SE5a CONSTRUCTION BEGINNING TO . . .

[Greyhead]

The pitot head is fitted to the R.H. interplane strut; the 2 copper “pipes”, which disappear through a hole in the covering into the wing, are made from twin and earth house wiring, the “hoses” are short lengths of the neutral sleeving. A few years ago I did some wiring work in the house and had the forethought to keep some of the old wire, which used red and black sleeving, the cable available now uses blue and brown.





I didn’t want the pitot head attached to the interplane strut too solidly so that a knock might damage the strut, therefore, I used1.5mm diameter plastic rod. I drilled shallow holes in the strut, pushed the rod through the mounting lug into the hole and applied a drop of thin cyano before trimming the rod over length. A touch with a sanding disc “mushroomed” the end producing a realistic attachment and twists of wire for hose clips finished the job.





Obviously it still needs to be weathered, talking of which, it may sound bizarre but the “dirt” on the underside of the tail plane in the post above is at the moment too clean, it will all be blended in at a later stage by gently rubbing over with a pan scourer.

[Guest]

Well Grahame,

I've just finished reading your thread up to this point and I must say you've done a magnificent job. I've learned alot from this build and I look forward to seeing you complete it.

Scott

[Greyhead]

I’ve just looked back through the last few pages to find out how long it’s been since I ordered the PC10 and it turns out to be just over 2 months. The reason for this is that the “new” PC10 (dark) arrived over the weekend but according to Phil at Fighteraces he’d been sent the old PC10. On further checking with the manufacturers in America it was discovered that this was indeed the PC10 (dark) but it’s nothing like the colour shown on the website and is in fact very similar to the old PC10.


The website has been updated in the last few days to show this colour but it’s definitely not what I want for my SE5a so that’s a couple of months wasted. I emailed Chuck Graves of Warbird Colors about this and he pointed me in the direction of some German WW2 colours that are a very close match to the colour I want,


As I’ve said before the colour of PC10 is at best an educated guess and as I’m not a competition man I’ve decided that Schwarzgrun RML70 is near enough for me.





The paint has had some talcum powder added to produce a nice matt finish and obviously still needs to be weathered but I think it looks a lot better than the lighter shades.

[dynamite25]

Hi Grahame the plane is looking brillant looking forward to seeing it finished and flying.

[Greyhead]

The templates for the white lettering are what I call “positive”; that is they are the actual shapes, which I draw around, not holes cut out. Here a card “Z” is held in position on the fuselage side with low tack masking tape.





I don’t know about you, but I find painting rather boring, not weathering, which I enjoy, as it really brings the model to life and makes it an individual “miniature aircraft” as opposed to a model. It’s the slapping on of the overall basic colour that really drags, especially with the prospect of having to apply 3 or 4 coats around a fairly complex shape as below.





There are a couple of things I do to relieve the boredom and a couple of things I don’t do. The photo above shows one of each! I do, if practical, split the painting into smaller sections. The section behind the rear white stripe has had 2 coats and the rear edge of the “Z” made a convenient place to stop the next section, the first coat will be continued forward before applying the second coat and so on. I don’t use a thick coat of paint to reduce the number of coats required, it may indeed reduce the number of coats of paint but the chances are that you’ll end up spending a lot of time and effort trying to remove sags and runs from the paint and the finish will never be as good as a build up of thin coats. You can tell from the area with only one coat that the paint is quite thin, it hasn’t covered very well but the second coat is a great improvement. Another thing I don’t do is rush the job; I always allow ample time for one coat to dry completely, not just “touch dry”, before applying the next.


Another thing I try to do to alleviate the boredom is to take breaks from painting and do a bit of detailing. Unfortunately I have done most of the small detailing work whilst waiting the 2 months for the paint to arrive, but there have been a couple of things to make.


The control for the radiator slats. It doesn’t show up very well, I’ll take another photo after the front has been painted.





The tubes from the pitot head exit the wing at the root and are encased in the rear of the cabane strut.





The other hole in the covering is for access to the aileron control cable adjustment and will be patched once they are set up correctly.

[Greyhead]

I had the comment made to me that it was a pity to “spoil” the covering by having to use patches. Well just have a look at this photo of the Shuttleworth SE5a.





This is an aircraft that doesn’t fly that often, is lovingly maintained and certainly doesn’t have to take the sort of punishment handed out on a WW1 airfield.

[Guest]

It continues to be a breathtaking model Grahame, I am completely with you on the weathering. I try to make a model look like a reduced version of the real thing so I strive to make it look as realistic as possible by careful weathering, which, like you, I really enjoy doing.

[wonwinglo]

The inspection patches were instigated by the CAA several years ago,like the De Havilland Tiger Moth's in service today the CAA stipulated that over 100 doped inspection patches needed to applied at strategic points along the wings,these serve to keep a constant check on internal structure integrity,inspection of the control runs and general condition,this scenerio was started when a former crop spraying Tiger Moth broke up in flight during aerobatics in Australia,that particular aircraft had been subjected to agricultural chemicals that affected the integrity of the airframe,and so as always happens everyone owning old biplanes has suffered since.

Standard S.E.5A aircraft in service during WW.1 were considered expendable,and as such had very little airframe inspections,most did not last that long anyway ? as such their wings were just patched us as required,but they did not have set inspection patches like the Shuttleworth example which has to meet modern airworthiness requirements.

[Greyhead]

Thanks for that info Barry, another insight into the history of the SE5a. I’d assumed that the patches must be for some sort of inspection because of their regularity; of course the Shuttleworth example is subject to modern day peacetime airworthiness regulations, a lot more rigorous than WW1 requirements!

The point I was trying to make was that patches on fabric-covered airframes are / were very common and don’t in fact “spoil” the covering. Of course I don’t know how many or where any patches may have been at any given time on SE5a E5808, but then again nor does anyone else so they can’t say it’s wrong.

[wonwinglo]

A bit more information on fabric aircraft patches,they are called 'Woods frames' these consist of a celluloid disc or square disc,to use you merely dope the frame straight onto the fabric,allow to dry then with a knife cut into the frame leaving the inspection hole,then a doped piece of fabric is placed over the hole with suitable overlap,on inspection the fabric is ripped off,the inspector then uses a small mirror and torch to look internally and sign the work off,then new patches are applied,and hopefully the paintwork touched up,usually it looks a bit untidy as you never get a perfect match,but anyway for anyone wondering what they are all about that is the way it works

[Greyhead]

The painting of the fuselage is now finished; the individual pieces were painted separately then fitted in place ready for weathering, this will ensure that the weathering “flows” from panel to panel in a natural way.





I need to leave it for a while to let the paint really harden off before I start wearing it away with a pan scourerer, that’ll really show up the rivets and panel edges etc. Only when I’m happy with that stage will I start to “dirty” it up a bit.


Here’s a better shot of the control rod for the radiator slats.





There’s lots of “damage” to the lower part of the front panel, which will eventually be very heavily weathered with chipped and worn paint.

[Greyhead]

“Dirtying up” the fuselage has been a bit of a hit and miss affair; with the PC10 being very dark it’s hard to tell where the very thin black paint has been applied and how much it may have built up in places, until it’s actually dry that is and by then of course it’s too late to do any corrective work if there’s too much build up of paint.





The finished effect needs to be quite subtle and I’m not happy with the front section, that is in front of the oil cover, so this area will be repainted with PC10 and the process repeated. The other side has worked out OK.





As far as the wings and tail plane are concerned the parts to concentrate on are the areas behind the hinges and the leading edges, but once again the effect is quite subtle. The colour of the paint in the photos varies depending on how the light falls on it, but this is not as noticeable in “real life”.





The roundels on the top wings also need careful attention; the stitching really picks up the “dirt” and the area behind the hinge, which is hidden by the aileron gap cover, shows up a lot more than on the PC10.





I can assure you that the roundels are round; it’s just the way it looks in the photo!


Another photo showing how the dirt picks out the stitching.

[Guest]

A really nice sympathetic weathering job Grahame. Beautifully done and combined with your attention to detail and the use of appropriate materials is going to make for a model that is going to be as near to a perfrect miniature replica as you are ever likely to see.

Seeing the landing struts in your latest shots reminds me of the first few shots you took when you first started this model and how it has now all started to really come together.

[Guest]

Grahame can I ask another silly question about the colour of your plane as it looks very dark I thought WW1 aircraft where brightly coloured or did that change as the war progressed or where the bright schemes propaganda

AMAZING work mate

[Greyhead]

Richard, it seems a long time ago that I was working on producing a nicely stained undercarriage and to some it may seem like sacrilege, but this is what it looks like now!





As for the colours, it was really the Germans who went for the “flashy” paint schemes and very nice models they make too, perhaps the British were / are too reserved. In the photo of the Shuttleworth SE5a you can see how dark the PC10 is, this is a latter variation, some of the earlier ones were a lot lighter, but whatever base colour was used the red wheel covers are about as far as they usually went, although there are one or two examples of fairly bright “nose art”.


Of course as I’ve said on several occasions, PC10 was not a colour as such; it was the 10th variation of Protective Coating and consisted of several layers of clear dope, undercoats, etc., etc.