Ford Trimotor redrawn and recolored by Ruben Andres Martinez A."City of Philadelphia"

[alfadoc]

This will be my build of Ruben's now well known redraw and recolor of Peter Zorn's Ford Trimotor. I am building the "City of Philadelphia" because I like the scheme, but after some poking around on the internet looking for references, it turns out I have a connection to the plane.
In the mid-80s, when I was about 14, my parents and grandparents took me to a restaurant in Morgan Hill California called The Flying Lady. The owner was an airplane fanatic, and had built the place from the ground up as a shrine to planes; there was memorabilia everywhere, WWI props, aviation spark plugs, even a moving track suspended from the ceiling moving large scale model planes in a circuit around the restaurant; here's a period video of the place: Flying Lady Restaurant Morgan Hill - YouTube. There was also a large hangar with real airplanes, and the Trimotor on display was the "City of Philadelphia"! It must have inspired me, because guess what I found in the gift shop? An original copy of Peter Zorn's model! It was the first paper model my pl*stic building self had seen, and I took it home and started buildind it immediately. I got it mostly built before it got lost in a move. I think it was a search for another copy that led me (back) to cardmodeling in the late 90's.
So a big thumbs up to Ruben and Mr. Zorn for making this build possible!

To start, I am making a couple of modifications to make the model a closer representation of the "City". Looking at photos I noticed that the greenhouse has only the two forward triangular windows up top and no "eyebrow", and that the engine louvers are wrong for this plane, so I opened the PDFs in Photoshop and made some modifications. The windows were fixed by airbrushing out the rear panes and the eyebrow will simply be omitted, and I also airbrushed out the louvers, as I plan to make them physical.

I'm going to research some more, and I haven't decided if I will make the engines more detailed, but I am looking forward to starting cutting, and, 27 years later, finally finishing this great Tin Goose.

[cdavenport]

Looking forward to watching this one come alive. Do RAM justice with a great build!

[Rubenandres77]

While repainting the original kit I was able to add some details to the "City of Philadelphia" thanks to Rbeach84's nice photos, which he uploaded to our gallery.
Message - Paper Modelers Gallery

William Larkins is the authority in Tri-Motors. He has some other interesting photos at his flickr account.
Flickr: The Flying the Ford Tri-Motor Pool

In this particular photo:
Ford 5-AT-B N9651 | Flickr - Photo Sharing!
he states: "Owner Irv Perch painted it white with dark red and gold trim."
But I think I read his book "the Ford Tri-Motor 1929-1992" he says the paint was light cream with dark red (I'm not 100% sure about this, but I'll check).

From the photos it is sometimes hard to tell if the paint was white or creamy. Or maybe it became creamy with the age. So it was hard to decide the final color in the kit.

I'll be watching this with interest. The Philadelphia is probably the most unusual color scheme any Tri-Motor ever had, because those were never the original colors of any airline, but nonetheless it became very famous with that livery.

You will surely find this model very enjoyable

[mbauer]

Originally Posted by alfadoc

This will be my build of Ruben's now well known redraw and recolor of Peter Zorn's Ford Trimotor. I am building the "City of Philadelphia" because I like the scheme, but after some poking around on the internet looking for references, it turns out I have a connection to the plane.
In the mid-80s, when I was about 14, my parents and grandparents took me to a restaurant in Morgan Hill California called The Flying Lady. The owner was an airplane fanatic, and had built the place from the ground up as a shrine to planes; there was memorabilia everywhere, WWI props, aviation spark plugs, even a moving track suspended from the ceiling moving large scale model planes in a circuit around the restaurant; here's a period video of the place: Flying Lady Restaurant Morgan Hill - YouTube. There was also a large hangar with real airplanes, and the Trimotor on display was the "City of Philadelphia"! It must have inspired me, because guess what I found in the gift shop? An original copy of Peter Zorn's model! It was the first paper model my pl*stic building self had seen, and I took it home and started buildind it immediately. I got it mostly built before it got lost in a move. I think it was a search for another copy that led me (back) to cardmodeling in the late 90's.
So a big thumbs up to Ruben and Mr. Zorn for making this build possible!

To start, I am making a couple of modifications to make the model a closer representation of the "City". Looking at photos I noticed that the greenhouse has only the two forward triangular windows up top and no "eyebrow", and that the engine louvers are wrong for this plane, so I opened the PDFs in Photoshop and made some modifications. The windows were fixed by airbrushing out the rear panes and the eyebrow will simply be omitted, and I also airbrushed out the louvers, as I plan to make them physical.

I'm going to research some more, and I haven't decided if I will make the engines more detailed, but I am looking forward to starting cutting, and, 27 years later, finally finishing this great Tin Goose.

Great story!! Hope it brings back great memories as you build, looking forward to seeing your progress.

My story is a little different. In the 1980's I met the founder and president of a museum here in Alaska. Was flying Huey's for the national guard. A mission was to go to King Salmon with a Skycrane to sling-loaded a PBY to Anchorage. My bird had the museum president and military as well as museum photographers/movie crews on board.

The museum founder did not fly. He was trying to contact the owner of a Ford Tri-Motor that was in sorry shape near Flat, Alaska. One day he asked if I would fly him out to talk to the owner.

I rented a Piper Warrior and flew him as well as my two kids to Flat. It was a private airstrip with some very interesting history. The Ford was at a place near Flat called "Iditarod", Alaska.

He was able to get the Ford and it is now being rebuilt and can be seen at the Alaska Heritage Aviation Museum at Lake Hood, part of the Ted Stevens International Airport comlex. All planes are rebuilt and flown!

The history of the Flat Airstrip? Near the middle of the runway there is a very unique marker, one you can read about in Jean Potter's The Flying North. Wiley Post crashed an airplane there on his around the world flight.

I've always liked the Ford as well!

Mike

[alfadoc]

Mike: That's a great story. Did you take any pics of the Trimotor in its sorry state?
Ruben: What a treasure trove of reference material! Thank you! Poking around the web, I was starting to think there weren't many photos of this bird. This will help with detailing a lot.
The color scheme question is interesting. I can see red and cream as a viable scheme, but I can also imagine after 40+ years, a pure white yellowing. I wonder if there is any record out there that would answer this question?
I decided against a Red River build because the metallic paper has the wrong sheen for the Trimotor's skin, but I recently read a thread about spraying it with Krylon Preserve-it to seal the surface, and it was said the sheen became more dull aluminum, so maybe I'll make a naked Goose at some point.
I am looking forward greatly to first cuts.

[mbauer]

No photos, but, it was used to store 55 gal oil drums at the time, the wings were gone and the fuselage shell was all that remained. tailfeathers were in the bush alongside the fuselage with several dents in them.

So much damage it was hard to picture it as ever flying again. I'm sure the museum has some photos of it arriving for the restoration though.

Different president and crew at the museum now, I contacted them a couple of times about some photos I have from the PBY recovery, they don't seem interested. Was planning to donate them. All in 35mm format with negatives, as digital cameras were not available at the time.

Scanned photo of PBY recovery...


Mike

[alfadoc]

A little more Photoshop work before starting the build: a change to the exit hole for the control cables in the wing. As you can see from the second photo, the cables exit through three small holes, not the large square one on the model. So I airbrushed the large hole white and added the three small holes. As an added bonus, the wing section prints better. Before, the upper edge was very slightly cut off, now with this version, the lower edge is cut off, and since it is a glue flap, it doesn't matter. First cuts soon, as soon as I am sure there is nothing else I want to modify.

PS: Does anyone know of a reasonably detailed kit with a nine cylinder engine that could pass for a Trimotor engine if scanned three times?

[Don Boose]

Wonderful project! It's grat that you are providing these accuracy fixes. And you have sparked some good stories as well!

Don

[wag]

Gremir has a Gee-Bee R1 which happens to have a nice looking Pratt & Whitney Wasp engine.
Models
Wayne

[alfadoc]

That Wasp from the BeeGee looks to be the ticket. Studying the photos I've found, I've come to the conclusion that the crankcase of the kit's engine is much too large, pushing the cylinders out too far. I'll have to scratch up a new mount, but it looks doable. Thanks!