A4 Skyhawk - minimal build blog

[John A H]

The circles and spots on the previous photos are where more shaping was requires and talc/dope required to fill nicks. As we are rapidly running out of time it will be a less than perfect finish as I need to get some paint on. At the moment I'm not sure if there is time to allow coats to dry enough to apply masking.

Last bit of sanding of the wing showing the talc powder dust that it creates

[Mark Kettle 1]

John I must say I do like your flair fuselage to wing with gun ports .

[John A H]

Thanks Mark - it did cost me half a week of building time messing about with them trying different ways of modelling, fixing, blending in and drilling for the guns. It means that to have any chance of been ready for next weekend I am now trying to fit in spraying top coat of paint while still finishing off parts of the airframe.

As usual the top coat shows off lots of imperfections, normally I would rub it back and sort them but not got the time to be that fussy, I've had to miss out applying a filler primer as that would have cost another day. Unfortunately you can't speed up paint drying by staying up late ....... and if you rush you risk pulling paint off when removing masking..... and then your spray gun splatters just at the wrong time. Only saving grace is that pictures of Skyhawks show that they were far from been in showroom condition, so I think I will claim the imperfections are scale .

[John A H]

I am now about to glue on the canopy so, as with Phil, that means not been able to touch the fuselage for at least 24 hours while the glue dries to be safe.

[John A H]

I've used the canopy aerial as a switch similar to the one on my Jet Provost.. To get away with only drilling a small hole in the rear canopy fairing it is designed so that the aerial can be adjusted to allow for the switch high difference when in the on/off positions.

Used a cut down M2 clevis to screw down onto the switch wire

Glued into aerial former

"skinned with 16th sides and screwed onto piano wire.

Hole drilled through canopy and top of fuselage. Switch is positioned on a frame just behind former F3. The black "mess" is where I "repainted" the inside of the canopy after the the holes were drilled.

How it looks without aerial, the wire is routed through a carbon tube which also stops the canopy been pushed down.

and with aerial screwed in place

One thing that I didn't anticipate was the amount of balsa dust created when I drilled the hole; the canopy now looks like the pilot has a dandruff problem. Also, to make sure the pull wire emerged inside the fuselage with enough room to fit the switch , the aerial is a bit further back on the canopy than it should be.

To switch on pull the aerial up and then screw it down to the canopy, to switch off unscrew the aerial and push down. Means can't be accidentally switched off.

[John A H]

You can see from the pictures I have managed to get a coat of white primer on the fuselage and sprayed the red for the jet intake markings. Need to spray plastic primer on the canopy and then the overall grey upper fuselage surfaces.

[Mark Kettle 1]

Switch .

[Phil Cooke]

nicely engineered solution to the switch problem John - good luck with the rest of the paint - nearly there now!

[John A H]

After a long night of masking and spraying I'm finally making progress with the paint finish. Needs remasking for the black characters to be sprayed on. The wing is a bit behind because I've run out of paint .... again.

It's at this point I'm wondering why I had the bright idea to mask and paint all the markings .... I would probably of finished by now if I had cut them out of vynl.

I prefer to spray in daylight as it is easier to see what is going on. Someone else said photos don't show the imperfections and they are right, now I've taken it out into daylight there are quite a lot of "dust bits" in the paint, one big run and some issues around where the masks were. If there is time I might rub it back a bit and give a top coat of varnish to blend it - that could be asking for trouble as it doesn't always dry that fast and anyone launching it on the weekend might end up stuck to it .............. otherwise don't look too closely.

[Phil Cooke]

Looks good to me that does John!! Lovely job!!

[Mark Kettle 1]

Nice that John - in by best Lancashire accent.

[John A H]

Thanks chaps.

You have to laugh at all of us rushing to finish for the weekend - after having 5 months to complete them. I imagine that by saturday 13:00 most of us will be lying on top of the Great Orme fast asleep - or still glueing arrestor hooks and fuel probes on.

[Andy Meade]

Or sanding busily in the bathroom at the hotel...Mr Kettle!

[Mark Kettle 1]

Well this year - a compressor, 40 psi and a workmate behind the shower curtain playing with my airbrush. All in the best possible taste.

[John A H]

One final masking of the fuselage to spray the black lettering etc. and the jet pipe. This took 5 hours to completely mask up, at this stage really have to make sure that there is no gaps for the spray dust to creep through and spoil previous work. As much as possible I try to minimise the masking tape been stuck directly to the paint by using paper and taping over that.

And how it looked after spraying the black and removing the masking while having fingers crossed.

[Phil Cooke]

Beautiful work that John, great stuff. Like you I have finished the last of the masking today... should be completed and ready to go tomorrow after a huge effort this week. Looks like you are the same - I look forward to seeing your model up close on Saturday!

[John A H]

After some tidying up and rudder decoration how it looks sat on the wings. I seem to have miscalculated the size of my wing stars & bars - they are a little on the small size. Might have to rub down the wings and re-paint that, but not before the weekend.

Ideally it needs rubbing down with polishing compound to remove all the paint inconsistencies then spraying with clear coat but I don't think I can be confident that it would dry fully before the weekend so will not risk it.

Refuelling probe on - pinched the idea of using a bullet connector for the nozzle.

And how the elevator horn removable shroud looks when in place.

Still lots to do, fitting ailerons and elevator, installing radio gear, sorting out C 0f G.

Might not get time to make an arrester hook so deck landings will be off limits. It is also unarmed at the moment (apart from wing cannons) and without it's drop tanks so flying range will be limited

[John H. Rood]

Beautiful! Under the gun, but VERY well on the way! Way to go, John.

[John H. Rood]

A terrific choice of Skyhawk to model, too. The Bonny Dick!

Great mix of bright colours over the gull grey and white. Kudos on all that careful work.

[Harry Twist]

Brilliant work John - love the fin and rudder colour mix.

[Chris Barlow]

This one looks very sleek and fast. Excellent finish and detail too. Very nice John.

[Phil Cooke]

Lovely finish as usual John, cant wait to give this one a close inspection over the weekend!

[Peter Garsden]

Having now just read this for the first time (shame and negligence admitted) I now understand the many conversations about it yesterday!

Was going to do a write up for LMMGA site but no time now as need to get up early to the Orme for a parking spot!

Lovely detailed work and can feel the agonisation (new word).

Do I envy the painstaking detail? Yes.

Am I glad that I am not so fastidious? Sort of yes as I have had a bit more sleep over the last few days.

[Mark Kettle 1]

Yes this one by John is very nice.

[John A H]

 

Although the Skyhawk flew at the September PSS meeting there were still a number of jobs that needed completing.

First off was a bit of boat building.

 

​ and after 64 planks we have a submarine !

Painted white and we have two drop tanks, the pylons are colour coded so I know which is left and right (red/port and green/starboard).

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Edited By John A H on 25/02/2017 22:32:05