Douglas Dakota C-47 - by ESCI

Kelly Wellington
I had the internal deck out, working on it, today. So, I separated the fuselage halves and trialed the deck in the fuselage. I found that this fuselage is going to be a bit of a challenge. One half has a bit of a twist which, when the two halves are brought together, most things go fine, but the lower, post-wing section overlap, rather than meet. Unless, of course, one holds them together, which causes the nose sections to require forcing together. I get the impression that fuselage assembly may require six hands.

Kelly Wellington
I'm pleased that I pulled off joining those two fuselage halves with just my two hands. It was using a bindery clip on the portion just aft of the wing opening on the fuselage centerline. By doing that, I could concentrate on taping up the dorsal spine and then, last of all, holding the nose halves together while the glue (Slo-Zap) dried. It all held! All I had to do in terms of putty work was a bit on the dorsal centerline, just behind the navigator dome. The halves still, ever-so-slightly, mismatched.

Kelly Wellington
So far, I've left out only part of the control panel and some doodah attachments to the landing gear....they evidently don't _do_ anything, so I'm not gonna go blind and sticky fingered trying to attach four itsy-bitsy parts after the fact.

Mike Kryza
Hi Kelly - you don't use an airbrush? - It's all handpainted by brush??

Kelly Wellington
Yessir, that is correct. At this time, I hand paint only. I have an airbrush, but I have never used it, but someday I may get my act together and acquire a compressor and learn it. I'm actually kind of enjoying the hand painting.

Mike Kryza
And for the handpainting you have my respect! Btw I like the colors of your Do 24. A very nice plane...

Kelly Wellington
Why, thanks...Handpainting was more a matter of necessity than anything else. I don't have the compressor and I don't have a space to spraypaint yet (I still await the return of my basement from the clutches of 'storage'. And thanks for the compliment on the Do-24. Right now, I'm inordinately proud of that. It's my biggest (and most expensive) kit so far, so I'm doubly pleased that it turned out so well. You'll have to check back and see how the decal session goes.

Augie
Speaking as another brush painter.. its looking very good

Mike Kryza
I'll still follow you - :-D

Kelly Wellington
Thanks! At least I now know that I'm not just pontificating to the ether. Somebody actually does look at this stuff. Whey kewl.

I'm assuming that postings go to the "News Feed", is that right?

Mike Kryza
Yes - that's right. It's visible for the whole community. But you can talk with other mates on their(?) walls in a private stile. (What do mean with "Whey kewl". I can't translate it 🙂)

Kelly Wellington
Sorry, Mike...it's a garbage rendering of "way cool", a slang term of supreme satisfaction.

Mike Kryza
That doesn't matter, Kelly - I asked when I can not understand a term. :-D
But it's good - learned something new today... 😉

Kelly Wellington
It's idiosyncratic English slang...not something to depend upon. ;D

Kelly Wellington
Oh...Here's a curiosity. The windscreen? It snapped into place. It is not glued, but painted, into place. The props also 'snapped' on, and SPIN! I thought I'd inadvertantly glued the shaft into place, but once the props were on, lo and behold if they didn't spin nicely.

Dave Flitton
Looking good. My only two cents to this conversation would be to add a little black paint or interior green to the edges of the clear pastic windows before gluing. This will prevent the translucent shine on the inside of the window panels.

Kelly Wellington
I was going to ask about the "sock dryers" outside the pilots' side windows of the windscreen. Anybody know what those things are (I'm assuming some kind of communications tool)? Or, more to the point, what color they should be? I'm tending towards painting all the cockpit protuberances in OD, so they fade in and don't look so much like whiskers on grandma. But I'm willing to listen to the more knowledgeable....

Dave Flitton
I believe the radar (sock dryers) could either be silver or OD

Dave Flitton
See this picture: [img1]&w=1024&h=728&ei=C_XRUI7uBerhigLr6IDYBA&zoom=1&biw=1345&bih=619&iact=rc&dur=400&sig=105619609693833636660&page=4&tbnh=136&tbnw=179&start=66&ndsp=24&ved=1t:429,r:78,s:0,i:328&tx=113&ty=79

Dave Flitton
Actually I think it's more like a radar receiver

Burkhard D
That's the transmit/receive antenna belonging to the AN/APN-2 "Rebecca" radio navigation system. "Rebecca" interrogated a corresponding "Eureka" ground set that was used to mark drop zones.

Kelly Wellington
Since I'm having difficulty in understanding why a transport of the time would have an exceedingly expensive and a mite 'experimental' radar set-up, Burkhard's transmit/receive antenna makes the most sense to me. Thanks, all!

This kit comes with lots of these add-ons...the typical bulbous teardrop-shaped radome/antenna, a hoop antenna, a fin of some type, a bent dual pipe probe, and a bent single tube probe. Even though I don't think that the hoop antenna should be smack dab on the center of the belly (half way between wingtips), that's the only hole which would accommodate the piece was the one in the center of the belly....which I opened with a punch upon reading the directions...*sigh*

Dave Flitton
shows you what I know. The P-61 has the same set up

Burkhard D
I guess the P-61 used Rebecca to find their home base in the dark, like the Dakotas used it to find their drop zone.
I think Dave has a point. The Rebecca system is not just a radio direction finder (passive antenna looking for transmitting beacons), it is sending out a coded 'request' and waiting for a distinct reply. In that sense, Rebecca is quite close to a radar. Very much like todays transponders, just working the other way around.

Kelly Wellington
I'm certainly getting edjumicated and appreciating it. I don't even know what the teardrop shaped equipment is....I have one on my C-45 Expeditor. I'm assuming it is a sensor of some kind.

Burkhard D
That's a direction finder loop antenna in a teardrop-shaped aerodynamic fairing. The Luftwaffe left their DF loops 'naked' in the airstream.

Duncan Cook
very nice Kelly. 👍

Urban Gardini
Nice to see Swedish subjects from outside Sweden! I like it a lot.