Tony Nijhuis Vampire Build

[David Brown]

Having near re-kitted my 1/5th Sterner Vamp I have decided to build Tony's new kit rather than repair it again !( Pilot error). I picked up 2 kits from him today at Weston and started the build as soon as I got home ( the other kit is for a fellow Catton member and mowing buddy John). The kits include all timber to complete the models Vac formed nose & canopy, I intend to use my Wren 70 for power, retracts of my own design and Weatronic radio. The other bits needed for the build are wing tubes (purchased from ADFA models) Tanks etc & jet pipe which I have already. Pictures show progress to date, mods are changes to formers F5&6 for fitting the Dubro tanks, increased cut out in F1&2 for my retracts and yet to be made new mounts for the Wren as the ones supplied are for the Jetcat size turbine. Apart from that I am following his build instructions on his website, the kit is a mixture of routed & laser cut parts and so far all seems very good quality
Dave

[Vince Raia]

Looking forward to following your build David, nice kit from a great guy & designer.

[David Brown]

Had a good day yesterday, framed up the second fuzz and started on the booms,Tanks fit ok and new turbine mounts made, today I made up the two elevators glued one pair of fins & rudders & finnished sheeting one pair of booms. Having discussed the project with John I will use closed loop on the rudders with the servo's in the wings to lighten the tail surfaces along with only using one elevator servo. With these changes I hope not to use any ballast in the nose, Tony used about 1/2 Kilo in the prototype. My 1/5 Sterner Vamp was 32lb dry with a jetcat 120 so I am aiming for under the 25lb mark for this build using the wren 70. Problems: I had to put a disc into the last former to stop it pulling out of shape, Mods: changed the 1/4 liteply F1 for 1/4 birch ply. John and I will make the retract units tomorrow ready for the wing build.
Dave

[David Brown]

With Johns help we made 2 sets of retracts & finnished the framework on the fuzz's ready for sheeting, widened all retract mounts to fit the retracts & mocked up one wing to check the fit. They are building very quickly at this stage and I am still pleased with the quality of the cut kit. The oleo's can wait as they will not slow the build. Flying tomorrow so I will have a break from building.
Dave

[David Brown]

Still plodding on with the build, Englands poor performance has kept me going & John has put a lot of time into the project over the last few days, both sets of wings are built ready for sheeting & fuzz's planked on top half. We have had a couple of small problems with the wing set up but nothing major. I have substituted balsa for spruce on the outer panels as they will be sheeted with 2mm lite-ply. The wing panels with retract & servo's weigh 2 1/2lb each before sheeting, the fuzz.s are 2 1/4lb in their present state, booms & tail surfaces 1 1/4lb so I think I am on target to keep them under 25lb. My camera is playing up so will post pics next update.

Dave

[Tony Nijhuis 2280]

Finally got the flying shots for RCM&E last week

just a bit of incentive Dave!!!

vamp2-1.JPG (159.89 KiB) Viewed 26276 times

[David Brown]

Thanks for that Tony, I need a boost as I am tiring a bit now with all the little bits to do, ailerons flaps etc, Johns ill so we have slowed down. I have been stripping out bits off the old Vamp shown here at Longmarston earlier in the year before the tree jumped out in front on landing.

Dave

[David Brown]

With all this rain I should be building an ark, it even started to flood my modeling workshop yesterday, the machine shop got flooded. Regarding the Vams the wings are all complete ready to sheet, fuzzes still not completely sheeted but tail surfaces done ready for sanding. Johns got ahead with his booms done while I had to work in the machine shop on retracts, I hope to catch up this weekend . The trailing links I have been working on are a replacement for the oleo legs on the Viperjet,( yet to be tested). Can't wait to get the Dak back in the air now that my full exemption has arrived.

Dave

[David Brown]

Started my booms this morning, its raining again. Just a note on the boom build, the spacers at the front are tapered for the wing so you need to mark them up as sets, also be aware that the side frames are longer than on the plan where BM2 fits so do not glue at the end as I first did.

[David Brown]

Both vampires are at the same stage of build now, sheeting of the fuzz's is now complete ready for sanding, both tail surfaces & booms done, just final sanding to do. Next job will be to start sheeting the wings. As stated before we have not hit any major problems with the kits its just time consuming sanding all the components to profile.

Dave

[David Brown]

Started sheeting the wings yesterday evening, as mensioned we are using 2mm lite-ply for this. After checking with Tony for the amount of washout built in he confirmed that it is 0 degrees so after setting up on the bench with supports ready for sheet aplication we checked the washout and it had held its shape at 0 degrees. Gator glue (the type that foams ) was used for bonding the skin, I wet the leading edge area first on the panel (this allows the panel to curve more easily) then applied the glue to the ribs etc then positioned the panel over the wing followed by lengths of bar to weight the panel down and stop the glue pushing it away as it foams. The leading edge is pulled around using a length of alloy angle and clamped the trailing edge I use flat strip, I find this gives a clean straight L/E & T/E. I use 2mm lite-ply because it does not need jointing allowing even large panels to be done in one go, it is more stable when wet, and leaves a ripple free smooth strong finnish neading very little sanding. 3 down 5 to go.

Dave

[David Brown]

At last got to spend some more time on the Vampires, finnishes sheting the wings today, fitted the nose cones to the fuzz's and started trimming the hatches. First time assembled with sheeted wings. One main change in the build should I build one again would be to replace F6 with birch ply instead of the lite-ply in the kit. This former takes all of the load from the wings with the main spars glued to it so the bond is only as good as the lite-ply. Otherwise she is looking great and will be a practical size for getting about & storage. John & I hope to have them both fully sheeted & assembled by the end of the week.

Dave

[David Brown]

God bless Coronation Street, no excuses needed on a Mondays 7:30 - 9:00 with tea & biscuits between episodes. Tried the booms & tail for fit & position, now its getting somewhere.

Dave

[David Brown]

Another good session today, both Vamps have been jigged & wings glued in position. Used 160mm packers under tips as shown on plan with additional supports (length to suit) inboard near to the fuzz to stop it rotating on its base & lifting or lowering the wings at the root, checked the wing tips & all are true to one another so chuffed with that. Carried on with the tail feathers fitting hinges, closed loop fittings etc ready for mock up tomorrow all being well. Pleased I did not fit the engine bearers earlier as I had to cut out for the rear lower spars. John had an idea to fit trailing link legs but after close scrutiny we decided against it so I will start the std oleo's later today. We did a test weigh of all of the parts made to date including batteries turbine retracts, servo's etc and they total 15lb at present so on target for around 20lb total.

Dave

[David Brown]

Johns is all sheeted now, booms test fitted & checked for incidence of tail surfaces, all to plan no probs. Just one panel to go on mine. Note top hatches left in front of the booms for the closed loop servo's, inner flaps now cut out & ready to mount servo,s.

Dave

[David Brown]

Well its been a month since my last post and I have very little to add, work & wedding plans have scuppered all building. Both aircraft are ready for glassing now but that will have to wait until after the wedding & Jet power.

Dave

[David Brown]

Seems ages since my last update, Wedding went well and Jetpower was well worth the visit with loads of trade to drool over & some fantastic flying. I nearly purchased another jet but saw sence & kept my money in my pocket. We attacked the Vamps this week and continued with fitting out of servo's and mounting the flaps along with legs & wheels. Another test balance & weight was done and about 2lb of lead was needed to balance (can be seen above the nose wheel retract) and weight is 18.5lb at this stage within out 20lb target. I did not make the oleo's due to time restraints so picked these up from Kingfisher aviation and they seem perfect for the job, the nose wheel is nice & heavy and I got that from Hobbyking, the main wheels I picked up at the Elvington show but they need new hubs as the plastic ones are useless. John wants to fit breaks to his but I am undecided as I intend to fly mainly off grass and at 20lb should stop ok. The last pic shows the rudder servo in place mounted on a ply plate which can slide back & forth to give simple adjustement of the closed loop system.

Dave

[David Brown]

These months just fly by unlike the Vamps. We have managed to get some build time in this month and have all but the booms glassed, which we intend to do after final assembly to reinforce the joints. We glassed the wings using Eze-Kote water based resin with .8oz cloth, this product is realy quick to use especialy on liteply finishes, I do not use it on balsa as it can ripple the surface if you get carried away with the resin. The tail surfaces used the same cloth but with Fibretech (Bucks composites) resin, the fuzz was glassed in 2 stages, firstly the main body was glassed using 2oz cloth with polyester resin then the wing sections with 1.5oz cloth again with polyester, this has given the fuzz a real hard feel to it using the heavier cloth and should help take the shock out of my arrivals. All glassed surfaces have had two coats of resin now and are awaiting the second sand ready for primer.In addition to glassing we have finnished the wings ready to paint with ailerons & flaps fitted along with linkages & servo covers. We plan to use 2 JR matchboxes, one to operate the 4 flaps and the other to operate the rudders & nose wheel. This will allow us to use simple 7 channel recievers in the models and trim the surfaces individualy. I also weighed a bubble trap full of fuel and was suprised to find it weighed nearly 8oz so some of the lead to balance won't be needed.

Dave

[David Brown]

At last managed to get time on the vamps, only because my lathe has broken down. Sanded the glass cloth & got some primer on the fuzz & wings, we have started fitting out before fitting the booms as Tony recommends and it certainly helps for turning them over. Note all the valves & pump right forward to help with balance, these will be trimmed in with 2mm lite ply, I did the same in my Sterner vamp. The layout is looking quite straight forward with my two Dubro tanks giving over 2ltrs of fuel (One 50oz & one 24oz ) and Johns oval tank from Fabio 2.5ltrs which should give adequate flight times on the Wren 70s. Jet tubes to make tomorrow and hopefully complete the instalation.

Dave

[David Brown]

Fitting out is my less favorite part of modeling, you seam to work for hrs with no real sence of achievement, I got one of the tailpipes done today, they are only 130mm long and according to Wren perform better with a taper after the belmouth, I therefore modified an existing wren 54 tube cutting it to length on the taper & then doubling the last 30mm to make it fit the corrugated sleave. I have ordered another tapered section with the belmouth from Wren to make up the second one. All of the pipework is in and most of the wiring, tanks fit neatly and the bubble trap tucks nicely up in the front. did another test balance and weight check and all is good with only 1.5lb of balast and an all up of 19lb but I now think it will reach nearer 21lb finished . Whilst not too happy with closed loop on nose leg stearing John and I decided to try a hard wire method using 2mm pusrods and swivel blocks which allow the rods to move through when retracted but stear when lowered and no sagging cables to snag on the gear.