Airfix DH4 with Blue Rider DH9 conversion, and Pegasus DH4 double build

[Tim Mixon]

Those are looking wonderful Ian. Brilliant job with the masks. 

[pepperman42]

Catching up. Great progress!

Steve

[WD]

Wonderful work!

Warren

[lone modeller]

What really matters is not how many models one finishes in a year, but the quality of same. In your case the quality is invariably of the highest standard, so the time is very well spent.

Stephen.

[Rookie]

Beautiful detail in this small scale Ian.

Looking good!

Cheers,
Willem

[IanB]

Evening all!

Many thanks all for the positive feedback. It's very much appreciated and I'm glad you're all enjoying the builds!

I had a great day at the GP, with a totally unexpected last minute offer from a friend of a hospitality ticket in the marina. Needless to say I didn't see much of the race! (and no, it wasn't one of the flashy mega yachts, but still great fun, a big party, and lots of alcohol). No we were NOT part of the mayhem that broke out, I was shocked when I saw footage of it and I'm absolutely certain that if any of those involved are residents, they won't be for much longer!

It was also National Day today so a long weekend for everyone. I took advantage and made some progress on another of those jobs that I'd been putting off. Namely prepping the wings on the 4.

I had another "doh" moment a week or so ago and started removing the surface detail and thinning the wings, including the upper wing centre section, separately. Yes, you guessed it, they then didn't match up! My first job then was to pin the outer wings and centre section, temporarily join them and sand/fill them to match!



First job done! They will be separated again to add the dihedral once everything else is done as it will be easier to mark everything up with them flat.

The upper and lower wings were then marked up for the spars and the strut locations drilled, ensuring, of course, that they all lined up!



Next up, marking and separating the ailerons.



Once separated, they were marked and drilled for the mounting pins. 
Of course the tail surfaces needed the same treatment, so they were thinned, control surfaces separated, and pinned as well. The rudder/vertical fin needed a little more work since it was not only too thick but too big. You will remember that I reduced the size of the rudder post on the fuselage so the rudder was now too deep. And the wrong shape!



Easy enough to fix with a sanding stick



So what I've ended up with at the end of this weekend is...



I may still thin the fin/rudder a little more. I normally make new ones from Evergreen sheet but for some reason decided not to this time.
I now have to do it all again for the 9, then make a couple of gravity tanks for the centre sections.

Thanks for looking in!


Ian

[lone modeller]

Oh the joys of sanding and filling.... followed by scribing and more sandin.... you get the idea!

Looks good though Ian - and it will be woth it when the models are finished.

Stephen.

[NigelR]

Lovely attention to detail here, looking forward to seeing more progress.

[Tim Mixon]

Those wings look really nice Ian.  The Airfix wings need a lot of work but all your efforts are worth it.

Tim

[PrzemoL]

Continuing to be and interesting double build.
Even if you do not manage to finish them this year you have a good chance to start the next year completed list with two lovely entries ;-)

[IanB]

Those wings look really nice Ian.  The Airfix wings need a lot of work but all your efforts are worth it.

Tim

Thanks Tim.
The Airfix wings were going to be used for the 9 conversion but were too warped so those are scratch built. These are the Pegasus wings for the 4.

Ian

[IanB]

Thanks all!
A quick update for this weekend's work on the wings and tail surfaces for the 9.

I had fortunately already prepared the blanks and sanded them to shape so I could get on with marking them out, separating the various sections, and drilling/pinning it all back together. There's something a little perverse about cutting something into pieces only to them spent a couple of hours drilling tiny holes and pinning it all back together, but there we go!

First then, mark it all up.

Carefully!



I have marked them for a) struts, b) ailerons, and c) the centre section, as that will need to be separated to get a crisp edge for the dihedral. Bending would work but it doesn't give a sharp edge. Also the lower wing obviously needs the centre section removed competely.

All done! 



Until that is I looked again and thought that the gao between the ailerons and the strut locations was a little too large. The struts fit to the same spar as the ailerons after all! I matched up the wing markings against the recesses in the fuselage and... they didn't match! So the rear strut holes were filled and redrilled slightly further aft. They now match! It was only about 1mm at the most but would definitely show as the struts would be out of line and not parallel so it had to be done.

Then on to the tail surfaces. I just found out I'm running dangerously low on 30thou sheet for these so I'll need to order more!

All marked out



cut out, and final shaping completed.



They have also been sanded to a fine edge at the rear and rounded off on all other edges. They're ready to have the sections separated and pinned now, but I've done enough of that this weekend, so I'm going to sit by the water and have a beer or 2. A very pleasant 27C today!

Thanks for looking in, have a great week everyone!


Ian

[lone modeller]

Good job you spotted the holes problem on the wings Ian. The tail surfacrs look good - nothing like 30 thou card for flying surfaces.

Stephen.

[NigelR]

Superb modelling. Harry W would be very proud!

[KiwiZac]

I've been away for a while and it's great to come back to so many tasty updates. Great work Ian!! I'm sorry for the issues you've hit but well done on recovering.