747 Dreamlifter

Interesting project Don.

What lead you to plan replacing the cargo area with wood?

Curious.

My, you are ambitious Don! That looks to be an interesting project. I did inspect the subject and shot a few pictures. An interesting point is where all of this is fastened together with some serious plates and fasteners. I'll try to see if find some more detail pix on that.

Anyway, cool project, keep us posted! I'll be watching.

Max 

Hmmm , Mike F6F;

 I think I would have to ask the same thing .  T.B.

I think I understand what Don is going to do. This cylinderic cargo area is going to be manufactured on a lathe and the material is irrelevant. Clever thinking Don!  

Max

Nope-can't do the cargo compartment on a lathe- it is not round.  It is sort of lightbulb shaped in section.

However, my early modeling experiences with non-flying scale models were with what we called solid models.  These were before plastic kits, and the kits were wood, sawn to profile, and in better kits, also to planform (top view).  The builder had to carve the cross section. I did enough back then that I am a pretty proficient carver.

In plastic I could cut formers and skin most of that area with styrene sheet, but the front and rear of the cargo container is made up of compound curves, which are hard to make in plastic without carving a mold and vacuforming, or laying up fiberglas on a mold.  Since I would have to carve molds anyway, to me it is just easier to carve the whole thing, so it will be heavy!  But there a lot of landing gears to support it!

OK, I'll buy that. It will still be clever!

Max

Those things are a bit of a beast.  I get to see them almost every day.  Rumor has it that our ex President and CEO of BCA, Ray Connor, was at a function honoring Joe Sutter (the father of the 747...RIP Mr. Sutter) for his contributions, and through the windows behind, a Dreamlifter (LCF) rolled past.....everyone looked....and Ray turned to Joe and said..."Joe - I'm so sorry for what we did to your 747".
They're pretty amazing.  It's incredible to see an entire 787 42/44/46 section, or a set of 787 wings being pulled out of the back of an LCF (the whole tail swings to port).....then the slow tow into the factory.  Wicked.

Hodakamax

My, you are ambitious Don! That looks to be an interesting project. I did inspect the subject and shot a few pictures. An interesting point is where all of this is fastened together with some serious plates and fasteners. I'll try to see if find some more detail pix on that.

Anyway, cool project, keep us posted! I'll be watching.

Max 

 

Thanks.  Yes, a couple of closeups of those areas would be great!  The photos I have only show things like that on the front and bottom.  Are there any on the tail section?

My shots were not as good as these. The braces I was referring to are behind the cockpit door. They may not be relevant at your scale but were impressive when you walked up to it!

Being from Kansas, where the Dreamlifters operate, I followed the story a while back about a Dreamlifter landing at the wrong Wichita airport at night. Just a mistake but the craft was so heavy it caused severe runway damage and some real expensive repairs to the paving. That thing is a whopper! 

Max

Don Stauffer

Nope-can't do the cargo compartment on a lathe- it is not round.  It is sort of lightbulb shaped in section.

However, my early modeling experiences with non-flying scale models were with what we called solid models.  These were before plastic kits, and the kits were wood, sawn to profile, and in better kits, also to planform (top view).  The builder had to carve the cross section. I did enough back then that I am a pretty proficient carver.

In plastic I could cut formers and skin most of that area with styrene sheet, but the front and rear of the cargo container is made up of compound curves, which are hard to make in plastic without carving a mold and vacuforming, or laying up fiberglas on a mold.  Since I would have to carve molds anyway, to me it is just easier to carve the whole thing, so it will be heavy!  But there a lot of landing gears to support it!

 

 

scottrc

 

 

Don Stauffer

Nope-can't do the cargo compartment on a lathe- it is not round.  It is sort of lightbulb shaped in section.

However, my early modeling experiences with non-flying scale models were with what we called solid models.  These were before plastic kits, and the kits were wood, sawn to profile, and in better kits, also to planform (top view).  The builder had to carve the cross section. I did enough back then that I am a pretty proficient carver.

In plastic I could cut formers and skin most of that area with styrene sheet, but the front and rear of the cargo container is made up of compound curves, which are hard to make in plastic without carving a mold and vacuforming, or laying up fiberglas on a mold.  Since I would have to carve molds anyway, to me it is just easier to carve the whole thing, so it will be heavy!  But there a lot of landing gears to support it!

 

 

 

 

 

 Like building a solid hull ship model by lifiting the contours from a plan onto the block of wood, then shaping the wood to meet the contour.  Do you have any plans to get the contours?  Or is it all guess work?  Pretty interesting subject Don.  

 

 

I managed to find a drawing of the profile view.  Rather than scale to actual aircraft, and again back to 1:144, I just scaled that drawing to 1:144, varified against kit overall length.  Found a good nose-on photo for the cross-section.  Did not need planform- should be pretty much same as kit except for slightly greater width in cargo area.  Yep, I do a lot of scratch ship models, and cargo area is simpler than most ships.

Don Stauffer

 

 

scottrc

 

 

Don Stauffer

Nope-can't do the cargo compartment on a lathe- it is not round.  It is sort of lightbulb shaped in section.

However, my early modeling experiences with non-flying scale models were with what we called solid models.  These were before plastic kits, and the kits were wood, sawn to profile, and in better kits, also to planform (top view).  The builder had to carve the cross section. I did enough back then that I am a pretty proficient carver.

In plastic I could cut formers and skin most of that area with styrene sheet, but the front and rear of the cargo container is made up of compound curves, which are hard to make in plastic without carving a mold and vacuforming, or laying up fiberglas on a mold.  Since I would have to carve molds anyway, to me it is just easier to carve the whole thing, so it will be heavy!  But there a lot of landing gears to support it!

 

 

 

 

 

 Like building a solid hull ship model by lifiting the contours from a plan onto the block of wood, then shaping the wood to meet the contour.  Do you have any plans to get the contours?  Or is it all guess work?  Pretty interesting subject Don.  

 

 

 

 

 

I managed to find a drawing of the profile view.  Rather than scale to actual aircraft, and again back to 1:144, I just scaled that drawing to 1:144, varified against kit overall length.  Found a good nose-on photo for the cross-section.  Did not need planform- should be pretty much same as kit except for slightly greater width in cargo area.  Yep, I do a lot of scratch ship models, and cargo area is simpler than most ships.

 

 

I thought that was how you were going to do this.  Even looking and the photo Max posted, there are enough features to verify the scale, convert, and get your measurements.  Looks like fun.

Here's some pics when we had our last air show in 2008. Of course, with Boeing here now the Dreamlifters are in and out daily. Someome, like Zvezda, needs to kit this plane! One of these days I'll go over to see about a tour, if they do them.

Chris

Thanks, Chris.  That is a great shot of the logo.  It will be a help when I do the decals.

Got the cargo bay blocks ready to carve.  I will not glue them in right away- I will do rough carving first, to be able to use bench plane for roughing, then glue the carved blocks into fuselage to do final carving and filling.

Don,  I say this again, its going to be fun to watch how you transfome this.  

Question, guys!

I have been starting working on some of the smaller detail parts while resting from carving.  I have not found good enough photos of landing gear struts and parts to answer this question- what color are they?  In some photos they look white, in others maybe a pearlescent white, and in yet others sort of an aluminum color.  What color are these parts on a 747?

Looking at my picture from under the wing it looks as I remember, satin white paint but very dirty. 

Got the rough carving of the cargo area done- ready to insert it into the fuselage for final fine carving, filling and sanding.

Here is a bad picture- sorry- overexposed (too close with flash) and out of focus.  Oh well.

The little plane is a new one I just bought.  I give more about it in the Tools forum.

Bloody good start!  A balsa plug -  a good idea.  Easy to carve, and easy to "fix" if things don't look right.

They see a lot of use - not much down time - they're always on the go.  And the only pressurized section is the nose.  Everything behind the start of the "hump" is unpressurized.  I think they've even started carrying cargo below "B" deck.  LOTS of rules and regs for that....no flammables....not even a paper manifest. 

leemitcheltree

Bloody good start!  A balsa plug -  a good idea.  Easy to carve, and easy to "fix" if things don't look right.

 

Actually, it is Aspen.  I find balsa hard on knife edges- ruins blades faster.  Also not as homogenous as some other woods. Also balsa is harder to finish, very open grain.

I find basswood by far the best carving wood, but it is expensive.  I use Aspen or Poplar (quite cheap) if the carving will not be to complex,  without many compound curve areas.

Very cool build Don.

Great prodject I seen one at MIA 

What a fantastic and ambitious project.  I'll definately be following along.

Toshi