Following on from the kind comments and interest shown in my Tiger Moth and Gloster Gladiator biplanes, I thought I would share my latest project. This is a 1/6 scale Gloster Gamecock which is a 1920's British Biplane "between wars" fighter plane. I am building this from a plan by Gordon Whitehead. I have been taking photos during the building process so it can be followed and I will be describing the whole build and thought process.

First off... why this plane. Well its not exactly pretty, but its different and rarely modelled. Not too much data available.. all in all a bit of a challenge! 

Anyhow, I hope its of interest and a source of fun! Watch this space


 

nice one mate..........
I have not flown planes for years now but have the plans for a WW11 SuperMarine Walruss..
the last of the bi-planes to see service in uk forces.
used most commonly on battleships and cruisers in 1941/42
I will follow your thread with interest....
regards
don

The excitement is building  

I hope that the powers that be provide you with lots of free time to make it a quick build !

Mike,

There are some builders (and their creations) who leave you speechless with awe. I won't even bother wishing you "best of luck", as I believe your expertise does not warrant such mundane encouragement.

By the way, you set the bar too high....................

 

Warm Regards,

VC

Hey Mike,
Excellent choice, I have built two of Gordon's design from plans and am a fan of his engineering, light and sturdy models does he design!
I have the Gamecock plan from Mr. Gordon for that one day project, and couple of others too.
Had a very educative interaction with him while building his 25 size Tiggy, wherein he helped a lot.
He has mostly converted to electric now
Would wait for your build pictures to draw some inspirations
How do you intend replicating the large Al panels on the nose ?  

Gloster Gamecock


Part 1

Little history first. My association with RC planes goes back a lot  of years when as a 13 year old I built a single channel 36” Keilkraft  “Gyron” with a 1cc diesel engine, which flew but had a mind of its own!

Put off, I dabbled in Control Line… more failure.  The advent of multi channel proportional radios in the 1970’s gave the budding RC modeler half a chance of success. I built from plan (the start!!) a 3 channel “Tauri” with an Enya 19, flew a few times successfully and then wrote it off it a fit of disorientation…. ooops -  I am 16 years old.  

Football, education, marriage, kids and my unrelenting quest to be a Rock Star, all seemed to get in the way, but I never lost touch.  It wasn’t until my early twenties I joined the model club in Dubai where I built a Gangster 63 with an HP61 and under the guidance of a nice man called Barry, learned to really fly and haven’t stopped apart from a few years back.

But I love to build as well hence this little story!

I am certainly no expert but when considering building scale models from a plan there are a few things to think about!  

Is it within your building capabilities?  Skills need to be acquired and developed, starting with simpler models and working up to more complex models.  

Is it a model that you will be able to fly?  A highly loaded Spitfire or a multi engined B17 is going to be a handful compared to a Piper Cub for example.  

Is it a model of a plane you like? Sounds silly but if you are a builder half the fun is “gloating” over your pride and joy!!  

Which plan? There are many plans available for all sort of planes and all trusted designs, however, certain designers have a reputation for quality of design such as Brian Taylor, David Boddington, Duncan Hutson, Nick Ziroli to name but a few.  Doesn’t mean you are limited to such designers but there is a degree of comfort available there.







THE PLANE

Gloster Gamecock.


Developed in the period after World War One which was period of apathy as far as the Armed forces were concerned, the Gamecock evolved from the Gloster Grebe. It was based on outdated designs, wooden structures and took no advantage of any advances in technology.  

The Air Ministry ordered a total of 80 Aircraft over the period September 1925 to November 1926.  By 1933 the Aircraft had been declared obsolete.

The only remains of an example of the Gamecock are part of a fuselage in a museum in Finland. In 2009 plans to construct a full size replica were underway in Gloucestershire in England.

The plane had a reputation for being highly aerobatic, prone to spinning; aileron flutter and poor visibility on take off. Most quirks were ironed out with the ongoing development of the Gloster Gamecock II.

I bought the plans years ago ( I like to collect plans!!) and spent a few months looking at them, identifying potential problem areas seeing if I could build it etc have I got  a suitable engine, in other words “do ability”.

This plane at 1/6 scale comes in at 60” wingspan, will probably weigh 10-11lbs (4.5-5.5kg) so my trusted Saito 91FS should be ok.  It’s large enough to get some nice detail and small enough to transport easily.

The landing gear needs to be fabricated  from metal tubing and wire and will require a lot of silver soldering, I have a blowtorch so that’s not a really worry, but again if you can only soft solder it would be an issue, potential area for skill development here!

Initially the Gamecock used a 9 cylinder Bristol Jupiter Mk IV engine, fully exposed, this is a version I want to replicate. I have a choice here, build it  from Scratch… and I mean from scratch, there a few photos on the web and off you go….. or buy a plastic replica, William Bros have kits of engines available, not quite the Jupiter, but maybe they can be adapted to suit. Something else we’ll be looking at later.

OK by now you will have decided for yourself, this scale modeling is all just a pain in the neck or it could be interesting and fun… researching, thinking, creating and  making… all of which at some point in time will result in a machine which will be flying majestically right past your eyes       “…and its all my own work…”

Having worked up a list of wood and hardware needed, I ordered it all up from a company called SLEC in the UK. This plane involves a lot of spruce timber which is new to me but readily available at SLEC;  www.slecuk.co.uk

The designer emphasizes that there is a build sequence:  wings THEN fuselage, rationale being you cannot complete the fuselage strut alignment without the wings.

No excuses now!

Thanks Mike for taking the time to post in such detail.  From our conversations, I thought you were into model stuff for about 15 years.... to know that you started before I was born certainly changes the perspective (nope, don't mean to paint you "old" )

Awaiting further developments and pictures of this build, and hopefully to see it take off in our field !

As promised some photos of where I am at present, to give you an idea. I will go back to the beginning of the build and go through it all with more photos.

You can see a photo of the replica being built in UK, this is in 2009, plus one of the better profile photos of the real thing back in the 1920's

As far as the build goes, this started in September 2009, so progressing ok (actually at lightening speed for me!) Lots to think about in this build but thats part of the fun

Awesome 

One more suggestion Mike.  A lot of us could learn from information about the tools and techniques you use for the delicate balsa work.  How you cut, shape etc, and how it may be different for ply versus balsa etc.  Also, the glue you are using, how you cover the mode etc.  Basically the things that may seem obvious to someone who has been around, but can pose as questions/choices for people who are newcomers to this aspect.

Part 2

WINGS

I now have a pile of timber and piano wire staring me in the face… almost goading me …”now what?”

Let’s go for it!

Not too much to think about with building the wings just follow the plans.

The one thing I made an early decision on is how to actuate the ailerons. As per the plan the ailerons are driven by a central servo. This drives pushrods through a 90 deg bell crank to the control horn.  This involves a lot of setting up and potential areas of linkage slop, I always get frustrated setting this type of linkage up.

Good news: the advent of super slim servos that sit in the wing that makes this type of connection redundant.

So I have used the Hitec 125 servo that will be fully concealed in each bottom wing half. I did consider putting them in the top wings but the full size plane has an external bottom/top aileron connector so I am going to do that as well. Decision made.

I always make a copy of the plan to work off  and photocopy the parts that have to cut out ie wing ribs fuselage formers and glue them using a gluestick to the timber. This gives an accurate template to cut to.

Other options are tracing through the plan on to the timber using carbon paper, or using pins to “prick” the outline though the plan onto the timber.  I find the copy method easier and flexible. The paper is easily removed later and one advantage is you can easily see what the part is!! Useful for me as it could be months before I come back to that part!!

The wings are 1/16” balsa ribs and 3/8 x 1/8” spruce spars, trailing edge and  bracing. Rib web bracing are 1/32” ply and the aileron spars from 3/16” balsa.

Fortunately the wings are for the most part parallel chord so we can use the sandwich method to cut the most of the ribs. Using two 1/16 ply rib templates made as described above and 1/16 balsa blanks sandwiched between the templates, the ribs are cut and sanded to size.  You can cut out for the spars as per the plan, but I always cut these to suit the actual spar so it is accurate, in this case 3/8 x 1/8” spruce. Being a biplane there are lots of ribs… patience is virtue!!

The cut ribs can be placed over the spars on the plan, careful alignment is the key here.

I always do a dry run or two before the glue comes out, to make sure I am happy

From the pictures you can see the sequence: one bottom wing bare bones complete with ribs and spars, note the aileron still in the rib and will be cut out later to maintain the exact profile…. that’s the theory… doesn’t quite work in practice but it wasn’t too bad! You can see what I mean , the angle cut for the aileron was tricky and the ribs don’t exactly align but the rib capping strip will hide this and any misalignment will be rectified with a sanding bar.


You can also see the ribs and spars plus Trailing edge glued up. Important to  get it flat on the board to avoid warps and keep the ribs vertical. I use PVA or white glue that gives a little bit of drying time for any final adjustment.

You can use superglue or cyano but glues have different properties and, not wanting to create a debate, I believe for wood to wood joints PVA glue is the best. My only caveate here is that on high stress areas ie wing joiners, firewalls, tailplane/fin joints epoxy gives you the extra strength. 

I am aware that there are many types of cyano now available, but at the risk of being called old fashioned, I am old fashioned!!

More to come!

Pretty neat build (and building table) there Mike.
One more way to transfer plans on to timber is to make a photocopy and then put the piece of copy upside down on to woodstock you need to cut and run suitably heated iron over the paper, which transfers the printed part on to wood. This would also work with any laser printer but not with inkjet printed documents.
The only downside to photocpier method is that unless you are carefull, it may distort the print 

WINGS Part 3

Following on from last time:

The end curved sections of the wings are three lamination made up from 1/16” x 1/4” spruce.

These were formed by gluing a copy of the plan to a 18mm mdf board, nailing pins to the outline , cutting the strips and wetting them, applying glue the face of two strips and them bending them to shape and putting nails in to hold tall three strips at the same time  whilst the glue sets and timber dries.

Lots of pain here as the hammer hit my fingers instead of the nail… you can see the ends loose laid for final cutting and fixing.

You can also the servo temporarily fixed whilst I work out the pushrod angles. Lovely servo, I think “cute” is the word! 

The leading edge is added planed and sanded to rough shape. Don’t forget to add the web bracing and stiffeners or else the wing will twist. 

There is an issue where the leading edge meets the laminated wing tips, they do not line up. The wing tips are flat and the TE centerline is halfway up the rib, “never the twain shall meet”. I am going to leave this till later as I will get the solution when I have a look at the covering.

One thing not to forget is the nuts that will take the bolts that will fix the interplane struts in place. The plan show “T-nuts” but I opted to use locknuts; these have the plastic thread in part of the nut to “grip” the bolt in place. Just a little bit more secure. These were fixed by drilling a tight fit hole in a spruce doubler and epoxying the nut in place before gluing the double under the spar, a hole is then drilled through the spar for the bolt access.

I have aligned the top wing half to suit the dihedral required. Word of warning…it’s very easy when joining wings to get a twist built in. If you draw a line through the centre of the trailing edge and leading edge of each wing half at the last full rib section, when you join the wings these lines must be parallel to each other assuming the wing has no washout, which is the case here.

Way to do it: place on wing on a flat surface, place a piece of timber exact height of dihedral you require under the last rib , the timber should be full length of the rib, now in theory the two wing datum’s are parallel. Remember this timber spacer will be slightly less than the stated dihedral as you are working away from the tip.  You have to be really honest with yourself here as a twist will really affect the trim of an aircraft.

The bottom wings have the same build sequence as the top so no excuses!

As an aside, I have put a photo as an idea of the basic tools I use, working from the left: assorted needle files, rasp file, razor saw (exacto type), Scalpel knife (exacto type), box cutter, home made sanding block, steel angle, various clamps, hacksaw and steel ruler. Obviously I have for example several steel rulers up to 1 meter long and clamps tools but most of my works building planes is using these types of tools. Not exactly hi-tech!

By this time I have had enough of the wings so next time we’ll be starting the fuselage!

See you later!

Not sure if this can get anymore personal than THAT !

Please do post in detail, especially the covering part (material, tools, techniques).  Also, on the fuse, I assume to use some epoxy instead of the white glue you have been using all along so far ?

Right, so I admit that I am now bored with the wings. Cutting, fixing and pinning 60 plus 1/16 x 1/8 x12” capping strips did it for me and I need to start the fuselage to create a diversion and some light entertainment.

Decision points here:

How will the engine fit, where will the tank go, where will the radio go, how will the servos actuate the controls …..?

The original design was for a 61 size 2 stroke, I want to use my Saito 91FS which is considerably bulkier and longer.  It means a putting a separate bulkhead behind the front former. There is 4deg down thrust and 4deg right thrust required so this needs pen and paper and calculating the position of the new bulkhead plus the offset needed to achieve the thrusts.  Four strokes vibrate and I wanted to use isolation mounts.

I settled on a product from Just Engines in the UK, www.justengines.unseen.org   they ship worldwide, which are neat and easy to use. By fixing the bulkhead with down thrust built it I can adjust the isolation fittings to give me the side thrust. Has to be a careful calculation to get centerlines in the correct position to take the mounts.  Also the isolation fittings require 10mm diameter holes drilling…. not for the faint hearted!  I always work up to this size by using a 2mm, then 5mm, then 8mm drill, less stress and more accurate.

Unfortunately the downside of this is that the bulkhead eats into the tank area, but I really don’t have a choice so will have to manage that later on.  With this design the tank and servos go into the same bay and that’s a pet hate of mine. Burst fuel pipe and loads of damage.

Happened once on a trainer I have. Fuel ended up coming out of the tail!!  Fortunately, radio was ok. I stripped the plane, poured rubbing alcohol through the fuselage which did the trick, neutralized the fuel soaked timber. Plane was recovered and is still flying!! Not bad for a plane originally bought in 1986… but that’s another story!


A photocopy formers are cut and pasted (literally) onto ply or balsa and cut by hand with a scroll saw, new blades make this fairly easy.  The balsa sides are cut as well as the doublers. The plans are a bit tricky to use as lines of demarcation for the parts are not clear, so it’s awkward to see where parts start and end. This goes back to the beginning about experience and skill levels; if you had just cut all parts from the plan and tried to assemble, you would be in all sorts of trouble.  You have to remember the designer is assuming you have experience and will cope with this sort of thing.

The secret is to check, measure, recheck and remeasure, then cut!  You are not in a hurry are you???

The sides can be glued together … use impact adhesive, fiddly but gives a flexible joint as opposed to epoxy. Don’t use PVA, I did this last year on a model, against my better judgment, the water in the PVA just bends the fuselage sides and doublers like a banana but lengthways along the fuselage.. and it’s impossible to get out.  IMO

The side longerons are 3/16” spruce are cut and I epoxied these to the fuselage sides. The intermediate struts and bracing are 3/16 x 1/8” balsa fixed with PVA this type structure is very strong. You have to build two opposite sides! The spruce longerons have a curve in them and that’s a bit fiddly to maintain. Build over the plan with lots of pins to keep the correct outline.

I got a fright when I saw how short the fuselage was in real life!

Next crucial task is the front bulkhead, it has to be fixed true or the whole fuselage will be out of line.  I always use 90 minute epoxy here a) because it’s strong and b) gives me time to make any adjustments to ensure its ok.

To get the fuselage to its basic box I added to formers that take the lower wing. These have brass tubing stitched to the ply; these will receive the wing dowels built in to the lower wing panels. It’s important to get these tubes in the right position... Stitching them in is achieved by tack gluing the tube with superglue, make sure you are happy and then drill 1mm holes both sides of the tubes every 10mm and using needle and thread stitch the tube to the former. Once done coat the thread in epoxy.  By the way this should be done before you fix the former to the fuselage. Again using a set square check the fuselage is straight and level and square when fixing formers.

The next test to check the fuselage is true is to mark the centre of each former at the top or bottom, fix a pin to this mark at the front former, attach a length of thread to the pin and pull it tight to the end of the fuselage. Pull the ends together and you can now line up the thread with the centre marks along the fuselage. Are they all in line? If so … good job, if not the fuselage has a twist in it, you may have to adjust the back before final gluing or worst case redo some formers.

Again it’s not a race, so take your time.

I now add the top and bottom bracing; this is done in two stages as the fuselage in plan view has two curves, so you can’t do this in one go. This was very very tricky and accompanied by a lot of bad language... (Apologies). I admit it took three goes to get the back end of the fuselage glued before I was happy. You can see the end result at this stage.

Ok now I turn into being a little kid, I want to see the lower wings fitted, so it’s back to the wings; the alignment here is really important.  You have to drill two holes in the end two ribs of the wing to match the brass tubes, not only that but the wing section datum is approx 3 deg off the fuselage centre line. This was built in when the tubes were stitched to the formers, but the wings have to match.  To do this before I fixed the end ply rib to the wing, I temporarily fixed this rib to the fuselage and marked the hole location using a piece of wire with ink on the end poked through from the other side… holes marked and drilled…. done!

Wing ribs are fixed, piano wire dowels cut and bent to achieve the 4 deg dihedral and wings located into the fuselage - now we have the semblance of a plane!!

See ya!

Coming up nicely

Are you referring to the the "JEN Isolation Fittings" on this page http://www.justengines.unseen.org/acatalog/Engine_Mounting_Gear.html  ?

Wow!.. great build!.. All the best Mate.

Yes the JEN isolation fittings.

Mike, You are the man with patience and passion      At the end, once everything is complete, please post the average number of hours you spent building this. I really wanna know that.

Missed you at the field today (and last week too).. guess/hope you are working overtime on this build, as opposed to over time on your day job

In UK! and now STUCK in UK due to ash    anyhow chance to post some more pics!

Aaahh, that explains it !  How long more is the flight ban expected to be ? 

Do you actually see any of the ash/soot in the air in your vicinity ?

Nobody knows. As far as the ash, there is no trace whatsoever. It is actually a really beautiful day with clear blue skies!! You wouldn't believe it!

Long time no see:  :)got caught in volcanic related delays, busy at work and took ages to setup the alignment for the wing struts and interplane struts. A total of 12 pieces of metal to cut and fix.

Anyhow as you can see from the photos all done. The struts are 1mm aluminum strips faced both sides with 1.5mm balsa plus the edges too, all sanded to give the aerofoil profile.  I used the impact adhesive to fix the balsa to the aluminium, takes 10 minutes. I then stained the balsa with teak colour wood stain, a coat of sanding sealer, sanded down and then another coat of stain. It is already for a coat of varnish at the end of the build.

The interplane struts are from ¼” x ½” spruce, again sanded to shape with 1mm aluminium fixing plates let into the ends.

The whole assemble was fitted loose, jigged, unfixed, glued with slow epoxy, rechecked for alignment, re jigged etc and allowed to dry and then hopefully once dry it has all stayed in place. Actually the final result wasn’t too bad I have to say.

Next up is the tailplane and elevators which are a mix of balsa and spruce, the tailplane is in two halves which will be fixed using piano wire dowels into brass tube in the fuselage, slightly unusual but wasn’t too difficult to keep aligned. The elevators are hinged using the robart type hinge, slop free but you have to be accurate drilling the holes.

Next the fin and rudder, the rudder frame design is three laminations of 1/16” spruce with tight curves. Try as I may I couldn’t do this. Wetting the timber, steaming it, cutting nicks in the back, front, a combination of all techniques, the spruce just cracked on the first bend and there are 4 bends. Ok forget it; I made up a frame using spruce on the straight and hard 3/16” balsa to form the curves as per the photo, problem solved. Fin was straightforward.

Now we have an airplane!! Undercarriage next up!
 

Great to see the bird take shape  

The original picture has more piano wire connections between the wings, those are in the works ?

PS: Looks like the windy weather today prevented us from flying, but resulted in you getting time to update the build thread  

Well spotted!!

These are the bracing wires which I will add when the plane is covered. The designer cautions not to over tighten so obvioulsy they have an some function to keep the wings in shape. Must say it feel solid as it is.

There are two diagonal braces on the V struts above the fuselage and two anti flutter struts going from the interplane struts to the wing tips. These are not in the photos but were added as the plane evolved. Not made yet certainly will be included!

Trust the wind to come out to play of Friday, should be ok for tomorrow though!

Hello. Long break, summer holiday etc. Anyhow, you’ll be pleased to know the plane is coming on nicely.

We are looking at the undercarriage. This consist of two sprung front struts with rear bracing and some cross bracing all connected to the front axle… all the part of which we have to make. The sprung struts were easy, the bracing was tricky getting the geometry right and the soldering sequence right.

Ok struts first. You can see the parts in the picture; the top part is 12mm dia aluminium tube, the bottom 10mm brass tube, the spring is 18g piano wire and is formed by winding the wire round a 4mm diameter bolt.
 
The ends on the tube were annealed and flattened using a vice and hammer.  The struts have degree of suspension from the spring, how well they work in practice remains to be seen.

I thought fitting the rest of the strut and bracings would be easy but it took a full two days to get it right and finally soldered up. You can see the finished assembly with the wheels.  The wheels are available from Williams Bros in USA, http://www.williamsbrothersmodelproducts.com/rc.html, they have lots of goodies for the Scale Modeller and I’ll be getting the replica 9 cylinder engine from them.

I also fabricated the rear tailskid out of brass sheet, tube and 16 piano wire, this bolts to the timber skid frame which is 3/16 spruce faced with 1mm ply both sides.

You will see I have also completed the front sheeting and gun troughs, I’ll be going through this is next time.

See you soon!

Are you taking on the heat in Doha ?   If you are still there, summer seems to be a good time to spend mostly indoors and finish tasks like this !

Had a couple of weeks in UK and came back to the sauna, but as you say good chance to finish some tasks up, think I'm on the finishing straight now. When are you back? 

Sorry for the delay in responding... Looks like I will be back around mid-Sept. 

Please do continue to post updates as you work through the summer

Hi back again.

The fuselage framing is complete and is reading for the side cladding. On the full size air craft, everything rear of the cockpit was covered in fabric, in front was ply/metal clad. This is curved and I glued 2 sheets of 3/32” balsa together, wetted one side to get a curved  piece to cover the side in one go. This has then offered up and trimmed and dry fixed to the fuselage, wetted again and allowed to dry to get the shape. This was ok for the sides but the top was curved in two directions and tricky to get at due to the struts, this I achieved using three pieces, final one being a “filler piece” to close the gap.

Before I finally closed the fuselage I added the instrument panel.  I enjoy this part as you can be a bit creative.  Having said that, the cockpit on this plane is so small, that once the pilot is in I doubt if you will be able to see anything!

Still, the technique I use is quite simple: the panel is cut from 1mm ply and 1/16 balsa.  Normally, you would find some documentation on panel layouts for the model, but I couldn’t find anything so, I made it up! I found on the web some pictures of 1920’s and 1930’s instruments for sale, selected the best images and saved them on my PC. I then adjusted the image to about right scale and printed them in colour. I then cut the holes in the ply to suit the instrument layout.  The printed instruments are cut out and pasted to the 1/16 balsa backing. 

Once I am happy with this I stained the ply and give it a coat of sanding sealer. As you can see it looks ok in this wood finish. I then put a sheet of plastic between the ply and balsa and this gives the dial its glass cover effect.

To bring out a bit more 3D effect, I add the “bezels”, this time I used a technique I had seen in a magazine which was to used normal soldering wire, wrapped round a round object, cut to the size in inserted in the dial. I painted some black and some bronze before fixing. Then I took some pins, filed the head flat and put a fine saw cut in the head to resemble a screw and put four around each dial as the fixings. I did the same around the panel. I then added some switches and lights using any old bits and peices lying around the house. All good fun and then fixed in position.

At this time I fixed the Radio switch in the cockpit floor and cut the door out. I intend to hinge the door and secure it with some magnetic fixings.

All this took a week off and on…. and I will be honest and say two thoughts often come into my head …..A LOT TO BE SAID FOR ARTF’S and WHAT IF IT CRASHES ON ITS MAIDEN FLIGHT…..   need to be positive though.

But I can tell you, when I got the fuselage covered and the undercarriage on and rear tail on and its sitting there; it’s a very satisfying feeling!!!!

Next time gun troughs and just how does the bottom sheeting all go together … much head scratching to come!!! 

Bye.
 

Nice Work Mike!
your detailing works are very professional and lifelike!

Will be following this thread and learn!

Dorwin

Gun Troughs and Bottom Sheeting  

The fuselage sides have to be cut for the gun trough to go in. This is a typical Gloster detail
.  
I had spent ages getting the cladding right and now I going to cut a great big hole in it… anyhow it was quite painless and the trough was formed using the acetate sheets sanded both sides to get adhesion for the glue and paint. You just press it into the gap and it forms the curved trough naturally. I fixed this using clear UHU and trimmed off the excess. Lots neat and you imagine a machine gun just sitting in the trough.

The bottom sheeting really posed a headache as I couldn’t see how it worked; I sat for ages looking at it.  What I ended up doing was building up the sheeting in 1/4 “ balsa and by trial and error got it to work, at the same time I built in the access hatch using two 16g wire dowels at the front and 2mm bolts at the back. You can see the end result with and without the access hatch.  I have decided to fix the tank at this point and get the fuel tubing in as well. This is being done at early stage but I am worried about fixing it in later, remember this all came about due to the engine bulhead being relocated because I was fitting a four stroke. As long as the fuel tubes are sealed it should be fine.

One question I kept asking myself during the final bits of the fuselage was how was I going to cover it, lots of curves, and struts – not easy. I was planning to use solartex which is a fabric equivalent of the usual film covering, but I find it easier to use, has more adhesion and is very strong.

The solution eventually came to me although I have to admit it wasn’t revolutionary. On the real thing the rear stringered fuselage is fabric and the solartex is perfect for that. The front section is mainly timber and aluminium panels. Ok no need for solartex I can use fiberglass and laminating resin for that. Problem solved.

The fiberglassing technique is one I have used before and is not as daunting as it seems; it gives a fuelproof, durable and excellent finish. My xtra wot has been flying for over 10 years now and although got a lot of hanger rash, dings and dents, still looks reasonable. This was finished in glassfibre cloth and painted.

A word of caution: you have to use laminating resin and not polyester resin that you buy at car accessory shops for vehicle repairs.  The reason for this is that the laminating resin is easily sanded; the polyester is a nightmare (a lesson learned as a youth fibreglassing my first wing joint which once completed looked like a relief map of the Himalayas).

Next time I’ll take you through it.
 

Eventually there comes a time when you run out of excuses to not start covering the airframe.  Some of the parts have been laying around for a while now so a quick check to make sure all are ok i.e. completed and let’s go. 

As I said previously I had been worried about covering the front section of the fuselage as it is curved with struts plus lots of fiddly bits where the wings meet the fuselage.  I feel glass cloth and resin is ideal for this albeit hard work.  Getting the film covering around all the bits and pieces won’t be easy, but I am sure it could be done by those who are more able that I am!

I am a fan of solartex which is an iron on covering material, www.solarfilm.co.uk. Solarfilm is one of the original plastic iron-on coverings and solartex is the “fabric” version. It is heavier but I find it very tough, easier to manage and once on it doesn’t move. Solartex comes in prepainted colours and is fuel proof. I tend to use it in a natural or white colour and then paint and fuel proof it with a coat of marine matt varnish. This seems to works well and is certainly durable, my Gladiator is still ok after 7 years.

The techniques for covering can be found everywhere and I can’t add too much if anything. To be honest, I am not a fan of film covering but have to admire the skills of the ARTF’s that come out of China, better than anything I can do.  Although with solartex if you take a bit of care it’s difficult to tell that it is an iron-on covering.

So I started with the fuselage and applied glass cloth and resin. This is a topic in itself so I will post this separately for anyone who’s interested to look at.  Patience is a virtue here as it took longer to do this bit that the rest of the plane put together but the result is a durable surface that will take a few knocks.

The rear stringered section will be covered in Solartex. I want to get the front edge accurate as I intend to add simulated panels to the front section of the fuselage and this edge of the fabric covering will form part of a panel.  So some careful cutting with a VERY sharp knife and off we go.  As with any panel, tack the middle and outer edges and work outwards. I tacked to the top of the fuselage longeron and worked my way around and towards the back.

I made life difficult as I wanted to cover in one piece without a join at the top. This I managed by taking it slowly easing  the wrinkles out as I went ( Top tip is to always leave one edge free till last to get rid of wrinkles and air bubbles as you go). Other tip is always have a sharp knife to cut clean edges.

It came out ok, but I will need to go back to catch any wrinkles or spots I missed.  Next up was the two tail plane halves and the fin. This was followed by the elevators and rudder.

Whilst I doing this I have been messing about with the paint finish. The Gamecock was a silver finish and this is a tricky colour to work with, silver paint has a mind of its own.  My Tiger Moth wings have silver prefinished Solartex finished in matt varnish and looks ok.

For some reason I opted not to go down this route, can’t remember why. So I covered some scrap balsa and started messing about. I am using a water based paint from Folkart  these are acrylic paints available in all sorts of colours, I really got them for my HMS Victory, which I started prepainting  a while back, mixing colours etc, but this has been mothballed for my later years as  I estimated it was a 3-5 year build. These paints are great to use, easy to clean but obviously need to be fuel proofed. 

I tried some silver and the coverage was not good, oops here we go…. I gave it a couple of coats expecting to have to give it a 3rd but it dried out ok after two coats.   Now I don’t want a plane that looks like it came from the factory, I want it to look well used, dirty and tired. The effect we are looking for is called “weathering”.  This is where you add the everyday wear and tear effect to the plane.

There is the story of a renowned scale modeler, who had built a replica of a plane and used to visit the museum every year where the plane was kept to see what new scratches and dents there were so that he could incorporate them into his model. 

Ok well I’m not going to be that extreme, mainly due to the fact that my skills and touch in this field aren’t too clever, but I’m going to give it a go!   I have read lots of articles on this and admire the small 1/72 scale plastic models that have been weathered to look absolutely amazing.

The comments frequently used in these articles are “less is more” and “be subtle”. Anyone who knows me will realize I am going to struggle here!

Lots of techniques available here, washes, dry brushing, smudging to name a few, I will leave all the ins and outs of it all to the experts and just describe what I did. You can judge for yourself if it’s ok or not. Again where would we be today without the web and access to all this information?

As usual my first attempt was too much. I took some pastel chalks and I sandpapered some black dust onto my test piece. Using a dry brush I brushed the dust around a bit which looked ok. I then applied matt varnish. Now varnishing normally reduces the effect, but for some reason it made it look even blacker, very smudgy. Not good.  LESS IS MORE!!

The second attempt, I took the chalks (brown and black) and sandpapered specks onto the surface, almost like putting salt and pepper on your food.  I dry brushed the dust at random applied a coat of matt varnish, much better, I will post some photos soon.  No problem on a scrap piece 1” x 6”. Bit more daunting on a wing panel 12” x 60”.

Next covering job was the wings; I still had some work to do to finish the wings but covered them together with the ailerons.  You can see that the top wings are in Solartex White and the bottom wings are in Solartex Natural. The natural is easier to apply; this is probably due to the fact that as it is not prepainted it is lighter and the heat transfer more effective. The top wing is covered using two pieces. The recommendation is four pieces, top and bottom on each wing half; my preference is one piece top and bottom as I hate the centre joint. Again this is tricky to do but worth it in my opinion.

So there we are we can now see the plane starting to look the business, albeit a gaping hole at the front without an engine and cowling

The replica engine and pilot are on their way from William Bros in USA.  Once I have these we can proceed to complete the cowling.

Awesome... I feel lucky that I would be around for the maiden

Aha! Looks like a proper airplane now! Nice work, I have never been able to cover the entire wing in just two pieces, admire your skills in doing that +1 

It's coming up very well.  Looking forward to the "end result". It's going to be great, I can see!

Engines……

Those who have been following this little story will have noted the vacant bit at the front of the plane. The design shows a card and balsa cowl, which I didn’t particularly like. I have always used fiberglass cowls for my models obviously there are none commercially available for this plane.

The cowl comprises two 1/8” ply rings, outer and inner, clad in card.  The immediate problem here is getting the outer ring to match the already finished front bulkhead outline. Although I cut the ring using template from the plan, it didn’t match. I got round this by taking a piece of clear acetate sheet and attached it to the front of the bulkhead using double sided tape. I then drew the outline of the bulkhead with marker pen and cut the outer ring using this outline, I reduced the outline by 1/16” as I am not using card but 3/32 balsa for more strength and I can sand it to give a better fit.  The inner ring is a circle which is easy enough to do.

Using two pieces of 3/16” balsa formed in a “X”  the two rings are spaced at 66mm and glued centre I then fixed the balsa cladding using segments and hey presto… one cowl. The “X” former are removed now.

I fixed the engine without the exhaust and trial fitted the cowl, cutting away for the cylinder head and was really pleased with the result.  Fixing the exhaust was not so easy; the standard Saito exhaust won’t fit inside the cowling, so I used a bendy exhaust with the muffler fitted at the end and a aluminum clamp fixed to the bulkhead to keep it fixed in place.

The other aspect of the cowl is how to fix it.  Normally you fix blocks to the bulkhead and then screw through the cowl. I wanted to avoid this as it is not scale and unsightly. The plan shows wood retainers and a spring, which I didn’t like either

What I devised was a system of 3 metal “Z” sections glued to the inner ring and 3 retainer blocks glued to the bulkhead. The idea is that you offer up the cowl flat to the bulkhead, a small twist to the right and the “Z” clips and retainers engage and the cowl won’t pull out.  A small fixing screw accessed through the front of the cowl to lock the cowl in position and job done.

Getting the exhaust and cowl set up so it all fitted and worked took a while but I was happy with the result.


OK the BAD news; one thing I completely overlooked during the whole build was the engine needle valve.  My excuse for this oversight is that normally this sits in front of the bulkhead and is accessed through the cowl. In this case because I set the engine back it is sitting inside the fuselage and when I eyed up the potential exit point it is coming right in the middle of the front strut fixing.  This is not disastrous as all I need is a 1.5mm dia hole to slot a wire into the end of the needle valve but it will be a headache if hits a fixing screw. As is happened I carefully marked the point on the fuselage which I thought was right a drilled a hole and luckily it was spot on.  I silvered soldered a hex cap nut to a piece of 16g wire with a brass tube sleeve to act as the needle valve extension.

All that’s left is to fiberglass the cowl and the fit the dummy engines when they arrive.

Nice!
I also like the idea of cowl attachment as described by. May be a few picture of the attachment would help us 

I have put a couple of close ups: The Z fixing is 1mm steel about 15 x8mm bent and glued to the cowl ring. The retainers are 1/4" ply about 10 x8mm and I have cut a slot in half of the back face which receives the  Z clip as you turn it in.

You can also see the 1.5mm aluminium bracket which takes a 3mm bolt to fix to the bulkhead. I have used a T nut to take the bolt.

Hope this is clear!!!

Thanks for posting the close ups Mike that sure helps.

Painting

I have to say that this has proved to be extremely troublesome. I did mention before that using silver paint was notoriously difficult, well using acrylic silver paint has proved to be more than difficult.

I did experiment beforehand with acrylic water based paint and it looked as though it would be fine, and in all honesty it has turned out to be ok, but we did have some heartache in between!

I had used a technique before on my Gladiator to replicate the fuselage panels by gluing ordinary printing paper cut to the panel size onto the solartex covering using thinned PVA glue and then painting over with the Airfix enamel that you buy for the plastic kits. Worked like a charm.

We have a slight difference here in that the area for the panels is glass cloth and resin finish and I am going to use acrylic paint.  You can buy the aerosol spray cans but they are not fuel proof and when you apply matt varnish the silver paint reacts.

First headache;  I did wonder about sticking the paper with PVA to the resin,  but I tried it and at first it looked as though it would be ok, but as soon as the glue dried the paper just peeled off. 

Second headache; Option 2 was to use UHU glue.  I spread the glue on the paper and fixed a panel. Hey presto, looks good, but you have to be careful of the “strands” of glue getting where they shouldn’t  i.e. edges and face of the paper. Messy.

Third headache; I fixed all the panels using UHU and as per the photos look fine.  Then I applied the first coat of paint and because it is water based, the paper bubbles up where it is not glued properly…. oh dear...  anyhow I know it should all dry back again, which it does mostly, but the edges have be reglued and the painted again, it bubbles again and it started to look a mess. 

I am not happy with the result so I strip it all off to start again, of course where the glue has dried on the resin has to be sanded down again. What a Pain!!

Back to the drawing board.   I decide to reapply the panels and use cellulose sanding sealer to stop water penetrating the paper when I use the acrylic paint.

Fourth headache; The new technique works but the downside is that paint is not “man” enough to cover the sealer and needs 4-5 coats to do its work and even then its not 100%. 

I apply some charcoal weathering and a coat of matt marine varnish and decide that I disappointed with the effect and it’s not what I wanted to achieve,  at this time I am somewhat despondent.  The thought of trying to paint the whole model with this paint is depressing.

I searched in the market for some silver enamel and found two products that covered beautifully but the paint reacted badly to the matt varnish when applied.  At this point I am totally fed up and wondering why I ever started.

Anyhow, I persevered with the acrylic painting and found that using a 4” gloss roller applying the paint carefully it looks ok after 3 or 4 coats, so with renewed enthusiasm I  marched on with the painting!!

The one area of finishing a scale model where I have never been too clever at is the markings and roundels. This time I thought I try a new technique for me albeit used quite commonly by scale modelers.  For the RAF roundels I had some scrap blue solartex and white and red solarfilm.  I had bought a little tool that cut circles recently and it can cut the film really well. For the large roundel on the wing I used a saucepan lid from my wife collection as a cutting template. Using low heat I tacked the roundels on and then sanded them with 1200 wet and dry to take the gloss finish off.  Really pleased with the result.  I then did the same with the fuselage markings. For the numbering I printed out a suitable font and cut the lettering in white paper, painted them matt black and glued on with PVA. This time because your gluing to solartex it works.  The cutting-out isn’t perfect but acceptable.  All in all I think its my best effort to date but as usual still lots of room for improvement.

I have used a lot of new techniques (for me) in this model and I like to think the end result will be worth it.

The paint process has taken far longer than I anticipated and I am now just keen to complete and fly the model.

I said in my last post I had tried a lot of new techniques on this model. One of them was to simulate the rib stitching on the wings.  What is this you ask?

The full size aircraft from the 1900’s to 1930’s were mainly constructed in the same way we build models, i.e. timber framework and fabric (for our models read “film covering”!). A typical wing would have the ribs and spar construction which would then be covered in fabric. Ok the difference is that in those days they wouldn’t get a giant iron and shrink the covering as we do on our models, they would in fact stitch the fabric to the ribs. This entailed sewing a cord around the rib every 2” approx to tie the fabric to the wing structure. This stitching would be covered by gluing a thin strip of fabric along the rib.

How to replicate this? Well this method is not my idea but something I gleaned from others, but in doing this I found wasn’t as straightforward as made out but not too difficult and certainly looks the part when finished. If you want the easy way check out www.glue-it.com who sell the rib tapes already done.

We need some timber board approx ½” thick, panel pins, thread, paper and pva glue. Easy enough.

I used a board approx 9” x 12”. The full size stitch spacing was about 2” so at 1/6 scale we are looking at 5/16” or 8mm spacings.  On the two 12” edges fix the panel pins at 8mm centres.  We are going to use the pins to attach the thread across the board to create a series of parallel lines at 8mm centres.  Remember in the early part of this century this work would not be too accurate so any imperfections in our work is ok……that is my excuse and I am sticking to it!!!


Before you attach the thread, place a sheet of ordinary paper on the board, I used A4 size and fix with masking tape at each edge to prevent from lifting. This is important as I omitted this step the first time and the paper wrinkled when the glue was applied and the threads lifted. Now starting at one end attached the thread to the pins and work your way up the board (see photo).  Using a 50:50 pva water mix apply this with a brush to the paper, I found you had to keeping going back to make sure the threads stayed parallel and stuck to the paper. Let dry and repeat the gluing. You need to make sure the threads are well glued down as when you come to slice the paper up they will fall off and that’s a bit annoying.

Leave to dry out and remove the paper. If you slice a 3mm piece of the paper you have a tape with bits of thread across at 8mm spacing. Superglue this to the ribs, (BTW you are supposed to have covered the wings before this step!!!) ends and centre and you get to see the effect.  Next cut a piece of covering approx 6mm wide and this can be applied over the rib tape, what you have is the cover tape and underneath the threads give the impression of the rib stitching.  (Remember I working at 1/6 scale to the dimensions have to modified to suit your scale)

You can see in the photo the finished effect prior to painting, just another little thing to bring the aircraft to life. I was quite pleased as it was another skill learned and looked ok!

On the Gamecock I have 52 to do (104 if I do the underside)…. mmmm.

As an aside, and to show what a glutton for punishment I am, I have a 1/100 model of the ship HMS Victory waiting to be built in my retirement days… the guns alone have 3000 parts  and there are 600 plus holes (1mm dia) to be drilled to attach the securing lines for the porthole covers …. Doing 52 rib stitch tapes will be like a walk in the park!!


Finally, I did the above on a test piece before launching into the main event. I tried it on a piece of balsa, which I painted and varnished to see the finished effect. I then covered one tail plane half and fixed the ribs to get an even better idea.  Just as well cos I realized that I’d fixed the panel pins at ½” centres which is ¼ scale and so if I’d gone ahead and done the whole plane I would have been really upset.  Anyhow I decided to leave the tail plane as it is and re-jig the board at 5/16” for the main wings. This is why I am a Sunday afternoon sports modeler and not a top flight competitor!!

So all left to do now is to slice the rib stitch paper into 52 no 1/8” strips glue them to the wing and cut 52 no ¼” strips of covering material and iron them on!

Anyhow I did this over several evenings sitting in front of the telly and was really happy with result so I am pleased I decided to do it. Why not try it on your next project?


See you next time!

Lovelly Mike, the Gamecock has turned to be lovely!
I am sure you would be posting a video of the maiden.

as always, and can't wait to see it at the field.  Next week at Wakrah ?

Great build...

Awesome!! 

Final Knocks


It is always the last bits and pieces that seem to take forever !

Setting up the radio took a while and I felt the elevator was a bit stiff so I put a Hi Torque servo on this just to be sure.  I wanted to mix two channels to get the servo that moved the pilots head so that it worked with the ailerons but couldn’t get it to work. I eventually tracked it down to an extension lead failure and not my programming!  Have to say it does look cute the pilots head moving with ailerons , - almost looks as if he’s doing a preflight check… how old am I?

I finally got round to fixing the last of the fairings around the undercarriage struts, very simple technique employed here.  Instead of trying to fair pieces of balsa around the wire by making up several layers of balsa,  I fixed one piece of balsa behind the wire, chamfered it and wrapped the whole thing in solartex, easy but effective, all ready for painting.

The next thing and one of the most important – the C of G check.  As you can imagine with the planes short nose its not going to be easy to get the CG right first time and one thing I have learnt is that you have to be HONEST;  a rearward CG is going to spell disaster.  On my Gladiator I wasn’t honest and first flight was almost 3D when I touched the elevator as the CG was too far back.  I ended up putting lots of lead in the nose and I was really unhappy about it but the next flight the plane was transformed from being almost unflyable to a trainer,  flew as if on rails. Lesson learnt.

I knew that I would need to put weight in the nose but used more than I expected to get the CG right and spent a while making sure that the CG was ok, it is so easy to say  “yeah that’ll do” and then suffer the consequences.

Fixing the bottom hatch proved to be a hassle as I forgot about the undercarriage struts restricting the access to fix the hatch.  In the end I ran the battery charge lead to the cockpit and just accepted I would have to remove the two rear strut attachments if I need to get the hatch off and on. Not so bad if the charge lead is accessible in the cockpit.

At this point the plane is weighing in at about 11lbs.  My Gloster Gladiator was 10lbs with a 56” span, so with the Gamecock at 60” span should ok.  Scale experts will say that the heavier the plane the more stable it becomes but the key is the correct CG.

I have some final bits to do such as the bracing wires between the struts, the underwing fuel tanks and so on but these can wait until the maiden flight.

Well it took just over 14 months and a lot a work, a project not for the faint hearted. You would have to have a few “from plan” builds and scale model projects before you tried this one. 

I think it looks good, I hope it will fly ok and I am at present “all modelled out!!!!” 

I confess that I did receive yesterday the plans for the new Tony Nijhuis 72” Spitfire ….. and I have tried 2 spitfires before and not had any success. This may be one!!!

Awesome

Missed you at the field today.  It was not windy at all till about 8am, even though yesterday evening was !

Let me know if you want to go another time this weekend... would love to see this one in action

Lovely!.. 

It was a great day at the field, seeing this beauty go up in the air !  Mike will be posting videos and pictures soon, I hope

Absolutely do not want to steal his thunder with details... just want to build up the anticipation 

Love that sepia tint picture. Evocative. Waiting eagerly for the video and more pictures

Lift Off!!

I’ve been thinking about this day for a while now.  I ran the engine during the week and that’s was fine.

No excuses now with Anwar and Jamal on hand to help, we fire up the Saito 91FS which starts first time,  small tweak to the needle, grab the camera whilst Jamal is holding her.  Point the plane into the wind, open the throttle, tracking straight, I can tell immediately I am going to need all of the Saito’s power to get her off, tail up, ease the elevator back, the moment of truth, will she twitch, roll, dip… none of it, nice and stable, wings level climbing away.  Few click of up trim on the elevator and she’s flying well. Few circuits for the camera and steady my nerves, feels very very satisfying.

Time to land, nice wide approach, she is not a floater that’s for sure, but solid, can I keep the nose from tipping on touch down, will the home made undercarriage work?  Down fairly solidly tail settles and stays put and she rolls to a stop.

The plane was a pleasure to fly and over the next few weeks as I get used to her I will enjoy her even more.

JOB DONE!

My thanks to Anwar and Jamal for their help, support and encouragement and to EVERYBODY for their kind comments during this build. I hope you enjoyed it and took something from it. Now I can relax a bit, I go back to what I said at the beginning - just have fun !

Over and out!!
 

Mike yes, Job done! Congratulations
But then you need to get cracking on that 72" Spit from Mr. Nijhuis stable. I am sure you would do a build thread here. I  have been eyeing the short kit (with mouldings) for some time now ever since I got my copy of free plan with RCM&E 

Mike - We are waiting for the "heads to turn" at the sight of the pilot... hope Youtube is busy processing your video

Funny you should mention that:




hot off the press! Haven't even looked at it on youtube myself yet! 

Thanks for posting these... Still photos can never do complete justice to something like this

And for the effort of getting those lines on all the ribs !  You must be the most patient man on earth !

And like our Qatari friend aptly put it, part of the kudos go to your "government" too ! ("Which government ?" someone asks...  "HOME government !" says the Qatari friend )

Anwar,
Your Qatari friend very aptly put it. All of us owe it to them. 

the pilot in that plane is just awesome 

Ahhh! Lovely video's. The take off was very stately and the climbout very scale (like a period fighter).
But I must say that shiny metal piece at the cowl stands out like a sore thumb amongst all that nice looking open rocker arms.
Maybe taking off those rocker covers would give a better look (but then do not know how bad would be sand and dirt ingestion there) 

What to do!!

Here's a flyby shot.

I did wish for better camera equipment at one point... sad thing is that we did not carry to the field what we already had

But there will be better days ahead, after inter-wing struts are in place etc.

Mike the model looks splendid. You have put in so much of effort and it had resulted in a priceless piece of work. Brilliant build mate

Mike, please post pictures of the small scale add-ons you have done recently

More Add-ons  Already its EXTREME scale modeling. Mike  

Not according to Mike.  He says he has been to a few scale competitions as a spectator, and he said he would get less than 200 points out of 1000 for this one, while some champion scale builders would score close to 980 !

Yes Anwar that is right. While Mike's work is good the model he has built and the details added though consuming lot of time and require painstaking efforts are not what would be required to compete for a trophy at FAI sanctioned scale event.
To begin with the plan is not scale, it is sports scale. Most of Gordon Whiteheads plan are in sport scale category where he specializes in good flying and close resembelancne to the subject being modelled rather than scale fidelity. His models are good everyday flying model, unlike the 1000 hr pure scale job which get flown mostly at comps. 
This does not belittle Mike's effort in any way and his skills are far above most of us here on the forum or many who would be at any flying field.
He has done a great job on a great design

Apologies for not replying to Anwars request for some detail photos. I have just finished adding the two underwing fuel tanks and piping and cross strut braces. I also changed the windscreen as I wasn't happy. I did say that one thing about this type of building was you could add bits and peices at your leisure. Anyhow I think that's it.  It flies great, I actually started aerobatics last time out and I love to just "gloat" over it. Can't be bad!!

In the photos you can see the nav lights, made from balsa and litho sheet. The strut bracing, this is from stainless steel fishing wire, swivels, brass tube and m2 nuts and bolts, fully adjustable. The tailplane bracing is not functional. The new windscreen is from cardboard and clear plastic, my "new" method for windcsreens!

The pitot tube on the front strut is brass tube and piano wire. The small prop on the leading edge of this wing is balsa and screams when flying. I understand the Stuka dive bombers had these little props that use to make a real loud screaming noise when in a dive and terrify people on the ground. You can see why.

Mike - missed you at the field today !

Please put in some details on what you did to "weather" this model.

awesome mikey, reminded me Albert Ball, Mick Mannock and the aces hay days, thanks to RC can re-live those now. did i say ? gr8 build.

As noted in another thread, Mike has moved back to the UK.  He did mention he will be in touch on RC India.

Hello

As Anwar has stated I am now in the UK back from the warmer climes of Doha.

After waiting for a couple of months to get my gear I have now joined a club and thought you would be interested to see the environment and landing strips - somewhat different to Doha and I have certainly had to tighten up my landing approach skills!

I put this video not to show the plane (my trusty extra wot) but the strips and surrounding areas. so forgive the poor coverage of the flying!!

The grass strips are lovely but not too kind on retracts, for those who followed the build of my Gloster Gamecock I wouldn't fly this plane from these strips as the landing would be too tricky with the spongy grass. I have flow my Tiger Moth from here and as usual looked lovely and was pleasure to fly.

Happy building and Safe flying to all!!

Great to hear from you Mike !  Glad to see you enjoying what you seem to enjoy best

Hope you get to build something new... and see a build thread for the same here !

Nice to see my favorite  thread still alive Mike. Persistence and Patience are best friend of a flyer! Keep the destiny Bird for a good day, so that you may show the flying fraternity, one of marvels of good times, flying.

All the best for fighting all the temptations

Hello !!! this is my first post on RCIndia. I am also building the Gloster Gamecock from the same plan but am going to use electric power so thought I miight start a build thread showing any differences to Mike's model. I started this project a couple of years ago !! but got distracted bt now I wish to finish it eventually. It will be a long job and the posts might be intermittent but I am determined not to start any other builds. Some pictures of the lower wing build. I am using 1/4 x 1/8 spars to save wieght.

Really great project

Welcome to RC India Chris

You should get in touch with Mike. Not sure if he is still around Edinburgh (or some city up north, from what I can remember).

All the best for your build.  Would love to see a maiden video soon !

Chris good luck with this build. If I can help in anyway let me know! It will definitely be worth all the effort!! Hi Anwar, now in Dubai, certainly miss the flying gang in Doha!

Hi Mike... great to hear from you again

Are you flying at all in Dubai ? Nad El Sheba ?

Haven't flown for a while but have done some flying at Nad El Sheba, very close to a busy highway which is a bit off putting! There is another strip towards Al Ain which I need to check out. Currently building (very slowly) a Mick Reeves Spitfire 63" - a 30 year old kit which I bought off ebay. When I opened the box there was some interesting odours!!! All good stuff. Hows the flying in Qatar these days? (sorry gone a bit off topic here but great to catch up!!)

We are mostly flying at the main club in Al-Khor itself, now that both the highway and the approach road to the RC field have been made better.  Fair amount of activity on weekends, although I personally had a long hiatus of many months due to work/travel and just started getting back in the past couple of weeks.

Best wishes on your new build ! Hope to see the beauty in progress and the maiden.

Hello all,
I am currently undertaking this same project of building the  Gloster Gamecock, however I had enlarged the plans to 125% which gives it a wingspan of 72inches. this is the only build thread that I had found on the web so I have saved it and will use it to reference my build.  The present stage of my build is cutting the ribs, only 44 to go,  all the rest of the parts have now been done.
I will be making a few mods as I go along such as adding aluminium wing tubes for the lower wing sections , all rear controls to be pull pull, and power will be a inverted 26cc gas engine.....BTW Mike , that's a very nice job , hope its still flying.

Cheers
Rick....Sydney Aust