I finally got the kit my wife bought me for Christmas the other day, it was on backorder for a couple of months. I sat down and started working on it and thought I'd post the build as construction progresses. I'd like to be able to fly it by June 1, but I've got some busy times ahead with work, so that might be a little ambitions.

The kit is a Top Flite Elder 40, which has a WWI era scale look to it. Here's what it should look like when I'm done.


I'll begin construction by building the horizontal stab. First step is to lay the plans out on the workbench, then cover it in wax paper. I'll then build right on the plan. Some of the parts needed to build the stab are also in view.


The framework for the stab is built out of 1/2" by 1/4" balsa. The center slotted area and the curves at the tips are pre-made, the rest is cut to fit.



Stab ribs are in place.


Capstrips have been added to the ribs (on top and bottom surfaces) as well as gussets to reinforce the ribs. On the left side, you can see I've sanded it into shape. The capstrips are blended to the leading and trailing edges of the stab, and the some of edges are smoothed and curves are blended in. You can compare the difference to the right side, and you'll see it right away.



Both sides have been sanded to shape. I'll finish sand it and fill in any blemishes when it comes time to cover the piece. The leading edge has also been rounded a bit, but that won't show in this pic.



Next, the elevator!

The finished picture isn't showing for me.
Linking from the forum didn't work either.
Opening a new window and putting the link for the picture in it did work.

It looks like it will be a pretty neat plane when you are done.


Wheels

I downloaded the pic from Tower Hobbies and put it in my photobucket album with the construction pics. Let me know if it works better for you now.

I agree, it is a great looking plane! Thanks!

Yep, that got it.
I put this thread on my watched list too.

Good luck with the build.


Wheels

Wow, this looks to become an interesting thread! Good luck with the build.

How do you determine the curvature of the cap strips? Or do they have the same curve front and aft?

Good question! The plans have a cross section view of the stab to show the way the capstrips are blended in to the leading and trailing edges.

I haven't been able to get much done, but I've just finished working on our HS musical, "Mame." I'm the band director, and I directed the pit for the production. Now that its over, I'll have more time to build.

I haven't been completely out of it, though. I was able to get some work on the elevator. The Elder has a split elevator, and the halves will be joined together with a wooden dowel You can see the notches for the dowel on the two halves. One half is almost done, it needs to be sanded to have a tapered trailing edge ( you'd think they could have given tapered stock to make the elevator! I hate sanding!) and the hinge area needs to be tapered as well. I'll show that when it's done. For now, though, you can see the stock from which the elevator halves were cut, the basic form of the elevator, and the more or less finished version with the rounded end and scalloped trailing edge.

Will love to see it fly

Have to have it in my watch List

Yeah, sanding is terrible... I have this wooden boat model I'm working on occasionally, and the worst part is the sanding to shape. All those frames.

My offices is only a few feet from my workbench too, so I worry about sawdust getting sucked into the computer (as well as all over everything!) If the weather is nice enough, I'll take it outside and do it there were it's no big deal.
The last model I made (Great Planes Ultrasport) I wound up doing the final sanding on my deck in the back yard. That had a lot of shaping to do for the cowl and wingtips.
Here's that plane

I finished it last spring and flew it all summer.

Got some more building time in so here's some more pics of the progress.
I finished the elevator, and joined the halves using some 5 minute epoxy. Heavier, but much stronger than CA and the strength is needed in high stress areas. I then slotted the hinge locations in both stab and elevator, and temporarily installed the mylar laminated CA hinges. Some people don't like them, but if you installed correctly, they work great. I also like that it cuts down on the hinge gap, which reduces flutter in the surface.
Here is the completed stabilizer with elevator installed.


I then began working on the fin and rudder. The construction of these is much the same as the construction of the stab, as you can see.



The curved parts of the fin were die cut and laminated, and the rest of the frame was 1/4" x 1/2" stock. The fin ribs were made with 1/4"x1/4" stock, and the cap strips were from 1/4" x 3/32" stock. In addition to providing strength to the rib joints, the cap strips will also serve to provide a ribbed look to the covered fin/stab and give the plane a more vintage look.

Also in this picture is the beginning of the rudder. Online reviews of this kit tend to agree that the rudder is a little undersized, esp. in crosswind situations. Most recommend to build the rudder a little bigger than the kit calls for. The design size of the rudder is 9" x 2 1/4". This is accomplished by taking the same stock as the elevator (which was 1 3/4" wide) and joining some of the 1/2" wide stock used to frame the stab and fin. Instead, I picked up some 1" wide stock and joined it to the the 1 3/4" and built a rudder that is 1/2" wider than plan spec.


Hers is the completed tail feather assembly. If you look back at the stab, there is a slot in the center that the fin fits into quite nicely. This is the first kit I've built which has this feature, and I must say I'm glad. Nothing is more of a pain than trying to be absolutely certain you've joined the tail correctly!


The rudder has a cutout for the dowel joining the elevator halves.


The tail assembly is taken apart (though I'll leave the control surfaces in place for storage) until final assembly. Hinges won't be glued in place until much later.

Next up, the wings!

Looking good.


Wheels

Looking at the plan, it seems like a made an error in the fin. The part circled below is actually supposed to be part of the rudder.


It's not an issue that will cause any problems in flight, but I kinda liked the way it is supposed to look. So I broke out my trusty razor saw, chopped it off, and attached it to the rudder. I had to add a strip of balsa to fill it in a bit, but with wood filler and covering later on, you'll never know it was there. So it will look like this when it moves.


On to the wing.
The wing is built in two halves and then joined together. I'm about halfway through building the right half, so there it will take some time for another update as I will then go through and build the left half. After that, they get joined together. But I'm getting ahead of myself...

Step one is to lock down the main spar to the plan. I do that with T-pins as you can see.
The instructions are also in view. I have to say they have been very easy to read and straightfoward to follow.


The spar is basswood, a harder, denser wood. Up to now I've been working with balsa (albeit a couple different grades). The harder wood is used in higher stress areas, and you can imagine the stress the main spar of the wing undergoes.

Next we fit the ribs (back to balsa for these) to the spar. Notice the last rib is longer than the others as it is positioned outside of the ailerons.


Once they are glued down, I glue in the second main spar on the top of the ribs as well as the secondary leading edge spar (balsa this time) toward the front of the ribs. You can also see what will become the leading and trailing edges of the wing in the picture.



Here the leading and trailing edges have been glued in place, and the wing is beginning to really take shape.



Now I've added thin balsa sheeting to the leading and trailing edge (as well as a good dose of CA on my fingers!) The materials overhanging the rib will be trimmed away later.




An edge on view of the wing from the (as yet unfinished) wingtip. Looking at the shape of the ribs, you will notice they are flat at the bottom rather than curved - actually there is a slight curve to them. This is a semi-symmetrical non-tapered wing - as opposed to flat bottomed or symmetrical. A flat bottom wing is used on training models. It is very gentle and has great glide characteristics. It will slow down nicely for landing and recover from stalls easily. It won't do much by way of aerobatics though. The fully symmetrical wing is the opposite - lands (and flies) faster, will handle all maneuvers, including inverted flight, nicely. The semi-symmetrical is, as you probably have guessed, somewhere in the middle. It isn't as stable and gentle as a flat bottom, nor as wild and sporty as a symmetrical. It will give me more 'relaxing' flights, and I'll use the other plane I showed earlier in the thread (which has fully symmetrical, tapered wings) when I want to cut loose a little.

It's been a busy week, but I managed to get a little more work done on the right wing.

Here you can see the shear webs attached to the main spars and in between the center section of ribs. The grain orientation is important, and will help the spars to share the load as the wing flexes in flight.


Here is the mostly completed wing half. Biggest difference between this picture and previous ones is the center sheeting on the left (root) side of the wing and the shear webs.


As I mentioned before, the wing is built in halves and the halves are then joined. The Trailing Edge Brace, Leading Edge Brace, and Dihedral Braces will help join the wing at the proper angle. Here you can see them installed in a bottom view of the wing. They are attached with a 30 minute epoxy. Up to now, everything has been glued in place with CA (cyanoacrylate glue aka super glue). It holds well, but for the highest stress areas, the stronger yet heavier epoxy is preferred. When I join the wing halves, I'll use epoxy with a piece of fibreglass tape laid in for maximum strength.


I had to cut slots in the end rib to fit the braces in, and in the process mangled the rib. You can see where the rib was damaged as well as the pieces on the bench in front of the wing.


A little CA and it's as good as new.


A little extra balsa where the rib broke won't hurt either!


Next step is to build the left wing half. Since it's the same, as the right, I won't bother documenting it, so my next update may be a couple of weeks away!

Looking good.


Wheels

Time and patience you are doing such great work. enjoy watching the rc planes fly and the planes some of the modelers make ww11 and the jet age.

The wing is finally finished, here's some highlights:

Since I left off, I've completed the left wing half. Once that was done, it was time to finish the bottom of the right wing. The leading and trailing edge panels as well as the center panel and capstrips have been added in this pic.


Next, we add the control mechanism for the right aileron. The control arm is inserted into the shaped balsa block with is then glued to the trailing edge at the wing root. The threaded arm has a control arm attached to it which will then attach to the aileron servo. The rod parallel to the trailing edge with the 90 degree angle in it will attach directly into the aileron.


The two wing halves are joined using 30 minute epoxy for maximum strength. After joining the wing halves, I'll reinforce the joint with fiberglass tape epoxied to the joint. This will increase the strength of the wing joint exponentially.


Yuck. The joint between the wings isn't as tight as I would have liked. I'm not too worried though, as the epoxy/fiberglass tape will provide all the strength we need.


Here you can see the fiberglass tape joint on the underside of the wing. The opening on the wing is where the aileron servo will sit.


A closeup of the wingtip. This is an unusual wingtip. All the other planes I've built have had wingtips made out of balsa blocks which you shave and sand into shape. All I can figure is that the structure will add to the vintage look once covered.


Here is the completed wing, top view. You can see the ailerons (not glued in place, just attached by the hinges) as well as fiberglass tape joint and reinforcing blocks for the wing bolts.

At this point, the wing is pretty much done. Some work will be done as some point during the fuselage construction to place the wing bolt holes and the dowels in the front to secure the wing for flight.



Next step is the build the fuselage. Here is the engine I've selected for this model. It is an O.S. 46AX nitromethane fueled 2 stroke engine.

Ok, onto the fuse.
Here we see the right side of the fuselage and the parts for the left.


Putting the parts together, I used epoxy rather than CA due to the bass wood longerons (CA doesn't seem to bond bass as well as balsa)


Now the formers for the fuse are inserted into the right side.


Before the fuse sides are joined, the firewall is put in place. Here is the view from the backside. The blind nuts will hold the engine mount in place.


The right side of the fuse with formers and firewall in place.


The fuse halves have been joined, and now the tail section longerons are joined with 1/4" bass to give the open structure look to the tail. These are epoxied in place. The epoxy takes about an hour to get to full bond strength, so its slow going.


Still lots to do on the fuse, and of course it's getting busy at work and around the house, so it's gonna slow things down a bit more.

You're getting there.


Wheels

Slowly but surely!

Got a bit more done, mainly placing the wing mounts. This is a tedious, time consuming, and very important part, as you may imagine. You place the wing on the fuse and measure from tip to fuse on each side, keeping it even. Then, you measure from tip to tail, again making sure you have the same measurements on each side. You keep doing this until it is consistent and you are satisfied you haven't moved it a bit in the process.
Then, you mark the locations for the pins on the leading edge of the wing. Here you see the wing in place with the pins (wooden dowels) epoxied in place.


After that is done, you put it in place, and check your measurements again. Once you are satisfied, a hole is drilled through the wing and into the wing mount block in the fuse body. The holes in the mount block get tapped, and now your wing can be mounted by screwing it down into the wing saddle.
Wing mount block with holes drilled.


Nylon bolts hold the wing down. The opening in the top of the wing is for the cockpit.


The wing is mounted. Of course, the wing is only mounted on the plane for flight. For storage and transport, the wing is kept separate.


On to a different part of the plane, the tail structure, which is constructed open, is shown here. The plywood gussets add a good deal of strength to the tail. It will be painted, and simulated rigging will also be installed. The control rods for the elevator and rudder will be visible as well.

really nice work.

Thanks Navigator! I only wish I had a bit more time! Now that the weather has gotten better, outdoor projects are taking priority, so building time is cut down! I haven't even had any flight time yet this season!

Anyway, here's the next stage in the construction - the cowling.
We begin by using some balsa sticks to construct a framwork. The sticks go in two sections:from the side former to a ridge in the fuse side and form the former to the nosering. This was a pretty quick and easy bit of construction for the most part.
Here's the initial stage:


And the stage from the former to the nosering


A couple of views of the finished framework:


and


Now to add the sheeting. To do this, I soaked pieces of balsa sheeting for about an hour in rubbing alcohol and then worked it in. The rubbing alcohol dries pretty quickly. Once I placed it, I used CA and accelerator to lock the piece in place, then liberally applied CA to the interior joints of the the sheeting and frame pieces.

First the left lower side:



Then the left top:



Then the right top:


Here you can see the issue I had with the right top piece. First, it cracked when I attempted to shape it in place. Then, I wound up cutting it a bit short.



I added the bottom right piece, and then some extra balsa to fill the shape of the cracked top piece.


Then a thorough sanding. Here's that right side again, the sanding has smoothed out a lot of the problems. Before I cover it, I will sand again and use some balsa filler to smooth it out even more. Once it is covered, you will never know there was an issue there.



The fuse construction is almost completed. Next up is a wing fairing, then some work on the landing gear. Once that is done, I'll be adding in the radio equipment, and begin the finishing process - sanding, filling, and covering. I'll also be painting the open framework at the tail and adding in some rigging for looks. So the bulk of the construction is behind me, but the detail work involved in finishing it up to make it flight ready will still be time consuming.

Thanks for reading!

Nice fix.


Wheels

This sure brings back memories. I built the same kit over 20 years ago.

Thanks Wheels!

Mbeaver - cool, the cowling was a pain, wasn't it? I also didn't care for the wing joint, I'd rather epoxy the root ribs with a dihideral brace. The three brace solution was troublesome for me.

Well the construction phase is pretty much done. Now on to covering, tail assembly, radio installation and setup, engine install, and a few other minor tidbits. Then run a couple of tanks of fuel through the (brand new and never run before) engine and it's off to the field!

But I digress....

Anyway, here's my latest status update.

Here is the final built piece of the plane. It is a fairing to smooth the joint from the fuse to the wing. I wasn't crazy about how the manual said to do it, so I took a piece of balsa sheeting and did it my own way. It came out pretty well, if I do say so myself.


The landing gear wire is pre-bent, but must be joined by a wrapped solder joint. I had to buy a small torch to get this done, but it will be handy to have in the future. Here you can see the wrapped joints. I will have more vintage looking wheels, but they didn't come in yet and I threw these spares I had lying around on.





I test-installed the engine to see how the fit was...and picked up a nice wooden prop from the hobby store. I usually use APC props as they tend to be a bit more durable than wood, but I figured the wood would look nicer on this ship.


After installing the engine, I discovered that the muffler wouldn't quite fit the cowling as designed. I kinda figured that would be the case, so no big shock there. The solution? cut out a chunk of the cowling!




As you can see, the muffler now fits quite nicely.

The inside of the cowling is going to need some fuelproofing, and for looks I decided to paint it with some dark brown rust-oleum followed by a clear fuelproof paint. Here is the cowling, and a closer look at the area I cut away for the muffler.





And finally, you may recall that the tail section is left open (ie. uncovered) so I went ahead and gave it a couple of coats of paint. You'll notice that some of the tail section is left bare, that will be where I attach the stab. I wanted a good wood-wood glue joint there so I taped it off prior to painting.



Right now, the fuse is sitting on the bench sanded and ready to be covered. Pics of that will follow!

Well, it's been quite a while since I last updated this thread. It's been a busy summer, but I've been able to get some work done on the model. I hope to fly it by the end of August (even with a week at Disney World coming up!).

After filling in irregularities with balsa filler and sanding the whole thing down nice and smooth, I've completed covering the model with Monokote. For those of you not familiar with this, Monokote is an iron-on vinyl covering material. It doesn't add any strength to the structure, but it does cover the airframe nicely.

I chose a beige color to give it a fabric type look. The decals came with the model. I had some scrap red and blue to give the tail some final touches.

Starting with the tail, here are before and after pics. Remember I made a mistake on the rudder, which is shown in the before picture, and is undetectable in the after picture.



Here is a before/after picture of the nose.



Here is before and after with the wing mounted. The before pic was pre-cowling too, so you can see the development of that as well.



And here is an up close picture of the open tail section with some simulated rigging.


Next on the to-do list is to install the servos, battery, receiver, fuel tank, and switch to turn the radio gear on and off. Then I'll connect the servos to the control servos with pushrods and program the radio for the correct control throws. Next would be to mount the engine and connect the throttle servo and finally add the landing gear.

Done? Not quite! Balancing is very important, and I've laterally balanced the plane already but I'll have to balance it fore/aft. Once that is done, it's time to break in the engine for a tank of fuel or two, and then she's ready to fly!

That's coming out looking real nice.


Wheels

Thanks Wheels!

nice work

Thanks! May have run into a snag, though. It looks as if the servo tray is mounted too high in the fuse. The servo controls don't clear the wing mounting block properly.

Between that and my sudden acquisition of Starcraft 2 my build is slowing waaaaaaay down.....

Any progress ?


Wheels

Not much,wheels. I pulled the offending servo tray out of the fuse, , but haven't decided whether to use one of the plastic Futaba trays or make a new wooden one. With the weather, work and holidays, I haven't really put much time into the build.

I also put floats on my trainer to fly it off snow, but in the process I broke the stab, so that has to be repaired before I can fly it. I'll probably get back on the Elder once it starts to look a little more like Spring!

Did you ever make any more progress on this one?


Wheels

There is a guy down at the local club that flys an Elder 40, it is a really nice flying model, slows up nicely and looks like a nice relaxing model to fly. Good job with your build, hope it is a great flyer!

Cheers
Craig

A Pitts Style Muffler would look nice on that. Top Flite Kits are generally very smooth builds with real thourough instructions and plans, Looking Good!

Been looking at it quite a bit, but haven't finished it yet!
Servo tray has been replaced with a new (wood) one, much lower in the fuse so as to give adequate room for the control rods.

I was all set last Spring to bring it out and break in the engine on it, but found out that the plywood piece that has the screw holes for mounting the wing was too high (though it was built per plan) so the control rods for the aileron were in the way and the wing couldn't be mounted. Figures. Just one thing after another with this build.

I've fabricated a new piece, and am (on and off) in the process of figuring out where it should be mounted to be out of the way of the rods. I'm also toying with the idea of turning the mount block into 2 pieces rather than one. If I support it right underneath, it will be plenty strong enough. This is also more of a "Sunday flyer" ie relaxing circles around the field rather than an aerobatic sport plane (that's what the Ultra Sport is for) so it won't have to deal with huge stresses.

Of course, the way this build has been going, it will fold up or explode midair on the maiden flight anyway!

Thanks for checking in!

Lol, I am happy to see you are keeping a good attitude about its maiden flight.


Wheels

Been a long time since I planted one, so I'm probably due! Just hope it's this bird and not the Ultra Sport! That plane is just too damn fun!

Did you ever get this one finished and take it up for its maiden flight ?


Wheels

I was going to wait until it was in the air and do one big final post, but since you asked, here's an update:



So I converted the wing mount block into two blocks to allow the aileron control rods to move freely.




That worked, and everything feels good. Next up, seal the gaps in the wing mount. I chose to cover the wing mount area with wax paper and then put silicone on the wing saddle. When it dries, I've got a nice tight seal. The alternative to this is to use foam tape, which works, just not as sexily.
Here you can see the white line of silicone in the wing/fuse gap.



Over the time this has been on the bench and moved around a bit, it took a little damage in the wing (aka "hangar rash")



So that gets patched up too.

Here she is sitting on the grass for an engine test.



And the engine works!



Balance is very important. I found it was a bit tail heavy, so I added some weight to the nose to keep it balanced.



Now I'm waiting for these #$$%^ winds to die down a bit. I've seen nothing but high teens/20's for (it seems like) weeks!

I've also got some scale things to add - my wife painted the pilot very nicely for me, and I've got a nice Vickers gun for
it as well.



I'll update again when I've got more, hopefully a video of the first flight!

Wow JC you do good work

Sweet

Looking really nice.
Good luck with the maiden flight.


Wheels

It's been quite a treat to read this thread, for the very first time. I've never had much luck with balsa models of any sort, even the little rubber band powered things gave me fits. But it sure looks like you know what you're doing with this kit, JohnnyChemo. I hope it flies smoothly and gives you many, many hours of entertaining flight time.

Did a little Google searching on that engine... Not exactly an entry-level piece of equipment there.

Thanks! I've come to the conclusion that you don't fly a plane, you fly an engine. I've had too many crappy engines that have caused me to
sit on the ground trying to get it to run reliably, so I decided from now on, I buy good engines. I've got another OS46AX in my Ultra Sport (the blue and white plane on the bottom of the first page of this thread) and it flies great. Starts the first time every time, low idle is smooth, and powers up nicely if I have to abort landings. Not to mention it can really burn holes in the sky!

I read through the whole thread again last night, and I found it pretty neat to watch the process. I can't wait until I get it off the ground with some video to go along with it, it will be a nice conclusion!

Ok, some great news!

First, I did some finishing touches - I installed the pilot my wife painted for me as wells as the Vickers gun.




I was able to get to the field today and get it up in the air! Winds were a little troublesome, there was a nasty crosswind that kicked up when I was on final approach on the first flight ( you'll hear the wind in the recording). There was a gentleman there who was kind enough to record it for me, though he had a little trouble keeping it in frame. The second flight went much smoother, as I had trimmed it up pretty well on the maiden. I had much less wind to deal with on the landing, so it was a much smoother affair.

So, without further adieu, here is the maiden flight of my Elder!

congrats on the completion, and successful maiden bud, i'm sure you will enjoy many great flights with her!

Cheers
Craig

well done

wow thats real nice flying JC well done.

Awesome thread!

I always wanted to fly, never to build - but I can appreciate the art behind doing this from balsa and wire. Nice pictures too for the whole process.

Thanks for the memories, I can smell the wood glue now and dust from the sanding.

Thanks everyone! It flies quite well, good for a relaxing afternoon. Took long enough, but it was worth it!

Great to see it up and flying.


Wheels