Begin' Acro Glider

Chris - Thanks for link - all is clear now.
Colin

MikeSeale wrote: ... You don't need to be too anal about this because the wings strength comes from the spar and the sheeting, not a perfect spar slot

I can't help thinking that Mike is hinting that I might focus on the minutia too much

Anyway I decided the first step was to get the leading and trailing edges to sit at their respective angles without being pulled out of shape by the ribs.

Through careful calculation i determined that the leading edge lugs of the ribs required a 6º taper. To demonstrate a relaxed approach to these things I rounded it up to 6.5º and created a wedge.


With a chisel following the taper of the wedge I removed the offending 6.5º

The result is that the ribs, leading and trailing edges slot together correctly without any tension.


Further work will be required to fettle the other parts of the wing.

A little rough fettling of the spar slots and the wing slotted together without out tension.



I've put the two halves together, back to back, and was pleasantly surprised that they line up with each other. There will be a little finishing off to do before I can glue the first wing skin on, but that will have to wait for another evening.

The bottom of each wing is now sheeted, I used magazines to weight it down and conform to the shape, next time I'll used a ream of paper, as this will follow the shape of the aerofoil better.



Sheeting the top is going to be fun as there is the potential to twist the wing.

Not if you make a jig.

But Chris doesn't like jigs :dry:

Gromit wrote

next time I'll used a ream of paper

I've got a stack of old 'phone books I use for that purpose, just the job!

Being from Yorkshire I'm far more sophisticated - Just nail it te bench lad !

I got a little frustrated with this build sometime in January, I skinned the wings and wasn't totally happy with the results, and had a few troublesome issues that I can't quite remember now, but basically lost interest in it... But with it unfinished I am unable to crack on with anything else, so I'm back at it with a different attitude, 'just get it done and see how it files' So last weekend I got the glue out again.

Oh and yes I did use my jig when gluing the fuselage

Okay this will be my last moan about this kit, but I think this just sums up the frustration I've been having with it



The trailing edge of the tail plane is one piece and the elevator is one piece, yet some how they have managed, with great precision, to make the elevator 2mm too short!

There is a 4mm dowel that secures the front end of the canopy, I didn't quite drill it at the right angle, but hopefully it's close enough.



Is there a convention as to whether to glue the dowel into the canopy and have a hole in the glider nose, or the hole in the canopy and the dowel glued into the nose?