ORIGINAL: fheppenheimer
How do you prepare an ARF's CA hinge slots (U Can Do 46) to accept flat nylon hinges (dubro)? any difference between preparing the slots in the wing and the aileron itself? IS there any beveling needed here, and what does it do?
I'm afraid that if I just chop out the wood it'll be uneven from slot to slot -- maybe one hinge winds up a little high at one slot and a little low at another slot. Do you take one slice off the top of the slot and then one slice off the bottom to keep it even? those aileron's are usually not too thick.
Sorry on making a fuss about what is simple to many of you -- I just don't get this, maybe it should be asked in the BEginner's forum. (I can't use CA so this is a gating item for me in assembling ARFs -- up to now I've just asked friends to CA the CA hinges for me, but I want to do the hinging myself from now on.)
When the slots are too tight, I use a piece of hacksaw blade. I broke a used one into a number of pieces about 1.5" long and sandwiched each in couple of pieces of wood. Basically made a crude "knife" that has a serrated blade.
When the slots are off center or canted (that happens about as often as being off center), the hacksaw blade can be pressured to straighten or to widen just one side. You really don't need to widen too much.
Cutting slots yourself is just like any woodcraft. You need to learn the technique. I use a pointed xacto and stab a line of short cuts to keep the slot straight and centered. Then you can join each cut to the next, and the knife won't have a chance to follow wood grain that might angle the cut otherwise.
Are you asking about beveling the leading edge of the surface? You do that so the aileron or elevator or rudder can be hinged so tightly to the TE of the matching wing/stab/fin that there won't be a gap, but the surface LE's edges don't bump into anything.