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Warbird Replicas Spitfire LF mk IXc


Ady Hayward

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  • 1 month later...
Posted by Ady Hayward on 05/05/2015 22:49:18:

Hi Folks.

It is really good to have support from the kit manufacturer and Warbirds certainly sets the example of great support.

Richard Wills at Warbirds has asked that I include a note about the build of the motor mount/ battery tray in this blog to assist future builders.

Due to the differing sizes of motors and types of spinner used the motor mount as supplied may need a simple modification to ensure the best fit possible of the motor, propeller and spinner to the cowling. He suggests that the battery tray is not glued to F1 and F2 until the cowling is fitted to the built fuselage and the power system is checked for best fit. This will allow the builder to shorten the "Motor Mount Support" plate as needed by shortening the plate at the rear edge (As shown by the hatched area) and the lower locating lug to allow the built battery mount tray and motor mount to slide to the rear to obtain the best fit to the cowling. The tray can then be fixed fully when satisfied with the motor / spinner fit. Richard suggests that the FMS 3 blade Spitfire spinner is an easy compromise **LINK** These are available from example Wheel spin ( And should have a "N" suffix after the part number) but peoples may choose different combinations so this information will be very useful to prospective builders.

sdc19772revised.jpg

Adrian

Gents, just getting started on Spit build - not started my build log yet, will do so! But it's also nice to keep the mine of information available on this thread to help everyone else in future.

Looking at this post, I have the opposite issue to what's shown here - my motor is somewhat shorter and in order to reach roughly the correct position the battery tray needs to be more forward than the flush position shown above.

img_20210130_143457.jpg

Two choices:

  1. standoffs for the motor at the X-mount
  2. bring the battery box forward and pack the space in front of F1 with scrap

If I had to then replace the motor, and I wanted something a bit punchier, I suppose I'd be better off flush mounting the battery box against F1, and having standoffs.

What do the wise and wonderful folk on here think?

 

Edited By David Hazell 1 on 30/01/2021 15:32:42

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Yeah I've almost convinced myself to just sit it flush. Gives me more scope if I end up with a longer motor later on. On my Gringo, I did the 4 threaded rods method which I could do again - still have plenty of spare rod:

img_20200917_220236.jpg

quite a faff, although I doubt it's a huge amount more work than using those alu stand offs.

Thanks for your response, I shall ponder...

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Posted by Eric Robson on 30/01/2021 17:39:58:

That is my favourite method David. A length of 5mm rod from B&Q , flanged nuts from Screwfix £2-30 for a 100 no fiddling about with washers

Flanged nuts is a brilliant tip, thanks. I've got captive nuts on the back of the mounting plate, and am locking things into place with nuts tightening against nuts. Losing some washer fiddling will make life a bit easier!

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  • 2 weeks later...
On 6/16/2020 at 2:52 PM, RICHARD WILLS said:

Graham , There is a thin piece of stiff piano wire in the kit to make a leg from . If you cnat find it , use an old push rod.

The wire leaves the axle , runs along the face of the wheel , then cants 45 degrees in to the centre line. At that point it then bends 45 in the opposite direction to bring the leg central .

You can dress the leg up to look two sided if you can be bothered , Do not make it castor ! just fix it straight ahead .,/sites/3/images/member_albums/53288/867358.jpg

This is super helpful... But what's the slot for on the ply mount of the tail wheel?

On the plan, there's a dashed rectangular something but I can't for the life of me figure out what it is!

IMG_20210213_131703.jpg

Edited by David Hazell 1
Added some more info
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I'm very confused about how I'm supposed to get the ply wheel mount plus nylon bracket plus pre bent piano wire in place when it sits under the rear bottom fuselage. How is it done, or does the rear fuselage right at the back there by the wheel get sanded literally to nothing, therefore providing access?

Oh I suppose a big enough hole in the rear bottom fuse is made to allow the bendiness of piano wire to get wrangled through?

The examples of tail wheel on here have been both castoring ones so I don't see how the bog standard fit is done.

Edited by David Hazell 1
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At long last I have now cleared my bench of the Pitts so I can make a start on my WR Spitfire.

I started with the wings, and followed the guide and this thread regarding the build for the first panel - set up then CA.

I am no lover of CA joins with ply / hardwood as I have found them a little bit unreliable (maybe it is just me?). So having done one panel with CA, I decided to try the other with my normal waterproof PVA. Having laid it all out to check the fit, I then disassembled it so I could apply glue.

I glued the LE to the tip with CA (balsa to balsa), added R10, then the lower half spar, added the ribs from tip to root (including the servo tray) then the top half spar. After clamping for 15 mins to allow the glue to grab I fitted the rear spar and the false TE and aileron LE. This was then weighed down to the bench to set.

Having now set, I have weighed both of the framed panels and I am glad to say there is no weight difference between the 2 methods, both weighing 113g.

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Hello Andy. I share your views on the use of cyano. Also I’m sensitised to the standard thin stuff so am limited to the odourless/foam-safe variety which doesn’t penetrate so well into pre-assembled joints. I’m currently building the WR Mustang and have also used PVA to build the wings. It’s good to hear that there’s no measurable weight penalty!

Trevor

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All this talk of glue has reminded me to tell you one of my little secrets 

(No , not that one ) .

The one about the glue . 

I concluded long ago that birds that spend all of their life on the wing must have the secret to light flight . I also know that Larks glue their nest together with their own spittle . 

Takes a long time to milk a pint out of the little devils though . 

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3 hours ago, RICHARD WILLS said:

All this talk of glue has reminded me to tell you one of my little secrets 

(No , not that one ) .

The one about the glue . 

I concluded long ago that birds that spend all of their life on the wing must have the secret to light flight . I also know that Larks glue their nest together with their own spittle . 

Takes a long time to milk a pint out of the little devils though . 

Have you seen how little glue there is in the super phatic bottles? I wouldn't be at all surprised if that was Larks spittle...

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BTW , I'm building another Spitfire myself . This time I am going to try a few changes . As we have always had to battle the short nose and long tail problem , I've decided to accept the challenge of making a Mk1 Battle of Britain example . This is really asking for it .

However with a few mods , I think it can be done without ballast . I also want to squeeze a sound speaker in the already overcrowded nose . The cowl will be as modified last year , with the cam cover removable and battery coming in from the top . 

It might all fail miserably , but I will keep you informed and post some pictures when the design firms up a bit . 

From my calculations the difference in cowl length on the full size was 17.8cm . At roughly 1/8 scale that means losing over 2cm of precious nose (and weight ).  I will see how we go . 

I grew up living and playing on Hornchurch Aerodrome . Even the school teams were Malan , Finucane , Bader and Tuck !

So I guess , the very least I can do for those gallant chaps is to produce a cracking BOB Spit . 

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Richard,

 

Have you got inside my head or something?

I am planning just that but a Buck McNair machine, either Kiwi or Kiwi II.

 

I have worked out the access through the top for the battery (or 2), I will be doing flaps due to the field I fly on being somewhat sloped, steerable tailwheel at minimal weight is sorted and I think I have a way to drop the tail weight.

 

I have got part way though the wing in the manner you suggested, top skinned both halves and then joined.

Currently sorting out the flap system in my head, the flaps will be made using reinforced balsa.

Once sorted I will have to do the lower skins in the dining room as my shed is just not big enough for the wing to sit inverted on the bench.

I have reinforced the landing gear mount using ply off cuts from the ribs and balsa from the tip, basically made a L shape - ply on the lower leg and balsa on the upright which I have stuck between the ribs so the ply sits above the front wing spar/joiner wing, see pictures for better explanation.

You can also see my spruce reinforcement for R2 as I had to cut quite a bit out for my retracts to fit.

 

Going to have some practice over the weekend at covering some curves using laminating film, should be interesting.

 

Stay safe.

 

Andy

PICT0137web.jpg

PICT0136web.jpg

Edited by Andy Gates
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On 25/02/2021 at 19:53, Andy Gates said:

I am planning just that but a Buck McNair machine, either Kiwi or Kiwi II.

 

I must be reading too many WWII pilots  books as I crossed Robert NcNair with Al Deere in the above comment.

 

Decided to drop the Robert McNair planes as I do not want that colour scheme and sadly Al Deere's planes have been done to death, so I am now looking for other alternative options. Found quite a few.

 

In the mean time I have been sorting the flap spars.

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You mentioned that I must have popped inside your head Andy , Well , I did , a while back ,and I have to be honest , I found it a bit weird . 

There was this rabbit running around with a watch, and a cat with a constant grin on it's face that seemed to be in and out of focus . 

Understandably , I am not keen to go back in , so please don't ask . 

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