HA!!!

Bet you guys thought I forgot about this thread!!! Actually, I am in the throws of the car show season and between getting cars ready for shows and working on planes, there's not much time left to take pics, crop, upload, post, blah, blah, blah....

At any rate, here are a few more pics, although they are dated - MUCH more has been done to the 'Cat since these pics including choosing a better "interim" wheel for it than the Dave Brown cheapies shown. I picked up a set of the Dubro Treaded Lightweight Wheels (4 inch of course) that I will be using until Robart has their aluminum hubbed 4 inchers available. Shown in the pics is continuation of finishing the wing off in prep for final panel lines and paint. I am not going overboard on the panel lines, just trying to have "something" on the wings and tailfeathers to match the cast-in panel lines on the fuse. As can be seen in the pics, rather than leave the wheel well open, I went ahead lined it with a laminate of 1/16 balse and 1/64 ply, strictly from a strengthening standpoint. If I was building the wing from scratch, I would build internal strengthening mods to allow an open wheelwell. I am, as pointed out earlier, making some inexpensive and easily made gear door covers out of the thin metal roof flashing. You can see my Sierra retracts (thanks Darrell!!!) which only required fabbing up some hardwood mounts and carbon fiber tissue re-enforcement. I hope to have more pics uploaded this weekend showing the bottom of the wing primered and ready for panel lines. I used a two part filler made by Evercoat that is VERY light, and does not shrink like the other fillers. This was used extensively throughout, especially feathering the outer wing joint re-enforcement areas. If I haven't uploaded a pic of it, I will do so shortly to show what I am talking about.....

Jim Jager (Corsair Jock) has been in contact with me and I am trying like heck to get over to Bob Holman's place (he's about 15 minutes from me) to check out the Jerry Bates cowl and canopy, especially the canopy that Jim says more closely matches the CMP outline. I recently bought a Hasgawa 1/32 plastic model of the "Cat and the canopy included in the CMP kit is definitely lacking in the scale outline department. Anyways, check out what I have done and I hope to have more up within a day or two....

randy

p.s. just noticed the pic I posted about the wheels - the one on the left is what is included in the kit, the other is the 4 inch Dave Brown unit. Although I am switching to Dubro's, you can see the HUGE difference in tire size and the impact it can have on this size model....