I just found your build Matt and I must say you are making great progress. The design looks to be the typical building crutch design used by other scale designers like Dick Katz. I have a set of plans for the old Royal design and was fortunate to know an old builder, now passed on, that built a number of Staggerwing designs over several decades. In conversations with him he warned me away from building the Royal as designed. He found when he built his 4th Royal Staggerwing he could greatly improve the way it flew and fit in retracts by increasing the wing thickness by 14%. I realize its a little late for your build but should you one day build another or decide to make new wings you might take this into consideration. Whenever I get to the point I want to built the Staggerwing I will take his warnings to heart. Right now its way down the list on airplanes to build but I do have a an Ace Simple Series Staggerwing I may build before then for a little casual flying. Sometimes you just need a quick easy build to recharge the old batteries.

Mike