JSF-TC

My Feedback: (2)

Latest Update

The ailerons were cut out and hinged using the same method as the elevators and rudder. Servo boxes were cut out and lined with 1/16th ply. 8411 servos will be used for the ailerons, mounted flat on their side, but after studying options for the flap servos, I opted for JR 9411 mid sized servos mounted upright just aft of the landing gear. I would have liked to have mounted them on their side as well, but I was worried about the amount of wing that would have been cut away, leaving almost nothing aft of the wing jointer tube. Mounting it upright was I thought the best compromise. Not quite as neat an installation, but better that than a wing failure.

Last but not least for the wing was the fitting of wing pylon attachment points. I cut out 1/8th ply disks and attached a 4/40 captive nut on the back side, stuck a small piece of parcel tape over the nut to prevent the glue getting into the threads and epoxied them into the wing. Not sure if I’ll use them, but it was easy enough to install now, rather than later.

I think I’m now at the point where I can cover the wings. I plan on using 2oz carbon cloth from CST on the lower surface to restore the strength over all the cut-outs, and 0.7oz carbon tissue on the upper surface. That will give me two layers of carbon for each skin. Over the carbon I’ll lay some glass cloth for the final finish layer.



Paul

Dave Matthews

Hi Paul,

Nice Hunter build. I am doing the same one myself at the moment for a friend. He bought his a while ago too.


Davie

David Gladwin

I have a Westbury Hunter for sale, much of the work done including LE extensions, flaps. etc. too many projects, too little time I am retired now ! PM for further details,
Regards,
David Gladwin.

JSF-TC

My Feedback: (2)

Hi Davie,

Post some pictures please.

Paul

Dave Matthews

more on a later posting

JSF-TC

My Feedback: (2)

Looking good Davie,

Two questions for you or maybe David G.

1) How are you going to retain the wings. I've never seen a kit which shows a wing retention method. I don't want to rely on just plugging them in.

2) Are you going to use the method described in the plans to hold down the duct cover over the engine. The rear edge is very close to the fuselage skin and doesn't give much room to work. Also, given that lack of space between the duct and the fuselage hatch, I haven't yet worked out how to retain the rear edge of the outer hatch. Any ideas?

Keep us all posted.

Paul

Dave Matthews

Hi Paul,

Ok here is the method used in the hunter that you see pics of in the instructions. Todate it has had about 200 flights over the past 7-8 years. Most of them were competition flights and the method of fixing you can see in the pics (below) has never let go.




Ok, the inner hatch is mounted as you see in the instructions, with the outer hatch fitted (again as per instructions) as you can see in the pic below. Again these hatches have NEVER let go in flight and the outer edges of the outer hatch don't flap about in the breeze.

Any other questions, please feel free to ask.

JSF-TC

My Feedback: (2)

Hi Davie,

Thanks a lot. That model looks very nice. It sets the standard that hopefully I can aim to achieve with mine.

The wing retention method is similar to what I was envisioning. With your reassurance, I will probably now go with your method for the hatches.

Thanks and take care

Paul

Dave Matthews

Hi Paul,

The pics of the red,white and blue model above, are ones of the guy who did the instructions. Mine is in primer at the moment so we can BOTH see if we can do these Hunters justice.

With mine I am filling a few of the mould and join lines on the fuselage at the moment and then I am down to surface detail.

Anyway, how are you finding the build on yours so far. I noticed you found that it is not quite scale in a few areas too.


Davie

Dave Matthews

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JSF-TC

My Feedback: (2)

Hi Davie,

Nice photos.

I'm really enjoying the build. In no way can you call it a quick build kit, and I've had to scratch my head a few times to work out the best way to do some parts. It is definitely develping my building skills, and especially helped by a lot of tips and techniques that have been posted here on RCU.

ARFs definitely have their place, but I think that the good old build your own models are now easily overlooked in the rush to have something to fly today. Building your own may or may not work out to be cheaper than an ARF, but to me the building phase is as equally rewarding and is a good way to unwind after a busy day at work.

Keep us all posted on your progress

Cheers

Paul

Dave Matthews

Hi Again Paul,

Here are some pics of what she looks like after the weekend in with my spray gun. Spraying all the marking during this week.

Davie

Dave Matthews

Anyway, got to get it finished by this thursday night as . . .moving house next week ! ! ! ! ! No more work on it for 4-5 weeks as I get into the new place.

Haldor

My Feedback: (5)

Looking awesome

CJ2002

Super job, Dave!

Good luck with the move...going far?

Cheers,

Dick
England

PS...see you in Hungary

Dave Matthews

Hi Dick,

Falling off the face of the planet . . . . well sort of, if you know what I mean. Will keep you in the loop.

Dave

CJ2002

Gotcha! Speak soon.

Rgds,

Dick

JSF-TC

My Feedback: (2)

I’ve spent the last month applying the carbon and glass covering to all of the surfaces. This was the first time that I’ve used carbon along with the glass, and I’m really impressed with the results. I used 2oz carbon on the lower wings for maximum strength, and 0.5oz carbon tissue on the top surface to try to minimize the weight. After completing each surface of the first wing, I weighed them and discovered that the tissue surface was twice as heavy as the lower surface with the cloth. The savings in cloth weight must be outweighed by the extra epoxy that the tissue absorbs. After this, I did the other wing the same, but all the other surfaces I used the 2oz carbon cloth exclusively. After all parts were completed, the total weight gain for the whole model was exactly 1lb. I was surprised to find that the wings were within 1/8oz of each other.

The stub fin molded into the fuselage was approximately 3/16in fatter than the finished fin. To get the two to match, I split the stub fin on the fuselage, and cut out a centre section and clamped them back together and glassed over on the inside. Now it matches the fin and it should blend in with only a small amount of filler.

The parachute fairing as supplied was the wrong shape, but was easily trimmed to fit. I was tempted to fit a functional brake chute, but the space is too small to do a good job. Maybe a later upgrade.

Total weight of the model covered and sitting on its wheels is 13lb 13oz. Finished target weight is around 20lb.


Paul

JSF-TC

My Feedback: (2)

Next on the list were the landing gear doors. Everything went smoothly and I had all the fuselage mounted doors (2 for the nose wheel and one each for the inner main wheel doors) installed as well as the main gear door air rams. Each door has a removable pin so that almost all of the hinge assemblies can be removed. The hinge blocks were CA’d to the fuselage, and the hinge arms are screwed to the doors using poly ply screws. Receiving sockets for the hinge arms were molded into the doors after cutting away areas of the foam lining.

Trouble started after I installed the nose retract unit and strut. I had forgotten that the retract unit sits almost in contact with the bottom of the fuselage, leaving no room for the rear nose gear door hinge assembly. I also noticed that the nose retract unit does not sit totally square, and when retracted, the nose gear is off centre by about 1/8th inch, enough to prevent it going through the door opening. I will have to remake the complete nose gear mounting assembly to correct both problems, by raising the mounting plates 1/4 inch to give clearance for the door.

Not much progress for the next few weeks as I'm headed back to the UK for some vacation.

Paul

JSF-TC

My Feedback: (2)

It’s been a while since I managed to grab some time to do much work on the Hunter. Also it being over 100F in the garage does not make slaving away all that pleasant this time of year. What little I have managed has seemed to take forever. I have permanently fixed the tailplane and fin onto the fuselage, and blended the joint with filler. I made the tail bullet fairing from some laminated balsa which I hand rough shaped and then finished by turning it down in my pillar drill. After covering with glass/ epoxy I attached it to the base of the fin.

The conformal fuel tank turned out well, for only my second attempt at home made Kevlar tanks. It holds 28oz, but now that I’ve got most of the equipment installed, I think I could remake it and get probably 40oz capacity. With my home made tank and one from Gary at JetTech, I have a total of 96oz plus the UAT.

I have spent hours trying to come up with the best radio installation. I think what I’ve ended up with is a reasonable compromise between neatness and maintainability. The batteries and UAT are mounted well forward and the air valves and Rx are below the cockpit with the ECU mounted aft of the cockpit next to the fuel tanks between the inlets. I will leave running the wires and air lines until after painting.

I have started adding some details to the fuselage. Scale access panels have been cut out which will enable me to attach the thrust tube to the rear of the ducting. There are several prominent NACA inlets on the fuselage, so I have molded the curved sidewalls from glass/ epoxy, and will make up the inlets from these and some polyply, before gluing them to the fuselage.

To disguise the control surface hinge piano wires, I made some fairings that blend the ends of the wires into the tips of the elevators and rudder. These were lined with thin polyply to give an almost invisible join line. They are a snug push fit and should not slide out in flight. Just the ailerons to go with these.

Paul

JSF-TC

My Feedback: (2)

Slow progress over the last few months, but I’m now into the painting stage. I’ve applied about 3 layers of PPG K-36 primer, rubbing down hard between layers. The fuselage had some pits and bubbles below the surface which required filling, and as I opened up the bubbles, the finish layer of epoxy started to peel away, uncovering quite large areas of the glass cloth below. With enough filler I have managed to hide all of the defects. Even though I washed the surfaces down before I started, I’ve had a couple of areas where the K-36 has cracked which has required rubbing down and recoating. Hopefully I have caught all of these areas before I detail the surface.

I have been experimenting with adding surface details to the wings, prior to trying it on the fuselage. Using aluminum tape I have cut out the access panels, and then added fastener details with some sharpened brass tube. Panel lines were marked out and 1/32inch wide tape was laid down. A heavy coat of K-36 was then applied over the tape lines and when dry I removed the tape. A light sand with 300 grit used wet resulted in a very presentable representation of the panel lines. Next step will be to try to burn in some rivet details prior to the color coat.


Paul

JSF-TC

My Feedback: (2)

I can’t believe it’s been 10 months since I posted the last update. I knew things had slowed down, with work and home life taking precedence, plus the heat of the summer doesn’t speed up progress.

After applying the initial primer coats and adding panel lines, which worked really well, especially for a first attempt, I decided to add functioning navigation lights. I know, should have done this before painting, but I just thought of them. I ordered a set of FlightLights [link]http://www.flightlites.com/[/link] and pull-molded a set of clear wing tip and tail fairing covers prior to cutting out the pockets for the LEDs. I lined them with Polyply and aluminum tape for a reflective surface prior to gluing them in place. Hopefully when I pull off the protective masking tape all will be revealed.

I had to remove and relocate a couple of aluminum panels, and they stuck so hard thay they pulled up part of the epoxy skin so I had a bit of rework to do before finally getting round to finishing off the primer coat. For what seemed like months I worked through all of the small details such as servo mountings and servo covers, the tailplane servo covers had to be molded as the servos sat just proud of the undersurface of the tailplane, so a bulged cover was devised. I also realised that I had positioned the upper wing surface outer pylon fairings too far inboard, so these had to be removed, remade and refitted.

The final part of the priming stage was to burn in the rivet details. The control surfaces and wing tips on the full size seem to have noticeable flush rivets, whereas the wings and fuselage have had them filled and they can’t really be seen. Again a new technique for me, but with a small brass tube sharpened in the pillar drill and then fitted into a soldering iron, it was a simple task to work away holding the iron in place for a few seconds at each rivet location. A light sand down afterwards resulted in a very realistic surface. Again, I was impressed for another first attempt.

JSF-TC

My Feedback: (2)

After researching a lot of different paints, I selected Warbird Colors as they did all the primary camouflage colors I wanted. As a water-based acrylic paint they go on really easily and cover well, just a couple of coats was all that was needed to get a smooth full depth finish. I started with the lower surface light grey, and then moved up to the upper surface dark grey and green camouflage. The chosen model I am reproducing, XF418, was pained in an ‘Agressor’ scheme with red tails and wing tips. I couldn’t get the Red Arrows red from Warbird Colors, so I ordered a bunch of acrylic plastic model paints. These worked well, but I couldn’t get enough of them, so I took a part that I had painted to my local auto paint store, and they scanned it and mixed me a pint of Omni. The match was perfect and I eventually went over all of the red areas with the Omni.

It is almost ready to apply the markings, which I have ordered from TailorMade decals.

Paul

DaveMatthews

Hey Paul,

It's looking very nice now. Yep time flies when doing the Hunter. . . . . . I think you are going to like it though.

Here's a pic of the one (above) that I finished last January.







Keep you the good work.


Davie

Ron S

My Feedback: (2)

Looking nice, Paul! Hope to see it at the field soon!