CardPlane Bartel BM-6a

[ccoyle]

I finally found my cable, so now I can post some pictures. :)

After a couple month hiatus from modeling, I felt the itch to get at it again. I started on the Bartel, because I didn't want to tackle something too serious. The kit is one of the numerous freebies available at the CardPlane web site (shout-out to Lech!).

I am building this kit as straightforwardly as possible and resisting the urge to extra-detail anything. The fit of the parts has thus far been fair to good. As with other early CardPlane kits, this one lacks joiner strips, and the skins-to-frame fit can be very tight. Patiently checking and re-checking the fit of parts before gluing alleviates much of the problem. The hardest part to this point was the fitting of the engine cylinder covers. The design calls for a small former to be glued toward the front of each cover; I found it much easier to fit the covers by omitting that former. Also, it worked out much better for me to glue the three cover parts together off the model and then fit them to the fuselage, rather than glue each piece separately to the fuselage.

Cheers for now,

[Toddlea]

You are off to a great start. I built this one in January (http://www.zealot.com/forum/showpost.php?p=703893&postcount=25) and had a great time with it. Heads up with one of the insignia on the top wing. It has a graphical error. Good luck.

[zachy]

I built one of these last year. I holds up well to play, my grandson has used it for six months now and it's still mostly intact.

[Don Boose]

Very nice builds both.

Don

[birder]

That is a very nice build, and thanks for the tips (I downloaded the latest free model)!!

[Royaloakmin]

Nice to see you building again, Chris. Are you going to do the PWS 10 soon? Can you resist???

[ccoyle]

Are you going to do the PWS 10 soon? Can you resist???

The PWS-10 is indeed a very tempting build, as are all of the CardPlane kits I have in my stash, but I never know too far in advance what will be built next. I have some great ship kits I would like to have a go at, plus I still have my partially completed wood kit of the sloop-of-war HMS Fly sitting on my workbench, daily accusing me of neglect. :rolleyes: To make matters worse, I also just downloaded Emil Zarkov's Avia B-135. Somewhere along the way I'm simply going to have to stop collecting kits and work only on the ones thus far accumulated...but who here has ever pulled that off successfully??

Cheers!

[ccoyle]

An update:

My camera's batteries died and I have no replacements at the moment, so unfortunately no pics. :( I added the engine exhausts, gun sight, filler cap, vertical stabilizer, and windscreen. On the latter bit I used the double-sided tape technique suggested by Joerg Schulze at Kartonbau; turned out very nice. While I await an opportunity to get new batteries (a hazard of mountain living -- there is no Wal-Mart around the corner), I'm making progress on cutting out the 20 longitudinal wing formers. I can only handle about five per sitting without going insane. :rolleyes:

Cheers!

[Royaloakmin]

Chris, can you explain the double sided tape technique, and what brand of tape you used? I did not understand Jorg's original explanation. Thx!

[ccoyle]

Hi, Fred.

I used Scotch brand double-sided tape. It does not have a backing on one side, which makes it less than ideal, but it worked out anyway. I first placed a piece of the tape on the back of the exterior windscreen frame on the parts sheet. I then cut out the bits within the frame. Since there was no backing strip on the tape, it tended to stick to my cutting mat, but by pressing lightly with my knife I was able to do the cutting without sticking the tape to the mat firmly; the second side remained sufficiently sticky to finish the job. Next, I stuck the frame/tape combo to the mylar sheet and then cut out the frame+mylar from the parts sheet. I could have repeated the process for the inner windscreen frame, but I think that would have made the whole thing a bit on the thick side, so instead I painted the interior frame onto the mylar. The whole thing came out well, I think.

Cheers!

[ccoyle]

A slightly blurred shot of the fuselage to date. The wings are in progress at the moment. All CardPlane kits have substantial wing former assemblies -- 16 pieces per each half-wing in this case. That'll be all for now until the new year. I'm heading out-of-town for a bit...will be in Pasadena for the Rose Parade on 1/1/09.

Cheers!

[Yu Gyokubun]

What ccoyl described is the method that I also always use for four years except for very small scale model like smaller than 1:144.
But, once one of Japanese fellow paper modeler said that the adhesive on the tape will be deteriorated in a long run and cause detachment of mylar from frame.
It has past four years since I used this technique for the first time and I observe no deterioration but I would like to know does anybody experience that?

[whulsey]

Haven't used the double sided tape, but have found a lot of tape adhesives either deteriorate or attack the surface of what they're attached to after a few years. Althought for some of the better quality tapes it may be 10 or 15 years before this starts, depending on storage conditions. There are tapes made for bookbinding and mounting artwork and photos that use archiveal materials and don't have the problems.

[ccoyle]

Hmmm...that's not very comforting to read. Perhaps I'll try experimenting with wicking a bit of CA into the taped frame/mylar joint. That would give the joint a greater degree of permanence.

[ccoyle]

Wow...I can't believe it has been this long since I posted any progress. :o And what I have to post will not appear like much.

The accompanying shot shows the partially completed upper wing. I like this shot because it shows not only a wing skin in place, but also shows the typical rock-solid former assembly typical of CardPlane designs, even the early freebies. There are, though, a couple of major differences between this design and Lech's later, more sophisticated designs, such as the PWS-10 currently being built by Shrike. First, the graphics on the Bartel are much simpler: no weathering, and the rib lines are just plain lines rather than the shaded lines of newer kits that give a greater illusion of depth. Second, the earlier CardPlane kits make much less use of joiner strips; you can see where I added a strip to join the left and right wing halves.

If you are sharp-eyed, you will notice that the part numbers on some right wing elements don't match. :rolleyes: I accidentally glued some of the formers together out of sequence. Fortunately for me, the Bm-6a was built with identical upper/lower and left/right wing sections; therefore, the parts for each wing section are mostly interchangeable. Whew!

Cheers!

[Leif Ohlsson]

Good to see this progressing! - L.

[Don Boose]

That's a good-looking wing and I like the photo showing the underlying starboard structure and the completed port wing.

Don

[ccoyle]

Thanks, Don. Sorry about the lack of progress lately -- life has been getting in the way of modeling. :-(

[ccoyle]

OK, soccer tournament out of the way...got a little modeling done. Also owe some thanks to Shrike for motivating me with his PWS-10 build. I have not had the same difficulty with tight skin fits on this model as with my other CardPlane kits; in fact, the wing skins are quite loose and required a tiny bit of trimming in some spots. Also, there is a printing error on the right upper aileron -- the insignia is set too far back from the leading edge and so creates a large gap in the insignia where the aileron joins the wing. I printed an extra lower left wing aileron; flip it over, it matches exactly due to the symmetrical upper and lower wings.

Cheers!

[willygoat]

Looking very nice Chris :p

[ccoyle]

I have the struts partially completed, but I have hit one of those modeling walls that pop up from time to time -- very little modeling urge at the moment. Struts...urgh!

[bob martin]

BEEN THERE:o DONE THAT:(

IT'LL PASS;)

[dansls1]

Hmmm - inspiration to do struts. Maybe a little dose of Mr. Bob Seger (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OKrNtWZUN2I) will help...
:D

[ccoyle]

I needed to take a break from struts, so I finished the tail surfaces.

[B-Manic]

You are doing a great job on this model Chris. It really looks good.

[ccoyle]

Got the top wing mounted today. In one of the pictures, you can see that there is a significant error in the location of the center struts; if one attaches them to the fuselage at the points indicated on the printed part, then the struts do not line up properly with the attachment points on the upper wing. I removed the struts from the fuselage, attached them first to the upper wing, then glued them to the fuselage wherever they would touch. It doesn't look too bad.

[redhorse]

Struts are always the hardest part and these look great!

[dansls1]

Looks very nice!

[Yu Gyokubun]

Although I have built only 3 biplanes, I experienced the same strut problem and only solution so far I found is same as you. Glue struts onto the wing first then glued the other edge of the struts onto fuselage.

Your build looks nice!!

[bob martin]

Great looking model.

[Don Boose]

Excellent recovery on the strut problem. The finished "wing-fuselage interface" looks great. This is a very nice-looking airplane and your model is great.

Don

[ccoyle]

Landing gear finished. I wrapped the strut skins around 1 mm steel rod -- very sturdy. One serious boo-boo I deliberately framed out of the photos :p is that the plane, when sitting on the gear, tilts about 2 mm lower to one side than the other. Frustrating, to be sure, but I don't know an easy way to fix the problem without potentially seriously boogering something. It's a flaw that's not readily apparent if I angle the model just so in my display case, so I'm tempted to just leave it.

[ct ertz]

This was the first plane I dprinted out and started. I had never done a card model before and it was a bit much for a start. I gave up after doing the seat and cockpit, and went on to do a few boats and a couple of other planes. Our 11 year old did a nice F-D7 biplane and it came out well, though he cheated a bit with the wing struts by using cut bamboo. I ma now have to get back to this model after seeing how nice it can be made!

[ccoyle]

There were a few last details to take care of: radiator, spinner, tail skid, control horns and cables, and the little starboard side thingy I'm guessing is some kind of airspeed indicator? Anyways, the Bartel is now complete. Many thanks to our friends at CardPlane for making this and many other designs free to the card modeling community!

[ccoyle]

Expertly shot with my home-made, high-tech photo set-up. :rolleyes::rolleyes:

[ccoyle]

And finally, a shot of my growing stable of CardPlane offerings, the WZ-X, PWS Z-17, and the Bartel. I thought it would be interesting to contrast the size of the Bartel, a trainer, with the other two aircraft. The size difference is actually smaller than in reality, because I scaled the WZ-X to fit 8 1/2 x 11 inch paper, making it somewhat smaller than 1/33 scale. It's still a good-sized plane next to the Bartel.

Now I get to think about my next build...so many choices to ponder! I'm pretty sure, though, that whatever it is, it will not be Polish...gotta add some diversity to my completed builds.

TTFN!

[B-Manic]

Expert photos indeed. They really show off your skill. This is a great model, well built Chris. Maybe the Fokker E-III next? It comes in a variety of schemes.

Fokker E-III (http://www.modele-kartonowe.com/fokker/index.html)

[Don Boose]

That is a very attractive display. I think there is something to be said for focusing on a particular set of aircraft (by country, time period, or other category). As you pointed out, it provides some useful and interesting comparisons.

Don

[Royaloakmin]

Awsome work, Chris.

[cjwalas]

Looks great, Chris. And that is a nice looking grouping you've got there!
Chris

[redhorse]

It's good to see all of them together. Very nice builds!

[dansls1]

Excellent collection!