Topic: Gloster Meteor F8

You could, Mark, but as long as the foam keeps its shape you wouldn't need to remove it.  It's the glass sheath, possibly quite thin which might warp, but if it's epoxy, it has a better chance.  Polyester ("ordinary" GRP) is the warpy one.

A/C2

I never use polyester - I hate the stuff.

This is blue foam, 0.75oz/sq.yd glass cloth applied with epoxy skinning resin, mostly plastered over with epoxy and microballoons to correct shape errors in the foam and then painted to get it a uniform colour (which is the first time you can really see what you've made).

That should be fine, Jamie, at least for a few pulls.
I've e-mailed my chum in London and given him your approximate measurements. I'm a bit concerned it's a bit bigger than his machine, which he built himself expressly to do slot racing stuff.

I'll let you know if he can help.

The problem you had with that filthy acrylic muck is not uncommon. They force us to use something which does NOT do what it says on the tin, then allow it to react with itself.  Infuriating.  I just let it do its worst, rub it down and dust some thin on, then polish the dustiness out.  None of which ever happened in using cellulose for 30 years or more.
I simply won't use the muck any more, it stinks, too.  I have a supplier of excellent enamels made by HMG and they now will do for anything from models to my car which I've started repainting with roller and brush, a la narrow boats (I've done a few of them, too!)
Can't spray where I live, it's always too windy.
Cheers,
A/C2

My chum says he can only do about 5" long, so is having a word with his mate who does bigger stuff. I'll let you know when he gets back to me.
Cheers,
A/C2

Jamie,
the mate's mate says he can do up to about 9" mouldings.  If the canopy is a slider, might that be enough?

Cheers,
A/C2

Hi Martin,

I never did get round to measuring properly. I'd hoped to get outside last night but the toddler was having none of it... I'm taking tomorrow off work though so I'll definately get outside for a measure then.

Thanks for your efforts 

Other than a couple of engines fitted to another model, I have achieved zero progress on any hobby type pursuits over the festive period.

Tonight though, dear wife is helping (i.e. doing) the hinging of the main u/c doors on the Meteor. I haven't used offset hinges before (using the Tamjets type) so getting the various offsets etc sorted out has taken a bit of time on the first door, but now we know what we're doing the other doors should go a bit quicker. We've used a length of piano wire to ensure the hinges were aligned on the same axis, then this was removed and the Tamjets hinge pin fitted for final installation. They're chuffing expensive for what they are but they're nicely moulded and glue well so I'd use them again 

Will take pics when we've completed something worth showing. Hopefully I'll get some motivation back eventually  New baby is due in a fortnight though so this model is unlikely to be finished within this orbit of the sun 

And as threatened some dull photos of a few hours' effort, plus one of the engineering team 

Right that's the main doors hinged. I've been rethinking the actuation of the inners, but the outers will definately be linked to the u/c legs.

The fit isn't great all round but I can sort most of this. I want a little clearance anyway - I'd rather have gaps than stuck doors. I'd prefer them a little more uniform though. The gap along the hingeline of the inners will get filled in a bit though.

Next time I do this it'll be neater.

Nice work the Duff household!

Next time I do this it'll be neater.

Nobody will know (or worry) about it once the first coat of primer goes on.


Pete

Thanks Pete,

I think it'll good fine once I've done a wee bit of corrective work to tidy up and it's been primed. I'm actually quite keen to get some primer on just to prove the point to myself.

I need to return my attentions to the canopy now, and carve the pannier tank from blue foam then I can start priming 

Righto... when I tried the first canopy pull with the home made vacuum former, it demonstrated that it would eventually work, but I'd need to be less stupid next time round. Unfortunately it also proved previous contributors to this thread correct, and the plug suffered some damage from heat on the first go.

I haven't touched the plug again until tonight, when I rubbed back the bubbled areas and it's lifted a few small areas of glass. There's some filler on it right now. I'll get it smooth again, then I need to take a more robust moulding from it. I'd like to do it Phil Clark style with tooling resin, but to be honest my efforts aren't close to Fighteraces quality and the presumed expense isn't really worth producing an industrial grade tooling which faithfully reproduces all my building flaws.

I was thinking of trying plaster of paris. Any comments? I will heed them this time, since "just going for it" merely ended up a few steps backwards.

I was thinking of trying plaster of paris. Any comments?

Hi Jamie,
Despite Dizz' best efforts to make a 3D CAM person out of me, (I will get there Dizz!) Plaster of Paris is what I use.  I'm just about to cast a marked-up block (takes the troublesome artisic element out of the process!) for the latest project, which will then require carving to shape. The tool is usually unscathed after the first half-dozen pulls and the quality is reasonable enough.
Paul W.
I've attached a picture of a previous plug (P.1121) in the final shaping stages.

Thanks Paul. How keen is the stuff to stick to things it's in contact with? I've never used it at all before. I expect I'll need some manner of release agent to get the plug out of the female casting. Would vaseline or PVA serve well enough to prevent the male casting from sticking to the female?

Hi Jamie,
If you mean does it detach from the glazing after a pull - yes, no problems.
Usually a slightly thicker plastic is used for the first pull (to guard against catastrophe by providing the chance of a copy!) then the actual canopies required.
Paul W.

Right, once the foam plug is repaired I'll pour a female mould in plaster, then butter it up and pour a male.

Right, once the foam plug is repaired I'll pour a female mould in plaster, then butter it up and pour a male

I should have read your Q. more carefully   You're starting with the male in foam and ending with a male in plaster.  Haven't tried doing that - although it sounds like a plan!
Paul W.

Jamie

If you want to tidy up the original foam plug then take a medium weight glass mould from it, I'll pour you as resin one. I have a few Bates canopy tools coming up soon so I can pour this at the same time for the cost of the resin if that of any use.........

Phil

Jamie

If you want to tidy up the original foam plug then take a medium weight glass mould from it, I'll pour you as resin one. I have a few Bates canopy tools coming up soon so I can pour this at the same time for the cost of the resin if that of any use.........

Phil

Thank you Phil, what sort of dead line would I need to work to for that? I've plenty of Zpoxy that's as well to be used on the female (it won't be going on models any more  ) and I think I've got a stash of random weave chopped strand mat too. I think I'd need to give you a ring for release wax and some fibres for filling the corners 

Let me check with Gill - it's been an expensive month 

Within the next 2 weeks would be ideal.........

PS:- you can't use epoxy and chopped strand mat together.......chopped strand is all held together by an emulsion which is ONLY dissolved by polyester resin. Use it with epoxy and it doesn't break down and become nice and malleable as it does with polyester. You can only use woven cloths with epoxy.

Phil

Davids Fastglas then? 

I work to deadlines daily...

Let's see if I can work to deadlines when modelling 

Moulding stuff on order from Phil - Check
Existing canopy plug to be tarted up - In progress
Baby not to arrive ahead of schedule - Who knows? 

The race is on... 

Tonight has seen a little more work on repairing the canopy plug. It's going to take a few iterations of fill, sand, spray, fill, sand, spray again. Pity really but there's nothing else for it.

For motivation though, I decided to plonk the failed attempt onto the fuselage to get an impression of what I was working towards. It's the first material difference to the way this project has looked in many months, and quite nice to see how it's going to look when a decent canopy is made. 

I kept finding little bubbles in the glass that deflected under the gentle pressure of sanding. After a coat or two of gloss black with sanding in between, the high spots just weren't going away in the manner I wanted, so tonight I decided to bite the bullet and re-glass the plug.

That's curing now. Still reckon I can meet the resin casting deadline 

nice flight ... what hits me is your gf holding the wing in the beginning..   and how big your daughter are in the later post


i'll start my thread when i get home... doing my vailly Tempest... still waiting for alot of parts but some arrived   .... yeah i guess it will take alooot of time too

Rob

Hi Rob,

Yes I suppose I do get good value for money with these models when you consider how long I manage to drag them out over  My daughter there turned 2 last month, and her little sister is now 6 weeks old also. I think another couple of months are needed before I can (fairly) venture out to the modelling shed without just being a bad father/husband and this year I'm aiming to get out flying on the nice days rather than running off to the building shed to work on something to fly next year 

I do want to finish this one though, particularly as my grandfather (the one who worked on these in 43Sqn mentioned at the beginning of this thread) is starting to fade a bit and I know he'd like to see this one done. 

I looke forward to seeing your Tempest thread. A big Tempest is on my to-do list for one day  Along with a load of other things I'd have to knock up myself. I'm fancying a Panavia Tornado at the moment. A lot of my notions would be a lot easier if I got into turbines and found a decent paved runway 

Along with a load of other things I'd have to knock up myself. I'm fancying a Panavia Tornado at the moment. A lot of my notions would be a lot easier if I got into turbines and found a decent paved runway 

.....  sounds like you have been better at doing that to your gf than planes the last 3 years   

I don't get much time these days for modelling  Most of that is my choice rather than anything else, although I have taken a bit of a step into the unknown employment wise and have spent the past month mostly preoccupied with setting up a company and all the stuff that goes along with that.

I must say I was shamed into heading out to the shed again by Ali Machinchy who rightly pointed out on Facebook that if I weren't playing Lego Pirates games on XBox (most of it was dual player with family - honest!  ) I might get a model finished once in a while.

A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away (ok, ok, I bought Lego Star Wars on Saturday  ) a nice chap named Phil offered to cast me a proper resin tool for my Meteor canopy - all I had to do was sort out the existing plug and take a female from it. I haven't really got an excuse for the timescale to date, but I missed that particular boat at the time because the damage I did to the surface of the plug was really rather more extensive than I'd thought. In hindsight, I'd possibly have been quicker just starting afresh. The overall surface softened, and the foam no longer stabilises the fibreglass all that convincingly. It holds it's shape well enough normally, but it was very difficult to fill and sand because any pressure applied with fingers to wet & dry paper just distorted the plug.

I'm pleased to say though, that I'm confident it's one final 800 grit sand, a final coat and a polish away from being repaired to a good enough standard now. There's absolutely no way I'm going to try vacuum forming over it again, so I'll press on and take a female mould from it, then take things from there. 

I was wrong. There's still one sorry excuse for a pinhole (over the worst bit of damage) which showed through the latest coats. I worked a while with 1200grit to see if I could cut it down but I ran out of microns of paint and was still left with a hole around 0.5mm diameter and at a guess around 0.25mm deep.

I've admitted defeat (again) and opened the filler. I'll maybe get there one day... 

Anyone know what the correct attire for an early 1950s RAF fighter pilot would have been?

Or perhaps more simply, can anyone suggest an appropriate 1/9 scale pilot figure?

Just a bit later than the time bracket you are looking at, but this is what Sea Vixen aircrew wore (taken at the FAA Museum, Yeovilton).
I think I took some photos of flying gear at Cosford too, will have a look.
Pete

Thanks Pete. I don't think that would look out of place. I understand they still wore goggles in the Meteors rather than the modern visors on their helmets, and I think they also still used yellow life jackets like that.

So, where can I get a little one?  A  fibreglass helmet on a WW2 RAF pilot would probably look fine for this scale?

Hi Jamie,
For a pilot, you could try an ebay search for 'Petes Pilots': he does a large range of pilot figures at different scales.
Paul W.

Getting there slowly. Had another pinhole appear - but I think it's perhaps a solvent issue with this Halfords crud I'm compelled to keep using.

Sorry, can't find my Cosford snaps. 
Have thumbed through "Wings on my sleeve", "Faster than the sun", "The years flew past", "Sound Barrier", "Fly Navy - the view from the cockpit 1945-2000", Vulcan test pilot", "Empire of the clouds", "Miles M52" and "100 years of British Naval Aviation" and other than a couple of black and white photos of test pilots like Roly Falk and Roland Beamont sat in the cockpit about to get airborne in pin striped suits, nothing I'm afraid.
I was going to suggest Pete's Pilots too, but Paul beat me to it:
http://stores.ebay.co.uk/Petes-Pilots
JPerkins do 1/9th scale latex pilots:
http://www.jperkinsdistribution.co.uk/detail.php?JPNO=5508315&activepage=1&Navmain=Accessories&subcatname=Pilots

Hi Jamie,
Looking in  'Jet Age Photographer' which is a wonderful Russell Adams compilation of high-quality B&W photography.  The Gloster test pilots are  apparently using leather helmets with the Meteor at this time. 
In 1952 there are shots of Neville Duke flying the second Hunter prototype in a bone-dome and Meteor shots from the same year showing a 245 Squadron aircraft being flown by a squadron pilot who is definitely wearing a leather helmet. 
My father-in-law flew Meteors with this squadron but unhappily, he is no longer around to ask.   His jacket, 'cold weather, flying, Mk1(?)' was green.  I still have his dinghy knife - but that's probably a little too much detail at this scale..?!
Paul W.

Whilst I was still able to supply figures (not that this scale is of use for you), this was our 1950's RAF jet figure........



Regarding pinholes on your plug, remember this thing is going to have at least 6 coats of release wax before the mould is taken, this will fill the odd little imperfection. The inside of the mould can then be fettled if needs be, and once the resin is poured, this too will require a fine wet & dry rub down before it's vac'd........so don't get too tied up with making the plug 100% blemish free before moulding.

Phil

Hmmm thanks.

I'm thinking I might be best getting 2 CJM pilots in 1/9 scale - an RAF WW2 pilot and a "Jet" pilot. I could cut the head off the RAF pilot who has a leather helmet and goggles, and stick it on the body of the jet pilot who is wearing green without a big sheepskin collar. All that would really be missing then is the big yellow lifejacket, but that wouldn't be too hard to replicate.

Whilst I was still able to supply figures (not that this scale is of use for you), this was our 1950's RAF jet figure........

(Attachment Link)

Regarding pinholes on your plug, remember this thing is going to have at least 6 coats of release wax before the mould is taken, this will fill the odd little imperfection. The inside of the mould can then be fettled if needs be, and once the resin is poured, this too will require a fine wet & dry rub down before it's vac'd........so don't get too tied up with making the plug 100% blemish free before moulding.

Phil

Thanks Phil. I take it you can still get CJM stuff ok? Would you still be able to pour my mould? Obviously I'd pay you more as it would be a one-off rather than tacking onto the back of the Seafury mould you were making in January.

I'm fairly confident I'll have the plug finished tonight. (famous last words  )

Hi Jamie

Yes, still dealing with CJM. Remember the CJM figures also come in kit form as well as assembled & prepainted (cheaper for you).....so if you let me know which ones you need, I can take it from there so you can assembled, fill, fettle and paint to your hearts content

Yes, still happy to do your resin tool......the new 1/4 Sea Fury tool is long done now so this will just be a one off, but I still have plenty of resin in stock.

Cheers

Phil