Luxuswaffe

There are 2 build threads about the Meister Scale Zero on RCU. Since those are years old and not updated I decided to bring up a brand new build thread on the 108-118 inch Meister Scale Mitsubishi Zero.

First thing I do is to read anything I can get about the desired plane.
Literature is plentiful in stock about this famous fighter plane. I highly recommend the book "Samurai!" from Saburo Sakai who scored 64 victories in combat.
Sakai was never being deadly shot down himself and became a recognized veteran and ambassador after the war.
Also recommendable are diverse technical books with graphics, illustrations and pictures. The books will help me to make the Zero to nearest scale.

Due to the size and affordable capital to build this plane, I partnered up with 'pittss3s' who shares the same RC club with me in Cape Coral, Florida! We will be having tons of fun and cold beer during this build.

Between order and delivery of the Full Kit from Meister lied about 10 weeks. Therefore you get a white cardboard box with all required wood parts - lasercut.
Broken parts during transport can easily glued together and are of no means to the excellent overall quality of the kit.
Also the fiberglass parts are coming with rivets and lines already incorporated. As driving power we decided on the Fuji BT 86 twin engine.
The Zero will completely encowl the engine. The sound of a twin engine is just awesome, the power should be more than enough for this 35/40 lbs plane.
The single prop shaft is in favour over shafts that will need 5 hole precision drills.

Let's begin with a list of glues and additional building material.

From the Hobby Shop:

Thin CA, large bottle
Medium CA, large bottle
Thick CA, large bottle
Accelerator, Zip Kicker
Epoxy – 30 min. XL-bottle
Epoxy – 6 min. XL-bottle
Brushes and cups
Xacto Kit Set
Razor saw, large and small
Mitre
T-Pins

From Home Depot to build the Jig:

1 * 1’ x 8’ x 8� poplar wood
9 * 1’ x 8’ x 8’ ribs
Countersink set for pan head screws
Pan head screws 2’
Sandpaper 80, 220, 400
Square, large
Straight Edge, large
Ruler, large
Standard drill set
Handdrill (gimlet)

From Publix or mom's kitchen:
Waxpaper

Luxuswaffe

1. Read carefully the manual that comes in the box.
2. Get familiar with all the wood parts.
3. Locate plan 1 with the fuselage and crutch assembly on it.
4. Staple the plan on an even working surface. I am using a straight door from HD. Lie the wax paper out on top of the precious plan.
5. The plan is not CAD generated and not 1:1 scale! Look with suspicion on taking measures from the drawings.
6. Measure the distances on the wooden bulk heads. Cut the balsa square wood using saw and mitre.
7. Attention: Centerline on plan is not straight. Take the long ruler and draw the real centerline on the plan!
8. Assemble and glue the crutch using saw and mitre.
9. Align the crutch assembly on the plan's centerline.
10. Prepare the jig.
11. Lie the crutch on top of the jig.
12. Assemble and glue the bulkheads in the crutch.

GhostRider32

Definately interested in this build. Keep it coming.

Luxuswaffe

OK. Crutch is done and laid out on the jig. Make sure the jigs are 90 degree square. Glue the bulkheads in according to the manual.

Luxuswaffe

Have the elevator saddle HF9 "underneath" Bulkhead 9. We didn't obey the construction order in the first place and had to remove bulkhead 9 again from the crutch. See pictures.

Luxuswaffe

Glue the ribs in. The firewall needs to be square. Big discrepancy between the kit and the manual: The bulkhead design had been reengineered by Meister without having the manual pictures revised. Also bulkhead no. 4 has recesses not lining up with no. 3 and -5. Dremel took care of widening the recess.

Luxuswaffe

After a couple of hours you can already imagine the later shape of the plane's fuselage.

Luxuswaffe

We did not decide yet whether to build the A6M2 or the later A6M5. Since we have the Meister cowl and exhaust stacks for the latter we are likely to build the A6M5. On the other hand the A6M5 will have the reduced wing span of 108".

However, we want to be ready with the plane until our next warbird meeting in 2009. I am planning of showing a dog fight with a giant scale Hellcat with the Zero going down (without its destruction) in black smoke in a desperate dogfight with the American fighter plane. I am reading myself into air-to-air tactics in order to bring some Hollywood feeling to our airfield.

GhostRider32

Keep up the good work, it's possible I may build this one next and these pics are a great source of help to a new scale builder. Thanks.

Stuka Jon N

My Feedback: (33)

Jochen Whose hellcat are you going to have the Dogfight with. Stuka Jon

vease

Looking good!

I'm building a Meister zero and doing a build thread on RC scale builder in the Meister section!

Gregg

Luxuswaffe

Hello John:

I was hoping to get your Hellcat and Matt as representative of the American fighter pilot.

Luxuswaffe

Hello Gregg:

Good to have you here. What is the hyperlink to your build thread in the UK?

What is your experience with the built so far? Which servos would you recommend? How did you do the wiring, pushrods etc.?

vease

There is my detailed build thread on RCScaleBuilder: http://www.rcscalebuilder.com/forum/...?TID=8502&PN=1

Or a pics only build onmy site www.veaseyjet.com: http://www.veaseyjet.com/VeaseyJet/M...o_build_1.html

have a look and see what you think

we can then discuss specifics

Gregg

Luxuswaffe

The sheeting of the fuselage goes as described in the manual. Some missing sheets were quickly replaced by Meister - Thank you Dino, great service!!!

Icemanjr92

My Feedback: (73)

Hello Luxuswaffe,

What is your name and when did you purchase the kit? We would like to do some research to your purchase. For some reason we never received a call regarding your problem with your kit, but it was posted in this thread and that's how we picked it up. If you purchased the kit from us recently, you should have received a note in the purchase stating the following:
"*** ATTENTION ***
MEISTER SCALE CUSTOMERS:
WHILE WE STRIVE TO PROVIDE YOU WITH THE BEST MATERIALS FOR YOUR MONEY
AND THE HIGHEST CUSTOMER SERVICE FOR YOUR NEEDS, SOMETIMES THINGS SIMPLY FALL THROUGH THE CRACKS.
PLEASE BE AWARE THAT HUMANS PACK YOUR ORDERS NOT COMPUTERS. THEREFORE SOMETIMES YOU MAY RECEIVE A DAMAGED PART, THE WRONG PART OR THE RIGHT PART BUT WRONG MODEL.
IF YOU RECEIVE A WOOD KIT FROM US AND IT CONTAINS DAMAGED OR MISSING PARTS,
(PLEASE) LET US KNOW FIRST.
DO NOT PURCHASE THE WOOD FROM YOUR LOCAL DEALER AND THEN SUBMIT US AN INVOICE. THIS WILL NOT BE ACCEPTED FOR CREDIT.
PLEASE CALL 772-621-9692 OR EMAIL [email protected] FOR ASSISTANCE.
WE WILL CORRECT THE PROBLEMS YOU ENCOUNTERED IN A TIMELY FASHION.

Even if you did not receive that memo, You should have let us know so we could have corrected your problem. We cant fix what we don't know about.
So please let us know your information regarding your trouble on your kit.

Thanks,
Dino Di Giorgio
Pres, Meister-Scale

t_burley

My Feedback: (59)

Jochen did you order your kit directly from Meister originally or from
some other knock off company that is not authorized to sell them?

Luxuswaffe

Sheeting of the top fuselage is done. I used a bleach/water mixture to bend the balsa. Works perfectly. Next steps will be the incorporation of the servo tray, tanks and motor mount.

pittss3s

Here the tail structure. Rudder and elevator.

1. Dry fit the skins and trace the rib locations onto the skins.
2. Put pin holes to the outline rib locations.
3. Glue skins in normal way and use pin holes to align t-pins attaching skins to ribs.
4. Use CA on leading edge of skins and white glue on rib to skins.

Stuka Jon N

My Feedback: (33)

You can cut your head off Jim but we still know its you by the hairy legs. Stuka Jon

pittss3s

With the help of a brazing torch we were able to braze the steel control horns onto the piano wire. We made the control horns out of sheet metal.

at-6 texan

Pitts very nice!!!

Luxuswaffe

Not much time to build on the actual plane. Therefore I built a new styrofoam cradle for the fuselage. Made out of styrofoam sheets and PVC tube. What a mess with all the sticky white styro cells.

Luxuswaffe

Here are the pictures from the installation of the tailretract. To make it look right to scale, the retract has to be extended as for down as possible. Use a spirit level on several measure points along the fuselage to make the installation even. There is no room for guesswork here.

Thanks to Veasey in the UK for his build thread on the same muster. Although our retract is pneumatic controlled.

Luxuswaffe

Tailretract, rudder control horn and elevator control horn. They all sitting in a confined space. Absolut precision is needed to make each one functional. We had to rebraze the control horns several times to make them fit.