Mike.K

Yes, Dave, I suppose is is very easy to get a bit over picky in detail. Certainly some of the ancient aircraft I worked on were far from perfect colourwise. Many patch ups and different shades of colour (even white) done over years by different maintenance businesses could produce a real patchwork. You never knew what paint had been used previously, its manufacturer, paint code or classification. An orange Stampe that I worked on had landed on its chin many times. Then it occurred again and it was my turn to tease out the punch on the chin, lightly fill, prime, flat down and spray my cl

I used to be a vehicle paint sprayer and later took the skill set with me to the aero hanger during the period of studying for my aircraft maintenance license. In those days I could colour brew my own paint shades in the paint shop. That was very handy on occasions. Now, without those facilities, colour matching is more difficult. Yes, Halfords do have a good "on the shelf" range but believe me, getting a match is often a fraught affair. Halfords used to do a bespoke Holts mixing service at their stores. That has now been taken away which is a great shame. They were the only people I could fin

One should never be frightened of good advice or second opinion. Indeed this was a core value instilled when I went back to Technical College and studied for my License Without Type Rating in the aero industry. Critical points were always inspected and signed off by the engineer doing the work, and two other suitably qualified engineers. The last inspecting person was the man who carried the blame if something went wrong in service.How well I remember wire locking eight prop nuts with the twisted wire pulling in the wrong direction. I never did that again! Here is an image taken from Geor

Fear not, Dan. The installation image was an early shot and the aerials were just were they were when I snapped. The whole installation was reworked several times until I got things worked out. The aerials are now properly spaced with the ends being at 90 degrees to each other and well away from any close interference. The same really for the front end shot where the motor wires appear to be touching the centre weight. At that time I was only roughing out C of G and was getting that right before finally nailing up the front end. I`ve now corrected a mis-alignment issue with the starb

Thanks for the reply and comments, Ben. All very valid. I`m trying to get some free time either today, Sat 29/9 or tomorrow Sun 29/9. Trust me to pick days when I have to attempt to find coverage for looking after my severely disabled Father. I`ll see what I can do. I`m still hoping to get to the Biggin visit tomorrow but again I`m struggling with that. George opinioned that with say a .40 i/c motor instead of electric, the model would have almost self balanced to the correct C of G with very little ballast being required. He is probably correct on that. Solarfilm is indeed rather li

My first posting on this site, guys so feeling my way in. Hope I get this right! I`ve just built the new Ripmax 48" £103 SE5a kit of around a thousand laser cut pieces in about 120 hours over two weeks. As a builder, its complete joy with only a few little mods required to strengthen formers in the rear fuselage and some infills at the trailing edges of the wing centre sections. Everything slots together and CA is the predominate adhesive used. Just a little alaphatic PVA used for fuselage doublers and joining the three sections of each wing in slow time. Essentially the model jig builds