SLINGSBY DART 17R 1/3 SCALE

[Laurent Beldame]

Therefore we all assume that Mrs Williams (certainly an holy spouse!)knows where the iron is ...

L

[loopingfred]

Well, she knows now that he can use it !

[cw]

Madame Williams knows where everything is...!

Moving to the front of the fuselage now:

The outer planking is covered with car body filler and sanded roughly to shape...




We have to start removing the temporary formers... (Note glassing in between the formers to hold the planking together)




Note the hole on the former to allow a finger to be inserted to pull it out!




Cleaning up with a power file..




Ready now to fully glass the interior...

[patte de loup]

Hi Chris,

It can't be more clear
Is the car body feeler named "Sinthofer ". Or what's it ? Polyester resin?
Soft? Easy to sand?
Pat'

[Arnaudo]

Hello Chris,

Very pleased to see you on the forum. Having a look at your new building, reminds me the begining of the fuselage of the Minimoa. Building like ships.

Hope to see you one day, may be in ireland. If i succeed to build the Minimoa in lest than 4 years

Arnaud

[cw]

Pat, over here it is called this. It is easy to sand soon after it cures (5mins) but gets harder the longer you leave it...




Arnaud, it would be good to see your Minimoa in Ireland. 4 years is a long time, maybe this build log for my new Minimoa will help...?

http://www.rcgroups.com/forums/showthread.php?t=660340&highlight=minimoa

[Arnaudo]

Chris,

I am building the 1/4 scale model i bought threw traplet. So this is your plan
Started the log on retroplane.net on 02/2006

Arnaud

[cw]

Keep building Arnaud...!

Now we must properly glass the inside of the fuselage (note card template)





A bit more filler on the outside to soothe the soul





Now to play with the retract...





Making the retract doors...2 pieces of 0.75mm plywood are laminated together with epoxy and taped to the bottom of the fuselage to get the correct shape...

[cw]

Now the doors are fitted and held shut with torsion springs...




Time now to check on progress...




Starting on the wing/fuselage fairing...




More of the same...

[GuillaumeG]

Hi Chris,
it's still nice and quick as usual! Your building is very efficient! I would like to ask you if you could make some close-up pictures of your retract system, and of the doors springs.
Keep going!
Thanks

[cw]

Gillaume, I should say that this build started earlier this year back in March and we are not up to the present date yet...!

The door hinging and springing I have copied from a Graupner Swift kit I built a few years ago. The doors have a brass tube epoxied to them and the retaining rods run through tubes in the fuselage so that they can be easily removed at any time. The torsion springs are just fine piano wire, also retained by small brass tubes as shown by the black arrows...

The retract is a standard Multiplex item...

[GuillaumeG]

Thank you Chris that's clear (the same system is used in F3k for hinges of rudder for example).

Last question, how the doors remains "enough" opened, as it's the wheel going down which pushes them?

[cw]

Gillaume, the doors rest against the retract legs: I have not yet worked out a method to make them open wider...

Meanwhile, before we can make the wing fairing over the centre of the wing, we must first make up the canopy frame to create the correct shape.

First, the starboard (right hand) rail must be hinged up...(Pressing the rail against the hinges marks the masking tape so that you know exactly where to drill the holes)







Now the rest of the frame can be made. The rear former is made up from laminations of .75mm plywood to obtain the correct shape...




The joints are reinforced with hardwood, to be trimmed up later




Drilling the holes for the locating peg to ensure that the canopy closes in the same place every time



Now the joints are reinforced with thin piano wire pegs...

[cw]

Now that the canopy frame is assembled, we can start to make the wing/fuselage fairing...

1st, we make up blanks from 12mm balsa sheet



The balsa blanks are glued to a .75mm plywood base




The wood is sanded roughly to shape, and body filler is applied to get it all to the final smooth shape




et voila...

[cw]

Now the outer wing panels must be made...

1st job: the wing joiner box (2 x 14mm flat brass boxes)




The wing box must be made while it is attached to the centre wing panel to ensure that the steel blades line up properly




Now we must make sure that the root rib lines up properly too




Once the bottom of the wing panel has been sheeted, it will be placed on these supports to keep it straight and true

[cw]

The wing is now laid on the supports and weighed down after taping the upper sheeting into place...




Time to rig again...




Well, we are catching up now: this was only five weeks ago... (I remember it well, it stopped raining for 5 whole minutes)

[patte de loup]

Chris,

The grass is perfect...... the glider is beautifull too
If I am not wrong, you use red brick as weight during the sheeting. Do you dismantle your workshop .
BTW congratulations for this professional building eager to follow it on this forum.
Pat'

[cw]

Do you dismantle your workshop
No Pat, I dismantle my neighbour's house

Attention now moves to the front of the fuselage, where it is always best to get some lead as far forward as possible...




Now we return once more to the car body filler...




We use a bit at a time as it can get very hot...!




Almost there...




All we need now is to make a hole for the brass tube that will connect to the tow release...

[GuillaumeG]

Nice, your garden is just big enough to display your glider! Do not build bigger
Still very nice

[Laurent Beldame]

How fast you build.. Impressive, retirement cannot explain everything for sure..
Your garden becomes well known throughout the years with all the models you built and presented...How is your daughter? Am serious :we all saw her when you presented the Petrel.. in the garden :lol:Nice I must say...

A part from our chap JP Voisin comes to visit us during his holidays. I should have the great pride to count him as passenger tomorrow (weather permitting) in the Duo Discus of the club..

Bravo et bonne construction + my to Sir Barry..

L

[cw]

Gillaume, the size of the garden is not a problem...the size of my tiny workshop is...!

Laurent, it 4 years yet before I can retire from my work...then I will really get going

My youngest daughter is finally getting married next year

Please send the regards of Barrington Smallpiece and myself to Jean-Pierre?

[cw]

Where the .75mm plywood joins on the fuselage there must be some 3mm sq spruce strip to spread the load. The slots are cut with 3 blades taped together on the hacksaw...




Time now to attend to some of the electrical jobs inside the fuselage...




Now some more plywood can be added to one side...

[Laurent Beldame]

[erwan]

Tu as fait un vol en onde avec JPV ??

On va sans doute en entendre parler d'ici quelques jours sur le terrain

Erwan

[cw]

Laurent...NICE!

Attention now moves to the Dart's empennage...

The All-Moving-Tail actuator is made from aluminium




Fitting the tube for the TEK probe




Sanding the rudder flush with the fin...

[cw]

Component parts of one AMT tailplane blade. (The 'D'section is made up from solid balsa with a 1.5mm plywood plate)






Tailplane completed




Complete unit now ready to offer up the fuselage

[caralp_laurent]

Hi Chris !
Beautiful work, and so fast...

Lolométéo

[cw]

Thank you Laurent, but we are nearly in real-time now...!

Setting up the tailplane at 1.5 degrees negative to the wing...




Drawing around the tailplane root to set up the glueing of the root fairings on the fin




Aiframe is now nearing completion...

[cw]

No progress yesterday...flew the Schweizer 2-32 off the hill instead...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lHAbVlmXRJ8

[ultralajt]

Nice presentation of building proces!





BTW, I cant help myself, being notty :





Man behind a camera: "Hey, I can`t capture whole wing on the photo! Go one step backwards, please! "