As I said earlier, the steps are now a little bit out of order from the instruction manual. But we're moving right along though. We're totally lost, but making great time!!!!

We missed it when we were putting the major fuselage parts on the fuselage, so now we'll back up a bit and install the windscreen and the tank hatch. When I test fit the windscreen on the fuselage there was a pretty big gap between the windscreen and the top of former F2, see picture #1. Gaps like this just drive me up the wall, so I took a few minutes to fix the gap. Using some scrap balsa I glued a small piece of balsa on to the top of the former, pictures #2 and #3. After the glue was dry I used a sanding block to sand down the balsa so that it fit properly between the windscreen and the top of the former. Picture #7 shows the fit after filling the gap. I applied glue to the fuselage and placed the windscreen in position. Pictures #4, #5, and #6 show the part held in position while the glue dries. I used the masking tape to hold it tightly against the fuselage, and I needed to put a clamp in the middle of the former in order to the a tight fit between the windscreen and the former. As I said earlier, picture #7 shows how the windscreen now fits. Much better now that there isn't a gap there.

Next up is the tank hatch. I like this kit because it is designed with a tank hatch, and doesn't have to be re-engineered to add a tank hatch. I like having easy access to the fuel tank of an airplane because it makes it a lot easier to do maintenance on the fuel tank. I can't even begin to count how many problems I've seen at the flying field that are problems with the fuel tank. Having a hatch makes it so much easier to troubleshoot those problems. Anyway, on to the fuel hatch. If you look at picture #8 you can see that there is a gap between the tank hatch and where it meets the bottom of the windscreen. Yep, you guessed it, I just don't like these types of gaps. Using a sanding block I beveled the edge of the tank hatch, picture #9. With the bevel you can see that the tank hatch now fits into the windscreen without any gap.

Well, I ran out of picture space here, so I'll continue in the next post.

Pictures
1. Test fitting the windscreen.
2. Gluing a strip of balsa to the top of the former in order to fill the gap.
3. Gluing a strip of balsa to the top of the former in order to fill the gap.
4. Gluing the windscreen in position
5. Using tape to hold the windscreen in position
6. Gluing the windscreen in position
7. Windscreen glued in position. Gap has been filled.
8. Gap between tank hatch and bottom of windscreen
9. Bevel the end of the tank hatch.
10. Beveled end of tank hatch fits snugly under windscreen.


Until next time

Ken