Peter Garsden

Next add the light ply 1.5mm ply All Moving Tailplane joiner supports into the space between Fin 4 and Fin 3. You can see that the holes have already been cut out for the back and front tail pivots. I have also temporarily inserted the aluminium tailplane horn. I am trying to work out how to get the tube that spans the slot in. There is a tube which glues to the horn then a concentric larger tube which glues to the fin, then a rod inside which fits into each tailplane. Note the overlap of balsa sheet beyond the trailing edge of the fin to act as shrouds for the rudder hinges - 6mm. Also I fitted and glued one side at a time. After the 1st side is glued, I made holes in the balsa to mark the limits of the ply internal supports then cut all the balsa out. I then glued on the 2nd side using these clamps, and when dry I will make holes in the other side. Not too big again so the AMT is importantly a tight fit.

This is the all moving tailplane horn which I cut from 1mm Aluminium and happened to have in stock from offcuts I had cadged from a local works. I photocopied the part from the plan, cut it out, and glued it with Pritt Stick to the metal, then used tin snips to cut the lines. I then drilled the holes with my pillar drill - checking of course the correct diameter from the tubing and wire I had bought from a local internet supplier, Macclesfield Models. Better to have the holes to small than too big because then you will have a sloppy tailplane, something AMT's are famous for.

This shoes how you attach the bottom fin rib ie Fin 4 by placing the fin up to the fuselage to get the angle right and protecting the joint from sticking with masking tape, as I am using cyano. The other ribs are attached with the trailing edge on the bench and engineer squares used to ensure they are upright. You can see that I have penned a middle line on the fin trailing edge to ensure that the fins, and the leading and trailing edge are parallel when viewed from front to back, The RCM&E mentions getting the LE and TE parrallel which I didn't understand at first as from the side they are askew.

What a mess? Well yes but it'll be reet when the Horseshoe Sander has attacked it. The nose P38 in particular was applied in 3 layers. Sadly the bottom layer is still not set as it has too little hardener in it. Not a lot I can do now, but I think it will be OK. The inside formers will of course be removed later, and the filler is great for sealing the gaps left by the plywood planking, which is very difficult to get accurate. I hope I have not put too much lead in the nose as now the c of g is between F3 and F4. Still a tailplane and fin to add so fingers crossed.

On with the nose - first of all glue in the formers then fill them with body filler - P38 is my choice as it dries quickly I made some paper templates for the shape of the lead which is screwed to the front former and drilled a 2mm hole for the small wood screw which holds it in place.

My first reaction was that my Canberra canopy is a lot different to that one before I researched the point and found this canopy on later versions. Good progress, keep at it!

Planking nearly finished both sides. Doesn't matter if there are gaps because the whole surface will be covered with body filler (I am using P38 for both the nose, and the sides. The last piece, however is difficult to form without a paper template. You can just see the pencil rubbings with a 4B soft pencil which follow a crease I make against the surrounding edge. I then cut out the shape with a fret saw. It also has to be steamed to bend into shape and scored to follow the curve which, over the keel, is quite acute.

And so to the other side of the fuselage. Fortunately I have an ace Robbe fuselage support which my mate Keith bought me for Christmas. It is essential for holding a spherical shaped fuselage still. One just repeats the process on the other half of the fuselage with the formers held in place with cyano due to its quick sticking power. I have also used cyano on F2 and F3 to make them easier to remove later. One can see the formers butt jointed and glued, but this shot shows how much I steam bent the central 6mm square longeron to follow the shape of the front of the fuselage. Again very important to open out the slots for the longeron in the formers BEFORE gluing up the formers as all the slots need adjusting to make them sit with no overlap, same goes for the length of 3mm square spruce. This shows that one must add 6mm square pieces to double up the central longeron so as to ease the 1/32" ply fuselage covering later, and also the gluing area over the top of the fuselage - a bit blurred but there is a piece of 6mm square either side of the top and bottom keel, which will need sanding to shape later. Obviously there is a risk of the fuselage being pulled out of shape when the central longeron is glued in place, so I clamped 2 pieces of softwood to the top and bottom of the fuselage to keep it straight. I am using some waterproof 5 minute to dry PVA which is brilliant and dries clear. You can just see a white blob of it under F4. Again sorry for the blur but this shows how much one has to steam bend the 6 x 3mm spruce longeron at the front and top of the fuselage. It then sits nice a relaxed with little clamping needed. And in situ.