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Rick, if you go to the home page, there is a tab "L-19" ; if you put your cursor there, a drop-down opens up that will take you to a gallery of restored planes, as well as a gallery of pictures showing the restoration process. This place even sells "renovated" BirdDogs ($165K), the line forms at the rear .
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Club Saito #2, WACO Brotherhood #20. What other trouble can I get into?
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Ken, the skin views you mean must be the iso. views in the parts catalog. I can't find any plan or elevations of the skins.
Yep, the photos of the restored planes are great, for sure. I would sure love to visit the factory and take some pictures of the restorations in progress.
Any photos of your cowling yet? I'm anxious to see how you hinged it.
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Yeah, Rick; there's a diagram in the parts area that shows an outline of the individual skins and how they overlapped. Perfect for applying scale panels and getting the overlaps correct.
Still have some work to do on the cowl. the lower access panels remain to be done, but here is the top "hood" panels, with the piano hinges in place.
1st two pics are the cowl with cut lines marked; 3rd pic shows strips of 1/64 ply epoxied to the inside of the cowl overlapping the cut lines. These are for gluing 1/32 ply over after the panels are cut free. The 1/32 will get sanded flush with the outside surface of the cowl, and serve as a place to glue the "hood" panels back to. Since the panels are cut free with a rotary blade that is 1mm wide, the panels have to have something to fit over, so the edge has to be built back up. Pic 4 shows the panel cut free and the 1/32 ply in place. The last two pictures show the hood panels epoxied back in place, with the hinges. I used 12 minute epoxy, it has a working time long enough to get it all smeared where it has to be, but quick enough set time so I don't have to hold the panel in place very long. I used clamps, masking tape, and both hands to hold the panel in place while the epoxy set. After gluing both panels in place, I used finishing resin and applied two layers of 3/4 oz fiberglass cloth over the joints from the inside, including over the hinges. very last pic shows profile view of full-scale cowl.
< Message edited by khodges -- 2/27/2008 3:39:05 AM >
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Club Saito #2, WACO Brotherhood #20. What other trouble can I get into?
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My goodness gracious, you are an artist. While I am recooping my health, it is just wonderful to see your work. Ken, your a magician, and you certainly bring a smile to my face. I thank you for that. I'm better but I need a few more days to rest and be well enough to continue work on my "Dawg". I missed the picture with the hinges. Chic
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Oooops, I spoke tooooo soon. I now see the pictures with the hinges. They are going to work so well. We made the right choice Ken, my set of hinges came in the mail today. They 2nd day the shipment because of their screwup. Can't wait to get back to work. Chic
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Well Hey, Chic. Good to hear from you. I was going to start checking the obits if you didn't post soon . That cowl is one job I'll be glad to have behind me. You wouldn't believe how I looked after cutting those panels free. There was fine white dust everywhere. I had my respirator on, my magnifying visor in place (so I can see what I'm doing) and it looked like I'd been out in the snow.
I forgot to mention in the last post that I took a sanding drum on my dremel tool and thinned the panels from the edges to about 3/4" back, so when they were glued down, they would have a more realistic thickness in the revealed edge. It's kind of hard to see in the unfinished fiberglass how the edges look. When I get the lower access panels done, I'll fine sand everything and shoot a coat of primer and take some more pics. I looked closely at the profile shot of the full-scale cowl; counted the individual fingers on the lower access panel hinges and then counted the same number on the scale hinge for the length I need in that location.. It looks like about 4.75mm would be perfect, so the 5mm ones we have couldn't be any closer.
Just for kicks, here are a few of the diagrams from that B'Dog repair site, from the parts catalog. they aren't the highest resolution, so you can only enlarge them slightly, but they still are some of the best detailing aids I've seen.
< Message edited by khodges -- 2/27/2008 4:16:54 AM >
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I'm beginning to wonder if all this detailing is worth it . If I detail one part, such as the access panels on the cowl, I'm sort of obligated to make the panel lines and rivets too. Still gotta figure out the how part.
I have one of the lower panels sort of complete; after mocking it up and drilling for the screws, I think it isn't going to be practical to make the lower access panels functional. It can be made to work, but the screw holes will eventually wallow out if the panels are removed much. The screws are also fairly small, and the panel itself wants to stay flat instead of conforming to the curvature of the cowl. I tried a piece of aluminum lithoplate for the panel, but it's so thin the edge doesn't give a scale "relief" when screwed in place. Then I cut a piece of 1/32" ply and it looks much better. I would also have had an issue with fastening the hinge to the aluminum. While it's not too difficult to make one material mimic another, sometimes it's impractical or near impossible to make one material ACT like another.
The small screws are #1 sheet metal (or wood) screws. They look very close to the screws holding the full scale panel in place, except those screws are plain slotted, instead of Phillips. Oh, well; at least I could match the pattern of how they are placed. here are some pics, showing the cutout of the cowl, and the panel in place with the screws and hinge. I won't permanently mount this until I paint, so I can prime around the face of the panel, and not get paint on the screws.
I have some tiny brass brads I got at A.C.Moore in the dollhouse area. They are only 1/4 inch long and have a tiny head; I will probably use them to "hold" the hinge in place, as you can see in the full-scale pic. They might also wind up being the rivets on most of this model, if I can't figure out a better way. These things are so small, a thousand of them wouldn't weigh anything. Of course, it will probably take 100,000.
< Message edited by khodges -- 2/28/2008 3:57:38 AM >
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Club Saito #2, WACO Brotherhood #20. What other trouble can I get into?
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quote:
ORIGINAL: khodges
The small screws are #1 sheet metal (or wood) screws. They look very close to the screws holding the full scale panel in place, except those screws are plain slotted, instead of Phillips. Oh, well; at least I could match the pattern of how they are placed......
Ken, Microfastners have the #1 screws with a slot head instead of phillips. This link takes you strait to that page of the online catalog. They have a couple flavors to chose from.
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Thanks, Rick. I'm getting ready to make a big Microfasteners order; the small screws I have came from them, but I didn't have any of the slotted ones, will add that to the order. I'm off work tomorreow, hope I can get a lot done on a long weekend.
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Club Saito #2, WACO Brotherhood #20. What other trouble can I get into?
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Made a big Microfasteners order today; there hasn't been so little money paid for so many screws since the '60s on Hay Street in Fayetteville, NC (I hope all you Army S.E. Asia Vets remember that from your Fort Bragg days)
I worked on and off all afternoon and evening, but it doesn't seem like I got anything done. I finished up the lower access panels on the cowl, and worked on a couple of panel lines where the front part of the full scale cowl attaches to the sides. It's hard to show them in a picture, but when the cowl is primed, they should show better.
I have the "hood" latches about half done. I cut out slots on each end of each side of the hood panels and glued a piece of 1/64 ply behind them. Then I carved the latches from basswood stock and covered them with aluminum HVAC tape. I still have a small bracket to make which will hold a small safety clip. There are some small body clips for r/c cars which should work well here; I'll pick some up tomorrow at the LHS.
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Club Saito #2, WACO Brotherhood #20. What other trouble can I get into?
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All Forums >> RC Airplanes >> RC Warbirds and Warplanes >> RE: 25% Cessna L-19/0-1 Bird Dog build 
RE: 25% Cessna L-19/0-1 Bird Dog build - 
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(I hope all you Army S.E. Asia Vets remember that from your Fort Bragg days) 
