'WASP' radial engine in 1/48 scale

[contourcreative]

The Pratt and Whitney Wasp (and Hornet) engines in 1928 were installed in 45 different types of planes, both military and commercial, and were used by more than 25 operators in the US alone.

Being part of so many aircraft of that era means that getting a reasonable, to scale, representation of this engine is important given our design range.

The engine was designed with a card 2-ply wheel with nine 'spokes' on which the individual cylinder heads were mounted. Each head was rolled from an individual piece of paper.

The detail of the push rods and rocker boxes, while not essential, give a far more realistic look to the model. The rockers boxes are folded from minute pieces of paper and the rod created out of 0.25 Evergreen styrene painted gray and fitted individually. A minute blob of white glue is then dropped in the front of the folded rocker box to give them better shape and touched up with gray paint. Doing all this will take between 2 to 3 hours per engine.

The engine, shown here without exhaust manifold on the Fairchild FC-2 prototype, is slightly over scale, but being such a visible part of the plane, contributes much to the appearance of the model.

Terry

[umtutsut]

Most excellent craftsmanship, Terry! Is the engine your own design or is it from a kit?

:cool: Les (The Voice of Authority -- VoiceofAuthority.net - The Voice Stylings of Les Dorr, Jr. (http://www.voiceofauthority.net))

[wag]

That looks fantastic. There are several models out there that would be greatly improved with one of those in the nose.
Wayne

[contourcreative]

Most excellent craftsmanship, Terry! Is the engine your own design or is it from a kit?

:cool: Les (The Voice of Authority -- VoiceofAuthority.net - The Voice Stylings of Les Dorr, Jr. (http://www.voiceofauthority.net))

Thanks. This is our own (Contour Creative Studio) design. It will be released in conjunction with the Fairchild FC-2 next month.

[contourcreative]

That looks fantastic. There are several models out there that would be greatly improved with one of those in the nose.
Wayne

Well hoping to get a few more modelers interested in the first civilian aircraft designs and deco airports. Always seems to me that one of the virtues of paper was it could represent the unrepresented; with the World War I and II aviation military scene over-catered for in every modeling medium and every conceivable scale.

[Don Boose]

It's an excellent engine, although I am not sure I have the skill to fold the cylinder heads and rocker boxes.

Don

[contourcreative]

It's an excellent engine, although I am not sure I have the skill to fold the cylinder heads and rocker boxes.

Don

Tweezers and a wee bit of time..
:)

[airdave]

I know from building the GeeBee that this little engine is a formidable challenge.
Its great to see another version!

[contourcreative]

I know from building the GeeBee that this little engine is a formidable challenge.
Its great to see another version!

Dave,the compelling reasons for this design was the proliferation of exposed radials of that era and our list of upcoming designs that use the engine. We'd has a go at them in the past, with the abandoned 1/72, but these are completely redesigned and also 1/48 permits a bit more detail, like the spark plug leads.

Cheers

[-Jim G]

I just found this old thread and I love it! One thig is that the link on the signature to Ecardmodels is broken. it should be: Contour Creative Studio (https://ecardmodels.com/vendors/contour-creative-studio). I think that when you update your signature it will update all of your old posts.

[Petestein]

Thanks. This is our own (Contour Creative Studio) design. It will be released in conjunction with the Fairchild FC-2 next month.

Looking forward to buy it. As you say, it will improve any highly detail model. Good work, congratulations

[aansorge]

I just found this old thread and I love it! One thig is that the link on the signature to Ecardmodels is broken. it should be: Contour Creative Studio (https://ecardmodels.com/vendors/contour-creative-studio). I think that when you update your signature it will update all of your old posts.


Good find! Thanks for sharing. I wanted a WASP for my current Beaver project, but did not find this thread (I was looking for that other radial by mistake). I did find Ruben Andres' Trimotor which has a WASP.



The most striking feature of the engine, at least on the Beaver with its cowling, is the chromed rod tubes. My ideas for making those silver have settled on silver tape (did it used to be called muffler tape?) or a silver sharpie.

[57townsman]

A bit of aluminum wire would polish up quite nicely.

[aansorge]

And stiffen the entire assembly. Excellent.