SE5a CONSTRUCTION BEGINNING TO . . .

[Guest]

I have even less experience than Bunker when it comes to mounting undercarriage on scale model biplanes. Although to my untrained eye - It does look like it's barely strong enough. I'd much rather see a bit of a belts and braces solution for such an important structural part of the model.

Otherwise it could be a little reminiscent of the old Messerschmitt Komet taking off from a trolley, leaving it's wheels on the grass and coming back down again on a skid...

Edit: I forgot to say - the build is looking amazing though - it's always nice to see you've updated this thread!

[Guest]

Grahame, as usual you have come up with an interesting solution to a problem. I had only thought of attaching the fairings solidly.

I think your landing gear will be fine. It worked on the full scale. At least I hope it will work. I attached mine the same way.

Steve

[Greyhead]

The tops of the undercarriage legs are filled to fit to the fuselage “hatch” and then have the litho plate added. Once again it was quite difficult working from the side view to get the correct shape to wrap around the legs, they’re still not perfect on the inside but that won’t be easily seen.





The large rivets were embossed using a pop rivet, before it’s been snapped off, and a sharp tap with a tack hammer. The nut and bolt used to attach the undercarriage to the fuselage is too big to be embossed so I moulded them.


I made the mould using a suitably sized bolt pressed into plasticine.





There’s no fine detail so a mixture of epoxy and micro balloon is OK, if there is fine detail you'll just have to bite the bullet and buy casting resin and proper mould making material.





Once the epoxy mixture is really hard the plasticine can be easily removed and the “bolt head” tidied up. The one on the right has a slight imperfection but a dob of filler soon cures that! A short length of plastic rod converts half the mouldings into nuts.





The mouldings are then cyanoed to the undercarriage; only one coat of paint at the moment just to check they don’t need any more filling.

[Greyhead]

The windscreen is quite an elaborate affair consisting of a wooden base to which the screen is fastened by adjustable side brackets and then just to complicate things further the side brackets have metal fairings!


The base is from 1/32 and 1/16 ply, the brackets are tin plate with cut down servo mounting grommet bushes soldered in place and the acetate screen has a litho plate edge.





The complete unit will be glued permanently in place after the fuselage has been painted.





Then I’ll have the problem of the fairings! Probably another “plunge moulding” exercise.

[Greyhead]

The 20swg bracing wires have ends made from brass tube, a time consuming job as there are 40 required all together.





This is where the vast majority of the drag comes from but on the plus side also a great deal of strength. As the bracing wires need to be included for scale effect I see no reason not to make them functional.





I’ve had to move to the conservatory for this job (the cat’s non too pleased), there is just not enough room in the shed to work comfortably with the wings in place. The bracing wires are held temporarily with pins; they will be labelled and removed, then attached permanently after the model is painted.

[Guest]

Looking every inch an SE5a now Grahame, can't wait to see her painted up ready to go.

Regards..........Mark

[Greyhead]

I’m also looking forward to getting some colour on, but what colour is the question? The answer would at first appear simple; PC10, but that is where the problems really begin! I’ve done a lot of research and the only firm conclusion I’ve arrived at is that nobody knows what colour PC10 should be.

PC10 was not primarily a colour, PC stands for Protective Coatings and protection of the fabric from UV light, fuel and other contaminates was its main purpose. As such it was as much about the under coats as the final colour coat and more about the quality (ie proportions of solids to solvents etc) than the actual colour of the paint. Only later in the war as aircraft became more capable and any aircraft caught on the ground was a “sitting duck” the idea of using the paint as camouflage was developed but the colour seems to have varied from a fairly bright green through many shades of brown to almost black.

I did find a recipe for “PC10”; it was like something from Shakespeare

"Eye of newt and toe of frog,

Wool of bat and tongue of dog,"

Seriously it had several variables, use this or this, and measured some ingredients in so many “handfuls” so it’s not surprising that the colour varied.

I’ve decided to use “Warbird Colors” from http://fighteraces.co.ukfor no better reason than it is a shade of PC10 that I like, an added advantage is that it’s water based, but it’s not cheap!

[Guest]

Hello Graeme, I'm using the PC10 from the Warbirds chap, Im hoping to be spraying it in the next week or so. Are you spraying or brushing?

Giles

[Greyhead]

Giles

It was very rare indeed for any WW1 aircraft to be spray-painted so brush painting using a soft brush is the best method for a realistic finish. The under surfaces were just clear doped linen (CDL) and I’m still debating whether to use the “linen” paint or to “age” the Solartex by staining it; apparently cold tea does the job but I’ll have to do some experimenting first.

I’ve heard good reports about Warbirds paint so I hope they’re born out in practice, I like the sound of it; water based and fuel proof!

Grahame

[Greyhead]

In my reply to Giles above I stated “It was very rare indeed for any WW1 aircraft to be spray-painted”; I should of course have added the caveat “ to the best of my knowledge from the research I have done.” in fact that caveat should be inferred for any “fact” about the original SE5a that appears anywhere in this thead!

The Internet is a wonderful thing but it can sometimes be a case of too much of a good thing and you can get contradicting information. Whist researching PC10 all the references I found referred to brushing the paint but I also found a photo of an SE5a which appeared to have sustained some damage to the fin, the repair had the (silver?) undercoat applied and it appears to have been sprayed on.

So we appear to have photographic evidence of spray painting but there is no write up about the photo so we don’t know really what it shows, it’s just conjecture, the photographic technology at the time wasn’t the best so it may not even really be spray-painted.

I suppose, if you’re trying to reproduce the model as it would have been during WW1 and not as a restoration, you can do whatever you like and no one can prove any different.

[Guest]

All this talk about spray painting - does anyone know when spray painting first became widespread?

[Guest]

I painted my SE5 last night with the Warbirds PC10 - I'll be posting pics to my build in a day or so. It is a little bit on the olive green side of things, but the sparying went well. I'm not very experienced with spraying, but the paint seemed easy to work with. The reason I chose to spray rather then brushing is although I want to make my model as scale as possible I also like a smooth paint finish! My brushing is very poor!

[Guest]

Hey Grahame, I'm thinking of brushing on my linen paint rather than spraying - do you think a soft brush will help reduce the appearance of brush lines?

Giles

PS I've updated my build with pics of the PC10 - olive stylee!

[Greyhead]

Giles

I’d use a soft brush about 20mm wide and don’t over brush too much, the finish shouldn’t really show brush marks as such but it’s definitely not a “spray” finish. Don’t be too worried about the finish; remember that they didn’t have the filtered air painting booths that are used today! Your models looking good by the way, I can’t remember if I’ve already posted a link to your build thread somewhere in this thread but here it is anyway.

http://www.rcmf.co.uk/4um/index.php/topic,33284.0.html

Grahame

My experiment of “aging” the Solartex by staining with cold tea has failed; a great pity, I like to get away with using “free” materials! The fabric just wouldn’t take up the colour, perhaps it has to be a natural material such as silk, it’s a long time since I read the article and I honestly can’t remember details.

[wonwinglo]

Cold tea will not adhere to the Solartex as you have found out,this is due to the glaze finish,try using watered down artists acrylic paint,yellow ocre should do the trick applied very thinly,once applied give a quick coat of Krylon clear to seal the finish.

To thin the paint buy some acrylic medium,this is better than water as it will assist in adhering to the Solatex.