Originally Posted by
Txmustangflyer
make base for panel from balsa sheet, shape as needed with isupropyl, clean it well, then I could a. Apply very light glass/resin to the panel, once cured, flitemetal..affix to structure with a. Hysol, b. 30 min zap epoxy, or c. med CA..or b..just balsa, no glass then flitemetal. For the wings and tail surfaces use fliteskin in a similar manner, gorilla, then flitemetal.
Once done, a "wash" of a very transparent black tint paint to pop the panel edges, followed by a scotchbrite pad to create a "brushed" finish on the flitemetal. The paint would most likely be a klass kote paint (two part epoxy paint and is fuel proof) mixed with reducer to create the wash. (The wash I may or may not do...just depends on how it looks when the panels are on.)
A warbird, in combat, wouldn't be all polished to a mirror, more of a brushed, or even natural aluminum if in air superiority "raw" scheme. This would be accomplished with a klasscote satin clear over whole plane as last step. Also result in a sealed fuselage at the panel junctions Fuel could never get to the wood.
What you think?
It depends on if your panels are flush or raised. You could save a lot of weight running flush panels as most were then adding your raised panels after the fact. At 1/5 scale I’m still careful on adding unneeded weight. Building each individual panel to “skin” the aircraft may add a bit more weight than I’d like, but if you were to keep them light you’ll probably be ok. I will say flitemetal over bare balsa doesn’t work very well as burnishing it down will dent and misshape the balsa. You also might look into fliteskin aeroscale. It’s super light very strong and is easy to work with. However keep in mind it cannot do compound curves.
My process for panels is all completed after I’ve glassed and primed and sanded and primed again. I map them all out from a 3-view, then I scribe them in using a flexible straight edge as a guide. I don’t scribe into the glass, it’s just through the primer. It creates a much smaller gap between panels but still prominent enough to run a wash after paint to bring them out. I will then aluminum tape(flitemetal etc) various panels and buff them up with .0000 steel wool. On raised panels I’ll use fliteskin to raise them .010”. After panels are completed I’ll then run my aluminum hatchwork/access panels, raised and flush rivets. Then I can think about painting.