Walking in a (EPP) Winter Wonderland

It was with a mixture of trepidation and excitement that I made my first shaky incisions into the precision-made, laser-cut foam fuselage of the Traceur – an aerobatic slope glider kit from Modellbau Joost in Germany.

Up until now it had been all about the flying – learning the basic maneuvers, controls and orientation of a radio-controlled aircraft. Building remained shrouded in mystery and intrigue. The preserve of people who actually know what they’re doing!

So when Rob kindly offered me his un-made Traceur, I accepted with both the relish and abject fear of a mountaineer eyeing up their next seemingly insurmountable peak. Either way, I was now committed and my fear was soon displaced by more tangible considerations about how to actually build the thing.

Fortunately for me, I was armed with a copy of Tim’s detailed Traceur build guide. Having painstakingly pondered over the optimal placement of the on-board components, I soon found myself engulfed in a man-made blizzard of EPP snowflakes, like a caricature snowman a winter wonderland shaker toy.

Battery, servo and receiver-shaped crevasses slowly started to emerge in the fuselage, as the EPP flakes formed a light dusting of powder snow on all surrounding surfaces. Like the cliché that Eskimo languages have an unusually large vocabulary for snow, I think modellers ought to develop a specific set of adjectives to describe the various techniques used to cut, carve, scratch, scrape, pull and prize away stubborn EPP.

There was now no turning back and I ploughed on with the “build”. I know some purists may dispute my use of the word build here – but I’m not a purist and it certainly felt like building to me! Following a couple of (thankfully non-consecutive) all-nighters, things started to take shape. Including the red and navy colour scheme designed, upon specific request by my three-year old, to resemble one of his favourite T-shirts (see picture below).

I now need one final push to construct the tail plane, attempt the laminate covering (another terrifying prospect!) and commence the final assembly. After that it’s just the small matter of checking the C of G, making sure everything’s trim and level and, not lastly, seeing of the damn thing will fly – just some of the thoughts that have plagued my dreams these last few weeks!

The Traceur beginning to take shape and some books finally getting used!

After another push! Just the covering to do now!