Hints and Tips

This for Andy's Tip re-hair clip..
Thank you for what they are called, I did not know, and for the reminder on how useful they are for light/fragile joints

I was searching the net this morning for some ideas on auto-rudder set up for Free Flight gliders when I came across this site. It didn't help me with the auto-rudder, but it's a mine of information on many free flight and scale subjects. Give it a try....but allow time to do so, there's probably over a hundred papers to indulge in:

The National Free Flight Society (of the USA) Technical Library:

freeflight.org/DigestOnline/library.htm

If you are really frugal many of these types of lid can be flexed and the old epoxy peeled off .This goes for body fillers too

one tenor wrote: If you are really frugal many of these types of lid can be flexed and the old epoxy peeled off This goes for body fillers too

Damn I just almost finished an addition to this . Pressed the space bar and bingo it vanished. Right here goes again. Dope brushes can be kept soft and ready for us as follows. Take a jar with a screw on metal lid that is big enough to accept the size of brush you use.. Drill/ cut a hole in the lid to take the brush handle and push the brush through from the inside and adjust the height of brush in the jar so the bristles are clear of the jar bottom when lid is screwed on. Epoxy the handle in this position. Pour in enough thinners to cover bristles and screw on the lid. This avoids the loss of dope each time you wash out the brush. The jar contents become dope itself and can be used as is or transferred to other jars. It does work for coloured dope as well but to save having a lot of different jars I suggest you do this only while the coloured job is in progress and clean out the pigment when finished Spray can nozzles can be kept ready for use by popping them in a small jar and covering them with the relevant thinners or just use cellulose anyway.Saves a lot of frustration

I thought I'd throw my hat into the ring here as well. I wrote a nifty article on covering tips for our club forum. Check it out here:
www.sccmas.org/smf/index.php?topic=284.msg557#msg557

I has loads of these as first wife was a hairdresser.They suddenly disappeared .Suspect wife #2 ditched them thinking I had them as a memento.Never admitted to it though . Must buy some more . However various sizes of " bulldog " clips are very handy but can crush some softer materials

Very informative, thanks boz

That's a very well made plug you have there Don what is it constructed of
Tony

I generally make the plug just as if it were going on the actual aircraft. It was made from rings of balsa and then sanded smooth with fillers and then fiberglassed with cloth and epoxy resin. Then I layout any panel lines or parting lines with 1/16" graphics tape and rivets with dots of glue, and then apply primer. Once I've sanded everything with wet-or-dry #600, I carefully remove the graphics tape which leaves a very thin groove in the primer.Polish and buff the plug with parting paste several times and then it's ready for molding.

I have been using blue foam to do mine, the problem I have with the foam is my fingers, making small dents, gouges
I think they call the disease HAM FISTED

I occasionally like to build scale models. Several items that really enhance the scale look is rivets and rib stitching. I won't go into riveting right now but I have a couple videos that show a pretty easy way to make a lot of rib stitching in a short period of time.
Scale Rib Stitching Part 1
Scale Rib Stitching Part 2

rivets arghhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.
one blob at a time. eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep.

Tony B wrote: rivets arghhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.
one blob at a time. eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep.

No Tony not Skydanz's way . One strip at a time . Knots and tapes too . I've seen his stuff . Very handy

From time-to-time SAM Speaks, the SAM 35 house magazine, comes up with a real gem and their June edition is no exception. In The Rubber Column, Andrew Longhurst has published a formula for calculating the maximum turns one can apply to a rubber motor. He stresses that the formula gives the maximum turns and for safety and sports flying, it may be worth cutting them back by 10%.

Max turns = 44 x sq root (motor length in inches cubed divided by weight in grams).

so a 30 gm motor 29 inches long would have max turns of:

44 x root(29 x 29 x 29 /30) = 1254 (rounding down to the nearest whole number)

This motor would be arranged in, say, 12 strands of 1/8", but that's not relevant to the formula. if you use it, do let me know how you get on!