Next up isn’t exactly a step in building planes, but trust me in that it’s something that you will face all the time. Looking at picture #1 you can see what I officially call and “oops”!! As I was handling the wing the tip of the aileron it something and left a chunk taken out of the wood. So before covering the ailerons the ding needs repaired. It’s really a fairly easy repair to do. To start off with the area to be repaired needs to be shaped so that we can repair it, so cut the area to repair so that we have straight edges to glue to (picture #2). Use a scrap piece of balsa and glue it into the area to repair (picture #3), it’s easier to use an oversized piece of wood and sand to shape than to try to cut to shape before gluing it in place (picture #4 & #5). Once the glue is dry on the wood it’s a simple matter of sanding the wood to shape to match the aileron (picture #6). If you look at pictures #8 - #10 you can see that the repaired area is very hard to detect, and when it’s covered it will not show at all. A simple easy repair to make and then we can move on with the project.

The point of this point was to simply point out that “stuff” happens as you build. But the best thing to do is what I said earlier “Don’t Panic”, repairs are usually easy to do. Just take your time and figure out the best way to fix the damage, fix it, then move on.

Pictures
1. Oops. A ding in the wood of aileron needs to be repaired before covering the aileron
2. Cut the wood of the damaged area
3. Glue in a piece of scrap wood in the area we just cut.
4. Glue in a piece of scrap wood in the area we just cut.
5. Glue in a piece of scrap wood in the area we just cut.
6. Sand the wood to the shape of the aileron.
7. Sand the wood to the shape of the aileron.
8. The repaired area is hard to see after it’s completed.
9. The repaired area is hard to see after it’s completed.
10. The repaired area is hard to see after it’s completed.

Until next time

Ken