dleboeuf

I think most of them are still there, you just have to click the box and they will show up. I think just the thumbnails are missing.

abufletcher

Nope. For me it just goes into permanent wait mode.

dleboeuf

Here are some of the newest pictures, I finally worked out the linkage system for the three rudders. Ihave it all glued up and ready to go. Ihave to build the linkage and cut the outside rudders for scale.
I cut out all the ribs for the wing today. Have not had a lot of time to work on the plane since the holidays.

Props4ever

Hi dleboeuf,

Wow you are progressing real swiftly on your Connie, i'm hoping whoever is selling those planes ahev actually fixed the errors in aft fuselage and tailplane. When i got my plans, formers in aft fuselage were not lining up at all plus few were not even of right shape. They were distorted quite a bit. A friend on mine help me fixed those errors in the back fuselage on his cad software. Plus if you look closely all the fins are smaller in size n shape for L1049s, vs there are good for L-749s!. I had to fix there shapre and englarge them manually to get right fin height and shape to replicate after L1049s. I used scale airfoils on my wing with 1.5 degrees of incidence on main wing. Stabilizer is set at "0" on my model. Another error that i also missed was the constant section of the fuselage for L1049s!, on these plans it's only between wings LE and TE but in reality it extends further to the front of the wing and also to the back of wing by 6"-7".....So basically these plans are good to do L749 Connies but if anyone wants to do L1049 S Connies, they have to to make fuselage mods that i ahve mentioned to you.

I will re-start workign on my Connie sometime in near future, presently i'm in hospital as 24/7 care giver for my very very ill father who is suffereing from multiple serious health issue and can pass on at any day or week.....


Sam

dleboeuf

Yes, the plans have some issues. But I have managed to work through most of them. I have another set of plans that I use for reference when in doubt. I'm sorry to hear about your father, I will keep you and him in our prayers.

dleboeuf

Anybody seen a set of Don Smith Plans for the Constellation? I'm thinking of purchasing a set but I have 2 sets of plans already and would like to know how detailed they are before spending $85 plus shipping on another set. One set I have is pretty good the other is garbage, there are so many inconsistencies in the plans that I don't think you could build a plane with them. I think Props4ever has this same set and had the same issues I did. I sent an email to the person selling them and he didn't seem to care. They are still selling the plans with the defects.

I sent an email to Don Smith and he told me that they do not send digital copies of plans.

dleboeuf

I was not happy with the tail assembly, so I built another one. Unfortunately I'm not happy with it either, I'm trying for a more scale appearance but have not found the right combination yet. The new one is much thinner than the old one. But it has issues all it's own. I built this one from the 2nd set of plans, and it came out nice but it has a flat bottom. I think it looks more scale than the symmetrical one that I built first.

Also on the original one the middle was thicker than the ends so the whole thing was tapered in all directions. Not something easy to make look scale with the hinge points. I think the full size one has a constant thickness from middle to ends. At least that's what I have found in all the pictures I have checked. Anybody know for certain on this? I have never seen the real thing so can't speculate on how it should look. Here are a few pictures that I use for reference.

F-A-P

Hi Dleboeuf,

try that what you can find in the pdf. It's from a Super Constellation. The fins of the Constellation are a little bit smaller.
I have drawn it from original datas.

Frank

tdstaf

My Feedback: (11)

Just saw this thread. Very nice so far I have been meaning to to do this plane at some point since my Dad was a crew chief on them in Vietnam and grew up hanging around them as a kid.
The taper you describe is scale. It's normal for a constant cord taperd wing plan to taper on all four sides it is much easier to construct these by building them in a clamshell (top and bottom halves)then glue these halves together after they have been sheeted in halves from the center rib out (left and right). I do not recomend having a flat bottom horizontal stabaliser as the lift from the top will cause a constant down trim efect. Hope this helps, if you have any questions about them or would like me to take some pictures from the museum here at The now closed McCllean AFB Where The 552 AEW flying Connies was staioned.

Tim

dleboeuf

After checking both sets of plans, they both have a 4.5 degree of positive incidence on the main wing.

Do you think the flat bottom stab will offset some of that positve incidence? With that much positive incidence on the main wing this thing is going to climb any time power is applied.

Been working on the fusalage, trying to finish the planking before starting the wing.

tdstaf

My Feedback: (11)

There is no way of dertermining the incedence of the stab with a flat bottom. Sure there is a positive, but what is it? With not knowing the lift of the airfoil that question is hard to answer. What is the incedence of the stab on the plans in relation to the 4.5 Degrees of incedence at the wing root and how much washout does it have? These planes were designed with more incedence to carry more weight at slower speeds and were not designed for high G manuvers as were fighters so you will always have more lift under power.

Props4ever

Hi Guys,


Don Smith plans have it's own issues from what i have learned and so is Kyousho plans i built my model and you are building it here.

I didn't wanted to go built-up route as i had very good feeling back then, that i will run into troubles, so i decided to make whole main structure out of foam. It worked out great for me. As for H Stab, well mine is set at "0" degrees and has symetrical airfoil on it. Main wing is set at 1.5 degrees of positive incidence. I did this coz i want my models to fly into landing and not become a floater since its small and hell a lot lighter then real airplane is. I think if you go with 3 or 4 degress of incidence on the wing, airplane will become very touchy at the time of take off and landings. If my model was bigger then 1/14th scale, then yeah i would have used scale incidence angles. Root airfoil i believe is NACA 2214 and Tip is NACA 4412 on main wing, these are scale airfoils.

Once i get back to completing my model, tailplane assembly will be the easiest to get done and move forward.


Sam

dleboeuf

Still working on sheeting fuselage, man this takes forever.A glass fuse is starting to look pretty good.

twoflyers

gread job !
greatings from Austria
any progress ?

günther

dleboeuf

Getting close to the end now on the sheeting. Should be able to finish that up this week. Will post some pictures soon.

dleboeuf

Here are a few pictures of the progress this week. There is light at the end of the tunnel. I know it's going slow but I'm not a full time hobby person, I'll normally spend less than 6 hours a week on my hobby.

dleboeuf

I glued in the landing gear blocks on Saturday, I then finished sheeting the fuse. Praise God that's over. I started the shape sanding on Sunday, got most of the bumps out already. I will post some pictures this evening.

dleboeuf

Well here is where I'm at, rough sanded most of the fuse this evening, after about 2 hours of sanding I have most of the high spots out. There is still a long way to go with the sanding block though. I snapped a few pictures before it got too dark. It's really hard to get a good overall picture since this thing is so big.

I've used up all my time this week and have other projects to work on so it will have to wait until next week for more sanding. I will keep the pictures coming, I know when I follow a build it makes a difference to have pictures!

twoflyers

great work !
greatings from austria
günther

dleboeuf

Well I got a lot of sanding done, but still a bunch left to finish. Been thinking about the Horizontal Stabilizer and the rudders. I don't think they are scale on any of the plans I have. You can see in the picture below what I'm talking about. I know the perspective is off a little but it's obvious they are not the same. The other plan set if anything is worse than this one. Anybody got an idea where I can get a rudder profile? I have a 3view but it does not match most of the pictures I have. I know there is a difference in 749's and 1049's anybody got a profile of each to show the difference? I know the main difference is the rudders are split. But if you look at the 2nd and 3rd picture you can see that they are clearlydifference in those and the 1st picture. These are all 749's, I thought the rudders got bigger on the 1049's not smaller.

I put markups on the 2nd picture so Iwould have a plan reference location with dimensions. I checked these against the plan and the rudder is about 14.14" tall on the plan. The dimension scales up on the photo markup to 14.75" so it's pretty close. But the width is off, the markup behind the wing that is 0.7 m the plan is 11.77" so the rudder width that is 0.72 should be about 11.85" the plans show it at 9.38" which is about 2.5" off.

Back in post #58 thereis a pdf uploaded and it scales to 14.75" tall by9.57" wide.

I'm kinda lost at this point, I would really like this to be as scale as possible but to make it right the stab width is going to have to change over an inch at the base and almost 3 inches at the tips.
Should I just build it like the plans and say it's close enough? Give me some ideas here!

Props4ever

Your fuselage is looking sweet n very nice, You added true constant sections in the center fuselage as it should be, i slightly missed out on it but no one can tell....I have started to work on my Connie once again starting by making ailerons on both outer wings. It's so neat that getting back into was like i just left it yesterday and started back again today!, it it's been around 2yrs mark of a break i took from this project.

As for the short height of ur fins, well i kept chord same and added 1" on the lower base part of all 3 fins that attaches to the stabilizer. Then i also added 1/2" on both lower fins if i remember clearly on lower ones, this gave me very accurate height and profile on my model's fins. Did you figured out the fins to stabilizer attachment problems as yet?, mine are going to be epoxied on the stabilizer and then i will add thin strip of fiberglass tape to fair in joints nicely on all 3 bases of upper fins and then both lower ones.

dleboeuf

I have 2 horizontal stabilizers and 4 vertical stabilizers built and I'm not happy with any of them. I'm going to try another horizontal stab out of foam and see how it works. I'm thinking foam on the vertical stabs also. That will make them much easier to attach to the horizontal stabilizer. Rudders are going to be out of balsa to maintain scale appearance. Since the full scale ones are covered with fabric.

Props4ever

I made rudders out of balsa as built-up structures, fins are foam core covered with fiberglass.....Built-up parts are definitely much lighter in weight then foam core parts, yet making foam parts is much much faster then built-up ones...

Props4ever

Look at post #826 of my thread's page 34, you will see how i did balsa built-up rudders on my model.

F-A-P

Hello dleboeuf.

use my pdf of post #58 for your super constellation project. It contains the outline of the super constellation vertical stabilizers.

The fins were enlarged by 18 inches to improve the stability. Only the super constellation prototype has the original small fins of the 046/749 series. But two early warning standard constellations were also fitted with the bigger ones.

The two pictures below are from the 1049-structural repair manual 7789.

Frank