<span style="font-family: Comic Sans MS">i believe i've ran into a bit of a snafoo. while trying to strip the covering off my cub to repair and recover it with fabric instead of monkeykote, i can't figure out how to get the ailerons seperated from the wing. i bite my tongue saying this is UNfortunate, but i did an exceptional job hinging them when building it up in the beginning. this was my first attempt at working scale hinges using robart hinge points, and now i can't figure out how to remove theailerons from the wing without damaging any of it. below is a (not so awesome) depiction of what i did. i have the covering removed from the top and bottom of the wing and aileron, for access to the hinges, but no access whatsoever to the actual hinge line. the glue held and is holding remarkably no matter how hard i try to pull the surface off. i've clipped the insides of the hinges off on the inside of the trailing edge of the wing, but i'm afraid i've managed to get enough glue soaked into the wood that it would withstand a cat 5 hurricane and not come loose. i need them removed so i can get the rest of the monkeykote off and be able to cover them with the koverall. i believe the barbs of the hinge points are holding the inside of the wood pretty damn good too. does anyone know how to get these things out without damaging the wing or aileron?</span>

If you used epoxy then use heat gun. It will soften the epoxy and the hinges will pull out like nothing! If you used wood glue you might try water to dissolve glue.... or a similar method... if you used CA you can try saturating the area with acetone to dissolve the CA. A cloth soaked in it and laid onto the surface might do the trick. Otherwise, the hinges will just have to be cut out. If you have to cut them out make the cut outs all the same and make filler blocks to replace the cutouts. I have made the blocks using my Micro Lux table saw which allows very precise cutting and is easy to set up for multiple parts to be duplicated- perfect for this app. I would make the blocks first then use them as a 'pattern' to make the cutouts. You are removing the covering anyway so this method of repair works very nice with minimal sanding.

I'm thinking that acetone will evaporate too quickly. It might help to wrap the area in a polyethylene bag to give it time to soften the CA.
Congratulations on your excellent work

Ok Crash: After looking at your aileron installation, my approach to removing the flight control would be: move the aileron down, and using a dremel thin cutoff wheel, cut the hinge apart carefully without doing any damage to the airframe. With the aileron remove, you can decide to either remove the hinge parts by soaking, etc, or just mold each section to the shape of the pivot edges. Install new hinges where they will support the aileron best.

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How about making a cutting tool out of brass tubing whose ID is just big enough to clear the hinge joint? You could fab a piece of dowel to insert into a drill chuck and fix it to the tube. Sharpen the end with a file and cut some teeth with a dremel or file.

The previous two posts have the answer. The hinge must be sacrificed. use a brass or steel tube that will just slide over the hinge. Use it like a drill or hole saw to remove the half of the hinge point in the wood. Make a round plug to fill the hole and glue in. Redrill the plug for new hinge points.

I have a question for ya'll: Why are CA hinges so easy to remove? 'Cause the need to be.  

Just kidding ...

I had the same problem. To cut the hinges, I used one of the heated Knives, the ones that hold Xacto blades. I used a chisel blade. It was slow work, but the robart plastic cut fairly good with this setup. You have to watch when the blade is about to break through that you don't slip and push it into the wood. Start working the hinge area first, it has the least mass and cuts fairly easy. Once the hinge line was seperated, I then shaved off the nubs flush to the wood. New hinges were added near the old ones.

Don

<span style="font-family: Comic Sans MS">thank you everyone for your replies. i think the best way to go about it is going to be cutting the entire area out and making blocks to fit in afterwards. not sure why i didn't think about this before. i've had to do this on a leading edge of a foam core balsa sheeted wing before. not that difficult. i just didn't want to cut anything away that wasn't necessary. i tried some CA debonder, with no luck. i'm not sure why anyone would waste their money on that stuff. it's never worked for anything i've tried it on before.the drilling with a brass tube sounds good as well, but i would have to go all the way from the trailing edge of the aileron itself as they are the type with the sheet and ribs on the top and bottom of it. kind of like this. again, told you i'm not an artist. but you get the idea. cutting the blocks would be sanded down and you won't be able to see through the covering anyways, so...</span>

Definitely gonna have to cut them apart and remove them.

I just flattened the wing on my Avistar and used Robart Hing Points for the Ailerons and Flaps and was thinking there's no easy way to reuse them if I need to.

Could also just dremel them flush and put the new hinges in a different location.

<span style="font-family: Comic Sans MS">so here's what i'm left with for repairs. the tip and leading edge are complete, now just for the hinges on the ailerons. i plan on cutting blocks as mentioned, filling them in place, doing a little putty and relocating the hinges over a little. going to be a bit of a pain re-shaping the trailing edges of the wing to the same contour as the rest of it. i can't seem to find the drum sander for the dremel.

still no sign of koverall and stix-it from sig, either, after 2 weeks. hmmm...</span>

Can you "pre-shape" your block before you glue it in? Just a thought.

<span style="font-family: Comic Sans MS">i'm pre-shaping it a little before glueing it in, but i previously had this bad habit of taking a 'little too much off the top', so i bought one of them little planer/shaper doohickies, and i have no idea at all why i didn't buy one of them when i first started modeling. i guess i used to like sanding, but heck with all the mess and dust. true, the planer does too, but it's a lot easier to track how much you're losing at a quicker rate. </span>