Oscar

[Oceaneer99]

Ken,

I've enjoyed your Oscar build photos on the gallery.  Using bamboo is a good idea.  I've always used pins or wire, or sometimes toothpicks, but I was always nervous making the wood thinner than that.  Bamboo seems like it would be stronger than a toothpick, and a package of bamboo skewers would last a long time.

Garet

[Ken Pugh]

Thanks Garet and Lou.  I will do a step-by-step here.  Hopefully the pics are not too big to use on the forum.  Large pics are good because you can actually see something but they slow things down.  I guess at least one large scale pic walkthrough will be good to have on the board for those beginnning the hobby.  Actually, the Oscar was my first attempt at a solid on my own, the other being the kit from Propellor Models.  A lot of lessons learned went into this model.  I want to get an efficient process for models this size so I can crank out all my favorites.

Ken Pugh

[Ken Pugh]

The Oscar, Nakajima Ki-43 Hayabusa, was my choice for the Japanese Cookup.  It is 1/72 scale.  The paint scheme was a colorful one I found on the internet but I don't know any details about the original.  I will provide the link to the photos and you can click on them yourself as you follow along.  Just click on the pic link and it will open in a separate window you can refer to as you read the post.  They appear to be too big to include in the post.

http://smm.solidmodelmemories.net/Gallery/displayimage.php?pos=-342

The model is made of basswood and completely hand-painted.  I have an airbrush and can use it, but it gets to be aggravating pulling it out and cleaning up afterwards.  I enjoy just hand-painting the models.

I get all my drawings from the internet and scale them to size with Paintshop Pro.  I usually print out several copies and a couple of copies on cardstock to use as templates throughout the project.

The sub-assemblies are cut out and you can see from this pic that the fuselage is already draw onto the wood.

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I like to make my fuselage of two pieces vice just one.  The advantages are that you always have an accurate centerline no matter how much carving you do and you can draw the template on the inside as well.  This one is drawn in red but I have refined that to drawing around the template in black ink, then drawing inside the black line with red ink.  As I am carving/filing/sanding, if I see a black line, I am close to the template size.  When I see red, it's time to stop because I have reached the exact size.  You will notice two small holes where I will put dowels to key the pieces together.  Now that I have a drill press, I would drill out the holes while the pieces are on the wood, prior to cutting them out on the scroll saw and with the template on the wood.  This will drill holes through the template that can be matched up when locating the template inside the two pieces of wood and drawing my colored lines.

You will also notice that if I put the rudder down as shown, the grain is running fore/aft inside of top/bottom, which is not good for that particular piece.

[Ken Pugh]

In the next photo you can see the pieces cut out and the fuselage in two pieces with the pins installed.

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You can also see that I noticed how dumb I was and cut a new rudder with the grain in the proper direction.  That's the great thing about scratchbuilding, if you mess up a part, chuck it in the trash and make a new one.

[Ken Pugh]

Now we cut out the fuselage on the scroll saw.  You can also use a bandsaw or cut it out by hand, depending on your personal taste.  I left a little connected on the top and bottom but you don't really need to do that.  When I was thinking over how to make these models, I wondered how you hold them together when you cut out the other surface as you will see later.  I realized when I tried it that the cut is so good you can just hold them together.  Another thing to do is to glue them with glue stick.  It holds well enough to finish the cuts and pops right off.  If it holds to strongly, loosen the glue with alcohol.  So with this pic the side is cut out and now the top needs to be done.



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As you can see from this pic I orginally intended to use a small slot for the wing.  I later modified this to cutting out the whole wing section.  I thought this would provide a stronger wing.

[Ken Pugh]

As you can see from the next pic I put the template on the top of the fuselage and drew around it in red ink.  I also glued it down lightly with glue stick though I did not dust it off well, so it barely stuck to the wood.  No worries, it still did the job.



http://smm.solidmodelmemories.net/Gallery/displayimage.php?pos=-462

You can also see I need a better saw blade.  This is the blade that came with the saw and it mangles the basswood.  I need a finer blade for this wood, though this blade works nicely with poplar, which I use a lot now.

[Ken Pugh]

The fuselage is now properly shaped.  I have a set of Two Cherries carving knives that work really well.  Good steel in the blades.  The set I bought was for chip carving.  I tried it for a while then decided it wasn't for me.  These knives now are my favorites for airplane carving.  Once I learned to properly hone them I realized how dull a new X-Acto blade was.  When I grab a new blade I hone it and it works much better.  I also hone the blades as they get dull and rarely use new blades.



Always carve, file, then sand, in that order.  With proper carving and filing, sandpaper is usually only needed to clean up the surface of the wood.

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[Ken Pugh]

The top looks good.



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The curves of the fuselage are now carved.  Once this was done, I carved in the canopy.



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[Ken Pugh]

Now what to do about the wing.  I have marked the leading and trailing edge of the wing because I just don't like the slot idea.  As you can see from the pic, my carving chisels are Ramelson brand.  This is an American company and the chisels are pretty good.  The steel is not the quality of German or Swiss steel, but it is plenty good enough for the job.  These chisels are very much cheaper than their Swiss cousins.



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From here I will carve out the entire wing saddle area and fit the wing up to the fuselage.  With a low-wing plane, this is all you have to do.  With a mid-wing plane, you need a piece to go under the wing.  This is not difficult to achieve.  When working with wood, glue on a piece larger than what you need then carve down to the proper shape.

[Ken Pugh]

Time to build a wing.  I cut it out then carved it to size and carved in the airfoil.  Once the surface looked right, I used a fine saw and made a cut down the centerline on top and bottom.  This cut goes part way through and leaves some wood in the middle of the wing.  You can then bend the wing up to the dihedral needed.  If you need more dihedral, deepen/widen the cut in the top.  If it tries to crack/split on the bottom, deepen the bottom cut.  Once you have the dihedral angle you desire, glue the wing.  Glue the top and bottom cuts.  Gluing the bottom cut strengthens the joint area and does a little filling.  When the glue is dry, fill the bottom joint and sand smooth.



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[Ken Pugh]

Shape the wing saddle until the wing fits nicely to the fuselage.  Don't worry about a perfect fit throughout.  You are mainly concerned with how it fits at the sides of the fuselage.  Inside the fuselage the dihedral messes things up.  Not a problem.  Make sure the wing is perpendicular to the fuselage and the angle of attack is right.   Once you have this done, don't glue the wing to the fuselage until you no longer need to take it apart.



http://smm.solidmodelmemories.net/Gallery/displayimage.php?pos=-466

[Ken Pugh]

I did not plan to put in an engine because you just can't see it with the spinner and prop disk.  You can, however, see the transmission housing.  I hollowed out the nose for the transmission housing and also shaped the intakes above the nose cowling.  You can also see the complete set of Ramelson carving chisels.



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The wooden contraption to the right is my hook.  A great tool to build for yourself if you are going to carve anything.  You can see Garet's hook in his Ascender album.

[Ken Pugh]

Time for more glue.  I glued together the fuselage then glued on the wing after the fuselage had dried overnight.  Clamp everything up and let it dry overnight.  Water based glues can separate some if you don't clamp it properly.  I leave it clamped until it dries, that way I don't mess things up.  Of course, I messed up something before I came to that conclusion.



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[Ken Pugh]

Now we need wing fillets.  Some wings have no fillets (Hellcat), some wings only have fillets along the top, and some, like the Oscar, have fillets that extend past the trailing edge of the wing.  All you have to do is add some wood along the bottom of the fillet.  If you have a bottom view on your plans you can easily determine the shape of the wing fillet.  Whatever filler you like to use will work fine in building fillets.  Of course, if you don't paint the model and want a natural wood finish, you have to make the fillets out of wood.  Then again, all your joints need to be better as well.



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You can also see from this pic that I filled in the gaps all over the model and have also installed the tail pieces.

[Ken Pugh]

There she is.  The Oscar has some beautiful lines, similar to the Spitfire.  She's a fine airplane, but the Wildcat knocked the snot out of the Oscar.  That just goes to show, during WWII there were some pretty fighters and then there were some stone-cold killer fighters.  Grumman and Vought made assasins.



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I use simple vinyl spackling for a filler in small models like this.  Once all is smooth enough, I cover the plane with Minwax Sanding Sealer.  This strengthens the surface of the spackle.  With a coat of sanding sealer you can then sand the surface smooth as you like.  You can also see that I painted the interior of the nose.