DH VAMPIRE

Wheel bays lined with 1/16 end grain using the wheel as a guide

Progress of the build amazingly fast Pete.

Have you not been able to get out? Has it been raining in Emsworth for a over week? :lol: If you have some spare time maybe I pick you up and you can help my grandson with his 3000 piece puzzle? :silly:

I just love building Phil,nothing better than getting out in the garage radio on plenty of coffee and fags and balsa shavings and dust everywhere

OK chaps! Inner wing panels scribed in and trial fit,once happy they will be.glued in place.
Fitted remaining formers and sheeted the boom support. Normanlly the booms would be a.permanent fixture but David has devised a superb way of making them removable.

Looking really good now Pete. Image 311, leave it as it is. Looks like a jet powered fpv drone.

Iv trimmed a tad off the exit end of the air ducts to bring It away from the main former /spar so I will be able to get some ducting on the end of it now.They are glued in place and can start the construction of the fairings on the inlet end.
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Maybe the Der Jet way would work, they use a "T" shaped duct with the horizontal stroke joining the two inlets and a short vertical stroke taking the air straight to the turbine inlet. This approach also helps to get the turbine well forward in the airframe and saves a bit of noseweight into the bargain. I expect that there are internal vanes to help the air round the corner into the turbine inlet.

David you are correct,! There are two angled vanes to force the inlet air around the corner.
We can leave the internal ducting for now as it would be nice to see how forward we can get the turbine? Started to glue the 1/2 balsa sheet in place to form the inlets,once dry it will be sanded to match the contours of the leading edge

Air intakes sanded to shape, they need more work ie filling and some sanding sealer brushed on to seal the grain. Another tip for newbies is if you find the grain keeps lifting when sanding balsa shapes put some thin cyano onto the balsa and it will seal the grain.
I will leave all the fine filling and sanding once the airframe is complete as it will pick up some dings as I move it around as it is easier to do it all in one hit.
The airframe once ready will be covered in light weight glass cloth and resin which will give a virtually ding proof finish and a nice base to apply the scale detailing.

OK then guy's, main airframe is complete so now on to the booms,tailplane and rudders.
David has made a start on the booms so I will finish them off and scribe and fit them to the fin / tailplane assembly, a few pics to start with