Airbus A310/A400 Un-prepared Airfield Airliner

[Jeffry Fontaine]

Nice to see this WIP back in the limelight.  Good luck! 

[kitnut617]

Thanks Jeff

[kitnut617]

Had a bit of a "panic" moment yesterday --- I got out the project so I could get back into it and found to my horror  ----  the main wheel sponsons had disappeared      now these things are not small, twice as big than a Spitfire fuselage ---- spent most of the afternoon looking through boxes but eventually I found them     I re-discovered I haven't got as far into them as I thought, one sponson has the undercarriage mounting parts glued in but the sponson shell halves are still separate. And I had not done anything to the other side. Pics to follow soon of the progress  ---

Actually in reply #33 you can see the status of the sponson build.

This project got shelved back before I started working at YYC mainly because I couldn't get the right colour shade of the blue on the rear fuselages of Canadian North. But once I was able to get around the airport by myself I had the opportunity to observe the aircraft that Canadian North used because they are based there.  The blue is sort of metallic, but not you flake type a metallic. It's more like a chrome finish and I've found a few hobby paints which actually say Chrome Black, or Chrome Red. And I found a reference to a Humbrol colour called Chrome Blue (H52). But do you think I can find any ----    So I'll make some myself ---

[Jeffry Fontaine]

@Robert/Kitnut617 - I feel your pain, have encountered similar situations here with trying to find things I thought were at hand and have either been disposed of or are still hidden away in another box at my storage unit. 

[kitnut617]

The funny thing is Jeff, I had been looking at them a few months ago because they were in an open box on my workbench, but since then I've been doing an up to date kit count and had moved stuff around some. I just forgot where I had put them. Still, got them now so it's on with the project.

[finsrin]

You are not alone regarding misplaced parts.  All to frequent around here.  Enjoying pictures.  Nice work !

[kitnut617]

Thanks Bill,

So I'm slowly getting back into this, re-discovering things I had previously done to rectify problems, like the replacement Scale Aircraft Conversions white metal u/c I got for the project. I mentioned above that the parts are smaller than the originals, so I found I had fixed some of the parts and abandoned some of the other parts as un-usable.

In these pics you can see that I had to modify the little locating stub on the end of the main u/c arm. I found I had modified three of the arms so now I've got to do the other three (top two pics). In the bottom pic you can just see why I had to make the extended stubs. But when I put the original plastic parts in, everything is fine.

[kitnut617]

I still have to do some painting inside the sponson before I glue the first one together, the second one nothing got done to it before, something I thought I had started    But I've got everything ready to go. Middle pic shows what it looks like when it is all glued together.
 
I've also worked out how to sand the side that will be glued to the fuselage. I found that the kit A310 fuselage has almost the same diameter as the outside diameter of a bit of 2 1/2" nominal bore pipe (which is 2.875" [73mm]). The A310 fuselage is 76mm so once I wrapped some sandpaper around the pipe I got hold of, it more or less is bang on. Makes quite a nice sanding block, which also works for the wing box (bottom pic)

[kitnut617]

A bit of progress:

I've got the wing assembled and glued on the flap track fairings, then finalized the wing box to fuselage connection. Before I glue it together I also got the tail plane on. In reply #34 you will see I had found that the A310 and A400 tail plane were quite similar, and I had penciled onto the A400 tail plane where the fuselage would be.  What I've done is cut out the tail plane shape on the fuselage side so that the new tail plane will fit right into the slot and then I'll fit it right on the pencil line. I've also got a round brass spar running through each tail plane and fuselage to keep everything level. I decided to do that because I examined photos of the Transall to see how that tail plane was orientated and found it level and about as far below the wing as on this project. I will square off the A400 tail plane tips though, and I'm also going to give it a bigger dorsal fillet. You can see the leading edge of it in the bottom pic.

[apophenia]

That is looking amazing! Truly impressive work and eye for detail 

[kitnut617]

Thanks Steven,

Here's some pics of the slot I cut and the spar in the tail plane. The slot is something you have to do with the construction of the A310 anyway, as the original tail is moulded as one complete piece, you then slide it through the slot. I decided to do something similar with the new tail plane which gave it something solid to glue to.  The spar I've made is glued into the starboard side of the tail plane for the moment, once I'm reading to glue the tail plane in place, I'll squirt some super glue onto the spar in the region of it's end (it's in contact inside of the parts at the leading edge and where it will contact the inner end of the tail plane).

I've also squared off the tail plane tips (pics of that later though)

[kitnut617]

The build is progressing:

[kitnut617]

Top pic here shows a comparison of one of the nacelles to a CH-146.

I decided to mount the nacelles temporarily, just to see how it sits. Then I had another moment of Oh f&$k! It didn't look right (middle two pics). The nacelles have a very pronounced downward slant towards the spinner. I was sure I had very carefully cut the wing box off the A400 fuselage while observing that the bottom edge of the wing box ran parallel to the top and bottom of the fuselage. I paid extra attention to how I have it on the A310 fuselage and everything seems to be alright there. So off to have a review of reference material ----

I wrote to Kit (PR9_Kit) as I knew he had just recently finished his Snoopy A400 and he replied that indeed the nacelles do droop down towards the front (showed me a couple of pics of his 'in progress' build). Just to make sure I did some delving around the internet and I found an official Airbus side view of the A400M. Sure enough the engines do really droop down. (bottom pic)  Phew! 

[kitnut617]

Interesting thing I noticed on that official A400N side view, the nacelles are angle down to the same angle as the refueling probe. That would mean it's normal flight orientation is slightly nose up, wouldn't you say ---

[GTX_Admin]

Interesting thing I noticed on that official A400N side view, the nacelles are angle down to the same angle as the refueling probe. That would mean it's normal flight orientation is slightly nose up, wouldn't you say ---

Hard to say from photos.  This one kind of shows that but it could be the camera angle:

[Kerick]

A beast that big can fly at whatever angle it wants to! 

[kitnut617]

Yeah! like that Greg --- although that view might be a little more nose high because as you say the angle the photo was taken.

I've only seen an A400M three times while at the airport, always on the apron though because they came and left when I wasn't on shift.

[kitnut617]

A beast that big can fly at whatever angle it wants to! 

He, He, He!     an aside story: we used to have a very large Great Dane (36" to the shoulder and 185lb, pic of him with mrs kitnut below), one day an appliance service guy was in to fix something and he wanted to know where the dog laid down, our reply was 'anywhere he wants to'   

[elmayerle]

Reminds me of a transmission shop I once did business with.  They had a German Shepherd guard dog.  When I picked up my car, it was obvious he had slept on the roof as there was a saucer-sized paw print on the top of the windshield.

[kitnut617]

Tail group is now done, I glued a shaped base plate to the top of the fuselage for the dorsal fillet side sheets to glue to, then glued them on after gluing the leading edge strip. Glued the tailplane into place then did a round or two of PSR. Then I gave it a coat of primer. There's some clean up to do though but most of it has come out quite good.

[Brian da Basher]

That's one of the cleanest fin fillet mods I've ever seen.

Brian da Basher

[kitnut617]

Thanks Brian, I've had a good look at it now that the paint has dried. A couple of areas need a bit of attention, the join of the fillet leading edge to fin leading edge has a bit of a notch to it for one and some other holes need filling. The white primer helps with showing up the defects ---

[Volkodav]

A beast that big can fly at whatever angle it wants to! 

He, He, He!     an aside story: we used to have a very large Great Dane (36" to the shoulder and 185lb, pic of him with mrs kitnut below), one day an appliance service guy was in to fix something and he wanted to know where the dog laid down, our reply was 'anywhere he wants to'   

and I thought my boy was big!

[kitnut617]

Got the nacelles done and glued on (top pic). Before I did that I painted the inside of the air intakes and the face of the compressors. In the second pic which I'm posting again, you can see the small triangular parts in front of the engines, I painted the inside side of them which is the side you see. These parts are turned upside down and fit into the triangular opening on the engine with the round bit up against the compressor face (third pic). However, once the lower front of the nacelles are in place you can see about naff all ----- (bottom pic). Also in the bottom pic you can see a radiator duct on the bottom of the nacelles, you have to add a small part which is the radiator before the nacelles side get glued together and is about half way down the intake, something else you're just not going to see when it's all built up. There is a lot of flash around the intake of this duct and on the exit end, maybe once I clean it all up something will be visible ---

The four nacelles are almost identical, the #1 nacelle and the #4 nacelle are interchangeable, the #2 and #3 nacelles are different slightly and also different to each other. That's because on the outer side of these inner nacelles it has what looks like a bit of armour plate which is inline with the outer nacelle propellers. I think I'm going to add something similar to the fuselage sides when I get that far ahead. I used to see something like it on the sides of the Q400's at YYC

[ericr]

impressive !