Guillows Focke Wulf 500 series laser cut

[scigs30]

I have all the 500 series laser cut kits and plan on building them out of the box with no modifications. The wood in all the kits is great, the best laser cutting I have ever seen from kit. I like that Guillows laser cut kits don't have all the burnt material that other kits have. The wood in the kit is also perfect weight for freeflight. Since it is laser cut the build went together fast, pretty much in one day and that's building with white glue. I am ready to cover using the kit tissue and will not add paint, just the decals. It should be interesting to see how she flies out of the box.

[scigs30]

Ready for covering.

[Bill Gaylord]

Looks nice. Looks like you got good wood also. The LC kits have much better wood, but I still seem to get a sheet that is a bit heavy. Wish I could take the plastic wrap off and inspect them at the hobby shop. I've been extending the nose on the Guilows 190 a bit, as it's an A3, where the A5-A8 were 6" inches longer. Only maybe 1/4" inch on the small 190, but still helped a bit. With good wood, maybe it will balance without much ballast.

[elkhart]

Looks great, looking forward to the finish work. I notice you use elmers glue all, why is that? I'm a new builder, always ready to learn! I've been using Titebond II

[scigs30]

I like it because it works great dries clear. It is more than strong enough for balsa, I also use it on my rc builds.

[scigs30]

Here she is built right out of the box with no modifications, as shown without landing gear is 22 grams. This is not a bad weight but the weight will go up once I add nose clay. I used the kit tissue attached with 50/50 Elmers glue and brushed on 2 coats of Aerogloss dope. For the fuselage I covered with wet tissue, just 2 pieces total, I would not recommend this for newer builders. Where the decals go I brushed on full strength Aerogloss dope for the decal to adhere better. I really want to see how well she flies out of the box so that is why I did not paint this one. I could have used my airbrush to keep the weight down but the little weight paint adds means more nose weight required to balance. Guillows used to include color tissue in their kits but now it is just white. I have talked to Guillows about adding color tissue so we will see what they do. Couple of other things Guillows could do is add their red 6 inch prop to the kit since this prop is too small. Also wish Guillows would add better quality rubber like they add in their current profile planes. The rubber that is included will fly this plane but it will be a fast flight. The plane could be flown with landing gear down but I have not had much luck with this over the years. Since these planes fly pretty fast I eventfully end up damaging the wing because of the landing gear. I will keep you updated on the flight report. Next will be the Rufe out of the box.

[kittyfritters]

Here she is built right out of the box with no modifications, as shown without landing gear is 22 grams...

Do you realize the significance of this statement? The difference in the wood quality since Guillow has been milling their own balsa and laser cutting is amazing. Back in the old die-crush days, when they were getting uneven quality wood from their suppliers, it was hard to build a 500 series kit, out of the box, that weighed less than 30 grams and it was more common to have them come out closer to 40! (Even though, if built straight, you could get them to fly at that weight.) You had to use every lightening trick in the book to get one down to 22 grams with kit wood. These ain't your grandfather's Guillow's kits!

[glassblade]

But I just received three sets of laser cut wood for a few of my 500 series kits, P-40, FW-19 and F6F. I bought replacement wood because I already have the kits, and only need two sheets for each kit. Very nice laser cutting, but the same heavy wood. I just weighed them - a little over twice the weight for the normal balsa I use for free flight scale building.
This is a disappointment, because I have all the 400 series kits, and built a Me 109D from one of these kits. Wood is fine and acceptably light, and I have a good airplane (see my thread on Bf109D for FAC scale), but these kits have much lighter wood than the replacement sheets I just bought.
I will do what I did with the BF 109D, which is eliminate keels, sand down all wood to 1/32", and grind out centers of formers. I have a bet with a couple guys in my club that I can build a competitive flying scale model from a 500 series Guillows kit.

[kittyfritters]

But I just received three sets of laser cut wood for a few of my 500 series kits, P-40, FW-19 and F6F. I bought replacement wood because I already have the kits, and only need two sheets for each kit. Very nice laser cutting, but the same heavy wood. I just weighed them - a little over twice the weight for the normal balsa I use for free flight scale building.
This is a disappointment, because I have all the 400 series kits, and built a Me 109D from one of these kits. Wood is fine and acceptably light, and I have a good airplane (see my thread on Bf109D for FAC scale), but these kits have much lighter wood than the replacement sheets I just bought.
I will do what I did with the BF 109D, which is eliminate keels, sand down all wood to 1/32", and grind out centers of formers. I have a bet with a couple guys in my club that I can build a competitive flying scale model from a 500 series Guillows kit.

Unfortunately, everyone has those days...

[Mitch]

Sorry to hear about the heavy wood.

I believe you have the skills to make the 500 series be competitive.

FYI... for everyone here, DPC models makes laser cut wood for OOP Guillow models. So for all the 100 series (there were 12) and the two models OOP in the 200 series (DH4 and Rumpler, and a few other models) are ALL available.

Of course you need the plans, but those are also obtainable.

Mitch

[scigs30]

I had some time to fly my models today and took some pictures of the Focke Wulf in action. Just like the build I flew her with the supplied prop and rubber combo. Believe it or not she flew but not for long. I then changed the prop out for the Guillows 6 inch prop with the supplied rubber, but she would not really stay afloat. Last thing I did was swap the 7 inch rubber band for doubled up 1/8th tan rubber 7 inches long. I used my heavy duty battery powered winder that comes with the profile foam planes to wind the rubber. I kept the length at 7 inches because that is the size of the rubber band that comes with the kit. The 7 inch rubber band in the kit produces 150 winds before it breaks, the 1/8 tan rubber same length but doubled over gives 300 plus winds. The rubber in the kit with supplied prop will give you an 8 sec flight once she is all trimmed out. The tan rubber will give a 15 to 20 sec flight with the 5 inch prop. the 6 inch prop really did not make much of a difference. So all said and done it was a fun time but I realized for a beginner getting one of these to fly can be challenging if not impossible. The 900 series kits are great for beginners and they all fly great with little trimming, I hope someday these will be laser cut. I know for a fact the 500 series Hellcat flies great, the P-40 and Avenger fly pretty decent but take some trimming skills. I built the FW190 Diels kit and she flew pretty nice but I think that is because of the long nose, but even that kit took a lot of trimming. The one great thing about these WWII planes from Guillows is that they are easily converted to Electric RC and fly pretty good. You can see all the YouTube videos out there and I am amazed how well they fly even though the quality of construction is marginal. Looking at some of these planes it looks like sanding never took place before covering and once covered the tissue was never shrunk. The funny thing is these planes still fly on RC but would never have a chance with rubber power. I also bought a couple of Guillows rubber band balsa toy planes, and I must say they flew worse than the Focke Wulf. The problem is the wings are so warped that getting it to fly is next to impossible out of the bag. I used all my tricks and finally got them to stay up for a few seconds before diving into the ground.

[kittyfritters]

... I also bought a couple of Guillows rubber band balsa toy planes, and I must say they flew worse than the Focke Wulf. The problem is the wings are so warped that getting it to fly is next to impossible out of the bag. I used all my tricks and finally got them to stay up for a few seconds before diving into the ground.

Take a Sky Streak. After sliding the wing in, measure in 1-1/4" from each tip. Using a straight edge crack the wing tips up to about a 45 degree angle and use some CA on the bottom of the wing to hold the polydihedral in place. Assemble the model, with the vertical tail grain up (90 degrees from the way it's printed) using a drop of CA to keep the tail feathers in place. Replace the "Blue Band" with a properly lubricated loop of 1/8" tan sport rubber, about 1-1/2 time the hook to peg length. Trim the model. Put about 1000 turns on that rubber and now see what kind of times you get with it!

[scigs30]

Howard, there is no doubt I can get one of those to fly but the point is a kid with no flying experience will be pretty disappointed out of the package........Just look on YouTube, not too many successful flights. I still have a good stock of Sleek Streek planes from North Pacific and they fly really nice out of the package. I am not bashing Guillows, I also bought a few of those profile kits at Hobby Lobby made by LYONAEEC and it took a lot of work to get them to fly. They come with good rubber and nice size prop and still take work to get to fly. The best thing about that company is they make a nice electric super winder that takes 4 AA batteries.

[kittyfritters]

Howard, there is no doubt I can get one of those to fly but the point is a kid with no flying experience will be pretty disappointed out of the package........Just look on YouTube, not too many successful flights. I still have a good stock of Sleek Streek planes from North Pacific and they fly really nice out of the package. I am not bashing Guillows, I also bought a few of those profile kits at Hobby Lobby made by LYONAEEC and it took a lot of work to get them to fly. They come with good rubber and nice size prop and still take work to get to fly. The best thing about that company is they make a nice electric super winder that takes 4 AA batteries.

That's why we need more outreach from the clubs to show the kids how to make models fly in a satisfying manner. This will get more kids interested in modeling in spite of all the other distractions in their lives. I can't tell you how many adults I meet who say, "I tried building those things when I was a kid. Could never get them to fly, but they burned nice." What would they be thinking now if there had been someone to show them how to trim and fly. I could get into the direction that the AMA is going, but that is for a different thread...maybe a different forum.