Trevor Rushton

I cannot believe that it's 6 months since my last post, but I can now report a successful maiden flight yesterday. Took advantage of an unexpected break in the weather and after a bit of trouble with a sticking aileron my chief test pilot decided to give it a try. Brilliant flight, no trimming needed at all I am pleased to say. I had a bit too much aileron throw, but aside from that she flew really well and I am dead chuffed. The weather took a turn for the worse as a front moved in so it got quite gusty; perhaps one for slightly calmer days, at least until I am used to it. I am making some minor mods to the wing servo mount to reduce the profile a bit ( the servo is very close to the wing fixing plate) but aside from that all good. I am pleased to say that the oleos were worth all the bother. All in all a great little kit; I enjoyed building it, and I hope that it has a long life. If I built another I think I would use glass on the wings instead of polyurethane, but that's down to experience; I used glass on the wings of my Cambrian Spitfire and found that with care ( and some help from Danny Fenton's video) it produces a really nice finish. Other lesson s would be to think a bit harder before installing the radio gear; part of my trouble with the ailerons was that I did not allow enough clearance between the 3 fuselage servos and the wing servo.

The second method described by Philip works really well; I tend to make a small ply or aluminium bracket fixed to the motor mount; fix a spare servo arm to that so that the arm pivots freely and then use a short pushrod back to the throttle. You can adjust the height of the bracket to suit. I have also tried the u bend approach but had less success with that. Let me know if you want a picture. Trevor

Hi Graham I used several coats of spectrum clear gloss fuel proofer over the Wilco chrome; it looked a treat.

Dear Graham Try this paint**LINK** I have used it before and with care you get some good results. Don't be tempted with foil faced insulation tape it's too thin, but the Mick Reeves Foil is very good but also very difficult to use. I have also had good results with Wilco chrome spray; it's not really chrome but does look good. Rubbed mine over with wire wool and gave it a few coats of fuel proofer. Trevor

Dear Manish I am ashamed to say that I have made no progress with the Tiger; my Spitfire is taking all my time at the moment - its that paint it/rub it down/paint it/rub it down stage that seems to be taking an age. My plan is to get the Spitfire and the Mason's Kestrel ready for the spring so that I have something to fly. I can then start back on the moth. Always so much to do! A friend has given me a book of old Flight International extracts covering the De Havilland stable up to 1939. There are a couple of interesting (and infrequently built) possibilities for scratch building - I'm taken with the idea of a DH 95 Flamingo as a project to work up - perhaps about 72" wingspan. However, I must stop dreaming and finish the existing projects. How about you? - I have not checked the India site lately and must do so. Best wishes Trevor

We decided to spend a few days in Berlin last week; tramping around as one does we came across this shop. Now I promise that the visit was not planned and happened quite by chance, but its quite difficult to convince the Chief of the Domestic Staff that these things just happen. I resisted the hand of temptation, but did invest in some nice looking wheels that will do for the Spitfire - they are not quite scale, but they look suitably business like. My only concern is that I have only 5mm clearance between the wheel and the wheel well and am concerned that the wheels might bind given a few rough landings. Its probably a case of keeping an eye on it. I must get some oleos as well. I decided to make fabric covered elevators and rudder using a core of 1/16 balsa with 3/16 ribs added. I had a decent pdf drawing of the full size control surfaces which I reduced to scale - the outline of the kit's surfaces was pretty accurate. I have covered the surfaces with solartex but in the usual way got far too ambitious with rib tape and stitching. Net result; not happy so built a second set, which I will probably keep simple in finishing terms. The weight of the built up surfaces was within a gramme of the solid ones so I am not really sure its worth the effort unless you are going for scale realism (probably a bit OTT on this size. My Pilot has arrives from Aces of Iron - he is strictly speaking American, but by the time he is painted and set behind the canopy I really don't think anyone will notice - Aces have some brilliant painting instructions on their website so I will report back when I have done it. Sorry, he's turned himself upside down - I cant work out how to reverse him. Hope that's all of some interest. Trevor

Okay Charles, I've not posted many because the model has been covered very well in other bloggs. However, I have made some more progress, made a few more mistakes and learnt some more lessons. So a few points. First of all here is the fuselage as it stands today. I cut the canopy out (not very well) and found that it no longer fits; I either modify the fuselage to fit or order a second canopy. I took the extravagant route and bought a new canopy. Take more care next time! I started out to use tissue and dope on the fuselage but was not happy with the result so went back to my tried and tested glass plus water based varnish. This time I applied sanding sealer first to prevent the balsa from swelling. I think that there were about 4 coats of pu in all plus a coat of filler primer, the latter being rubbed back down again virtually to nothing before using the grey primer. Although there are a few small blemishes the net result was good and with a bit of care I think that I can improve the few minor niggles. I am tempted to add some panel lines using the masking tape and spray method. Perhaps a few rivets as well (I suffer from Danny Fenton's problem as well). I have an irritating niggle with the edge of the wing fairing as the corner sticks up a bit from the wing surface - I may have to take the corner off and build an isopon replacement. I have fitted the slinky tubes for the rudder and elevator; these exit per the drawing but I am not very happy with the length of control rod inner that is then unsupported. I don't want that to kink under load, so I may modify this. The kit supplied bowden cable looks good but I am nervous of it and may go for wire instead. The front end has worked out okay following my blunder with the engine. The chin needs to be cut out again (I glassed it all in situ) but that should not present any problems. Its only designed to be removable for engine replacement purposes. My other niggle area is with the top of the fuselage where I have developed a small groove or depression between the fuselage sides and the top capping. Its very shallow but its proving very difficult to fill. I have tried lightweight filler but trying to get it to stay put in a shallow, convex groove is very difficult. I have just tried some knifing stopper and we will see how that goes. I decided to go back to glassfibre for the wings and see how I got on with that. PUV is great, but I find that the number of coats of varnish that you need is a bit of a pain. My thought was that 2 coats with the West Systems resin would be quicker - well I am not so sure now. Having watched Danny Fenton's glassing video (Poor Man's Spitty) I decided to give it a try. I was tempted to buy the official plunger dispensers to enable the correct quantities of resin and hardener but was put off by the price. However, help was at hand - the local pound shop had some travel bottles for a pound - they will not last long but they did the job perfectly - 5 squirts of resin to 1 squirt of hardner, all mixed in the bottom of a paper cup (cut the top off a Starbucks cup) to leave a container about 30mm deep - (skinflint!) but a good compromise for the proper stuff. I used a credit card to spread the resin and kept scraping it out until I had a nice matt surface with no glossy bits. That was all good. However, leaving the wing in the garage was the wrong thing to do - too cold! The resin stayed sticky pretty well all day. In the end I brought it indoors (hidden in the spare bedroom!) where it set properly quite quickly thereafter. Given the time taken for the resin to cure I am not sure that in time terms there is much to choose between resin and varnish. I think varnish is both very easy to use and easy to sand (wet or dry used wet) and if you fill the weave of the cloth you can get a really good finish.

Looking forward to seeing this one. This link might contain some helpful comment based on the Charlesworth plan Good luck!

Hi Percy Well sort of but not quite.. the 90 degree knuckle that they supply was not quite long enough. I bought a section of threaded pipe from them but that was not quite right either. I fancied the idea of making something and a bit of lathe work seemed to be a good project. Metalwork was not my thing at school so I wanted to practice and explore the possibilities of my mini-lathe. Now that I have made it I think that perhaps I have created problems for myself in terms of fitting the modified cowl so I might just end up with it coming out the side after all. However, I will still need to fabricate an extension piece that will join on to the standard "banana' shaped manifold, now that I have found out how to do it it should not take long (famous last words). Now I know what the thread is all manner of possibilities suddenly present themselves!

Who is a twit then? Fitted the engine to get the chin in the right position, fitted the thick balsa sides and bottom and shape d it roughly with a rasp; all went well until I went to take the engine out....... So I have modified the construction to make the chin part removable. Not sure exactly how it will be fixed yet, but it will make the whole thing much easier to service so it's probably done me a favour.

Oops sorry double post

After a lot of experimentation I abandoned the idea of trying to exhaust through the actual exhaust stubs. The problem was essentially lack of space and the difficulty of getting a suitable manifold out of the engine. I fabricated a matchbox sized silencer out of tin plate that might have worked but it started to get too heavy. So back to the drawing board and a decision to get the silencer out under the chin of the model rather than the side. To start with I ised some aluminium rod and whilst this was nice and light the 10x.75 mm thread needed was too fine for the metal and the thread stripped when I tried to tighten it up. Settled on mild steel and tried again ( well 3 times actually) and eventually ended up with something that works. I used brass to make a connection to the engine and silver soldered this to the steel adaptor - see photo. My silver soldering leaves a lot to be desired but I was pleased with my first attempts at blacking by dropping the hot unit into oil.

After a lot of experimentation I abandoned the idea of trying to exhaust through the actual exhaust stubs. The problem was essentially lack of space and the difficulty of getting a suitable manifold out of the engine. I fabricated a matchbox sized silencer out of tin plate that might have worked but it started to get too heavy. So back to the drawing board and a decision to get the silencer out under the chin of the model rather than the side. To start with I ised some aluminium rod and whilst this was nice and light the 10x.75 mm thread needed was too fine for the metal and the thread stripped when I tried to tighten it up. Settled on mild steel and tried again ( well 3 times actually) and eventually ended up with something that works. I used brass to make a connection to the engine and silver soldered this to the steel adaptor - see photo. My silver soldering leaves a lot to be desired but I was pleased with my first attempts at blacking by dropping the hot unit into oil.

Dear Manish it is great to hear from you and I am really glad that you have been encouraged to get back on the case. The truth is I think that this is a big project and needs to be given plenty of time. In my case I wrote off my trusty low winger in the autumn and have been building a replacement which has delayed progress on the moth. I have also started a Cambrian mkIx Spitfire which I want to have ready for the spring. after that I hope that I will get on with the Tiger. I enjoyed your log on the India site; it was one of the reasons for choosing the model in the first place. I just need more time! My money is on Peter finishing first! Best wishes

Hi Peter, Glad to see you have made a start; I'm following your log with interest.

Hi Peter I'm glad to see you making pr ogress with this kit and enjoying the process. Mine has taken a back seat for a little while. Whilst I sort out some other projects in time for the summer, but I am looking forward to getting back on the case. Mine will have a Laser 155 up front. Good luck with it; I like your photographs by the way; some good shots there. I think your fuselage is more or less where I got to, save that I started with the tail and wings. Trevor

Working on the fuselage now; all very straightforward save that as shown on the flan the floor of the tank bay is about 25mm too high to permit the centre line of the tank line up with the carb ( I am setting the engine inverted). I have adjusted the position of the deck which means cutting down one former and extending another.

Had a nice email from Steve Mason today. Regarding the ailerons ( earlier in this blog I had raised the question of how much to trim off. Well, he suggested a method that was so obvious I feel a complete twit for missing it. I had taken material from the retailing edge of the aileron which meant that I had to reprofile the aileron strip. The answer of course was to have removed the excess material from the front edge of the strip. Now why did I not think of that?

Possession granted; given the existing build logs on this model I am not intending to publish a build log as such, but to pick up on points of interest. I have built the wings and fitted the electric retracts supplied by Cambrian. The written instructions suggest reducing the main wheel diameter from 75mm down to 50mm but I was not so keen on that and have settled on 65 mm which seems to be a reasonable compromise. I am going to glass the wings so hopefully that will impart sufficient strength. Having been following the Chipmunk builds and Danny's instructions on fibreglass techniques I am tempted to try peel ply; my previous attempts with resin were not very successful and I have tended to go the PolyC route of late. However, Following some problems of rippling in the wings of my Mason's Kestrel, I think epoxy is worth another try. Decided to keep the Saito in my Wot trainer and have taken delivery of a new ASP 4s instead. I quite like the idea of fabricating some kind of bespoke muffler within the cowl, even discharging this via working exhausts like the BT plan; I am not sure if that would be feasible at this scale, but I'd like to experiment with it. I have not researched construction yet, but perhaps a bit of folded and soldered tin plate sheet would be a good starting point? Comments or suggestions very welcome.