Evening All,
Once again many thanks to all for the supportive comments.
This must have been a difficult job! Nice and clean cuts. Awesome in this scale. How do you manage?
Patrick, the cutting of the moulds is no more difficult than a vacuform - indeed it is very similar. Of course all of the joints and openings are cleaned up with glass paper and as I keep repeating, I use an eye loupe (magnifier which clips on to my glasses). I simply could not work in this scale (or do very fine work any other probably), without it.
I have made some more progress although things have been a bit slow as I have been distracted somewhat this week, and the Easter weekend is looming…..
I put two small supports for the engine into the engine compartment and then started the fiddle to get the engine to fit properly. The front of the engine sat behind the radiator housing and the rear extended slightly over the bar on the rear fuselage so I used a round file to shape a groove in the bar so that the end of the engine could rest on it. The radiator was cemented into place on the nacelle first, followed by the engine, which had been painted of course. I then added a piece of card to the starboard side of the engine - I am not certain what this was for - I think that it may have been an oil tank. The support struts were from stretched sprue. The exhaust sits above.
I removed the centre section from the lower wing of the DH 4. The new tip shape was drawn on the wings and then they were cut and reshaped. The strut holes, aileron grooves, and moulding dimples were filled and sanded and the bomb racks removed. I also rubbed down the wing ribs and added two small pieces of 20 thou card to the cut out in the centre section. The new cut-out was made and the trailing edge of the card sanded to a knife edge. Finally I re-aligned the anhedral.
The wings were now ready to fix to the nacelle: these were supported while they dried out to ensure that the correct anhedral was achieved. As usual I used the most sophisticated tools to support the wings while they dried out. Getting the wings square with the nacelle and the correct anhedral is crucial if everything is to line up properly later. I added new ribs from 10 thou Evergreen strip and the new ailerons were scribed.
Final details were then added to the nacelle. I drilled two holes for the front undercarriage legs, and made two ammunition boxes for the observer from 10 thou card and cemented them to the front of the nacelle sides. I made a small air intake for the starboard side just behind the pilot's cockpit from 10 thou card and another intake for underneath the nacelle, also from 10 thou card.
I will post more when I have completed the top wing and tail surfaces.
Thanks for looking.
