jofunk

Here are a few more pix. of Sebastian's work on the airframe Vladimir built.

jofunk

I ordered all the y harnesses and extensions I need form Radical RC. They can make custom lengths for anything you need. They also offer 20 gauge wire with silicone insulation. Since my elevator and rudder extensions are so long and run near the engine I ordered them in the 20 gauge silicone insulation type. We will see what shows up and I will let you know what they look like.

jofunk

Sebastian did some wet sanding and laid down more paint. I assume all these pix. are the same color but the blue sure looks different in different light.

sysiek

My Feedback: (176)

Hi to all the blue looks much lighter with flash from the camera its much darker in real lights ,now I working on the elevator rudder and wings surfaces and servo boxes .

jofunk

I masked off the stars and bars to apply the red stripe in the center of the bar. the red stripe is 1/5 the width of the total bar. The inside curve of the red bar was masked off with a free hand cut of the tape. Just cut a curve shallow to tight (within reason) and some part of the arc will match the mask you need. Still looking for a 1/4 scale pilot. I guess that would be about 17 or 18" tall.

jofunk

Hey John Roth here is some color chip help. I don't know about everything that is on this site. http://www.colorserver.net

jofunk

Mr Fun and Dennis came over Saturday afternoon. They flipped Mr. Fun's fuse over and started sanding the bottom. The automotive primer creates a lot of dust. John commented that he won't brush this primer on any future projects. The brush strokes are too much work to sand out. He also glassed his fuse wing root area with 2 layers of 2.5 oz. cloth. With the extra resin He fuel proofed his fuel tank floor. I put a few more rivets on the tops of my wing. I also taped off the nose of the tip tanks for the silver that will get sprayed on. To get a straight line I cut out a segment from a Cool Whip container and slipped it over the nose of the tip tank. Then I ran the narrow green tape around the tank using the container segment as a guide pulling the tape taut to lay flat. Wider tape wouldn't work because of the curve of the tank.

sysiek

My Feedback: (176)

Hi I try the brush and is suck ,after some samples the best was the small disposable menards chip roller .

jofunk

I was thinking about making some fuel caps out of aluminum tape. It wound up being a pain in the ***** trying to cut a perfect circle with scissors. In my frustration I put the circle gauge on the tape and with a bic pen started drawing increasingly adding pressure on a smooth hard surface. After about 15 to 20 seconds it cut a perfect circle out of the aluminum tape and didn't go through the backing. I went to town cutting all sizes of circles and shapes I could find. you can feel with the pen when it cuts through the aluminum and you are drawing on the tape backing. When you remove the work there is a raised ridge around the perimeter. You can put it back down on some old backing or waxed paper and burnish as much of the ridge down as you like all the way back to smooth....The cap I made in the pic. is two pieces of tape with a little detail drawn on the top one to simulate the cap. Who wants filler caps? I can make about two a minute.

jofunk

The wires from Radical RC arrived. A little box for a lot of money. I pulled the long leads for the elevators and rudders through the tunnel up to the main compartment where everything will get plugged together. I also pulled kite string from the servo locations back to the same compartment. None are straight shots so a vacuum did the trick to pull the string through. As I pulled each one I tied it into a loop and hung a weight on it so when I sucked the next string I wasn't pulling everything else. The strings will pull the servo wires when it is time. I also goofed around and made some tip tank fuel caps and sprayed them red.

sysiek

My Feedback: (176)

Looks lake maiden next month

jofunk

Hi Sebastian. Get yours done for spring and we will fly them together........... I started installing a rudder servo in the tail. the kite string pulled the servo lead fine. I messed around with the shelf liner that I primed and painted. I cut a piece out for a servo cover and stuck it on. It will work as long as the servo is flush. I also started masking off the LE for the silver that will get painted on.

donnyman

Hello!

I have been lurking for quite sometime and have watched you put a lot of work into your bird, NICE!!!!

Have you considered test flying before putting such a large amount of work in the finish????

jofunk

Hi Donny,

Thanks,.....It is no more work than anyone else does that builds from a set of plans. Although this is sorta on the large side for a jet. It is cold here in Chicago so we have 3 or 4 months of building season. There is no rush now to get it in the air so I will keep finishing and posting the progress. When this idea was hatched 5 planes were started. Two of them have changed hands now. Billy Jaw's airframe went to the local hobby store owner, Mike S. Vladimir's airframe went to Sebastian. John Roth and John Abrahamian (AKA Mr. Fun) are still slowly plugging away at the build. My plane being the last to get started, I wanted to post every little thing I did for posterity. Little did I know I would pass everyone up. Now when I get a question from the other guys about how I did something, I can give a verbal answer and they can refer to this thread and see some construction pictures. I will keep going this way until my plane is done. We will wind up with a 20 page, 1/4 scale, F9F Panther, construction booklet........ With pictures.

Joe Felonk

jofunk

With it 49 degrees in chicago Mr. Fun was going to come over and spray some primer on his fuse. Unfortunately his wife's alternator problem trumped his fuse plans. I masked off the wings, opened the door, set up the fan , and sprayed the silver on the wing LE and tip tank noses. The solvent based Rustoleum I picked up at Menards sprayed through the air brush without thinning. It covered the blue latex nicely, and dried to the touch in 10 minutes. The lines came out nice and sharp with no bleeding under the tape. None of the silver snuck through anywhere so that was a plus. When I did the stars and bars I got some white on the blue. Mineral spirits cleaned it up and it didn't bother the blue latex............I will see some of you guys later at Mister Roth's party. Happy 50th John!

donnyman

Hi JOE

I asked about flying before finishing the painting because that is what I did as a teenager living in Brooklyn N.Y. crashes kill finishes (just curious)

The cold and long winters is why I'm in Texas (right now it's 37 degrees)

I assume with the latex finish you used you will top coat with a clear, I am at that point with a Rustoleum painted bird that gave me fits with the finish (wrinkles) so I am asking around to see what others used for top coating , I don't want any more problems. I have the west paint and polyurethane any suggestions?

sysiek

My Feedback: (176)

Lallalal

sysiek

My Feedback: (176)

Future panther

jofunk

Sorry Donny but I am the last person the give advice about paint. I don't know a lot about solvent based paints. Sebastian, the guy with Vladimir's Panther, recently wrinkled up some paint as you described. He might have some do's and don'ts for you. My latex paint will not get a top coat of clear. the plane will be finished as is. The Rustoleum went on top of the latex ok because the latex is basically a coat of rubber.............. Hey Sebastian what type of flaps are on that Panther in the painting you posted titled Future Panther?................... I got all the servos mounted in the tail. I can start working on hinging the elevators and rudders. I also started pullng wires and installing servos in the wings. I had one little hiccup with my Radical rc extension and wire order. A few of the extensions did not come as Futaba. They have bevels on them for keying instead of the Futaba style flags. As they are, my servos won't plug into them. While the fuse. was up side down I drew some marks for the big panel line where the rear end of the plane separates to expose the full scale engine. To get it straight over the angles and curves I shined a laser level on it and then made some marks. The magnets in the laser stuck to the duct work in the house. I then dragged the plane under it. It was hard to get a good pic. of the laser line.

jofunk

All the servos are in the plane. For kicks I threw one of the completed wings on a baby scale. It showed 5 lbs,5 ozs. There won't be any scientific weighing until until I try holding the plane while standing on the bathroom scale. I just haven't figured out how to get the plane into the bathroom yet............ I called Radical RC about the wrong extensions. the owner dave Thacker answered the phone. I told him what happened and he said he would get the correct ones sent out right away. When I asked about the returns he said, "just give them to a new kid that can use them". I thought that was a nice gesture. So I will be on the lookout to give away some extensions this spring.

sysiek

My Feedback: (176)

Hi I will use them in mine panther.

jofunk

While I have the nylon Dubro links on all my Ziroli planes I needed to remind myself how strong they are. The set ups I have on the warbirds are the links on a mild steel 8-32 bolt. The Panther is getting 8-32 stainless steel bolts for arms. I clamped the bolt with 1/8th arm extended. I hung a bucket off of it and started loading it up. At 75 lbs everything was still happy. I stopped and extended the bolt out an inch. The 8-32 stainless steel bolt started to bend at 55 lbs. If that is the weakest point of the linkage I'm ok with it.

jofunk

All the hinges on the elevators and rudders are glued in and the rudder push rods are installed. I have rubber bands on the elevators while the glue is setting to confirm that I have enough travel once it sets. I also made a little tool to hold the links while I ran a tap in them. It also made it easy on the fingers when running them onto the bolt. I also put a few more peel and stick covers over the rudder , flap, and aileron servos. Before I slid the wings off I started taping off the intake area for some silver paint.

sysiek

My Feedback: (176)

I'm finishing the f-15 I got from rt 66 will finish Sunday and after the f-15 time to do some more work on the panther ,just revived some parts to install push rods ,heavy duty control arms wires ,the only think I'm missing is the lending gear .

jofunk

The Panther is all set to slope soar........ Trying to get this to hi light........http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GMqF-QEBPxY