Canon - Spirit of St. Louis

**dansls1** · #1 06-17-2008, 02:10 PM

http://cp.c-ij.com/japan/papercraft/...-st-louis.html
I know there are a ton of Spirit of St. Louis models out there, but here's another one

**Leif Ohlsson** · #2 06-18-2008, 02:42 AM

Dan, among that ton of Spirits, which one(s) would you say is good? I have the WAK version (slightly inferior to the same model by Gremir, since they went cheap on the number of colours used). - Leif

**dansls1** · #3 06-18-2008, 08:03 AM

The only SoStL that I have experience building was in 1985-ish and I don't remember anything about it, other than it was silver metallic paper, pretty 'flat' engine but the general plane went together easily. Infortunately all my models went into the garbage when I went to college in 1989, so it's long gone. (I regret that day often. The stuff that went away included a 60% complete Wilhelmshavener aircraft carrier...)
My dad has one he is working on currently, I'll have to check with him on which kit it is. He said it was going together well and had a pretty detailed engine. He was beefing up formers with balsa instead of laminating (as he often does with paper models), so he wasn't in any hurry to build it - but he liked the kit.

**Leif Ohlsson** · #4 06-18-2008, 02:05 PM

Dan, if your dad is building a pretty detailed Spirit, I'm pretty sure it is the one by Rafal Ciesielski. It has been marketed by both Gremir (here), and by WAK (here).

The model is, as witnessed by your dad, excellent. Cf pictures on the sites above and attached. However, as I intimated, the printed version is slightly inferior to the download by Gremir, since the producers of the printed version (WAK) tried to skimp on the number of colours needed in the printer. Which means that the wicker chair and other parts are greyish instead of brownish.

However, in the view of most prospective builders, this is vastly offset by the silver sheen, which would be impossible to achieve in an inkjet printer.

To my knowledge this is the best Spirit of St. Louis available to date. I have one other, namely a pretty book by Dover publications. (That is probably the one you built around 1985, since the book is out of print today.) Unfortunately, that model is far from today's standards as far as scale goes, so it belongs to the memorabilia shelf.

I have one criticism against Rafael's design as such: There is a pretty good interior pattern for the pilot section. But it ends there. That is a pity, since the one thing about the Spirit of St. Louis is that it was a very stripped down airframe, open behind the pilot all the way back to the tail. In the model there is an unfortunate former there, and no interior pattern beyond it.

I've been thinking ever since I got the kit how to amend that, and how to replicate the very visible interior mass of tubing, but haven't found a satisfactory solution yet. Next to the Piper J3 Cub, a really true-to-scale Spirit of St. Louis would be at the top of my wish list.

Rafael's design is the one and only so far coming even close. So if you wish for a Spirit of St. Louis today, that is your only choice - and it remains a very good one, albeit not all everyone could wish for.

Leif

PS. While you are looking at WAK, don't forget to check out their brand new P-38H Lightning. It has been advertised elsewhere on the site; this is just a reminder.

PPS. Looking at the photos below, it strikes me that the Spirit spinner would be an excellent project to try out Gil's method of making petal-designed parts!

**Leif Ohlsson** · #5 06-20-2008, 07:05 AM

Writing about Rafael's Spirit of St. Louis made me go back and have a closer look at the kit. I would much like to take back the criticism I made above. The design actually calls for a former ("W8") which is only TEMPORARILY inserted while shaping the fuselage section. It is then REMOVED, which lays a sufficiently large section of the rear fuselage open to view, at least as far as you can see in through the cabin windows.

The inner structure does not extend all the way back, but that is really not necessary if you don't plan to build a cut-away model.

I am sorry for my premature judgement. The Gremir/WAK model really is a very good model of the Spirit of St. Louis, much worth building.

My problem with it, having reason to think about it again, is how to accomplish the silver dope sheen when enlarging it. I am thinking about silver coloured paper, but I don't know if inkjet will print on that. Also, there is the problem of the front section pattern (aluminium sheeting burnished with a rotary sander in the original). How to accomplish that in Photoshop, and printed on what?

Gil's work earlier with a mixture to be applied to aluminium foil to enable printing is a little bit too advanced for me, I'm afraid...

Anyway, the main point is that the WAK/Gremir Spirit of St. Louis is a most excellent model, open to - but not demanding - some further refinement.

Leif

**GreMir** · #6 06-20-2008, 07:17 AM

Leif,
Thank you.

As for the silver paper - Red River Paper http://www.redrivercatalog.com/browse/cat=4&prod=30.htm
has silver mettalic paper for inkjets. They do not recomend it for the pigmented inks but the regular ones have no problems with it.

**Don Boose** · #7 06-20-2008, 07:41 AM

I don't want to get too far off the Spirit of St. Louis topic, but this thread is producing some very interesting and useful information beyond the evaluation of various SoSL paper models.

Mike: Do you use Red River papers for your own GreMir models? I know that Dan has used RR paper in the past and cannot put my hand on his messages regarding those papers. (1) If you use RR paper (other than the metallics), what do you use for 1/33 models and do you use a different weight/type for 1/48 models. (2) Is there a US Internet source for 0.5mm close-grained white card suitable for 1/48 formers and the like? DrBill has suggested taking a micrometer to the local art supply store and checking out their archival card. I tried this and could find no 0.5mm or 1mm stock.

Don

**dansls1** · #8 06-20-2008, 07:56 AM

You have me confused with somebody else, I haven't tried the metallic paper yet.

I'm still not convinced that layering normal cardstock isn't the best method for formers. The only thing I'm still working on is getting the glue thickness included in the total thickness, but for .5mm formers I've used 2 pieces of .2mm stock plus 1 sheet of normal copy paper (0.1mm) in the middle. It measured up at about 0.55mm - so I got the glue thin there (so far it appears my type 77 spray glue gives me a 0.025 to 0.05mm of thickness).
It is very easy to cut this layered paper, it has a little give but stays pretty stiff and is easy to trim to angles on the edges, and will sand with a little CA applied.
*Note - this is not my original idea, I copied it from somebody somewhere, but I'm liking it better than any of the cardboard alternatives I've messed with.

**GreMir** · #9 06-20-2008, 07:57 AM

Don,
No. So far the only model I considered for the RR silver paper was my recolor of P-51D from Moshe. It printed beautifully on Epson R220 using generic inks. There is a problem though... I can build only in the evenings and that means desk lamp but with this paper the reflections are just to great for me to try to cut out parts :o

For all my models I started using matte photo paper - I try to catch a sale on Staples/Office Depot/others - RR is a bit expensive for that...
I never bothered with "special" card for formers - I simply grab cardboard from the back of the notepad and if thickness is not enough, add a layer of card. For thinner formers I lamniate sheets of card veryfing thickness with the caliper.

**Leif Ohlsson** · #10 06-20-2008, 08:01 AM

Don (& Dan), the Red River paper was used by "AirBob" in this thread; and you had a discussion with him on the subject, Don.

I guess I'll have to ransack some specialists' shops here in Gothenburg for similar paper.

After having read about the Red River paper, I am thinking about that for the front section burnished aluminium sheets. The pattern could be taken from a scan of the kit (Mike, Mike, when are you going to get your kits compatible with a Mac... I would have bought the J22, the Spirit, and possibly others from you a long time ago!). And then more ordinary silver paper for the rest of the aircraft (silver doped fabric, not producing reflection, rather matt in fact).

As for laminating in small scales, I, too, am thinking along the lines of layers of ordinary paper (or photo paper). I've tried out 300g & 200g photo paper with (to me) satisfactory result.

Leif