503 HellCat Build... any coments?

[ADW 123]

this is my hell cat that i got just a couple of days ago. not as good as most of you but ok....

[r wheatley]

looks good to me , I'm working on the same kit and I'm not as good as most of these guys either but I hve learned a lot from this forum.
just keep building, you will learn more with each build.

Ronnie

[ADW 123]

im only 13 but ive been building for four or five years so ive gotten really good. maybe you could post pictures of your plane and compare....

[Phugoid]

looks good to me, far far better than my attempts at 13 that's for sure..... good luck with flying

The weather is pretty good here in the old world today, I may be able to fly my hellcat today....

Andrew

[ADW 123]

always good to start young right? maybe you could post some pictures of your builds. im waiting on some dope to come in so i can dope that plane and i also got a fairchild fc-2 from dumas yesterday to work on while im waiting.... (i like to have several things to work on so then i dont get bored waiting)

[Phugoid]

My Hellcat build is on the forum already, it should be close to the top as I'm adding a You tube link to it in a few minutes...

Yes start young, I built loads of kits when I was a kid, few flew well but it inspired me to do other things. I qualified with a degree in aerospace engineering...... I now design wind tunnels (amongst other cool stuff) for a living......

Andrew

[ADW 123]

interesting.... ever since i started building planes, i have wanted to go to the airforce

[Phugoid]

I wanted that too, but poor eyesight put pay to that, so I had to be content with understanding what made 'em fly instead of taking the "King's Shilling"

[ADW 123]

how do you get your planes to fly so high and long on rubber power?

[Scott]

Looks good,ADW 123.

[ADW 123]

i also got a fairchild from dumas so ill post pictures of that later when ive at least assembled it and doped it.

[Phugoid]

Three simple rules:

1) Build it straight and true: don't worry about wrinkles too much, a stick and tissue model aeroplane will fly with some failrly major wrinkles but not with a warped wing or tail surface.

2) Build it light: guillows kits are poor in this respect. The wood is generally heavy but even so you can still use it by removing thickness and excess (I used a few of these tricks on my Hellcat) in the worse case cut new parts from good wood (especially for the tail parts). Half decent wood is really cheap from a model shop or on line.

3) Get some decent rubber, lube and a proper geared winder, even with a short bit of rubber (I used a loop 1.5 times the prop to peg distance on the Hellcat) you can put 500 or so winds on time after time without much fear of breaking it.

To be honest I'm happy for anything around the 30s to the minute mark, I don't enter competitions so I never push things too hard, prefering to be happy seeing what it does, and then keeping hold of it or giving them to kids in the family.

[ADW 123]

hmmm thanks i tend to build for show but maybe i will try rubber flight

[ADW 123]

here is my plane after three coats of 50/50 dope/thinner (nitrate)