CL-415 winter project.

[Papa]

Still can't see the picture??Jack.

[wollins]

It's there Jack, attached to post 295.

[Papa]

Sorry did not look that far up.


I know. You're going to drop squinkies instead of water and have them blow the fire out.


Ingenious.


Jack.

[wollins]

Ah you guys are good!    I'm gonna make the bubble windows with that packaging.

Colin

[wollins]

Ok so I was looking the plane over and realized that I hadn't yet blended the TE into the fuse.  See the plans just called for the wing basically to just sit atop the fuse. See pic #1 and 2 below.

As you can see there was no smooth transitions between the wing and the fuse both front and back. (LE and TE) So what I had done to rectify this was I added a "fairing" or "lip" at the front of the wing saddle to create a more seamless transition from the wing to the fuse. This "lip" created a couple of positives but also a negative.  The positive was the blending and it also served as a partial attachment point that helped to hold the wing down even if I didn't have wing bolts.  See pic #3 below. 

The negative was that the angle of the lip caused the wing to sit further back on the fuse, (about a quarter of an inch) so that it now overlapped the back of the wing saddle by that amount. See pic #4.

It looked fine like that and made no difference in flight (since I adjusted the CG point to allow for this) but it always bothered me cosmetically.    After all, the full size has that blended/smooth transition from wing to fuse! (see pic #5) So, I decided to fix it. 

Check back for my simple fix. 

Colin

[piker]

The suspense is killing us!

[wollins]

Pics won't be uploaded for another hour ... I'm working as fast as I can! lol!

[wollins]

Here ya go. Now doesn't that look better? 

Colin

[wollins]

Still waiting on my decals from Callie Graphics.  If I get them tomorrow, the plane will be 100% completed for Sunday's funfly! Whew!  That would make it 7 months and 1 week from start to finish.    Applying striping, windows, doors, wing fences and possibly faux wheels as we speak!

Colin

[piker]

Wow!  You're getting fancy.

I'm glad we'll be able to fly together, finally, on Sunday.  Too bad it's not from water 

[wollins]

Ok as promised ... TANKER 273 is FINALLY 100% DONE. As true to scale as within my capabilities. Walk around video to be uploaded within the hour.

Colin

[sihinch]

That looks amazing Colin! Congrats. 

[Papa]

I love the mock wheels.


Great looking!


jack.

[wollins]

Thanks guys! Here's the vid. http://youtu.be/bkELuPZqEQc

Colin

[wollins]

Nice to have recognition from your peers! Well, this is the official end to this build thread. Thanks to everyone who have contributed their encouragement, comments and suggestions (especially the veterans ... you know who you are!  ) throughout the last seven months ... they certainly have helped me to create this bird.

Thanks to even the "lurkers" who I would only know of when they would come up to me at the field and mention the 415 in some way or another. SPECIAL thanks to Robert (Pike) for without his support and encouragement this would not have even gotten off the building board! Robert has truly been a mentor to me in this hobby from the time we met almost twelve years ago at a funfly in Richmond Hill.  As such it was especially exciting to have a formation flight with him and his CL-215 today. Sort of a fitting climax to the build I thought.   

So ... what have I learned in my first ever balsa build?  A LOT! Here are my main mistakes and what I'm gonna do to rectify them in my next build ...

- Use CA accelerator judiciously! (Makes for a cleaner build! )
- ONLY fiber glass the bottom half of your tip floats! (save yourself LOT of headache and WEIGHT!)
- Don't fiber glass more than is absolutely necessary. (makes for a lot lighter plane!)
- Wet out the surface FIRST when laying down heavy weight fiber glass, THEN lay down the glass. (no air bubbles this way)
- Make clean cut pieces of your glass cloth for glassing large areas. (eliminates ragged overlaps which cause a LOT of problems getting it smooth ... and even later in the filling and sanding stage)
- Plan your build two to three stages ahead so as to avoid costly (time and money) "rectifications" later on.
- Use a sanding block as opposed to a flexible sander like a sanding sponge.
- Build AS LIGHT AS YOU CAN AT EVERY STAGE of the build, even if you're ahead of the game (weight wise) and any one stage.
- Resist the temptation to rush the build.
- Resist the temptation to rush your paint job.
- Don't be lazy ... take the trouble to match your color properly if your trying to match painted surfaces to your covering.
- Don't write on the wood ... with lighter covering colors, it might show right through the covering!
- Plan at least 6 months for a build. (At MY pace that is! lol!)

And last but most importantly ... DON'T PICK A COMPLICATED PLANE FOR YOUR FIRST EVER BUILD! lol!
     
Colin.

P.S This was awesome practice for my "real" build later this year.  The Grumman HU-16B Albatross! I invite you to follow along with me again ... if you have the stomach for another marathon! lol!