and getting them to run off Youtube, this week I started to build up the pages for the research area. First off I will be discussing the Sopwith Pup, anyone thinking of building one of these lovely aircraft, will find photo,s drawings etc to help them, make a good stab at producing a scale like model.

Finaly all the bits for my 1/3 Pup build are now sitting safely in my little workshop, the trouble is Mrs Snippit is conducting a police action to ensure the Fiesler Storch project is out of the door before I get into the Pup. At time of writing, the Storch fusalage is about 80% and th ewings about 60% complete. All I have to do is the fiddly bits, flaps, ailerons etc. Unfortunalty it looks like I ma going to have to fabricate an exhaust for this one s there appears to be nothing "off the shelf" which will do the job. Once I get the computer to say "Yes" I will post some photo's

Back at the flying site, Helder is planning an "encontro" that is a Portuguese "fly-in" He is looking forward to it and has called a general meeting for tomorrow to decide how we will handle it.
I had a recent fatality in the shape of the Ryan , landing deadstick, I allowed it to tip stall ( it was pilot error). At first the damage did not look to bad, but after pulling back the covering it looks like the front end is not only crushed but has suffered from the ingress of fuel. The model is 6 years old and I have had a lot of fun with it, so with some regret it was flown into the bin.
Being away from the "sticks" I felt a bit rusty so I am now hacking a little trainer fitted with a Magnum 56 fourstroke,. It is nice little flyer, not up to my usual type of model but at least I am flying !

NEWS FLASH

2008-04-27T15:36:00.000-07:00

Due to reasons Which will become very obvious, I did not update the blog last week but if you go to wizzoplanes you will see why.

Just to much fun for a weekend

2008-04-07T06:36:00.001-07:00

Well what a fantastic weekend I had ! Starting off on Friday night I went to the Mark Knophler concert in Lisbon. Not only did we get to meet Mark and the Band, but I recieved a free copy of their latest CD and was treated to one of the best live concerts I have ever been too !

Saturday I was out with the Lisbon Hash House Harriers ( LH3) and had a fantastic afternoon wandering around the hills of Sintra with my very good mate Bloomingood. Sunday , despite the fact that I pranged the Taylorcraft, it was a spot on day at the flying site. I flew the Taylorcraft, Ryan STA, and my little Cessna.

Joao was busy buzzing around the strip with his electric chopper,

And of course throwing in the occasional flight with his Tuccano

I then spent the afternoon with the guys cleaning up the site and putting the roof on our new sun shade. Even did a spot of welding ( that brings back memories)
Well it started the day looking like this.

Then after a lot of strimming, welding , cutting and good old sweat it now looks like this.

If you are interrested, the guys also have a web page at www.GAAV.COM.PT

A Busy Weekend !

2008-04-01T13:50:00.000-07:00

It really was a busy couple of days. On Saturday I dragged my portable Gen set over to the field so that the welding of the roof could be started. Helder demonstrated to us that he was never intended to drive a tractor, but all in all some progress was made.

The roof once completed will be our our covered pits area, this is more to keep the sun off us in summer, than keep us dry! Knowing Helder it will probably be turned into an impromptu restaurant once the weather is good enough to get the BBQ out!

Sunday saw GAAV (Grupo de Aeromodelismo de Arruda das vinhos) out on tour. the aeromodeling club of Setubal were holding a fly-in so we set off in convoy for our first club big outing. Unfortunatly the weather was not on the side of the orginisers, with strong cross winds and heavy showers. There were a couple of turbine models playing at "hangar queen's" so I decided to join the club and left my models ( Ryan STA and Taylorcraft) safely tucked up in the back of the car.
I saw this excellent home built trailor, it had on board power, interior lighting, fuel and radio storage compartments, it also opened on both sides.

Unfortuantly Portugal does not seem to operate under the same safety controls as we see at UK model show's. The crazy thing is that the biggest offender on the day, who I saw flying over the spectators, starting engines with spectators in close proximity, and to top it off taxiing through the spectators was an official from Portuguese aeromodeling federation. Seeing anyone operate in this manner only strengthens my resolve to operate my models in the safest possible way. We have already decided that when we eventualy hold our own fly in it will follow very much how the LMA operate at Cosford, though on a much smaller scale.
Unforunatly at these small events, the orginisers seem to think they have a responsibility to entertain the public. Setubal was unfortunatly no exception the below Yak 52 which was a brand new unflown aircraft and considering the weather and level of stress the pilot was under it should have remained so.

Unfortunatly he decided to fly it and the video below shows the result. We did tell the pilot before he comitted that the negine sounded off, but he chose to ignore, he also failed to take the engine to full power for a few seconds before releasing the aircraft.(Not sure how I got the music and title on this!!)

I also filmed this very well flown electic Helicopter, the pilot I understand is only 14 years old ! Makes you sick does'nt it.

Only Mad Dogs and Englishmen try to fly in a force gale 8

2008-03-23T12:49:00.000-07:00

You might not know this, but its been a bit breezy in Portugal of late. With it being Easter I felt obligated to go and have a little buzz around the field. I arrived at my usual 08.00am and stepping out of the car thought it was perhaps a tad to breezy to fly ,so I settled down to a spot of radio and the remains of my morning coffee. I noticed that Helder and the boys had been busy during the week and have concreted in the uprights for what will be our Pits area roof, he has also had a mobile Loo put on site, All mod cons !

Somehow allowing myself to be lulled into a false sense of security, I failed to notice all the normal tell tale signs which would have indicated that it was perhaps a little to windy to fly, you know the signs, Wheely bins taking themselves for a walk, birds flying backwards, trees, growing horizontal to the ground , etc,etc. So not wanting to be thought of as being whimpish, I fueled up the Ryan and taxied out. Now the reason for todays flight being to test out the 2.5Ghz Futaba Fasst radio in a larger model. Using the radio's power down facility, I had range checked the model, with the engine stopped and with the engine running. All working AOK. We turned into the wind and opened the tap !, nice straight run down the runway and the model went up like it was in a lift, having passed the 18th floor before passing the end of the runway I decided to turn down wind. Perhaps, I mused there is something wrong with the propellor as I did not seem to be making any forward progress!, the turn once started seemed to suddenly go quite quickly with the aircraft setting off downwind like a rocket,,Mmmm, the nut on the propellor must have pulled tight because now she was really moving !turning back into wind I was distracted as a 45 gallon drum floated by ! AH AH ! I thought it might be a bit windier than I thought! better land this sucker! Unfortunatly that did not go exactly as planned, but its fair to say I got it down in one piece only springing the screw on the lefthand undercarriage leg.
The net result was that I arrived home some 4 hours early, Mrs "Snip it" was busy in her sewing room cutting large pieces of fabric into small pieces and then sewing them back together again, once sewn back together she says they are called Quilts. Anway my untimely arrival meant dinner was as yet not on the imedeate horizon so I retired to the garage.
I have been thinking for sometime that I need a Saturday flyer, after all 1/4 and 1/3 scale birds take some preparing and taking care of at the field. I have had an ARTF Cessna sitting around for ages, so I thought I would throw it together and at the same time write it up on the blog.
Over the years I have seen some models, which with a little preperation and forethought would have come out so much better.
On the Cessna, I decided to clean up the interior a little. the normal plain wood interior looks a bit naff so I sprayed it up with some Granite effect spray.

The plates in the bottom of the fuselage are the installed undercarriage legs.
Next I filed out the holes to ensure the servo's would fit in nicely, marked the holes for the servo mounting screws and dropped a little cyno glue into the holes, this hardens the wood and ensures the screws anchor in well, once done I sprayed the servo plate with the same granite effect paint.

Once that had dried off I installed the servo's, battery, receiver and switch, this allows you to make a tidy job of the wires under the plate. once that's all tidy I installed it into the fusalage.

Next up mark out the engine support on to the bulk head, take as much time as you need over this, getting the engine correctly mounted will improve dramaticaly the flying quality of your model .

When you drill the holes use a small "pilot" drill first it will help reduce splintering the edges of the wood. On the engine mount you will find little sharp edges on the moulding, clean these off with a small file or sand paper, it is important as these small pieces can stop the mount fitting snug to the firewall, if that is the case, the engine thrust line will not be as recomended by the maufacturer.

Next post we will look at fitting the tail feathers, joining the wing and setting up "balancing" the aircraft.

Home Again!

2008-03-19T14:05:00.001-07:00

Well I went to Las Vegas, absolute shite,,, We will not be going there again if it can be avoided. I actualy saw a guy loose a little over $6000 on the roll of a dice. He said "its only money" I said "he was a prat and he just threw a car away" Nuff said on that.
In my last write up I had a moan about not having moved forward with the Triplane, well sorry to say we are still in the the same if worse predicament, I have engine, reduction gear, servo's and a bloody big propellor and nothing to put them into!
I really hate having to rely on other people, I know I am on my soap box again but if you commit to doing something then you should do it, I was brought up knowing my word is my bond, If I say I will do something its simple I do it !
So to get the blood pressure back down to normal I spent the day fiddling with the Storch, afterall, I need to complete this aircraft before I can move on.
Today I focused on getting a bit more of the fusalage finished, I have to cover the under belly but that is going to be the very last thing I do after balancing the aircraft, but here is a general shot that gives an idea of how she is coming along.

I made the undercarriage covers out of balsa and glued them directly to the legs. It was pretty cold out today and seeing as I had both my heaters on in the garage, Molly joined me for the day, not that I did not enjoy the company , but it looks like I will need another seat !

Well the pilot is now in his place and I glazed the roof and rear machine gun position which is also fitted.

I also have one of the wings almost built this will be covered and kitted out with the flap and airleron servo's before I start on the other side

Here's a quicky

2008-03-04T23:15:00.000-08:00

Not a lot happening this week, I am traveling to the US on business ( Las Vegas) never been there before and to be honest if it wasn't for work I would not go!. But I have spoken to a model shop there ( Denny) who has ordered me the 32x10 props I need for my Sopwith project. This seems to have come to a grinding halt at the momen, the guy who has the plans seems to have disapeared from the face of the planet, its Deja vue AKA the Junkers 88 allover again, I think I am getting the message that there are more than a few people in the UK who will quite happily let you down!
So now with engine , reduction drive, prop, radio, all ready for installation I have no bloody aircraft to put it all into, so I am ordering the 1/3 scale Sopwith Pup and will content myself with that, until I find another source for the Triplane.
A mate in the UK sent me the photo and video clip below, I think it came from the TV series about supermodels on the Discovery Channel. Either way its a pretty big model, I think its also shown on the LMA web site.

I am also re kitting out my Ryan STA, Iused this as the flying testbed for the Gemini 160 engine now fitted to the Pup, the cowl is a bit rough but it should not effect the flying !

What a Bugger of a week

2008-03-02T07:51:00.000-08:00

Its been one of those weeks, firstly working in my Cubby hole, a piece of wood I was carrying got the better of me, I eventualy let go of it the only trouble was, it came down on top of a trainer model I had put together for Benjamin, so that wrote the wing off and I think dislocated my finger.
Sunday at the Field, Helder had a bad "first flight " with a brand new AT6 Texan, resulting in a total write off on the maiden flight ( I hate it when that happens)
Good news is that I managed to make contact with a model shop in the US. I am visiting Las Vega next week and have put in an order for 3 , 32 x 10 wooden props. I have decided to reduce my entire hangar to 3 aircraft. Two 1/3 scale WW1 aircraft, of which one will be the Triplane and one which I have yet to decide upon. I will also keep a small 1/4 scale sunday flyer, ( probably my D P Pup)
Good new's is that due to my poorly finger I was playing with my video camera and trying to work out why it lost all of my 2007 Cosford footage,when low and behold it started to play so here are the final two instalments of my wonderful day out at Cosford 2007.

This last one is I think the best because I actualy managed to get the WW1 flying section.

I had a good day flying my 1/4 Taylorcraft on the Sunday, the weather was great, in fact we were down to T-shirts, I had some good flights before doing a ground loop on the last landing, no damage done but it reminded us of the need to get the patch rolled as soon as possible.

Next Project

2008-02-27T06:26:00.001-08:00

Next project is most likely going to be one of these

IN from the cold !!!

2008-02-25T13:41:00.000-08:00

I was over in the UK last week,I must say I had completely forgotten how cold it gets. I flew over on Easyjet, eating one of their on board rip of the punter sandwhiches, and at 04.00am the next morning I was in the Loo, renaming easyjet as queasyjet, "God was I ill"
Anyway we ended up at Ashbourne airfield which I thought would give me chance to pop over and see if any of the local lads might be out flying, unfortunatly it was -7degrees and foggy ,so I had to settle for a quick visit to Mr Redshaws house. Ian is well on the way building a very impressive looking 1/3 scale Pup for the LMA WW1 group, I am really looking forward to Cosford this year it promises to be spot on with a large turn out of WW1 aircraft.I hope by then to have a Sopwith Triplane at 1/3 scale ready and hopefully flying. I would love to fly at Cosford but do not have the certificate of competance to fly there ( bit of a bummer living overseas sometimes) Anyway I have sold off some models and Kits to finance the project, it will be powered by a trusty 38cc Zenoah fitted with a reduction gear swinging a 32 inch prop.
In the meantime I have managed to get a bit done on the Fiesler Storch.

I picked up the pilot in the UK, "Brave lad " If he only knew who is really going to be flying this bird he wouldnt sit there so calmly?
I managed to lay up one wing panel, I was having a bit of a problem getting the trailing edge "sharp" so if you look close the white strip at the wing edge is a piece of plastic edging I found in B & Q it stiffens the edge and should save it from the inevitable Hangar rash.

The weather forecast is Shite for the next few days so I might get a bit of building done, I spent the entire weekend cleaning out my workshop and putting things away, it's amazing how much progress you can make when not tripping over things and you know where all your tools are !

Just a quick note

2008-02-09T03:54:00.000-08:00

Sorry for not updating the Blog , but work recently got out of hand so my attention is being drawn elsewhere. but I did fly the Pup again !
This time though fellow club member and all round nice guy Rod Stuart, ( no relation to the one spelt Stewart) was on hand to take the photo's and as you can see he is a hell of a lot better with a camera than me !

OK I know my aircraft is not up to the standard of the guys in the LMA but I admit to being pretty proud of it.

Rod even managed to make my cockpit look a bit more realistic.

I think I need to get a tad more lead in the nose as she seems a little unsure in the turns, landings a great and the 160twin sounds lovely. As a first time Biplane for me I would recomend the DB Sport and scale kit to anyone thinking of going in the WW1 direction. I am already planning a 1/3 scale Sopwith Triplane !

Now Rod also shot some video which is also pretty good, I just need to pursuade him to crop it down to 100MB and I will post that as well
AND HERE IT IS !

It Does not get much better than this

2008-01-06T14:50:00.000-08:00

Last year I visited the LMA show at Cosford, all being well I will be there again this year. Unfortunatly my video camera is getting a bit old and failed when I was trying to film the ME 262 flown by the Ghost squadron. Luckily someone posted the below film on Youtube. Absolutely fabulous, in terms of model building and flying skill it really does not get much better than this !!

Fiesler Storch

2008-01-03T14:36:00.001-08:00

We are moving along slowly with this but I am still pulling information together with, the aim of building something which looks prettty close to the real item "but smaller"

Now I also found this video of a model flying, it looks a bit twitchy on take-off but once in the air looks pretty good, Hope mine flies as good !

and finally, how to get rid of about £8000 in the blink of an eye.

And finally a really good 1/4 scale model,I am impressed with this one, I think it is flying with a Zenoah petrol engine, "very Nice"

JINGLE BELLS

2008-01-01T02:00:00.000-08:00

Well the christmas break was as anticipated a good time to get some building and a bit of flying in. Work on the Storch has been moving along slowly, due to the large number of small metal parts I have had to make. however the rear of the fusalage is now complete with fin, stabilizer in place. the closed loop is in for the rudder and I have installed a push rod for the elevators. If you look at the stabaliser you can see I have used carbon tubes to mount it, this should "I Hope" be stronger and lighter
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I have also mounted the Tail wheel assy, it looks pretty good and works! the two support braces seem to give enough support, but we will only find the truth after a few heavy landings.

I have been using pre colored Solatex, not an easy material to find in Portugal, but I have ordered 10m from Steve Webb Models and my daughter Lilly will bring it over in the new year. Elevator and Rudder hinge detail is as per full size

Engine is now installed and I have used a mini servo ( it came out of my twin) I have also inverted the carburetor so that all the fiddley bits come out the bottom of the aircraft, that way I should keep a more scale image.

I found the below video on you tube, this shows two examples of full size aircraft the first one is at RAF cosford and is pretty close to the WW11 version but you can see the rear gunner position has been removed, I believe this aircraft was used for glider towing before it went to the museum.

I had a good day at the field on Sunday, Ok I did destroy my Skymaster, but to be fair it always was an accident looking for somewhere to happen, I also did some filming, but the bloody video is on the blink and so far I only managed to salvage this small bit of Helda with his Tri Pacer.

New Horizons

2007-12-20T02:04:00.000-08:00

I was out pretty damn early last weekend,Two of my flying mates, Tony and Joao had located a new flying site. The "Super new" site built by the local council is very quickly turning into a red herring, I have flown there only once , damage the aircraft on landing due to turbulance and had a delegation from the local residents give me a real dressing down for flying !
Anyway the new site is also a very new club and is run by a very enthusiastic modeler by the name of Helder.

Now Helder also happens to be heavily into petrol engines, SO I predict he and I are going to get on swimingly!. The Site is located right out in the countryside, which means, no buildings, no people, little wind ( its in a valley) but most important NO HELICOPTERS.

The land owner has let the club operate from the middle of one of his fields, which itself is surrounded by vine yards, (pity I do not drink).
But this gives a really open flying area. Helder already has plans to build a small sun shade and put in a small club house where the guys can get a cup of coffee. The old cable drums make great work tables, so there is no need to kneel in the mud!. It was a pretty cold day but the farmer brought over aload of wood and a metal grill so we soon had somewhere to keep ourselves warm.
I didnt fly this time out as I was more interrsted in the site and watching Tony get to grips with the Funtana I sold him. After a bit of engine tweaking and a Prop change Tony threw in a faultless first flight even getting a few loops and rolls in.
I think he is now even happier with his new toy!

Joao on the other hand had a radio problem on his Extra, we think it was perhaps the switch or a cable plug but as the problem was discovered at pre-flight the model lives to fight another day ! he did fly this really clean Tuccano, the OS engine has just been fitted with a new liner and piston so after two tanks with the carb set very rich the model put in a really nice flight.

Helder seemed to be doing an impression of a windmill, going in all directions helping everyone with anything, He managed a flight with his big petrol and then spent the rest of the time teaching people to fly his aged Telemaster.

All in all a "Grand day out"! Cheers Tony and Joao for inviting me along !!

A Little bit of Detail

2007-12-12T01:47:00.000-08:00

Work has made the Storch project sit in the background over the last couple of weeks, but I did manage to get some of the detail together. Remember this project is a detail learning build prior to the forthcoming JU 88 build. The idea of the Storch is to get it to look "right" which includes getting more detail into the cockpit and fusalage external faces. I manged "finally!" to get the front screen frames and glass in place this was a real fiddle, I found the plan shapes just did not fit so I had to draw up my own frames and then file and sand to fit.
I also made up some solid Block Balsa stubs to finish off the wing seats. The frames have been covered with Solatex, I will next put some rivet / screw detail on to them prior to painting.

I wanted the cockpit to be clear of servo's cables etc and descovered that with the RCV motor fitted the airframe is very nose heavy this allows two courses of action, a) I will put the servo's reciever and battery behind the cockpit bulkhead and
b) I can afford to put more detail into the cockpit.
This way I get what I want without having to bolt lumps of lead onto the airframe to get the balance correct.
So far the cockpit looks like this.

The Map is of the area where I lived in the UK and was surprisingly simple to do on the computer. The red box below the map is not "true" I made it up to hide the nut and bolt which secure the metal support, I might stick a couple of knobs on it so it looks like a piece of cockpit furniture "Modelers license"....
I managed after much searching to find a very highly detailed 1/6 pilot figure, this guy comes in a Luftwaffe uniform complete with side arm, I also got some small items to "dress" the cockpit, earphones, canteen, bread bag, MP40 sub machine gun and the prize winner a 1/6 scale MG ( big machine gun) to go in the rear of the aircraft, this even has opening metal amunition magazines so with all these bits in there it should look at least half right!!

A Bit of Tin Bashing

2007-12-01T00:21:00.000-08:00

I had a busy night on Friday, it was pretty cold out but I have a couple of parrafin heaters in the garage so I was quite snug. I didnt want to get down to more wood cutting and shaping, so I settled down to form and mount the undercarriage. The drawings show that the mounting bolts for the main legs, are just drilled through the front top wing bearer, I opted for drilling out the wood and then machining a small brass insert which should strengthen the area and at the same time act as a bushing.I have strengthened the lower fusalage mounting formers with small sections of Bass wood, hopefully this will prevent any breakages caused by overly heavy landings.

The inner section of the main leg has a small piston sitting on top of a recoil spring, you can see there are a couple of pivot points which allow the entire unit to pivot out and up as it is compressed.
Next up was the rear tail wheel assy, you can see the model sits very high up at the nose at the moment, but this will be cured by the fitting of the long rear wheel leg. This is not something you can buy from a model shop so it has to be cut , bent and soldered.

I had a bit of bother getting the solder right, its not my "strongest skill" but after 1/2 an hours practice I got it sorted out. I also made the two trailing link arms from aluminium tube, the wheel axle is solid which sits into two bearing points soldered on to either side of the main yolk.

The flat plate fitted to the top of the outter axle will mount the unit into the Fusalage, I intend to fit a hard wood block inside the tail section, this will be drilled with the axle passing vertically up through it. When finally fitted ( I have some mounting points to make and fit) it should look something like this.

The final assy calls for the fitting of a leather boot over the vertical section so the only things visible will be the yolk , wheel and trailing links. Must say I am quite pleased with how this has turned out!

Storch Update

2007-11-28T09:53:00.000-08:00

Its been a busy old week so far, unfortuantly mostr of it being work rather than hobby orientated !.
I did manage a bit of garage time though and tried to sort out a way of getting the glazing mounted. On the plan it shows thin 0.25mm ply used to form the window frames, due to the shape of the frames I will stick with this on the frontscreen and front 1/4 windows, when in place they look like this:

The dowel frame to the front of the fusalage is the inner section of the two front windshields. I need to make the front engine cover section first, to ensure I get the lower radius correct.
I was wandering through our local DIY store and found some small plastic angle sheet, it was a bit on the big side but with a bit of sanding it makes a perfect frame for the rear and side sections, it tack glues really well with thin cyno glue, so once I have the full assy in place I will secure it with 2 pack resin.

I also made up a Kidney shaped rear gunners position and if you squint you can see the start of a control panel at the front of the cockpit.

Well thats all for today, off to a friends for a Canadian tea, "think we are having BBQ Eskimo"

From the building board

2007-11-26T02:32:00.000-08:00

With "her in doors" visiting England, I got down to a bit of serious cutting and gluing over the weekend, even Michael noticed I was somewhat intent on getting the Storch well on the way, so much so that he cooked the Sunday steak for us, MMmm turned out quite tasty.
Back to the plot, the plans for this aircraft are the large version Dennis Bryant ones, it flies on a 90-120 size fourstroke engine. If you have ever looked at a real storch, you will note it has a thick looking propeller.

Now I know that the RCV engine, due to its geared final drive can swing a serious pitch propellor, so I will be using their 90 size fourstroke unit, you can see it sitting on the building board in the photo below.

Over the weekend, I mated the two halves of the Fusalage together, this took ,longer than anticipated but finally with a bit of nipping and tucking it all came together square! On the plan the fuel tank looks a bit small, so I modified and strengthened the two frontal bulkheads to take a larger tank which should give ,me about 25-30 mins flying time, remember this is going to be on a big propellor so I should be able to throttle back a fair bit once we are up at a safe height.
I also built the rear gunners position, this was bit fiddly but it finally came together, I will now of course have to make a machine gun and then work out how to glaze the damn thing I am thinking of using 0.5 mm sheet plastic, it should help to put a bit of strength in to the cockpit area. Whilst Madam is away and I have time at nights I will look at the cockpit layout and servo instalation if possible it will look like the real thing , (but smaller ) of course

Whats new

2007-11-19T07:43:00.000-08:00

I was busy flicking through the Model related videos the other day and came across this one.

I am not sure if this is still flying or in fact where it was filmed but I believe it was in Belgium. Pretty big aircraft I understand it is using 4 x 150cc engines, it certainly sounds nice. I had a bit more feedback the other day from a couple of disbelievers who think all my models are either ARF or from kits. Well I am not sure if that is a compliment or insult, but I thought it could be a challenge. I am moving slowly towards the JU88 project, the Sopwith was used as a lesson in creating a "scale like" aircraft which, from the photo's I hope you agree I achieved. I now wanted to build something from scratch which would use up the large box of off-cuts and bits and bobs I have lying in the corners of the garage and at the same time allow me to practise more scale details, i,e opening doors, glazing and of course cutting all the parts from plans.
For some time now I have had a set of plans for a large Fiesler Storch sitting in my office, I built a Aviomodeli kit about a year back which, was fun but did'nt stretch my building abilities this one should take them over the limit.
Anyway having made the decision to build I set out on my tried and tested build routine.
Firstly I take the plans to our local office Depot and have a couple of copies run off, the originals are then put away safely for the future, I will work and build off the copies.
Next its research time, you will be surprised just how much information you can pull of the web, plus I already have a load of photo's I shot of the full size exhibit at the RAF Cosford museum.
So with your nice big photocopies in hand you can then cut out the parts and stick them onto the wood, I use an ordinary Pritt Stick for this.

Then you start cutting, I have an old Fret saw and a Belt sander to speed this up.

So in short time you have the makings of a kit of parts, I also at this time make up any metal work and build up any small sub assemblys. The Fiesler Storch has a very fiddly cockpit area which requires a lot of bending, cutting and then finally joining of 3mm Piano wire, I bend the wire hot and use the plan as a guide. I also made up scale gusset plates which are soldered and then scale "screwed" into place.

there is a small hard wood gusset under the alloy so the screws have something to anchor in to.These bits have to be pretty much cock on as they support the main wing mounting points so get this wrong and the wings will be pointing all over the place!
So We are now at this stage of the game, I have cut the main fusalage sides, cut and bent the metal uprights and spot glued the cockpit roof in as a guide. The long strip of dowel you can see is a guide for the front wing bar which I have yet to cut. the real problem is making sure its all square and that the correct wing incidence is now set before I finally glue it all up. Because I need strength here I will be using a 3 hour epoxy two pack resin which once set will take some punishment before it lets go !

According to the plan, I should have the rear section of the fusalage connected up by now, I have focused on the front section because I find it hard to fit the full fuzz on my building board, plus when you swing something this large around the chances of damage are greater. I will take the front section up to a point where it is rigid and the odd knock will not move anything out of true then build up the rear section as a box and finally mate the two halves together.

LOCAL NEWS AND FUTURE PROJECTS

2007-11-06T03:01:00.000-08:00

Great news
I went for a drive out on Sunday and managed to locate the new flying site, I will take my camera with me next time to show you the new place. The Runway is fantastic, asphalt and about 45 feet wide by 350 Feet long. I think that someone who flies Jets may have had a hand in the planning!
My only concern is that there are trees set down one side of the runway. not normally a problem but we are now at a higher elevation and the tree side is towards the coast, so the in coming winds roll over the trees and make quite a strong turbulance at a height of around 25-30 feet. Of course this is at 90 degrees to the runway so landing is quite interresting, I just happened to have my Funtana 90 in the back of the car so I gave the "Pista" a try out, getting down again was bit of a bugger. I aborted 4 times before on the 5th attempt knocked off the tailwheel and snapped the propeller. "More bloody expense".
Now we have a definite flying site, I have nailed Benjamins trainer together, because of the cross winds, I am thinking of fitting my flight stabilizer system to his model, The system will aid keep the wings level during landing which,will give him more time to react in a cross wind.

Pup Finished
Only need the pilot now, but as far as I am concerned the Pup is now completed, all that is left is to enjoy flying her. finished the contol panel off last night.

NEXT PROJECT

JU 88 A4

I recently visited the UK an dmet Ian Redshaw who kindly let me have the plans and a whole load of referance books on the JU88.The plans are currently being scanned into CAD format and the full list of aircraft parts will then be laser cut. When constructed, the model will have a wingspan of 10 feet. I am having a problem working out what motors to fit, I want to go petrol for operating costs, but they may not fit in the cowls. The model is designed around 120 size fourstrokes which whilst they fit are more costly to operate. If I do go with glow motors, I am thinking of using these:

The RCV designed engine will easily fit in the cowl, and due to its geared final drive will swing larger , "scale" propellers.
One of the real battles though is going to be the undercarriage , which on operation has to rotate 90 degrees to store the wheel flat inside the wing. I have a lathe ( did I mention that?) and will try to machine up my own set from the CAD image below.

So If the man with the laser gets it right, the middle section of the fusalage should go together like this!

PUP UPDATE

2007-10-31T11:09:00.001-07:00

The Pup is now rapidly getting to the point where I will consider it finished. I have a bit more detail on the control panel to do and the remaining inspection window on the lower wing needs to be cut out and glazed. The Williams Brothers machine gun is now mounted, I thought about copying the aluminium ammunition feed box off the full size , but in the end went with a bit of modelers license and made a wooden ammo box , at least you can see the ready ammunition this way !

I had a bit of a problem getting the OS 160 to life this morning, I think the battery I am using on the on board glow system is too small. trouble is that if I go bigger, the aircraft is carrying more weight. My solution is to charge the glow system between flights, I have a 12V DC - 220V converter so I can connect up to the car battery. Next prob was the fuel feed, the carb was running fuel out, could be a worn o ring but I think the tank was a bit to high, I have lowered the tank and fitted a one way valve to the feed line, this helps to pressurize the system. Having run a further 2 tank fulls I think that is now problem solved.

A Beginners Bit I updated this today 30/10/07

2007-10-12T05:40:00.001-07:00

I was recently talking to a couple of mates who for no real reason visit my blog quite frequently, they are no RC Modelers so I suppose they are just being nosy. but they did make a valid point and that is my blog only gives information to those who already know a bit about the hobby. So I have decided to thrown in every now and then a bit for beginners.
Ok lets assume you have just purchased your first model and as is the way things are nowadays it is an ARF ( Almost ready to fly. So all we have to do is a bit of gluing, ram in the radio, engine tank tubes etc and we are off to the field. So lets try and get things back to a sensible pace and set some goals, lets aim for a nice clean, straight aircraft and not one those twisted wing, covered in glue blobs we tend to see as first attempts!
Part number 1

Very important bit this, READ THE INSTRUCTIONS !!!

BIG PUP UPDATE
I recently learned that the Municipal council who ran our old flying site had re activated it for a one day fly-in, luckily one of my Portuguese flying chums had my mobile number and dropped me the wink. The Pup was already on charge, my intention being to conduct further Taxiing trials over the weekend, plans soon turned to pre-flight preparation and at 07.30 the next morning I was at the field with the aircraft assembled and the OS 1-60 twin happily ticking over. I hate having people looking over my shoulder when I am test flying, I have my own little routine of check, check and then check again before I commit to take off.

Take off was a total anti-climax, the aircraft tracked straight and climbed smoothly out, I noticed a tendency to drop the right wing ( probably due to the warped wing panel) 4 clicks of LH trim sorted this out and we continued to climb smoothly, at 1/3 throttle 2 clicks of down were needed to give smooth level flight, I spent about 10 mins exploring the flight characteristics and brought her in to land, which again proved simple and smooth,...
I have fitted a Williams Brothers Vickers Machine gun, but getting someone to sit in the aircraft has been a bit difficult but I hope to get a full body pilot from the Pilot People. I was going to fit a dummy Le Rhone engine but one of the cylinders of teh OS 160 is to far forward and to be honest I might run into cooling problems .Overall I am very chuffed with the way it has turned out, Ok its not totaly scale but from a distance looks very good.
Hopefully I will get Michael to shoot some video so I can share the fun with you all.

Sopwith update

2007-10-05T09:11:00.000-07:00

Back again almost a month to the day since the last update.The pup is now at a stage where a maiden flight is on the cards. I had a problem with a warped wing panel . My fault, I put the wing out in the garden to dry the paint, unfortunatly the ambient temp went up to 40 degree's and the result was a twisted wing. I have got most of it out and think we are now OK.

Even Molly dog is excited about this one and volunteered as airfield security !
Here are a couple more shots of the 99% finished job.

The next project has had a change of heart, speaking to all the experts, they suggested that a Mosquito was not the way to go. Anyway I have now almost obtained the plans for a ten foot wingspan JU88 -A4. If I get this one together it will be a fantastic aircraft using two Zenoah 26cc petrol engines. So watch this space for an update.

The Next Project

2007-09-05T03:07:00.000-07:00

Yes I know I haven't quite finished the Sopwith Pup yet, but I am now looking closely at what hopefully will be my next project.
I have always liked twin engined aircraft and have dabbled with the Partenavia and the Skymaster. I accept both are radically different design concepts but as you can see from the video's on the blog both flew pretty well. The Partenavia was lost due to an engine flame out on take-off, lesson learned was to make sure the engines are always running at their best. For this reason the Skymaster is fitted with an on-board glow system which up until the time of writing this has kept the fires burning in both engines. Now I have also developed a liking for petrol engines, mostly because they are cheaper and I think cleaner to operate. So the question is how do I bring this all together? and provide myself with a building challenge.
Everyone has one aircraft type that they want to build and in my case I have had a particular type in mind for many years but because its a fighter type I have steered clear thinking it might be overly difficult to control. I have with time become proficient enough to fly my large 3D aircraft and my building skill is I feel at a level where I can handle it so take a look at the video below and you will see what all the fuss is about.

Yes this a video of the Richard Rawle Mosquito.I have over the years been lucky to see Richard fly his Mosquito and also his large scale "Grace" Spitfire" both models are fantastic in the air,I hope its because of their design and not so much that Richard is an outstanding pilot !
Obviously there are items in the build which are going to be a bit on the difficult side , for example the undercarriage, this would be a small fortune to buy , but I have a lathe so I will try to knock my own up.
I will keep you posted.
And to close this here is a video of Richards Spitfire, not sure who shot these video's a mate sent them too me, so if they are yours many thanks and hope you do not mind me using them.

Sopwith Pup Update

2007-09-03T02:15:00.000-07:00

Saturday and Sunday turned out to be fantastic days, Bright blue clear sky, loads of sunshine,,, me working in the garden!!.
So the Pup took a bit of a back seat, but as night drew in I couldn't see too well in the garden, so I retired to the garage to get on with the last wing panel.

You can see my trusty engineers square in the picture, I use this to check vertical squareness and to ensure that the ribs are exactly 90 degrees to the main spars which run out the full length of the wing.
As I said previously, I am building one piece wings and have opted to reinforce the wing spar area slightly. So that you have an idea of how it all goes together, I put this short explanation with photo's together .The below photo shows the main spars sticking out from the last center section rib. You can also see the step set into the side of the fuselage, not part of the plan but is on the full size.

The next two ribs in the wing panel then have to be slotted to allow them to slide down over the spars and it is all then glued in place using two pack 2 hour drying resin glue.I have packed between the rib spars with off cuts of balsa and added some 90 degree gusset plates to help take the load. Whilst the wing is not glued into place yet, the final photo gives an idea of what she will look like when finished.

LMA Cosford

2007-08-30T06:21:00.000-07:00

Just a short bit of video I shot at Cosford, I am having problems uploading these so they will be scattered around in short bites. I know this first one is a bit boring but I never said I was a camera man !

Part two is a bit more fun!

and part 3 is even more so

getting bigger and better

2007-08-29T08:09:00.000-07:00

The LMA Cosford show of 2007, wsa by far the best ever model aircraft show I have so far attended. the range ogf models on display was quite frankly mind blowing whilst the standard of flying could only be described as breathtaking. The event covered everything from pre first world war to modern day and the speeds the models achieved fully reflected this wide spectrum of aircraft types.
Just check out the aircraft types below and then use the people in shot to give scale to the physical size of these things!

The three lancasters each have a wingspan of some 17 feet and flewin close formation during the show. landings were unhurried, and as gracefull as that of the full size aircraft. The ME 262 was rock steady, fast and fully demonstrated its agility in the sky, it must have been a terrifying thing to see for the allied crews of the world war 2 bombers.
For me this "little" beauty below was the best at the show, up close the level of detail was fantastic,

the dummy radial engine is mounted on the prop drive shaft so it spins with the prop very realistic, in the air though she could easily be mistaken for the real thing.

Sopwith Pup 1/4 Scale

2007-08-29T04:42:00.001-07:00

I have always wanted to build a model that stands out that bit more than the rest. over the summer break, I was lucky to visit the LMA at Cosford and taken in the many highly detailed and "Large" models on display there. These range from 1st world war through to modern jets, on some the detail really is breath taking.

Having seen what the "others" can do I felt challenged to put something a bit special together. So over the summer holidays I set about a D B Sport and Scale Sopwith Pup. Now this is not a kit for a beginner and needs more than the basic knowledge of sticking bits of wood together!. I chose to part model mine on the exhibits in the Fleet Air Arm and Duxford collections.
The first piece to come together was the fuselage, and due to my fitting the OS Gemini 160 to the bulkhead required only slight modification to the bulkhead position. but as you can see below the engine sits nicely inside the cowl.

Angela's car lends scale to the build showing just how big a 1/4 scale aircraft is!

next on the board was the upperwing, this is built in 3 panels and can be made to have plug in wings. I opted for a one piece wing, I think it is structurally stronger and I do not mind the transport problems preferring the added security.

The above shot shows the upper wing sitting in its correct place, in fact I am using it here to set up the rear stabiliser and the tail, to make sure all are in line and square. Once that was done I covered the turtle deck, Tail and stabiliser and fixed them into position.

The covering material is "Vintage Solartex" it is very easy to work with and replicates the doped linen of the original very well. From here though we move away from the standard kit, remember I said I wanted this to be a bit special. Studying the many photo's I have taken of the full size examples I fitted an edging strip to the cockpit sides.

I also replicated the stitching on the fuselage sides and wing ribs, I did telephone a UK Based Scale Guru , who was so damn arrogant over the phone, I decided to make up my own, each stitch is a small piece of fishing line under a thin strip of Solartex, OK it took along time to do but I got a lot of satisfaction out of the finished article!
As we stand at the moment, I still have a fair bit to get on with, apart from lower wing there is a lot of detail I want to create including the closed loop maintenance windows which sit in the wing leading edge, I also want to make up a control panel.
Anyway this is how she looks to date.

Ryan STA

2007-03-06T10:00:00.000-08:00

I recently discovered that Great Planes have now discontinued the Ryan from their model line up, a real pity. This is a great aircraft notonly looking good it is a good stable flyer. I have just started to refurbish mine and was playing with the idea of buying a new wing and cowel. If you read earlier I am in the process of changing from the OS 120 to an OS 160 Twin fourstroke engine. the aircraft does not need any more power, I need a test bed for the engine and the Ryan happened to be sitting around looking sorry for its self so it got nominated

The video was shot on a very windy day the landing was somewhat shorter than usual due to pilot error, basically I stalled the aircraft onto the runway, the sudden heavy arrival, caused one of the wheels to foul the undercarriage surround acting as a brake , bringing everything to a sudden halt.

A couple of tips to help you along

2007-02-22T11:17:00.000-08:00

So I did set out to give some modeling tips when I set up the page so here are a couple.
Things electric
You will get better performance and life out of your batteries if you fully discharge them prior to recharging. Considering that most of us only fly on one day per week try the following. From a small electric store i,e Radio Shack, buy a small lamp holder, these use a bulb the same size as a hand torch so buy one of about 4.5V
then from you model shop buy a male servo jack plug with two wires. connect to the bulb and then when you return from flying simply plug the bulb into the same plug you use when charging the model.At the same time raise the areal on you TX and switch it on, leave over night and in the morning both batteries will be nice and flat.

The next time you go to fly allow the batteries to charge for around 14Hours, I use a little longer I leave to fly at 07.30 am so I plug everything in at midday the day before.

Storing planes and wings safely can be a bugger when you do not have a lot of space, I solved this by using the metal shelf kits you can get from any DIY store cheaply. to protect the models the metal shelf "Base" has a length of water pipe insulation stuffed on it. you can use this to store up to 1/4 scale if you shop around for the large shelf kits.

I am currently playing with some key ring lights I bought at our local sports shop, these cost 3 euro but throw a bright beam of light about 15m if I can jig them up I will tell you how to make cheap landing lights.

The return of Magoo

2007-02-21T14:07:00.000-08:00

Following a two year gap of "other interests" Michael decided that over the Carnival break he would get back into flying. We have started to prep a Funtana 90 which as and when he is fully back up to speed he will hop it around the sky. he also has a small (OS 90 fourstroke) Spitfire to play with, though it needs a bit more work to make it flight ready.

Of course we have already got to the stage where I am not allowed to land my own model. the calls of watch out for the helicopter are to warn him of a small electric helicopter which nearly gave him a hair cut.

Cessna Skymaster

2007-02-21T13:42:00.000-08:00

OK so we finally got the show on the road, the initial shakedown flight was a gnats nadger away from disaster. Following the aviomodeli instructions I had set the C of G at the indicated 118mm from the leading edge, this was not a clever thing too do and in retrospect, I should have gone for the tried and tested 1/3 of wing chord. from wheels up the aircraft to a nose up attitude and was very sluggish responding to airlerone inputs. Through perhaps more luck than judgement the Skylane came back to earth. On return to workshop I reset the C of G and attached a further 40 grams of lead into the nose. the result is now a flyable model, OK its not a crisp handler and I still look at as an accident looking for somewhere to happen but at least it is flying !
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First flight after adding the lead was still a bit vague, the aircraft having a tendency to track to the right. this became very evident when landing, when the aircraft decided to impersonate a lawn mower before finally getting back on the asphalt. the cause was found to be a linkage on the inner rudder cross bar, a small blob of cyno glue had caused a high point sufficient to lock the rudders with a slight turn to the right this has now been cured.

I must say, I am more than a little disappointed with the Aviomodeli kit, the aircraft has come out really heavy. If you listen to the first video closely you will hear Michael say "one engine" this being due to the front engine stopping only a few minutes into the flight, luckily the rear (OS 90 Four stroke)produces enough draft to keep the thing flying. I have noticed and of course it is expected that as the fuel is burned, the aircraft starts to fly faster and becomes more responsive, I am at the moment trying to work out why the model does not react very well to left aileron commands.
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Bring on that sunshine !

2007-02-14T10:20:00.000-08:00

February seems to be slipping along just little too slowly at the moment. Benjamin and I have seen a couple of aborted Sundays due to either very heavy fog or rain. We have also noticed recently that there seems to be a competition going on though we were not sure we had been entered in it , our two main Sunday flyer mates Helda Coelho and Manuel Funenga seem to be trying to set a record for who can get to the strip first on consecutive weekends. I will soon be strongly cultivating a rumor that Helda is cheating by sleeping in his car over night. Anyway Helda has a very clean selection of models and when I say clean I mean of course very well turned out.

Of course like any serious modeller he has a Piper cub in his fleet, not sure what the other one is but he can also be seen ripping around the sky with a great planes "Little Tony" on occasions. Following the untimely demise of my Focke Fulf I have turned again to my Funtana 90, unfortunately this model does appear to have a design or quality fault. I happen to have two of these models one was used by Michael my son, before he lost interest. but as you can see below two almost identical in flight failures .

Both aircraft have failures to the stabiliser. although the damage is on opposite sides, both have the leading edge strip snapped on the side of the damage. the aircraft on the left actually lost the elevator in flight, now all was secure and checked before flight so I can only assume we had an internal material failure, the maneuvers being done were not at high speed so I do not think it was pulling that much "G" . What with the crappy weather I am now rebuilding and improving on my y now 6 year old Ryan, I am replacing any cracked or fatigued wood and giving her a better motor up front.

I am sticking with the classic red ands white livery but thought I would try to get more of a nostalgic look to the aircraft by swapping the OS 120 four stroke, for the 160 twin which has spent too much time sitting in a box!

Obviously the original aircraft was not fitted with a large twin but it should lend itself to the lines of the model and should hopefully look like a "what could have been"

Those who have been following on , the Cessna Skymaster completed its first test flight, it was not all that satisfactory so there will be some re thinking and adjusting.

January is almost over

2007-01-23T08:47:00.000-08:00

Well we are zooming towards the end of the month and looking forward to clearer weather. We actually lost a couple of days flying this month due to fog, not as common as you would think here in Portugal. Benjamin our ever smiling student is now back from his winter holidays and we are getting back into the training schedule.

Here is our happy smiling learner with my Century models T34 on his right and my Brazilian manufactured Albatross high wing trainer. if you look close you will note that the Albatross has very little dihedral on the wing,however this model has excellent slow speed handling and is in my opinion one of the best trainer planes money can buy. The fuselage is fibre glass and the wing is a one piece foam core. it will do anything a learner wants to do and a bit more. the one above is ten years old and I bought it when we lived in Sao Paulo, unfortunately I do not think it can be purchased outside of Brazil, because if I could I would buy a couple of these. the one above flew perfectly until I let Benjamin have ago !

Unfortunately the Albatross was totally destroyed, I know the fuselage doesn't look too bad in the photo but it is "egg shelled" (imagine tapping a hard boiled egg) the weight of the resin and matting needed to repair it would have been to great so I consigned it to the skip. unfortunately two days later whilst trying to be a bit too clever I stuffed the T34 into the ground whilst trying to do a too low inverted low pass up the runway, I didn't have my camera handy , it didn't matter really because the biggest surviving piece was the engine!

Luckily Benjamin's Dad is an understanding chap and we are currently flying a OS46 powered "Arising Star"

As you can see Benjamin is still smiling ! The Arising Star is actually quite a good first model, construction is simple and is easily tackled by a beginner, the instructions are clear and give just the right amount of information to allow for a clean unconfused build,flying is pretty stable but it doesn't like to fly in too high a wind. The OS 46 we fitted is just about perfect giving good controlled flying on half throttle and sufficient power for those "get of Jail" manoeuvres you need to do when the trainee drops a clanger. We are flying on a buddy cable using all Futaba gear .

RC TV

2007-01-08T11:33:00.000-08:00

I was busy clicking around the internet the other night and dropped onto this site Check it out.
http://www.xten.tv/view_video.php?viewkey=a8d3be2fe5614f42ba98&chid=010

Cessna Skymaster update

2007-01-06T09:52:00.000-08:00

The Skymaster is moving along well at the moment, a down turn in the weather saw me stuck in the garage all day so I got on with the wings and some covering.

When ever I get the chance I like to include a bit of "Scale effect" on my models, the skylane has a corrugated looking aileron, and I found a small plastic L section at my local household DIY shop which looked just about the right size.

I was considering putting lights on as well but they seem a bit to expensive for the effect. The rear engine is now fully installed with fuel tank and on board glow coupled up, I have set hard wood blocks into the rear fuselage member and then secure the canopy with blind nuts and Allen screws.

SPEAKING OF SAFETY !!!

2007-01-05T06:30:00.000-08:00

This is just how dangerous it can get !
Two guys standing at the end of the active runway taking no notice of what is going on around them, ( this is a weekly event in Portugal) so its only a matter of time before someone does'nt walk away from it !!

Safety,Safety, SAFETY!!!!

2007-01-05T04:03:00.000-08:00

Our hobby gives many hours of fun, it can however by the careless actions of a small group of individuals be turned from a safe to a very dangerous pastime. I will as time goes by discuss various safety aspects and I intend to do a video tip on engine starting and setting up.
The first safety tip is frequency checking. Always ALWAYS!! check that there is no one else using the same frequency as you before you even consider switching your radio on. In some countries their seems to be a severe mental block on this Portugal being a fine example, to date I have lost 3 very good aircraft due to some "Prat" switching on his radio and twiddling the sticks whilst I have been airborne. the below video illustrates what does happen to even nice large scale aircraft like my Taylorcraft. fitted with a 28cc Zenoah engine, I had the model fail safe set to switch off the engine in the event of radio failure, in this case, the rogue radio frequency caused the fail safe to activate, first switching off the engine and then proceeded to "Jam" all of my radio commands. The result Well see for yourselves.

Cessna's your either love them or hate them

2007-01-05T03:36:00.000-08:00

Personally I am a very big fan of the Cessna range of aircraft, they can be used as a nice slow flying Sunday aircraft or you can go full house scale with your project. Over the years I have flown, crashed , rebuilt a good number of Cessna Skylanes. my favorite of all time as to be the Topflite kit version. I for one like to build an aircraft. the ARTF models which fill the shops today are a quick and easy way to get into teh air but do not allow the modeller to learn the real building skills neede if he/she wants to get serious. The Topflite kit is basically just a box full of pieces, OK they are very well cut and prepared pieces but the builder must get it right to ensure a safe and good flying model. This is a kit I would seriously recommend to anyone building their first large scale or full scale aircraft, it can be powered by an engine in the 120 four stroke range. the video below is my aircraft fitted with a zenoah 23cc petrol engine. I had 5 years of excelent flying out of this aircraft, which unfortunatly was written off in a house move. I intend sometime in the future to get hold of another of these kits! Until then we will get on and complete the Skymaster.

my first video tip

2007-01-04T07:31:00.000-08:00

Happy New year

2007-01-03T07:33:00.000-08:00

Well its back to work for all of us so the Blog needs to take a slight shift towards the back seat again. Or I can burn the midnight oil a bit longer ! I was recently working on the Cessna Skymaster project and at about 1.00am decided to call it a night / day the next day being Sunday I thought I would do some Blog stuff and shot off the below shots so that you can see how we are progressing.
I have adopted an easy cover scheme for the model which you may notice is similar to the Skylane kits you might see in your local hobby shop. Both engines are now in place, following discussions with one of my more knowledgeable friends I opted to fit a OS 90 four stroke in the rear. I had originally thought to fit the smaller OS 70 , which I now learn would have caused me problems. What I did not realise at the time was that the lower air flow developed by the smaller engine would act as a brake against the airflow generated by the front engine, basically it would slow the aircraft and we would not get max performance. to solution this I am using identical size propellers, (if I can find a pusher one that is)

Due to the problems and crash of my Paternavia Victor ( that,s the white twin engine in the lower part of the blog) I have fitted an on board glow system too the engines. when the engine revs are reduced to idle, an on board battery will be activated automatically and the engine glow plug will be energised, this should reduce and hopefully eliminate the problem of engine failure in flight. In Terms of wood bashing I only have to finish and fit the ailerons to the wings and build and fit the elevator and the aircraft is then complete. I am looking at ways of improving the wing mounting system which looks a bit flimsy to me, it uses small wood screws to secure the wing rods into the fuselage. Past experience has proven that the holes in the wood will enlarge and the screw will then probably vibrate out in flight which will result in a very interesting situation if one or both wings start to come off !. I intend to use captive blind nuts and Allen screws with lock washers for added safety.

Some you win some you don't

2006-12-31T08:07:00.000-08:00

Having set up the blog, I decided to shoot some video of my Focke Wulf 190, have enrolled Manuel to run the camera we sat around waiting for the fog to clear so we could get the show on the road, unfortunately Manuel does not have much experience filming fast moving models, so he missed the best bit,. but it went like this, nice take off, nice low fast passes couple of loops, rolls into another fast low pass into a climbing turn and then straight into the ground !
Whilst I was flying a police car had arrived at the end of the runway and We believe his radio's blocked out our transmitters, I lost my FW 190, another club member lost his 3D acrobat (120 4-stroke size) and guys reported that the models in the pits lost radio frequency.I thought about using the technique to start a line in Jigsaw model aircraft but probably not !
Pity this had become my favorite weekend plane, but not to worry I am almost ready to fly the Cessna Skymaster. Ok Short up date on this bit, I have now stripped all the radio gear out of the airframe and re connected it all up on my work bench, I can now say it is all working correctly, so we have to point the finger at the police car.

twin engines

2006-12-30T04:54:00.000-08:00

ITS ANOTHER GREAT DAY FOR FLYING

I have always liked the sound of a twin engine, but have always put off the idea of building one, too many horror stories of engines stopping at the worst moment. I started building one in 1998 but with work and moving around it gathered dust in the attic.Before leaving Mexico I finally got it sorted out and below is the finished article.

The model gave me two years of good service until it did suffer an engine failure on take off, the result was a total write off.

2006-12-29T13:54:00.000-08:00

Over the christmas break, I finaly got down to work on my Cessna Skymaster.I had been sent the video below and that set me off on this project.

The video model is of course the KMP version, this has a fibre glass fuselage and to be honest, is a much nicer finished kit. unfortunatly no one seems to stock KMP here in Portugal so I had to go with the Aviomodeli kit and I have to say, whilst the wood in the box is of reasonable quality , the instructions and plans are crap. the hardware in the kit is also pretty suspect so I made a couple of changes. The airframe is made up of nicely cut ply formers and then planked balsa covering maks up the outer skin. Once you have the basic shape ypu can then set too with your sander to get it all looking something like!

The twin rudders are connected by a metal pushrod which runs through the stabiliser, I did'nt have a problem with this, but the anchor points were very suspect and would certainly not stand up to rough landing or even an bit of a bash in the back of the car. So I scrapped the ply wood ones and made up two new ones out of 5mm aluminium On the left is the original on the right is the new design

large scale model flying video

2006-12-29T13:22:00.000-08:00

these large scale bombers were I think filmed at RAF Cosford during the LMA event, I think the video was originaly on Bumpygreen which unfortunatly is no more. They all seem to be flying on large petrol engines.

2006-12-09T00:51:00.000-08:00

A good many years ago whilst still very much an aerovirgin, I wandered in to a model shop in stoke –on –trent (England) to have a nose around. Unfortunatly I can not recall the name of the shop, but those of you local will remember it due to the large Fiesler Storch which was hanging from the ceiling. That one model has remained on my list of things to build ever since, in fact it could well be that model, that got me interested in modelling as a whole. Unfortunatly it came very obvious that this model was not for the novice. So years of high wing trainers , became low wing trainers which in turn became high wingers such as Piper cubs and Taylorcrafts with the occasional Spitfire or AT6 Texan etc. But I would occasionally read somethingwhich would keep the fire still smouldering away. Finally whilst travelling through the Florida area I saw the real Storch owned by Kurmit Weeks. That was it, the building board was calling me to lay down some wood. However this coincided with a trip to the UK. Being based in Staffordshire (England) its only a short journey to Cosford and the collections exhibit which gave me the opportunity to get around 150 digital photo’s of the project. It then took a bit of time to work out how to get the project into wood I eventually wen for a kit version to which I made a few modifications and came up with this.

Wingspan at just over 2.5 meteres and powered by an RCV 90 fourstroke engine. Th model is really a stand off scale and in this case stand off means a long way off ! the aircraft is fitted with flaps so it couldfly very very slowly if pointed into a nice breeze. I had a lot of fun with this one until it was unfortunatly destroyed by someone switching on a radio whilst on my frequency. Unfortunatly in Portugal there is a void between safe modellers and and the idiot fringe, unfortunatly the latter seem to be on the increase. I have the plans and woodin my shed so one day I think I will build another of this type, unfortunatly I seem to have a shed full of aircraft at the moment so I will need to have a sort out first.

Whilst talking about the world war two types , I have recently ben playing with, I should mention my Focke Wulf 190. this particular version is fitted with Zenoah petrol engine which has been rebored to 30cc. the aircraft has Air retracs , flaps etc.

The model flys very well, the only problem I have had is the undercarriage , it is of course yet another CMP model. The wooden supports supplied and fitted for the Undercarriage mounts just are not sufficient. This resulted in medium damage being done on the first landing, to solve this problem, I cut out a large area under the wing, and then fitted larger Beech Wood mounting bearers , once in place these were bonded in place using carbon fibre matting, this has resolved the problem totally, there was a slight increase in the models weight but this has not changed the balance or the models flying qualities.

2006-12-08T02:23:00.000-08:00

The 2nd of November was a golden day, I judge my flying days with colours, a grey day well that speaks for itself, a Blue day is a normal nothing went wrong day and a Gold day of which there are few is a great day. Her in doors started the good day feelings off by providing me a picnic bag with some favourite goodies, The man upstairs provided a beautiful rich blue sky 32ºC no wind, what could be better !!. I loaded up my Albatross and Ryan 120 and headed out to the field, even the traffic was flowing nicely. Normally I would fire up the Albatross and air my fingers out before progressing on to the more technical model. This time I thought I would leap straight in with the Ryan. My last outing had not been so good and I had damaged the trouser leg style wheel pants. I normally find take off to be little skittish with the Ryan so I was somewhat surprised when the aircraft gracefully lifted its tail, balanced on the main landing gear and tracked straight down the centre of the runway the climb out was silky smooth so I started a gentle climbing right hand turn and settled into the pattern. I can only imagine that by removing the wheel pants had cleaned the model up (aerodynamically). I threw a couple of rolls and loops and it all came together nicely. Settling the model into the circuit and throttling back to just above ¼ throttle and bit of manoeuvring had her lined up on the centre of the runway. Usually I manage to get her down nicely then somehow end up dragging a wing tip down the asphalt until she has bled of enough speed to drop back onto her wheels. This time however I managed to float her in and get a spot on three point landing a slight bounce and she was home. I had a further 4 flights with the Ryan and 5 with the Albertross all in all a Golden day, I had the field and sky to myself, pity no one was there to see me flying so well !

The 3rd of November on the other hand was complete crap
I made arrangements with a mate to try once again to fly my Hangar 9 Taylorcraft. This particular model has given me a certain amount of pain, originally I fitted a Zenoah 28cc petrol engine, aiming for a good fuel efficient ( cheap to operate) aircraft. I tried on 6 occasions to get her off the ground but she just refused to play ball, the only thing I could think of is that the engine fitted was giving too much power so I fitted a Magnum 120 fourstroke.
Once again out at the flying site and bets were placed, will it get to the end of the runway?, will it get off the ground?, if it does get off the ground, how long will it stay in the air. Pre- flight checks done we wound uo the rubber band and pointed it into the wind. The Taylorcraft tracked straight and I became optimistic of a result, however we were suddenly off too the left and heading directly for a quantity of rubble at the side of the runway. Shutting off the motor was not going to resolve this, so full throttle and a slight tap on the up stick, this is where it all went south. CLASSIC to little speed , to great angle of attack = Bloody big stall.

But all is not lost!!
I had a couple of bottles of 30 min epox and a bit of lite ply so 4 hours later she was back together, The 120 was out and the Zenoah 28cc back in. Boy was I pissed with this aircraft.
Having tried everything I thought I would try the shit or bust approach. Next day balance was checked and all seemed in order. Once again back at the end of the runway engine happily burbling away. The usual crowd of well wishers ( piss takers) showed up to watch me plough the runway again. A slow advance of the throttle and we were away, ( having spoken to Ted at Helga, he told me to leave the elevator alone) so I did, and bugger me the tail came up I corrected a slight drift to the left on the rudder and got up to about ¾ throttle, LIFT OFF!!!!.. up to full throttle and a wonderfully flat smooth climb out, a click of up elevator and a click of right aileron and we had hands off flight !!

I flew about 10 circuits and threw in a couple of landing runs to get the feel for her, Ailerons were a bit slow ( I will review the expo settings)
Climbing up to about 3 mistakes worth of height I threw in a loop BRILLIANT ,,,,,, then the bloody wheel came off !!
Must have missed it , I don’t know how Because I am an over cautious bugger when it comes to signing off a model. But now I really had a dilemma,
I brought the model in slow throttling back until I had the model sitting almost on the end of the runway , with very little forward speed I managed to land on one wheel and kept the “bare axle “ up for about 6 feet before it dumped into the ground . The expected damage was actually quite light, it ripped the wood panel with the undercarriage out and snapped the spark plug off. Apart from that no other visible damage was noticed. BUT with a model of this size a full inspection is now underway, having finally getting it sorted I do not intend trashing it for some stupid reason. I will also refit the smoke pump and hopefully get some shots of it in the air. UPDATE, as you can see below we did not get the in flight photo's so a major rebuild is now under way. The aircraft will be fitted withthe Zenoah and we hope to be airbourne soon! The accident was that old classic of engine failure at take off and no where to go! the impact was in to rough ground with the engine striking a large rock this caused the front end of the model to "get off" We also suffered damage to wing and the wing supports> Due to the level of damage I will need to make twwo new fusalage sides, plus a new fire wall, etc ,etc

In the mean time I stuffed the os 120 in to my Cessna, this is a CMP model as in China Model Productions

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It is quite a large aircraft and represents a sizable investment. to reduce the always present threat of damage, the aircraft is fitted with an on board glow system and a flight stabilizer system. both have proved very good in operation. the only probel encountered, is that the CMP range seems to have a problem with weak undercarriages. On the last flight the Cesnna landed very gently, but on returning tothe pits I noticed a large crack had formed in the Left Hand leg, unfortunatly when I flexed it to see how deep the crack went the leg snapped in half. Getting a replacement leg is not so easy in fact

I would have more luck finding pigeons teeth!

I have manged to obtain a sheet of 5 mm aluminium sheet and will over the coming weeks try to fabtricate a couple of legs.

2006-12-07T10:58:00.000-08:00

Well following a gentle push from her indoors, I have started to put "stuff" on my page. over the coming weeks I will try to dazzle you with my lack of modeling prowess and have you wondering how I have managed to fly so many large models over the years with out causing myself considerable financial injury !!

Thats me kneeling by the side of my trusty Victor. This was unfortunatly to be its last flight, the model was at the time 12 years old and fitted with two Magnum 50 four stroke engines, I should have fitted an on board glow sytem but thought all would be well. Unfortunatly one of the engines decided to stop just after take-off and the resulting spin caused a total write-off.