Aloha EF-1 design and build

[Red]

I was able to get my canopy plugs sanded and polished today. I have had great luck pulling molds from polished primer, so I rarely paint a plug any more. I wet sand the primer to 1000g, then polish with a buffer and 3M Perfect-it rubbing compound followed by Finesse-it finishing compound. From here they will get several coats of wax. Then I will put a gel coat surface on them followed by epoxy and fiberglass. This should yield a nice tool lasting many many pulls if treated nicely.

I also painted my wheel pants, so progress!

Red

[Dave Yost]

Looks real nice Red. Can’t wait to see the finished airframe.

I have been doing a thin coat of clear over white primer lately. Seem to be working. Also, I have had good luck with PVA producing a very nice surface. Most people despise PVA, but after a one or two “failed to release” situations, I started experimenting. I have actually made parts where I painted over PVA.

[Fly Fast n Left]

Red,

Great progress! Attached is a nice shot of Alley Cat in 1995.

Jacob

[Red]

Looks real nice Red. Can’t wait to see the finished airframe.

I have been doing a thin coat of clear over white primer lately. Seem to be working. Also, I have had good luck with PVA producing a very nice surface. Most people despise PVA, but after a one or two “failed to release” situations, I started experimenting. I have actually made parts where I painted over PVA.

Dave,

On small parts I can wipe on PVA really nice. For larger parts it can be sprayed, you just have to use a surfactant to break the surface tension so it doesn’t bead up. I use JetDry, the same stuff you
put in your dishwasher to keep the glass from spotting. A few drops is all it takes.

I paint over PVA all the time, never had an issue. The only time I don’t use it is when I want to do multiple colors.

Your parts look real nice!

Red

[Red]

Red,

Great progress! Attached is a nice shot of Alley Cat in 1995.

Jacob

Jacob,

Great shot!! I’ve been fortunate to be able to attend Reno for the last 37 years. Ray was a really great guy, a vicious competitor who was never satisfied with good enough. He was always looking for more. Alley Cat was the only plane to ever beat Nemesis.

I hope to play at Reno myself in a year or two.

Red.

[Red]

I received my mold sealer finally. You are supposed to be able to coat the tooling foam, wax it then mold. It works, but the finish isn't as nice as I'd like. So I broke down and sprayed the molds with primer last night. I'll wet sand them then I should be able to pull parts with a very nice finish. A bit more work than I intended, but I know the method works and the results will be worth it.

Red

[Red]

Duplicate post

[Red]

I have been playing with the Lei design for the nose. This is a very distinct part of the color scheme so i really wanted to make an effort to at least get it close. I'm pretty sure the original was hand painted/airbrushed, so I decided "close enough" would have to work. I searched the web for a Lei flower drawing. Once I found something I liked I photo-shopped (MS Paint actually ) out the center part of the flower. I then imported it into my vinyl cutter program and traced the image. From there I placed several of the flowers in the rough curved outline I wanted to serve as the base. Those were "welded" together to create an outline of the lei string and cut in green vinyl. For the flowers I just used the pre-canned clip art flower that had sort of a 70's vintage style to it and cut it out of white, orange, red and blue vinyl. I then assembled them all together with a different center color from another flower. I'm pretty happy with the result! In hindsight I should have rotated the Moana base flower so they weren't all laid out in the same orientation. If I ever do it again I'll fix that.

I now need to find an original copy of the Western Air Racing logo and I think I will have all the markings complete.

Red

[Red]

Some finished pics....

Red

[Red]

I wet sanded the cowl molds this morning to 1000g and polished them with rubbing compound. I've started waxing them now and they could give up a part this weekend, but I am out of hardener.

Red

[Red]

Not too many pics to share. But I did get a cowl laid up, hinged the tail and installed pushrods.

Red

[Red]

Can’t resist a little bench flying.

Red

[Red]

I had a setback with the cowl mold and am in the process of redoing it. More pics soon...

Red

[Red]

Canopy molds are complete. Not perfect but good enough. Next up is polishing then wax for a part.

Red

[Red]

I found a few bubbles in the gelcoat of the canopy mold that I wasn't happy with. I've filled them and am in the process of polishing them, so no canopy part yet.

I was able to get most of the radio gear installed though and get a rough weight. I'm sitting about 2.9 lbs. without a cowl or canopy so I'm sure I'll be adding lead. Thats with metal gear servos too! Glad its light but hate adding unecessary weight to a racer lol.

Red