Spychalla Aircraft

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Here we go! We are creating the 1/5th Scale Bates / Imes Wildcat Fuselage. It’s going to be a long haul from plans, to plug, panel lines, split mold, and then finally to the glass lay-up. Lord willing, you’re going to see it all right here. I’m the technical guy and Zach is the craftsman. He’s got about 350 hours that he can dedicate to this effort over the next 10 weeks. We hope you enjoy the progress reports and benefit from seeing the process. Today started with 8 hours of making formers.

Leo

CaptainHook

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Leo,

This will be fun to watch for me as I am planing on starting this kit this winter. Any plans to market the glass fuse and an expected cost that you will charge?

Spychalla Aircraft

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Carey

My posts on this are to share information and basically add to the Wildcat discussions that are going on. It is not a forum for sales, so I have to maintain a focus on the Wildcat itself, plug creation, mold making and stuff like that. I'll have to answer your specific questions outside the forum via a private e-mail. Look for it.

Leo

Spychalla Aircraft

My Feedback: (34)

All the formers are cut now. Zach is building the top half of the formers over the plan. You'll note that our formers have the centers left in them for rigidity and ease of locating center lines. Since this particular fuse (or plug) will never fly we are not concerned about weight. I got a call from the hobby shop in Milwaukee. The Robart Gear are in so I will pick them up next week. Gary at Robart said that I got the last set until they make another run in the summer.

Spychalla Aircraft

My Feedback: (34)

It’s starting to look like a Wildcat! Big progress for Zach today. He says it was a fun day. Note the heavy ¼ sq. stringers. Since it won’t fly we are working with heavy materials. Bob Walker of Robart wrote today. Say’s this is just great, that the world needs a 1/5 scale Fiberglass Wildcat. He says that Robart does a scale tailwheel for the F4F and that he is sending one so that I can incorporate it into the design. I will gladly do that. We have some study to do. There is a noticable 1/8” concave on each side of the fuse between F3 and F6. I need to determine if that is supposed to be there. I may bring the surface out and make it straight. I don't see the concave in the multitude of photos we have. I also need to call Doug Imes and find out if any right thrust in the firewall is needed on this bird.

u2fast

My Feedback: (37)

go leo, go barry

BobH

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Leo, Bob Walker is right, the world does indeed need a glass wild cat. I'm sure your doing a credible job with the project. Could be a scale masters winner in the future!

Veltro

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Leo,

The Robart Wildcat tailwheel comes with a nice install drawing that you'll find handy. Glad to see you're including the tailwheel bulkhead.

- Jay

Spychalla Aircraft

My Feedback: (34)

We are getting so far along that gear fitment is required. I need to pick-up the gear tomorrow. Analysis of fuse bulkheads showed us that it should be slightly convex at the 10:00 and 2:00 positions. So we made it convex. This is a .250" shift outboard from the Bates shape. Zach says he isn't going to put any stringers or sheeting on the bottom until the gear is installed. I don't blame him. I talked to Doug Imes about the firewall. He says to add 1 degree of right thrust and keep it at Zero up and down. Zach will build out a 9.5" firewall as the next step plus work on the stab.

Leo

Spychalla Aircraft

My Feedback: (34)

It is working day 6. She is on the gear. Zach's got 42 hours into it. I have about 10. I've cleared away wood so that the gear fully retract. These will be reference points for where our wheel wells will end. I'm still trying to decide if I'm going to make that half moon shape behind the wheels as part of the fuse. From the picture you can see the start of the large firewall. It has 1 degree right thrust. The Robart tailwheel showed-up from Bob Walker. Nice little unit. I will put a former in for it, but it doesn't need to be part of this plug construction. Zach will close-up the bottom tomorrow.

Leo

F4u5

My Feedback: (81)

Zach/Leo.....sweet. Looking good. Keep up the good work.

Juice

Hi Leo,

I'm very interested in the work you are doing here. I have no experience in this aspect of the hobby. I do know that you will get a lighter stronger fiberglass fuse compared to a build up fuse. This comes at the expense of time and money involved in building your own plugs and molds.

I have a few questions about the process, if you don't mind...

Question #1... You have plans for a build up balsa fuse, right? In the final product, which is a fiberglass fuse, how many formers will you remove? How do you decide which ones to keep?

Question #2... How much experience do you and Zach have building composite parts? Would someone with no experience (like myself) be able to do something like this? Maybe a more appropriate question is... How would someone gain the experience to eventually do something like this? Is there a natural progression?

Thanks,
Juice

Spychalla Aircraft

My Feedback: (34)

Juice, I answer your questions below:

Answer #1: The balsa fuse is just a plug for making the mold. It is the most accurate way for us to get a shape to work from. The final fuse will only have 2 formers. Front gear mount and tailwheel gear mount. The rest is wide open. The decision is made relative to the outside shape of the fuse. Flat sided fuselages need more formers. A round tube like the wildcat wouldn't need any if you didn't have to mount gear in it. As an engineer by trade this issue does not take much time of reflection for me.

Answer #2: I've been building composite parts for 18 years both personally and professionally. There is definitely a progression, but you can watch and learn as we go. Anyone could make some simple parts with nothing more than Johnson's paste wax, fiberglass, resin, and a wood form. That is a gross oversimplification but it is true. On the other hand we are going to make a durable production type mold using industrial materials. I will tell you what it is and where to get it when the time is right. The rest is up to you based on your time, dedication, and financial commitment. Some of the stuff your going to see may be prohibitive for most modellers. If you want to see some examples of parts we've made go to www.spychallaaircraft.com

Well, Zach's got the belly sheeted. Firewall is roughed in. The big thing today was the wing root ribs and fillets. Dowels and a square kept everything straight. He is on to the tail cone tomorrow and then the tedious work of filling finishing and glassing this plug. Ugh! I'm glad he is up to it.

We are preparing to leave on Thursday afternoon for the AMA Scale NATS in Muncie. Our pair of Yellow Spitfires are ready to duke it out with the big boys again. It sure is going to be fun.

Leo

F86_SABRE

Hi,

It would be most unfortunate if after all this hard work there will not be readily available retracts for this plane. I am sure with the availability of a glass fuse there would be a higher demand for the retracts.
I have been after a set of retracts and my in-law was informed that they would be available in 6 months time. That was the same answer we got from Robart 6 weeks ago.

I hope the manufacturers won't miss out on this opportunity in making available these retract sets.

Needless to say the work on this plane is awesome and coming along nicely.

Wish you all the best in your project.

Regards

Reuben

F86_SABRE

oops.......I made a grammatical mistake.....he was informed that the retracts would infact be available in 6 weeks time not 6 months time as stated.

Please excuse my mistake.

Regards

Reuben

mike pierce

My Feedback: (7)

Reuben
From what Robarts told me in talking direct with the owner, a couple of months ago, is that they are made on special order basis only, not mass produced. You have to order your own set direct with them, building time 4-6 weeks.
Mike

CaptainHook

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Awesome work guy's. I thought I could build fast. Have fun at Muncie.

Spychalla Aircraft

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The whole key to what makes Wildcats possible is the creation of the Robart gear. I think gear will always be available from now on. Wildcats are now feasible for the average modeler, and having flown Doug Imes's version of this plane I can say that the average modeler can also fly it easily. So it is a perfect warbird to make in glass. The gear that I just bought and that you see in these pictures have been sitting on the shelf at Robart for some time. Anybody could have bought them. Talking to Gary in sales at Robart, he indicates that they make them in a batch run. 12 to 24 sets at a time. They have to work it into the production schedule. I'm just glad they were there for us when we needed them.

Zach did the tail cone today. He says it's just roughed in for now. He is studying pictures to see how to shape it. You're not going to see much progress now for about a week. We're preparing for Muncie.

Leo

bullet65

thank you for this very informative post.the work alone is hard but for people to post there progres as they build is what keeps me at rcu almost daily.i never thought much of the f6 untill a couple of weeks ago we took our honeymoon in orlando fl and we found fantasy of flight just south.they have an f6 that is being rebuilt and is it big.after i saw it i have been more and more thinking of a rc version so build away.

vik

My Feedback: (1)

nice work

Spychalla Aircraft

My Feedback: (34)

Well Bullet65, Thinking more of the F6 isn't going to help you here, because this model construction is an F4F Wildcat. I think the F6 is the Hellcat. The Hellcat is big. I think the Wildcat is relatively little. Same manufacturer, Grumman.

Leo

carlbecker

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Hi Leo and Zach
Looks great. Thanks for sharing the process. What a great summer job! You are planning on panel lines also. This will be very nice indeed.

I will be in touch

Carl

Spychalla Aircraft

My Feedback: (34)

Scale NATS is done. Tremendous fun! Competition in Expert was a little lighter this year. Nobody showed-up from the west coast. We think that it might have been due to gas prices. There were 19 entries in Expert. Zach placed 6th and I placed 4th. Our best finishes yet. We're happy. I held the kid off for just one more contest. It's not long now and he is going to whoop me. Lord willing, we'll both be at the U.S. Scale Masters this fall in Kansas City, KS. Even more fun!

OK. Back to work. Today was the stab. Zach framed one up for placement. Covered the center with monokote so we have something to wax against. After the incidence is checked it will get puttied into place with bondo and then pulled out. This will provide perfect registration in the mold. I told him to clear 1/16" around the wheel wells tomorrow. I want to see some more clearance for the tires. We expect to be glassing this plug within 2 days.

Leo

F4u5

My Feedback: (81)

Hey Leo....It's got to be tempting, at this pount, to just build the wings and go fly . Has to take some great persistance to keep pluggin (pun) on the plug. . Your kid can make some great balsa dust.

Jeff

Spychalla Aircraft

My Feedback: (34)

Jeff, there is no temptation to fly. This thing weighs a thousand pounds with all the body putty.

Well Zach has a total of 94 hours in on this plug right now. It is not a job for the faint of heart. He glassed the balsa and putty surface with .75 oz. glass cloth today. The resin used is a general purpose polyester. The reason for polyester is that it will have better adhesion to the body filler and it will be easier to sand and fill from this stage forward than epoxy. Tomorrow should be a day of more filler and some priming. The surface will now start to look good.

Leo