Thought I'd share my first real CL build. I have never built any CL planes bigger than 1/2a, and those were back in the early 80s! Well, actually I started on a Ring Master Jr, but never finished it. And that's a profile. This one is going to be a full built up fuse and everything! I can't wait!
Just beware, I like to talk, so I end up bantering around from time to time. I will try to stay on topic though.
So I actually started working on this about a week ago. I started out by cutting out the wing ribs from the die cut sheets. They were actually not too bad considering how old this kit is and how die cutting can be die "smashing" at times. This wasn't too bad. But the ribs were far from uniform with each other. The Peacemaker wing is a constant chord platform so I just ganged all the common ribs (W4) and proceeded to sand them to uniformity. I tried not to sand to much, and after all was said and done, the profiles didn't look to far off the plan outline. I was pleased and looking forward to getting this bad boy laid up!
Next I moved onto the leading and trailing edges. These are really cool. Not only are they notched for each rib, they are channeled and the ribs have a sort of "tongue" that nestles into the channel. Light stock, more glue surface for the rib, perfect! Well... until I noticed a flaw into the channels.
I assume these channels were routed into the material stock, and unfortunately, in my kit, the stock was misaligned. The channels don't run true down the length of the material stock. Instead, they start out of center on one end and then travel out of center on the other end. So, if the router channel sits high on one end, it'll sit just as low on the other.
I contemplated courses of action to remedy the problem. I went from cutting each rib individually so I can locate the tongues to match the misaligned channel at each appropriate station. This wasn't too bad an idea, as I'm not that thrilled with the little discrepancies from my sanding them anymore. Then I thought about milling new LE and TEs altogether. But then after I cut new ribs, I wont have much of the original kit left in the wing. For me flying these models that have been sitting in their boxes for decades just gives me a special feeling when I'm building and flying them. So that idea was brief to say the least.
I did come up with something though. It's hard to describe, so I'll just take some pictures once I get to that part.
Here are some pictures to help understand what I'm talking about.
So that's where I'm at today. My schedule is very erratic, but I'll try to get some more work done on the Peacemaker in the up coming days.
Thanks for joining me on my build!
David Miller