Morane-Saulnier Type N, Eduard 1/48, 19.12.2017 Wings

[Bughunter]

Thank you RAGIII, Ondra and Xan! Your feedback is highly appreciated!


Engine


Curious, there are a lot of rotary engines of different types from Small Stuff in my stash, but since many of my projects used the same type, I was out of Le Rhone 9C 80hp. So I had to order more.



So the next rotary engine was build with a little bit of routine and painted with Alclad and oils.



The bonnet was a bit to tight here too, so I sanded it inside. The cockpit front wall was also oversized - this helps here! I added thin sheets - this means again more space for the engine.



My know usual construction: turned sprue - brass pipe - brass axle allows a free rotatable engine.



View from inside. The suction tubes were replaced by real metal.



Also this engine gets very fine ignition wires from a high flexible silicon cable.



The fuselage and bonnet was painted with Alclad, followed by hairspray and Gunze Red H13. The hairspray can be solved later with warm water and a hard brush, but it cannot be very well controlled on small small areas.
Because the bonnet is tight on the front the engine needs to put in angular.



A small sheet is the insulator for the ignition wires.




Cheers,
Frank

[RAGIII]

The engine work is beautiful!! One of the nicest rotaries I have seen.
RAGIII

[Adam]

The engine looks real.

Adam.

[PrzemoL]

Very realistic. Top class!

[Bughunter]

Thank you my friends, it is always supportive to read such nice feedback, but I have to say also thanks to Small Stuff for such great engine kits!

Airscrew


This time I had a little rebound ...

According to the Datafile drawing I sanded a wooden airscrew, here with the one from the kit and the back plate.



The hole in the back plate was much bigger as the engine axle. I turned a sprue to matching diameter drilled carefully a small conical whole until it matches the Le Rhone axle. The distance to the bonnet could be adjusted by moving the Plat on the sprue.



Then I found some discussion on a finished model (long time ago in another forum) and the following pictures shows, there  is no wood grain visible! Further the blades seems to be much bigger compared to the drawing, so Eduard seems to be right.

Quelle: wikimedia.org


So I dropped the idea of the wooden one - back to plastic! Primed already.



Later I decided to add 4 nickel silver wires to the front side of the blades, which holds the bullet deflectors on the back side. This is a interesting detail! I had to sand carefully to clean from CA.



Painted with Alclad and brown. After every painting layer I polished the wires, to avoid a lower layer gets visible later.



With orange and brown Clear-color layers it looks now like dark painted wood.



On the back side I added the PE plate, but cut the flat connection to the deflectors and replaced them by round thin nickel silver.



The front side with red color and spallings.



After the mounting (luckily with wood glue!) the wires do not look good, running to tilted to the deflectors. So I removed the wires and after cut put them below the PE.



Now all fits! The screw is on the pictures at 1 o'clock, so the deflector is not in front of the gun barrel.



The bullet deflectors are an interesting detail, which avoids to destroy the blades, but it only works with the french copper bullets. The Germans tried that with steel bullets - different result

Cheers,
Frank

[Bughunter]

Wings


After white Alclad Primer I shaded the wings.
On the upper side it was to much. I wanted a strong contrast between linen and bright ribs, but here it was to much against the fuselage. So I had to tone it down further.



On some of the old pictures showing great details there is a very special feature visible: between the darker linen and small bright ribs are sitting very dark tapes. I want to show them, but how? The ribs are around 0,3mm thin, how to put on a tape in teh middle? Painting is not possible. I found 0,2mm trim, but it looks to wide and has some metallic points in.
The smallest decal stripes I found in internet are 0,25mm wide ...
Airbrush with masking?

I don't found a solution.

Later I experimented again: after stretched sprue I used this very thin thread recommended by ship modelers and not CA, but some foil glue:



With linen color, decals and threads this is the final result, which makes me happy!



Some more details ...

The front was painted Alclad dark alu followed by hairspray and Gunze Red.



Later I decided to mask and brush the stripes on the fuselage to, to get the same color.



The Holtchkiss-MG.



Mounted on cover.



The PE set contains also some small side covers.



Some plastic has to be removed to be able to mount them.



The next update will be the final one showing rigging.

Cheers,
Frank

[cduckworth]

The thread looks great, did you hold the thread in place and brush the foil glue over the top? 

[Bughunter]

The thread looks great

Do you mean the forum thread or the thin thread on wing or both?

Nope, I brushed the glue on the ribs and let it pre dry. Then there is some time for correct positioning. A final clear coat helps too.

Cheers,
Frank

[cduckworth]

Thanks   Did you purchase the thread in the US?

[Bughunter]

I bought it long time ago in Germany.

[cduckworth]

I did a Google search and it's still available from fly fishing stores so thanks for posting the photos of the thread and glue 

[Bughunter]

Rigging


For stabilising the wings I used fishing line.
This aircraft used wing warping, so it was not easy to fly. I added some things to the span tower, which is part of te PE set.



The backmost ropes are running via a pulley on the upper tower and the position of the turnbuckles was clearly visible on many pictures.

But what about the front ropes? No turnbuckles visible! But there must be a way to tighten also those ropes!
After checking multiple pictures I realized, that they used long bolts on the upper tower. So I created a metal "U" with holes for the bolts and soldered the pulley from the PE to it.



The U was added to the upper tower with CA.



The other end stops at the gear.



So the wings are strongly fixed, in 1/1 and 1/48




Only some details remaining!

I don't like the upholstery for head and shoulder, because the pictures shown it on all corners.



Created a new one with miliput ...



... and painted it.



A windscreen was missing in kit, some foil of another kit.



Formed according to the drawing.



And mounted:



The last detail is a rope around the bonnet to fix it. The mounting to the gear strut was part of the PE set.



So, I'm finished with this report. I hope this was a bit of entertainment for you!

Happy Christmas to all of you and your families,
Frank

[Borsos]

Thank you, my friends!

Andreas, in the first post you see the painting guide of this french red one. May be this is wrong, I don't know.

I also have this kit in my stash but i didn't remember that profile. Eduard once offered a non Profipack version of this kit with another error with the profiles. Well, the WDF is my only source for the colors of Morane Bullets here, but there they are quite clear about the red being only used on British Bullets. No French Moranes found with red metal parts...
 But anyway, that does not affect your great craftmanship on this wonderful model!
Andreas

[RAGIII]

Absolutely some of the finest detail work and overall modeling I have seen! Your processes are brilliant!
RAGIII

[Bughunter]

Thanks Andreas and RAGIII!
And Merry Christmas to all
Frank