Interceptor E Build—- Pursley Skin

[Nytrunner]

So John and his instructions suggest using latex trim paint as a sealer for the ball sack.

Instructions unclear, and now my zipper won't close

 

[BABAR]

Rudder segments were glued, wrapped in wax paper, and put in “da book” to dry. I do this for my papered fins too.

 

[afadeev]

As far as the body tubes go, I continue to assert that finishing them is not necessary and not recommended by John Pursley. Can't hurt though, as long as you get it nice and smooth and glossy.

The one time I had followed that advise (no priming of the paper body tube), the spirals showed through the Pursley skins on the Mercury Redstone.
From that point onwards, I've been filling the spirals and spraying one layer of primer onto the airframes that are to receive the vinyl skins.

YMMV

 

[neil_w]

The one time I had followed that advise (no priming of the paper body tube), the spirals showed through the Pursley skins on the Mercury Redstone.
From that point onwards, I've been filling the spirals and spraying one layer of primer onto the airframes that are to receive the vinyl skins.

Hmm, I will have to go inspect mine, I certainly don't ever recall seeing any spirals.

 

[BABAR]

Hmm, I will have to go inspect mine, I certainly don't ever recall seeing any spirals.

Was yours also the "chameleon " pattern? I am wondering if that might be more forgiving of surface imperfections.

 

[neil_w]

yes it was, as are the vast majority of his sci-fi skins.

 

[les]

The one time I had followed that advise (no priming of the paper body tube), the spirals showed through the Pursley skins on the Mercury Redstone.
From that point onwards, I've been filling the spirals and spraying one layer of primer onto the airframes that are to receive the vinyl skins.

YMMV

Now you made me go look at mine. Here are 3 non-sci-fi rockets with his skins
None of them had spirals filled, but all were first primed and sprayed with a gloss paint before applying the skins. I can't see a hint of a spiral in any of them. But as you stated, YMMV....

pix follows - had an issue posting...

 

[les]

 

[afadeev]

It's a little hard to take a quality picture of the issue, since the body of the Mercury Redstone is white, and the wrinkles over body tube spirals show up as slight variations in shades of white. And phone camera does not do a very good job of picking those up.
However, the two pics below begin to illustrate the situation.

It looks a little worse than what the pictures show, but still it's not THAT big of a deal.
Rocket still looks way better that what I would have achieved by spray painting it, and I have plenty of other imperfections in what was my first vinyl wrap model:

 

[kuririn]

Just wondering if you guys used the "soapy water" technique to position the decals prior to burnishing.
First Accur 8 decal I had for the LJ II I positioned without the water and found that it's a one shot deal.
The adhesive is so strong that you cannot lift and reposition if it's off.

 

[afadeev]

Just wondering if you guys used the "soapy water" technique to position the decals prior to burnishing.
First Accur 8 decal I had for the LJ II I positioned without the water and found that it's a one shot deal.
The adhesive is so strong that you cannot lift and reposition if it's off.

Now that I spray paint the airframes first, the glossier paint allows for more working time to lift and adjust the alignment of the vinyl wraps.
Eventually (24+ hours later), the adhesive seams to set in, and then wraps are stuck for good.

Thus, no soapy water for me.

YMMV

 

[neil_w]

I never used the soapy water. Using the prescribed method of placement, I nailed the positions of all the body tube wraps almost perfectly on the first try. I certainly didn't press the initial strip down until I was pretty confident of its placement, and then just went around the body, and left it there.

Fins and such weren't any sort of problem.

 

[BABAR]

Fins and such weren't any sort of problem.

Instructions say no fillet needed for the ventral tail fins. Hmmmmm...... those are the “not through the wall” fins. Makes me wonder. I am debating putting black dye in wood glue (the background for this Interceptor E Union Skin is black) for a fillet.

 

[neil_w]

Instructions say no fillet needed for the ventral tail fins. Hmmmmm...... those are the “not through the wall” fins. Makes me wonder. I am debating putting black dye in wood glue (the background for this Interceptor E Union Skin is black) for a fillet.

You can certainly try. But there's little or no room for a fillet between the skin seams, in my experience. Ultimately, I applied medium CA fillets to all the various fin/body junctions, mainly to seal the skins at those point. I don't expect much in the way of added strength.

Pursley skin builds are not like what you're used to. That's part of the fun.

 

[BABAR]

Dorsal fin/wing joint
Instructions are to attach the dorsal to the wing before attaching to body tube?
Any problems with getting surface alignment right if these are glue together before attachment to tube?

The body tube is skinned prior to fin and wing attachments. The wing and dorsal are skinned after attachment.

I was debating attaching the wing and dorsal fin separately (as opposed to a single piece.

Wing first (wing is through the wall alignment), then the dorsal fin (aka chine). If I attach the dorsal to the wing first, the alignment has to be perfect (both longitudinal— which is easy if I stick it in a book, but also lateral, which even with a straight edge might be off a tich.)

Previous experience?

 

[neil_w]

I imagine it would work either way, but I *always* assemble my fins before attaching them. That makes it easiest to get a perfectly smooth and invisible joint between the two pieces. Also I paper my complete assemblies, so I really have no choice.

Ensuring perfect alignment does take a bit of work, especially when you have to work around the TTW tabs.

BTW I'm surprised they call those pieces "dorsal fins" in the instructions. I would always call those "strakes". Chines are something different.

 

[BABAR]

BTW I'm surprised they call those pieces "dorsal fins" in the instructions. I would always call those "strakes". Chines are something different.

Concur, but I guess fish don't have lateral fins

 

[BABAR]

Tapes the adhesion surfaces prior to priming. Instruction recommend sealing with latex paint prior to skinning, but latex paint recommends priming before latex.

There was an old lady who swallowed a fly......

 

[BABAR]

I went ahead and tried der Micro Meister’s method of filling the fins with three wet coats of primer and sanded prior to putting on the black latex code. Probably overkill. Even with the three layers of primer can still see a little bit of grain showing through but shouldn’t be a problem with the overlying skin. I have kept the attachment edges taped so that I will hopefully get a good adhesion when I glue these on.

 

[BABAR]

Glued the wing pods. Rubber bands and tape to try to close all the gaps

 

[BABAR]

I went ahead and primed and painted the body tube, if figure it will provide a smooth surface for adhesion and more importantly if the skin gets any holes or peel backs there is a black background. I have taped around the slots and sanded down to the paper, I will cover that with black Sharpie.

 

[BABAR]

Another boo-boo. Forgot to mask off the areas where the ventral fins will attach. For some reason Estes decided that whereas the dorsal fins and the wing fans required through the wall slots the ventral fins had enough surface area to attach without them. So now I need to go back and re-mark over the black. I marked out the areas involved, tape them off. Required the Dremel tool to really scrape down to the outer layer of the white tube and actually scraped a little bit into it I figure that will give me a better adhesion.

 

[BABAR]

Skin 1

 

[BABAR]

Blacked the edges, I think this will help for a black skin.

 

[BABAR]

Had some difficulty with curve pre rolled second section

 

[BABAR]

Small wrinkle first piece

 

[BABAR]

Bubble on 2 at edge. Gonna try iron

 

[BABAR]

Bubble out, but small wrinkle on bottom

 

[BABAR]

Once cut out, can be hard to keep track of front and back. If you remember

Red to the Rear

All the body tube pieces will work.

 

[neil_w]

Most likely you'll do better with the skins as you go.

But as for small wrinkles like that, don't sweat it. My Ragnarok has a million small mistakes that I made, but that is not what you notice when you look at the final product. I think that the more decoration (decals, skins, etc.) a model has, the less you notice stuff like this, because the eye is drawn to the design rather than the defects, unless someone is doing a close inspection *looking* for defects.

Carry on, this will be great.