Building a balsa cowl
 

Hi. I've search for some threads on how to build a cowl, but haven't found a good step by step technique. Are there any sites, mags, etc. that show step by step intructions?

RE: Building a balsa cowl
 

I am currently building the yak 3 from redstarrc and it has a balsa cowl. Take a look at the manual it has some pics that might help. www.redstarrc.com

RE: Building a balsa cowl
 

Have built basla cowls before and now I go for the ease of ordering a fiberglass one and gives me much better looking front end

RE: Building a balsa cowl
 

You can make a fiberglass cowl using the "Lost Foam" method. Here is few photos of a recent one I made. Laminate blue foam sheets to get the size you need, sand to shape and glass the outside with fiberglass cloth and epoxy.

RE: Building a balsa cowl
 

Once the epoxy cures, melt the foam out with acetone or gasoline, I found that gasoline works as well as the acetone on blue foam.

RE: Building a balsa cowl
 

I used balsa where finer detail is necessary

RE: Building a balsa cowl
 

Tony,
That cowl looks great. When you say blue foam do you mean the stuff that home depot sell's that is about a half inch thick and real smooth? Also what weight glass do you normally use. I need to make a cowl and a set of wheel pants and this will be my first attempt at it.
Thanks

RE: Building a balsa cowl
 

This is probably what you are looking for:
[link=http://origin-images.rcuniverse.com/forum/upfiles/183029/Sp45492.jpg]Page 1[/link]
[link=http://origin-images.rcuniverse.com/forum/upfiles/183029/Lh18451.jpg]Page 2[/link]
[link=http://origin-images.rcuniverse.com/forum/upfiles/183029/Ek15077.jpg]Page 3[/link]
[link=http://origin-images.rcuniverse.com/forum/upfiles/183029/Ec87589.jpg]Page 4[/link]
[link=http://origin-images.rcuniverse.com/forum/upfiles/183029/Pk30097.jpg]Page 5[/link]
[link=http://origin-images.rcuniverse.com/forum/upfiles/183029/Jo29659.jpg]Page 6[/link]
[link=http://origin-images.rcuniverse.com/forum/upfiles/183029/Qj20924.jpg]Page 7[/link]

It's from the Sept. 2000 issue of RCM

RE: Building a balsa cowl
 

Krossk,

Talk about timing! I am building a Sig Mid-Star and contemplating a cowl. I am at that point in the build so this is very timely stuff! Thanks for posting!

-MA

RE: Building a balsa cowl
 

I can't take credit for the original posting. Someone else posted it for me a while back and I just happened to have a hard-copy laying here with the links to the pages printed at the top. It is, however a very good article to have in one's reference library...

RE: Building a balsa cowl
 

Yep, copied and filed away. I was hoping you had the originals as a few of the scans could use a touch-up or two ;). Oh well, its great information nevertheless.

Yet another reason to love these forums.

-MA

RE: Building a balsa cowl
 

Import it to Acrobat then increase the size. It will be plain as day.

Bob

RE: Building a balsa cowl
 

Agreed. Probably wasn't very clear in my prior post ;). I was thinking it could have been copied better - leaving out the gutter of the page ... small stuff that really didn't effect the readability of the piece, just asthetics. Hummm, I guess that same rationale is what keeps my kits on the building table longer - always trying to make everything just right and asthethetically pleasing. :D

RE: Building a balsa cowl
 

I'm the "someone else". Thanks krossk. I used this articlt to build a cowl on the tiger 2. I can re-scan the article if you like. What pages do you want posted?

Mods

RE: Building a balsa cowl
 

Yep - that's right. I guess the memory's going faster than I thought.
So how's the ModKat coming along? Haven't seen any updates for a while.

RE: Building a balsa cowl
 

I know my last update was on 3/19/07. Sanding is taking its toll on my sanity. Good news is that I'm pretty close to making the molds and my telemetry from eagletreesystems came in.