Algebra Build 8 - Covering!

Well it's been a while since my last installment.

I have the plane covered now.

One thing I learned -  covering your pride and joy does not hide imperfections, it highlights them! I'm really wishing I'd spent more time sanding and finishing before starting the covering process. Ah well - never been a great one for finishing things off...

I had covered the fuse and tail earlier on in the build process. This entailed cutting out shapes to the rough size  and ironing on. I did top, bottom, left and right sides for the fuse - got a bit fiddly and i really should get sharper scissors!

The blue Solarfilm was part of the job-lot of stuff I got off Paul - not saying it's old or anything....

Fuse and tail covered.

Having learned a bit from the fuselage covering, I decided to get a bit more technical with the wings - I measured the panels to be cut, allowing for overlaps where necessary (the instructions that came with the solarfilm were very useful!), and cut these out on the workbench, rather than trying to use scissors round the edge of the piece after the event. this worked much better.

Cutting out the panel: 

 

The panel in place:

Cutting accurately made it easier to line up the change in colour between the blue and white:

When applying large panels to a solid surface like a veneered wing (rather than an open framework like a built-up wing), the instructions suggest starting from the centre and working out towards the edges. However this didn't work when needing a straight edge for the change in colour. So I did it like this - I tacked the covering at each end, then in the centre, along the line of the join. Then I tacked it again at intervals along the line, relying on the heat of the iron to get rid of wrinkles. Then I smoothed the covering in a 'starburst' pattern towards the leading edge of the wing. Worked a treat!

You really have to trust the heat of the iron to shrink the covering and get rid of wrinkles - I gradually increased the heat till i got the right results! 

One thing I changed, wast to make a cover for the iron - I'd lost the cotton one that came with it when it was new, so I decided to make a new one;

  

This allowed much higher heat without the iron 'catching' on the plastic of the covering.

The Algebra is almost finished! I need to re-install the radio gear, make the forward hatch, fit the rudder control cables and fit the tow-hook. Not long now!