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I envy you greatly. I wish I had the time (and skills) to do a rebuild like that. Hope all goes well and I look forward to seeing it in the air.
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Next week, and after the fuselage registrations have been applied, the following is the list of jobs to get on with:
1. Tailwheel fitted (already overhauled and painted up) 2. Seatbelt harness fitted (already overhauled and length checked). 3. Rudder cables fitted. 4. Fuel tank installed and connected up (already overhauled, pressure tested and new filler cap installed). 5. Windshield fitted (already made, just needs bolting on). 6. Full IFR panel fitted* (as above) Then, it's a case of temporarily dismantling the polythene cocoon we have been working in, to allow us to do a trial assembly of the fuse/wing. Excitement on the 10 scale has now reached 9.9993....:) * Yeah, ok, I was kidding. We are both purists, and have kept it as simple and authentic as possible. Pic available if desired. |
Still would like to fly in to the first flight celebrations even though you've decamped to the dark side....
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Truly wonderful. I've enjoyed watching this rebuild for months, I'm almost longing to see her fly as much as you!
Does she have a name? (surely she must!) |
I've delayed giving her my own personal name until I have flown her. What she is christened will most probably reflect how she flys/handles.
I just hope I don't end up calling her Emu!! |
Tinkering
Due to other commitments today, I only had time for some tinkering this morning. So I decided to:
Add the NO STEP graphic to the port wing root. It's an inch high, and done in the same post-war RAF font as the registrations, and in the same colour. http://i45.photobucket.com/albums/f7...CC6BCFA3F5.jpg As mentioned, Sam and I debated about the best thing to have on the tail, and in the end we decided to go for a subtle, lower down the rudder serial number, once again in the same font and colour. Many of the Turbulent fleet have old PFA serial numbers of between 450 and 550, so we felt this was fitting to its age, and somewhat respectful to the good old PFA, without whom many of us wouldn't be flying today. http://i45.photobucket.com/albums/f7...21127F0337.jpg And finally, some really obsessive tinkering, the painting up of the fuel tank filler!! The filler has had a little protruding tube that we had welded to it to support the fuel gauge wire, which is simply a piece of wire with a petrol/ethanol proof float on the bottom. I have one in the Cub and it's guaranteed to be accurate every time! http://i45.photobucket.com/albums/f7...249E378F37.jpg Registrations going on fuselage tomorrow.... |
Love this thread. i am so jelous. One question . Why did you go for a Matt paint finish rather than gloss like this?
https://encrypted-tbn3.gstatic.com/i...wkJ-M1We5QxfbQ |
It is a gloss paint, but it is possible to matt it down with a light 'dry roll' when it's partly dry. We prefer a less glossy finish ourselves, but everyone's taste is different I suppose.
That's a lovely glider you have there. :ok: |
Cumulusrider, are you sure it is gloss on and not dope that has been buffed to a fine finish. ?
Gloss paint did not exist for aircraft when the turbulent was designed. |
MC - hello! Beautiful photos, beautiful project, and Mrs. M. should be grateful as years will be added to your life and your new youthful slender frame should make up for all the evenings devoted to your beautiful baby! Alas, though provision is made for the vineous cargo, where is the second seat to take her for a flight with the wind in her hair? - guess it will have to be the Cub, with the doors off...
So much work goes into frame, fabric, finish. My beloved GOFER Supercub was sold to White Waltham, in superb condition thanks to the labours of my engineer, who spent a very cold winter in a similar plastic construction breathing fumes! I will forward your epic to him to enjoy. My daddy was a boatbuilder and sailor, so educated me properly in the ways of navigation, met, and caution...so many happy hours flying and good company. Do drop in to Shenington (Edgehill) when your baby is fully fledged.... Mary |
Mary,
Thank you for your kind comments - I will make a point of contacting you about a visit to Shenington when she is flying. :) |
She finally has an identity. :)
http://i45.photobucket.com/albums/f7...9433BBB455.jpg http://i45.photobucket.com/albums/f7...531E7E9481.jpg |
Next week will see some more progress.
Cub Permit was this week, and other minor set-backs like kids breaking hands playing rugby, flooding returning and a few problematic issues with unwanted visitors... :sad: Weirdly, I'm also finding Light Aero Spares are taking ages to deliver these days, compared to their usual 24 hour turnaround. I made an order on Tues and have been told it'll be next week when I get it.... :( There must be a few 'internals' going on there. |
Everybody should have a Turb. Never mind this that and the other...
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Progress has been good this week.
Tailwheel is now on: http://i45.photobucket.com/albums/f7...7014026BE5.jpg Mounting brackets for the stabiliser have also gone on: http://i45.photobucket.com/albums/f7...EA88FA22E6.jpg Next it was a case of getting the rollover bar and windscreen fitted. This was finished off with some neat trim around the perspex: http://i45.photobucket.com/albums/f7...0D20388BE9.jpg http://i45.photobucket.com/albums/f7...01D706D953.jpg The finished job: http://i45.photobucket.com/albums/f7...0DC023F601.jpg There were some annoying bits of dust that had got trapped so we decided to blast them out: http://i45.photobucket.com/albums/f7...9CA8035856.jpg We will be adding some trim where the windscreen meets the fuselage, mainly to ensure no air creeps underneath, and also for aesthetics. The fuel tank was tricky to get in, but we managed it eventually: http://i45.photobucket.com/albums/f7...142E825560.png http://i45.photobucket.com/albums/f7...ECB4445FC4.png http://i45.photobucket.com/albums/f7...55AF0DF80D.jpg Sam spent a fair bit of the morning like this...! http://i45.photobucket.com/albums/f7...36182B6037.jpg Firewall all installed: http://i45.photobucket.com/albums/f7...57615C190A.jpg Rudder cables are installed and ready for crimping at the correct length when the rudder goes on, and the pilot harness cables are all ready for a simple attachment to the harness when it goes in. The panel will be going in next, followed by some trim on the side of the cockpit/fuselage side. After that, and a few other smallish jobs, we will be putting the undercarriage on the wing, ready for trial wing/fuselage assembly.... Would write more, but pretty tied up with other bits and pieces this afternoon. |
Looking good.
Take care when filling with fuel as the screen looks close to the filler neck. |
Hi bingo,
You're right, it is. It was a toss up between having a bit of 'rake' on the screen, or a really dorky looking vertical one. We went for the slightly more raked one. The filling will be no different to how it is for my Cub, or Sam's Luton. We'll need to be careful, but luckily there'll be no need for ladders etc, and we can always protect the screen with a cloth/sheet during re-filling. :ok: |
Many people have asked what the total cost is to date.....
I'd be interested to hear some guesses before I disclose the figure. Let's just say it's just got to a nice round figure, so now's a good time (with not much left to buy for her) to see what people estimate the complete build costs to be. |
Nice build, but not liking the design location of the fuel tank. :=
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Hi Desert,
Sadly, Mr Druine is dead. If he wasn't, I'd happily pass his contact details on to you as I'm sure he'd welcome your technical views on this matter. As it stands, his design is well proven, so we feel quite happy to go along with it. The fuel tank in my Cub is in exactly the same place too. Mr Piper built a few Cubs with such fuel tank locations, so we feel reasonably happy that it'll be ok. :ok: |
All,
Having had some pretty unnecessary and vindictive PMs about this build, I'm undecided about whether to continue this thread. I might just add photos each week for those who are interested. Please don't expect a reply to any messages though, as I have decided to stop opening them. :ok: |
monocock you should actually publish those comments and expose the tossers.
the Druine D3 Turbulent is a superb wooden design. the design is beautifully put together. my own calcs of the spar strength show it to be 100 pounds over the 6g ultimate stresses. a near perfect blend of design strength and lightness. flat 4 engines like the VW are totally free of vibration, amazingly so. the only weakness I know of in the design is the standard springing in the gear legs. Turbulent G-ASPU was bought back by it's original builder and is now in Western Australia. I managed to shoehorn myself in the cockpit for an hours flying. The handling is superb. They are a design well worth keeping in the air. my fuselage build came to $250. wing ribs seem to be built out of nothing and are a pleasant winter in front of the fire activity, one rib per night. allan tried wheelbarrow tyres on his and found out that taxying out for 5 flights had totally worn them out. vespa motorbike tyres last much longer. keep the posts coming mate. the dickeads are only jealous |
Thanks. :ok:
As mentioned, I will update with pic's regularly. :) |
Here here
Please don't stop posting, it is a fascinating read, if people are being tossers let em, it's a reflection on them. If they have something worth saying they should put it on a public forum so that we can all benefit from their wisdom....
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Mono..........
Really sorry to hear you have had this treatment from some stupid trolls. Please stay with the thread, great to see all the work you are putting into (re)building this aircraft. As I have said before, certainly hope to see it at Sywell in September. Planemike |
Seconded. Report them to the mods. I'm loving the thread and wondering if I could ever do a similar project...
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of course you could build a turbulent.
you would find it quite therapeutic. I didn't finish mine, I gave it away to a short guy. I used a 6 inch steel rule, a pencil, swiss army knife to sharpen the pencil, a 6 inch coping saw, a 1 metre steel rule and a stanley knife to build most of it. get medium orbital sanding paper and glue it to wood blocks about 10mm thick, 3 inches by 2 inches and you will have a supply of precision sanding tools. this sounds daunting bit really isn't. there are some 5,000 glue joints in the wings. if you build a jig and build one rib a night, when you have finished the wing ribs you have over half the joints in the aircraft done. the only problem with a turbulent is that it was built for a guy probably 5ft nothing tall. the cockpit is small, though there are changes made that improve the cockpit size. on G-ASPU the seat was canted back so that it gave 2 inches more space. I'm 5ft 10" and I only just fitted in the expanded cockpit. knowing what I do now I'd build to the original french plans but with the cockpit space tweaked maybe 2 inches aft and 3 inches at the firewall. I bought a timber available locally at the time as pool decking and sliced my own. alaskan yellow cedar and queensland hoop pine was the wood I used and Queensland Hoop Pine marine plywood. I wonder if the mods would be happy for me to post workable photos of the plans? |
Having had some pretty unnecessary and vindictive PMs about this build, I'm undecided about whether to continue this thread. I might just add photos each week for those who are interested. Please don't expect a reply to any messages though, as I have decided to stop opening them. Please do let the mods and / or admins know the senders and the contents of the abusive PMs. Please keep the thread going! :ok: Thanks SD |
Mono....As last few posters have said....Nil Illegitimi Carborundum!
You find inadequates in all walks of life....little dicks and a sense of inadequacy lead to this sort of cowardly abuse.. NAME, SHAME...YES , I'm sure , despite your nom de plume elsewhere, you aren't a precious shrinking violet... therefore these knobbers need to be exposed. It's a terrific project, beautifully executed and irrespective of the impractical nature of an open tourer in the UK's weather, I'm sure there will be many happy hours spent poling it around. Simple fuel system, one tank , one big tap....yea, monocock! |
Monocock
Hi Desert, Sadly, Mr Druine is dead. If he wasn't, I'd happily pass his contact details on to you as I'm sure he'd welcome your technical views on this matter. As it stands, his design is well proven, so we feel quite happy to go along with it. The fuel tank in my Cub is in exactly the same place too. Mr Piper built a few Cubs with such fuel tank locations, so we feel reasonably happy that it'll be ok. Enjoyable thread to read, and I hope you continue to illustrate and describe the fine, restorative work you are doing. Disregard the dis. They're everywhere in life, and occasionally there sometimes seems to be more than their share on PPRuNe. |
Panel temporarily installed to check everything lines up (control cables etc). The two missing instruments are currently being used in the engine test set-up.
Most of the instruments have been sourced on eBay, and some were found at amazingly good prices. http://i45.photobucket.com/albums/f7...olland/iii.png |
Monocock,
I'm no aviator, and build nothing with a wingspan beyond 7', but I've been immensely enjoying following your build of this beautiful little work of art. Please continue and, as others have suggested, to hell with the trolls. This world is filled with consumers. You're one of the rare creators. You and Sam are to be commended. Jason. |
Absolutely the right dials for this panel.:ok:
Brings back happy memories of flying a Turb which I helped refabric in a plastic tent in a barn on a farm. Keep the pix coming - those of us rebuilding this a/c vicariously through you need to feed the need. SGC |
Tank position:
The Jodel DR1050 which I fly has 2X55L tanks. One behind the firewall, over the legs of the front seat occupants. The other under the rear seat. In a fatal accident, where the spinner was first impact, followed by a wingtip, there was no fire. |
in an aircraft with wing tanks the wings were ruptured in the impact and soaked the entire aircraft and area in fuel.
moral of the incident. there is no safe place to put the fuel tanks in a prang. so don't bloody prang. |
I have legible digital images of the french plans and the australian plans.
sadly Roger Druine died of cancer decades ago and so I believe that there is no copyright issues regarding these plans. each of the plans images is about a meg in size. I have found them useful on a laptop since you can zoom in and read all the details. On the photo bucket page at the bottom right of the image is a magnifying glass. keep clicking on that until you are seeing the original image. then right click and save the jpg image to your machine. ok there are 22 plans in all but I do not have a copy of page 20 which I believe is the weight and balance calcs. if anyone has a copy of this page I'd love a copy. plan 30-01 3 view and specifications http://i1274.photobucket.com/albums/...ps31f17a25.jpg plan 30-02 tailplanes http://i1274.photobucket.com/albums/...ps70ab601b.jpg plan 30-03 empennage spars http://i1274.photobucket.com/albums/...ps2084515f.jpg 30-04 ailerons http://i1274.photobucket.com/albums/...ps7391826d.jpg 30-05 misc pieces http://i1274.photobucket.com/albums/...psf6826bef.jpg 30-06 control horns http://i1274.photobucket.com/albums/...psd443dba4.jpg 30-07 fuselage http://i1274.photobucket.com/albums/...ps2ee8115c.jpg 30-08 turtledeck http://i1274.photobucket.com/albums/...psadbb5d7f.jpg 30-09 instrument panel http://i1274.photobucket.com/albums/...ps33e01cd2.jpg 30-10 fuselage frames http://i1274.photobucket.com/albums/...psffd3d029.jpg 30-11 tailwheel http://i1274.photobucket.com/albums/...ps9a06a040.jpg 30-12 undercarriage parts http://i1274.photobucket.com/albums/...ps081d5bff.jpg 30-13 pedals http://i1274.photobucket.com/albums/...psecd64f4a.jpg 30-14 wing ribs http://i1274.photobucket.com/albums/...ps346366c0.jpg 30-15 seat and control column http://i1274.photobucket.com/albums/...psf9fb7f30.jpg 30-16 small fittings http://i1274.photobucket.com/albums/...ps8d988e19.jpg 30-17 wing spars http://i1274.photobucket.com/albums/...psd7500193.jpg 30-18 undercarriage http://i1274.photobucket.com/albums/...ps7f7fb331.jpg 30-19 wing http://i1274.photobucket.com/albums/...psfe7fad66.jpg 30-20 as I mentioned previously I am missing this sheet. weight and balance I believe 30-21 fuel tank http://i1274.photobucket.com/albums/...ps14cf780f.jpg 30-22 parts list http://i1274.photobucket.com/albums/...ps85aa2d3a.jpg front cover of the plans folder http://i1274.photobucket.com/albums/...psaafebcce.jpg inside page of the plans folder http://i1274.photobucket.com/albums/...ps6e856732.jpg have we hit a pprune first? first set of plans published on pprune? these aren't actually the plans. these are photographs of them. no copyright claimed. all my own work mum. W8 |
I am looking forward to seeing more of the plans. No interest in building one as I sat in one many years ago and my legs/feet were unable to move. That was when Wally Watkins was looking at beefing up the wing.
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Australian Turbulent Plans
The Ultra Light Aircraft Association (in australia) guys did a mod to the standard Turbulent that increased the spar strength and added a second mainspar support.
Cockpit is still the restricted size that suits a 5 ft tall Roger Druine though. the plans were available from the "australian plans holder" for the cost of printing off the dyeline prints. from memory Gordon in melbourne was the guy. When The SAAA changed structure to chapters and "experimental" they seemed to forget all about the old system of plans holders, which is sad really. anyway in the interests of keeping the knowledge here are links to images of the australian turbulent plans. falconar in canada used to sell copies of turbulent plans, maybe they still do. their plans had no dihedral dimensions on them and in conjunction with a mate in the USA we gave falconar the missing details. AT-01 the 3 view and specifications. none of the contact details on the page are valid now. http://i1274.photobucket.com/albums/...ps75edd179.jpg AT-02 covering and control runs http://i1274.photobucket.com/albums/...psc3fef60c.jpg AT-03 wing http://i1274.photobucket.com/albums/...ps11d0a8c9.jpg AT-04 strengthening details http://i1274.photobucket.com/albums/...ps6f894208.jpg AT-04-2 stronger wing spar http://i1274.photobucket.com/albums/...ps3550c980.jpg AT-05 wing ribs http://i1274.photobucket.com/albums/...ps5c82d25e.jpg AT-06 ailerons http://i1274.photobucket.com/albums/...ps352472c4.jpg AT-07 fuselage http://i1274.photobucket.com/albums/...pse823e9f7.jpg AT-08 fuselage details http://i1274.photobucket.com/albums/...pse30564cb.jpg AT-09 fuselage frames http://i1274.photobucket.com/albums/...ps5f292a51.jpg AT-10 fuselage turtledeck http://i1274.photobucket.com/albums/...ps6982ee88.jpg AT-11 rudder and elevator http://i1274.photobucket.com/albums/...psa2e3ef34.jpg AT-12 engine and instruments http://i1274.photobucket.com/albums/...ps8809a1d9.jpg AT-13 is a double sized drawing of the undercarriage so there is a left side, right side and overall shot. http://i1274.photobucket.com/albums/...pseb45d814.jpg http://i1274.photobucket.com/albums/...ps8e42584c.jpg http://i1274.photobucket.com/albums/...ps25128738.jpg AT-14 undercarriage parts http://i1274.photobucket.com/albums/...ps1330988d.jpg AT-15 more undercarriage parts http://i1274.photobucket.com/albums/...ps6a2089c2.jpg AT-16 tailwheel http://i1274.photobucket.com/albums/...ps69659e84.jpg AT-17 pedals http://i1274.photobucket.com/albums/...ps4bdde47e.jpg AT-18 control column and seat. http://i1274.photobucket.com/albums/...ps8ad0204b.jpg AT-19 control brackets etc. http://i1274.photobucket.com/albums/...ps42db3188.jpg AT-20 misc fittings http://i1274.photobucket.com/albums/...ps4410b09b.jpg I believe the images posted are good enough to build from. I ended up doing my build from a computer screen with the images enlarged to show the detail I was working on. DONT MIX THE PLANS. either build from the french plans or build from the australian plans. |
this is an evil grin post. :E
if you have flown the last 10 hours in a turbulent and don't have another aircraft available then your biennial flight review is done in the turbulent. the instructor stands on the airfield with a hand held radio and watches you fly a circuit, stalls etc. it is a powerful reason for building a turbulent :E |
D8,
Those plans are great, thanks for posting. :ok::ok: |
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