Kitfox 1 More pics

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Posted

Thought you guys could use more pics,  I finished riveting my flaperons, Made a drill jig and made a riveter both worked well, finished painting my flaperons, spinner, prop hub, turtle deck, started on my version of counter balance weights, weather I use them or not who knows, built an oil separator for the Jabiru, and this morning I decided to go with wood for the struts and I will cover them with fabric because that's the look I want, Enjoy

 

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Posted (edited)

TJay,  Looks good - If you made those wood fairings, then you should start selling them!  One tip on the flaperon weights:  If you support the flaperons at the pivot tube hangers, and not from the control horn, then the front of the flaperon should be about 1/2" or so lower than the trailing edge when you have the right amount of balance weight on them.   There is no need to add more weight than that.   EDMO

Edited by EDMO

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Posted

Looks good TJay,  how did you make the wood fairings?  JImChuk

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Posted

 I made them from a couple 1X6 clear pine, by drilling the lighting holes I could balance there weight, they each weigh just over a pound,

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Posted

I was more referring to how did you cut them out? JImChuk

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Posted

It's fairly easy to cut out that type of shape using a tablesaw. You just have to get the angles correct on the fence and the height of the blade for the depth. I do it all the time for different projects, including leading edge wood for wings.

 

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Posted

It's fairly easy to cut out that type of shape using a tablesaw. You just have to get the angles correct on the fence and the height of the blade for the depth. I do it all the time for different projects, including leading edge wood for wings.

 

Looks like some real nice router work too.   EDMO

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Posted

I was more referring to how did you cut them out? JImChuk

Im in construction, when we build a house for someone we try to get all the drywall, taping, flooring and the  cabinetry work as well, So with that being said we have every standard cabinet making tool there is, to cut that airfoil only takes about 5 minutes on the shaper to do all 4

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Posted

Looks good, if the shipping wasn't s crazy I would be interest in buying some off you,I ordered up a 3/4 inch round router bit but dont have a shaper,I'll be closer to taking 5 days lol

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Posted

I think another easy way to make the fairings if you don't have the shaper but do have a table saw, would be to use ranch style casing.  Cut a bit off the inside of two pieces of casing, till it ends up the right width, and glue the two pieces together.   I saw where someone was doing that with the foam/vinyl casing/trim, and it was lighter than wood.  If the glue used in the covering or gluing on didn't dissolve the foam, you would be good to go I suppose .  JImChuk

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Posted (edited)

I thought about taking 3 pieces of 1/8" or thinner plywood and gluing them together to make a tall A, turned sideways, and glue that to the struts.   EDMO

Edited by EDMO

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Posted

Got my flappers installed today and finished up my Prop.

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Posted

I found the when I painted the tips of my wood prop a red color, I was able to balance the prop with more or less paint on one side or the other.  Ran a 1" bar through the prop and set the bar on knife edges.  What was surprising was how little it took to make the prop move one way or the other with just a little bit of weight on the prop tip.  I know you will balance yours as well.  :-)  JImChuk

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Posted

Mass Balance weights finished

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Posted

awesome job!  can you give a pic of the "shaper" that you used to make those?  I would really be interested in that! 

:BC:

 

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Posted

awesome job!  can you give a pic of the "shaper" that you used to make those?  I would really be interested in that! 

:BC:

 

Will do, I used a big router bit mounted in the shaper, you could also use a router table

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Posted

For those of you that were interested the tool I used is a delta shaper cutter with a router bit installed #Freud 99-027 If your on a budget you can get these router tables quite reasonable too, otherwise cut an angle with the table saw and sand the rest not real tough. As you can see I set the cutter quite deep and had to sand the ridge out, definitely not necessary but its the profile I wanted,

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Posted

It makes things oh so nice to have the right tool set up!  I think you could sell those fairings pretty easily!  make some for the jury struts and tail struts as well as the gear legs.  You will be surprised what it gets you in terms of climb and extending the glide as well.

I am going to have to play with the table saw and router table now. 

:BC:

 

Thanks for the pics!

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Posted

Quick question, the taper on the inside of your flaperons.  Is that a Model 1 thing or did you add that detail for another reason?

Another quick offering.  I added my flaperon weights per the locations in the Kitfox drawings.  However, I also installed a model IV rudder, which has a deepr cord than the Model III.  And... the counterweights would have met just aft of the model three rudder.  However, I cannot fully close now as they will nut clear the rudder (need to be moved outboard slightly).

Hopefully you have already done a folding test, but... did want you to be aware of the problem I encountered.  You probably already know this, but flaperon counterweights are still available from Kitfox.  Yours look just as nice though and you got to put the TJay stamp on them!

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Posted (edited)

Quick question, the taper on the inside of your flaperons.  Is that a Model 1 thing or did you add that detail for another reason?

Another quick offering.  I added my flaperon weights per the locations in the Kitfox drawings.  However, I also installed a model IV rudder, which has a deepr cord than the Model III.  And... the counterweights would have met just aft of the model three rudder.  However, I cannot fully close now as they will nut clear the rudder (need to be moved outboard slightly).

Hopefully you have already done a folding test, but... did want you to be aware of the problem I encountered.  You probably already know this, but flaperon counterweights are still available from Kitfox.  Yours look just as nice though and you got to put the TJay stamp on them!

Larry, If you are talking about the root end of the flaperons being at an angle, that is supposed to help with folding the second wing.   EDMO

Edited by EDMO

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Posted

Yep, at the root end.  Never saw that before.  Maybe they changed it for later models.

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Posted (edited)

Yep, at the root end.  Never saw that before.  Maybe they changed it for later models.

I believe it was standard for Kitfox 1, and maybe thought they didn't need it on later models?  I will have to check my books & flaperons.  I plan to do that to my flaps.    

Donno about the Avids. EDMO

Edited by EDMO

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Posted

I just did it because I thought it looked cool, I think the book calls for something like a 3 inch diameter half circle cut,

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Posted

I just did it because I thought it looked cool, I think the book calls for something like a 3 inch diameter half circle cut,

I think it looks a lot better than the book shows.  Jolly Good Show TJay!  EDMO

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Posted (edited)

Ok so had to cut the bottom off the new ram air ducts I bought from Jabiru and completely make new shape intake to fit my cowl. And finally got around to fitting gluing the the strut fairings in place,

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Edited by TJay

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