Looking good, Lee!

I finally have completed designing and building the motor mount and started on the cowl. Thinking through how to design the front end was challenging because I need to be able to pass a battery through the firewall and I wanted to recreate a Jenny look. It's now starting to come together and I think it should work. The motor mount has down thrust, as already designed into the firewall, and then I added 3.5 degrees of right thrust. The engine will be offset so the prop is centered on the front. The cowl is removable, with internal attachments to keep a clean look. I picked up some doll house hinges and used that to hinge the bottom hatch, which will serve as the battery pass through. The top of the cowl will follow the turtle deck lines and will be held in place with magnets. I'll then cut the very front end (radiator surround) out of a solid piece of hardwood, which will ultimately be painted a metal color.

I still need to build the OX-5 dummy engine so I can fit it in the top hatch, and also need to build some louvers for the cowl sides. These little embelishments should help it look like a Jenny. It's a huge improvement over stock, which has no real enclosure.

Steve

Finally built my dummy engine, modified to 6 cylinders so it fits. I still need to add the exhaust stacks. The detail is awesome. It took me hours to understand how this would go together, but once I started building it it came together pretty quick. Results are better than I could have imagined.

Lee - The pic of your Proctor Jenny from the other thread looks beautiful. Have you flown it yet? How's your Antic conversion coming along?

Hi Steve. For the Jenny, I ran short of Worldtex and had to order another roll. In the meantime, to get a little warmth in my bones, we went to Arizona for 2-1/2 weeks. Great temps (72 during the day), but now that I've been home for a week, it's time to get back to work on the Jenny. All I need to do is cover the fuselage, paint the forward part to match the Kelly Field version, rig it, and it'll be ready to fly. I've been working on the cockpit/gunner's area of my Jerry Bates 85" SBD Dauntless over the last week. At first, I didn't want to spend the time on these areas, but as I got started, it just became part of the build. It's taking much more time than I thought it would, as I have to make everything up from scratch, using photos from various publications. I'm very happy with the results so far, but I have a long way to go. With all of the detail work on the SBD, I know I'll burn out soon and I'll go back to the Jenny. I'm not in a great hurry to finish the Jenny, because it's a little cold here right now (mid 20s at night, up to high 30s during the day). Also still some snow around. But, when flying weather returns in the Spring, the Jenny will be ready to go. When I have it finished and ready for pics, I'll post some here. Thanks, Lee

Hi- you will love building this airplane! I have not read all the posts on this thread. At one time someone offered a plan supplement to convert the Antic bipe to be a sport scale Albatross CII or similar German WWI '2-holer' observation craft. That would be easily accomplished on your own by changing the stab and rudder plus minimal nose mods. My $0.02 Good luck!

The dummy engine is now mounted and the cowl top is done. The only problem I have is that once I glue on the exhaust stacks, the dummy engines will not be removable, so I'll add the exhaust stacks at the very end. Now onto the front end/radiator.
Steve

Steve, great job on the engine. For my larger Proctor Jenny, I attached the exhaust stacks to the dummy engine and they come off as a single unit with the cowl top. Is there any way you can do that to make access to the electric motor easier? Lee

Lee - thanks. The lower half of the cowl (everything but the domed top) comes off and the domed top is fastened to the lower portion of the cowl, so it does come apart. It will ultimately be hinged on one side and held on with staps (leather shoe laces) . The dummy engine is removable too, but the way I did it is that the lower part is wedged between a stringer and the skin while the uper part is attached with two screws. The problem with this method (which I now discover) is that it needs to pivot into position so the rocker arms clear. With the exhausts glued on, they will get in the way, preventing it from pivoting in. I figure I will not have to remove the engines once it's completed, and if I do, I'll just have to break the glue joint for the exhausts. Please let me know if you have any ideas. The easy solution would be to enlarge the opening in the skin, but I don't want to do that.

I cut out the very front end from a piece of thick birch ply. I was dreading this process but I was able to make the piece in less than an hour with my scroll saw. I'm thinking of epoxying the front end onto the lower part of the cowl (top part will still be removable) to strengthen the entire front end. But I'm going to hold of glueing it in place until I'm sure I don't need to make it removable! This front end piece will be painted brass and will have wire screen placed inside so you can't see in. I'll paint the inside of the cowl flat back as welll so you can't see anything except the prop coming out.

Steve

Good idea on the front part. I made mine from balsa and glued it to the sides/lower sheeting with triangle stock for reinforcement. For the front screen, I made a small "inner" frame and glued some window screen to that, with an opening for the engine. Screening is good for cooling, especially for electrics. I cut some openings in the side where the louvers would be to help cool air flow around the engine. Also, since my engine head projects above the cowl, I didn't make up an OX engine for mine, just made sure there was plenty of clearance for air flow from inside the cowl to around the cylinder head.

Another thought for your exhausts might be to install them (epoxy) onto the OX engine AND the fuselage sides, then carefully cut them apart at the point where the top cowl needs to come off. Then, drill both ends of the cut exhaust for a small dowel, glue the dowel into one end, and it will help align the exhausts. Painted black would make the joint nearly invisible.

Lee

Insalacosm,

I don't suppose that you have any details on how you built that dummy engine, do you? I take it that you built it from scratch? I have never seen a kit around with that much detail...

Looks very nice,

Bob

Hey Bob - The dummy engine is the OX-5 kit from Proctor, made for their 1/6 Jenny. If you go back a page or so you can see a post of all the parts, it's a little overwhelming! But it does turn out nice. I don't have details on the build, but it does come with instructions. I had more work than standard because I made it into a 6 cylinder instead of 8. This meant I had to recreate a new intake manifold and cut off the plastic one that was molded with the cylinders. Contact Proctor if you're interested in one, I think it cost around $50, but it was worth it. Let me know if you would like any detailed photos.
Steve

Lee - I like your idea with the dowels, I have time to think about what to do. I was thinking of using balsa for the front end too but though plywood would hold up better so went that route instead.

I've decided to shave a little more off the outside perimeter so it doesn't overhang so much, then I'm going to attempt to make some louvers.
Steve

Bob, when I built my Proctor Jenny, I made up the OX engine from their plastic kit which was part of the full kit. As Steve says, it's a project, but the results as you can see from Steve's photos is well worth it. Give Joe at Proctor a call and you'll see what I mean.

Steve, there is a good article in the November 2005 issue of Model Aviation (pgs 57 thru 60) on how to make realistic looking louvers from Balsa rather than hammering them out of metal or vacuum-forming. If you can't find the copy, I'll be glad to make a copy and send it to you. Let me know by e-mail.

Lee

Lee - Someone sent me the great article, thanks though. I'll be attempting the method they describe, just hope I don't cut off any fingers!
Steve

Thanks for the info on that OX-5. I'll go back a couple of pages and try to find it. and thanks for the source for it too!

That was really nice work,

Bob

With the front end structure complete I was able to finally mount the motor, making sure it came out on center eventhough I have a lot of right thrust. It lines up well and looks good. I also hinged the top part of the cowl. I attached another picture showing how the cowl opens up for accessibility. The entire cowl is removable as well if needed.

I also made all the louvers while the kids were napping. I modified the technique in the article because I like my fingers. I basically cut a thick piece of balsa into triangle stips, cut them to length (seven different lengths on each side), curved the ends, and then used a file to remove the inside. I then painted them with thinned epoxy to stenghten.

Bob - it looks like the picture of the components are in post #28. Note that the plastic parts bag containing the cylinders, intake manifold, rocker arms, and pushrods is not in the picture. Somehow this parts bag didn't make it in with my shipment and since the instructions show you how to make the parts cylinders out of aluminum and mold the detailed parts, I dind't think I was missing anything. I'm not up for molding any parts so I called Joe at Proctor and asked for some tips on how to make the molds, etc, but then he told me that it has already been done for me. What a relief! He sent the parts bag out and that made the build much much easier.

Steve

Steve, now I see what you were talking about with the cowl, and that certainly creates a problem with the left bank exhaust. Right exhaust could stay connected all of the time, but maybe the left could be attached to the fuse side (and OX engine) with small screws (and dowels), removable when motor maintenance needed? Just a thought.

Great job on the louvers. I can see where they will look authentic when mounted. I didn't go to any trouble on mine, just cut louver-shaped openings in the fuse sides for cooling. Also glad you kept your fingers .

Lee

argh, I've had two setbacks. The thinned epoxy on the louvers didn't cure properly so I have to remake them all. I tried sticking them in the oven, sealing with sanding sealer, and priming them, but they are still sticky. I never have luck thinking epoxy so I'm only going to use it straight from now on. The other setback I had is that I was thinking that I could just finish the cowl area by applying sanding sealer, primer, and paint. After two coats of sanding sealer and one coat of primer, I still see a little grain eventhough I sanded between each coat. The only solution is to glass these parts so I'm going to glass with lightweight cloth and use the waterbased polyurethane method. Other than that, things are going fine.

Steve, I've also had trouble occasionally with thinned epoxy not setting up. Had that trouble with some Envirotex that I usually use for adhering fiberglass to sheeted fuselage/wings on larger scale. It always worked before, but this time I let it cure in the garage (very cold), but since it didn't set I tried everything from heat gun to just putting it over the floor register for a day. Still sticky after a few days so I shot it with a couple of coats of gray primer and evidently that "covered up" the stickyness. Sanded the primer down and now everything is OK. Next time I use any epoxy, I'll be sure to cure it above 60 degrees .

Re the cowl area and sanding sealer/primer, next time just put a clear coat of nitrate dope on the wood and let it dry. Then, put on some wetted silkspan with clear dope. After it's dry, trim it to size, put on another coat or two of dope and you should have sealed the grain by then. Add a coat of primer, sand with 320 and maybe another coat of primer if you can still see the grain. I've used that technique a lot on sport scale models, and that's what I plan to do on my Jenny over the sheeting covering the cockpits, front side panels, and lower front panel. Since I plan to paint these areas, it should look fine. It's a lot lighter than fiberglass/epoxy, and it can be done in a much shorter time. Also, no cloth weave to fill.

Progress made! I rebuilt the louvers and ended up glassing all these painted parts with .5 oz cloth and water based polyurethane. It was my first attempt at glassing and it was amazingly easy with this approach versus epoxy resin. I then filled the weave with thinned (with water) spackling compound and Krylon primer, sanding them all down. I accidently sanded though the weave in a few spots but now I know to use more caution. Once I had a nice surface, I added trim tape to get the look of the crimped edge on the straight parts as well as the outline of the cowl side door panel, and then pin head dabs of epoxy to represent the rivets. I glued on the louvers one at a time and used epoxy mixed with micro balloons to smooth the joint - it's a little heavy in spots but good enough. The hinges for the side door panel are just cut pieces of steel rod and a little tape. After a nice coat of primer, I painted with dark green Model Masters paint. It looks great and has a nice satin finissh. My only concern is that the paint seems to mark up fairly easily so I'm thinking of applying a coat of Model Masters clear satin finish to protect it. Anyone have experience with this? Since this is electric it doesn't need to be fuel proof.
Steve

Nice work. I am enjoying your build.

Jim

Great job Steve. I've used the water based poly before and it is easier and less heavy than going with epoxy. Actually, the marking up issue may not be bad at all, since the Jennys got a lot of abuse flying off plowed fields and the like when barnstorming . Lee

thanks guys! I'm now having fun trying to figure out how all this rigging goes together. With this Proctor kit, I've found that I can study the plans forever and it doesn't make sense until I start actually building. Then it all becomes pretty obvious. I'm using thread for my first rigging attempt and this will help me identify where the holes need to be in the covering, when covered.
Steve

Lee - I'm trying to figure out how the upper aileron pull cables work. It looks almost as though they pass inside the upper wing, but then they would have to pass through the center section on the cabane. None of this is shown very well in the planes so I'm confused. How did you rig yours? I think I'm clear on how the lower aileron cables are run.

Also, have you flown your Antic yet? I'm curious about the incidence used on the horizontal stab. I'm very tempted just to epoxy the stab in place instead of using screws.

thanks
Steve