Something borrowed, whatever.

I finished the new Pathfinder on Wednesday. I put some paint on the wing bottom on Thursday and it's curing. I installed all the needed stuff and it's ready to go. I'm planning on a first flight Monday Sept 3. Before covering the plane I weighted all the parts including the covering with it's protective sheet and the cardboard core. I wanted to get a conservative estimate of the final weight figuring it would be lighter. 52.6 ounces said the scale. After everything was bolted on and ready to fly I put it on the scale again and got 52.0 ounces. Oh well. The paint scheme is a copy of another plane but in different colors that I borrowed from somebody else.

Mystery solved.

Last fall I built a wing to replace one that broke in flight. I bought a wing kit from Brodak, the mfg. and set up the wing jig using plans I had saved. I had two sets of wing plans for this plane and when I measured the distance between the ribs and set the jig to that the wing came out 5 inches longer than it should have been. I have pondered how that could have happened ever since. I ordered a kit of the whole plane and while waiting for it I set up the wing jig again and it came out to the right size. A bit later I measured the plans again and got a different dimension. It was the larger dimension from last year. I finally figured out what was going on. I separated the two wing drawings and compared them. One set was enlarged when I had some copies made at Office Depot without me noticing it. The other set was the right size. Last year I measured from the enlarged set by mistake and built the longer wing from it. I put the enlarged set in the trash. I got another set of plans with the new kit and they are the right size. The new plane is taking shape and I'm assembling the fuselage now. It should be ready to glue together by next week and flying in another month. If I can settle on a paint scheme.

Two for one.

At the Canton, Ga contest I won a $50.00 gift certificate in the raffle to Brodak hobby shop. I won one at the King Orange contest last fall also. The first one I used to get a new wing kit for the plane that folded it's wing at the contest. This one I used to buy a kit of the plane that folded it's wing. I got the new planes wing built and the tail. I'm starting on the fuselage and I'm going to use the Stalker .51 engine that was in the Legacy 40. That should be a good match. I managed to get a third place finish in the Warbird event. I got a call a few days ago and one of the club members wanted to know if I wanted to sell one or two of the planes I got from the estate sale. I agreed to sell both of them. So I'm only down one plane.