Evening All,
Many thanks for the kind comments and suggestions for figures - they are all much appreciated.
I have completed the S38 part of the Africa/Hibernia project: the S 38 will be set on the launch ramp over the turret when that part of the project is finished. Here is how the last parts of the aircraft were put together and then the remaining rigging finished. I started by fitting the front elevator to the front booms and added the control horns to the sides:
I fixed the pilot's seat and the small platform which extended in front of the pilot, plus the rudder bar and control stick, to the leading edge of the lower wing. The undercarriage was next. This consisted of two horizontal skids held by two legs on each side of the centre line, with a single axle and two wheels mounted inside the skids. I expected this to be weak, (which is why I had been putting it off for a long time), as the undercarriage legs are only set in very shallow pits on the underside of the wing. However once the axle and wheels were in place the structure seemed to gain strength so provided that I handle the model carefully, it seems to hold up well. I rigged this part of the model straight away as it was easily accessible at this stage:
The engine and propellor followed: before I could fit the engine I had to add the push rods. Those supplied in the kit were just too thin for me to handle, and in addition some of the locating holes in the crank case had become filled with paint, so I made some alternatives from stretched sprue instead. I did not bother with the spark plugs: they are so small that they are impossible for me to handle and nobody would ever see them anyway. With the engine in place the wood propellor was added to finish that part of the model. Rigging of the lower boom arms followed so that I could fit the rear float. That sat on two arms suspended between the tail skids. The arms were made from 20 thou styrene rod and the skids from thin strip. I also fitted the horizontal tail surfaces and ailerons which completed almost all of the sub-assemblies except the floats and rudders:
I superglued two pieces of stripwood to the main undercarraige struts - they form the attachment points for the forward floats when they were fitted later. Final rigging now took place - I used rolled 40 SWG copper wire held with superglue to finish the booms and add the control wires to the elevator and rudders. Before I could fit the rudders to the rudder post the bracing had to be attached first - 6 wires per side on two rudders:
With the rudders attached and rigging complete it only needed the fixing of the undercarriage floats to complete the aircraft.
I will show more photographs of the completed S38 when I have finished the whole project and can put the aeroplane permanently on to the platform. However that will not be for a few days so in the meantime here is a teaser shot of the S38:
Thanks for looking.
Stephen.
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