Guillows Laser Cut Rufe build

[scigs30]

Here is another build I am doing for Guillows out of the box. Once again the laser cutting and parts are excellent except the numbered parts for the built float are incorrect ID, I will let Guillows know. I did this all in less than 2 hours using Elmers glue. The parts just fall out of the balsa sheets, not cutting nubbers. Just like my Focke Wulf I will build it per the plans and see if I can get her to fly with rubber.

[Balsa Pilot]

Looks good so far. I am in process of building the 500 series Grumman Hellcat, and have been pleasantly surprised with the quality of the wood, and the ease of construction. Others are helping me with getting pics on the site, but I must compliment Guillows for this "leaps and bounds " flight into the future"
(pun intended) of quality and technology involving laser cutting and new wood selection process.
If you are doing factory builds then tell 'em so for me will you? Its my intention now to go to the ol' local hobby store-(55miles) and buy the whole 500 series, so much improved are they from the old "Die-smashed" heavy coarse grained wood that we all remember.

Can't wait to see more shots of the build and flying!

[Bill Gaylord]

On the 500 series and small 900 series, I've had some of the best die-cutting I've come across with them. Had a 500 series Hellcat, where the die-cut parts were like laser cut. They were that good. I try to remember that at the time, die-setting was a real art performed by old-time craftsmen. Many builders would have been less accurate cutting by hand, which is why they gravitated toward die-cut kits, versus cutting by hand with a print wood kit. Guillow's again had what I've seen to be pretty accurate parts, compared with a few other manufacturers. I've seen comments such as "parts not matching plans". When you take a 1mm thick line from a drawing, and then transfer it to die-cutting, it's easy to have a +/- 1mm tolerance from perfection, even if the center of the hand drawn lines were CAD perfect, which they weren't. I'm working on a hand drawn design now, where I had to pad one former about 1.5mm in one area, and deck another about 1mm tops. That small bit of difference would have made the difference between a perfect smooth curved fuselage, and obvious bows in the transition. I tried to correct my original templates to reflect the change, but I could imagine if they were transferred to die-cutting, it would be easy to end up with the same scenario I had, where 1mm here or there of adjustment was needed.

My only issue with the older kits was unmatched and heavy wood. When you get a kit where one sheet of fuse formers are contest wood, and the other are oak, then that presents a problem. At least match them, so I can either remove a lot of wood and still benefit from the strength of heavy wood, or give me light matched sheets so I can laminate stringer reinforcements across the weak cross-grain areas and be efficient about it. Same goes for oak main spars, where you can't afford to add 15 grams of weight for main spars and leading edges. I've also had kits with one spar rotted carrot soft, and the other hard as oak. I still end up replacing those parts on the newer kits, as I can usually find or cut lighter and better matched spars from my own stock.

[scigs30]

Bill,
Die Cut kits would not have been so bad if the wood would have been lighter. I understand if the wood was too soft and light it would produce die crushed parts that were tough to use. I have not issues with printed wood and cutting out my own parts like the old Comet kits but even those kits had their issues. A new builder would have a tough time with Comet kits since they lacked instructions.

[kittyfritters]

Bill,
Die Cut kits would not have been so bad if the wood would have been lighter. I understand if the wood was too soft and light it would produce die crushed parts that were tough to use. I have not issues with printed wood and cutting out my own parts like the old Comet kits but even those kits had their issues. A new builder would have a tough time with Comet kits since they lacked instructions.

Yes. back when I was a kid it took a while for me to learn to make Comet kits that would fly even with an aeronautical engineer for a father.

[Bill Gaylord]

There's a point there with the instructions. We've had people come here asking about the stringer terminations at the rear fuse, which can be a bit unclear on the plans. Of course they're a minor detail and not a show stopper. Now have them try to build from one of those vintage single page plans, where everything is on one sheet with no assembly details.
I've had some light weight crushed wood, but was still useable, given that parts absolutely required cutting out with a knife and required a bit of gluing back together at times. They were Comet and Sterling kits, but the AUWs ended up pretty good with kit wood. A 12oz AUW isn't bad for a 1/32" sheeted r/c P26.

[scigs30]

Here she is all built using Elmers glue and building out of the box. The build went together fast thanks to the great laser cutting and the only flaw I found was the pontoon formers are mislabeled on the plans parts sheet and the actual laser cut parts. Make sure to see that they fit before gluing in place. Is the actual numbering, L1-L4, L2-L3
L4-L1 and L5 is correct. Thanks to the laser cut parts there is no reason to use a jig for a straight fuselage, just be careful not to pull the fuselage out of alignment when adding the stringers. The notches line up pretty well, there has be no reason to enlarge or move any of the notches. In the posted pictures I have not sanded anything yet, I wanted to show how well the parts go together, will give a good sanding before covering with the kit tissue. The plastic pontoons go together well just have to carefully cut out and sand lightly until the parts fit perfect. Don't press down hard when sanding or else the parts will come out crooked and no line up. I use Testors plastic cement to glue the 2 halves together. As shown she weighs 25 grams and I don't think she is going to need nose weight to balance out. The weight will go up with the reinforced wire on the pontoon braces and the covering with dope. I am going to leave everything white and just add the decals for show. All and all a great kit but I don't know how well she will fly until I take her out. Well I will be gone for Thanksgiving, but when I return I will start covering. The hardest part about this build is putting her together for the skeleton pictures.

[scigs30]

More pictures

[glassblade]

25 grams is good. That laser cut wood must be considerably lighter. I was wondering if you can just buy the laser cut wood for these 500 series kits. I have all of them, which already contain the cowl, canopy, spinner, decals, plan. Would be nice if I could just replace all the bad wood with laser cut. I know that Guillows sells replacement plastic parts....

[Steve Blanchard]

You can buy all of the wood, but the total for the laser cut parts is only $2.99 short of a full kit.

Steve

[glassblade]

Roger that, I just looked it up on the Guillows site and you're right. But I bought those kits for $6 each on sale at Hobby Lobby. Looking carefully, I realize I only need two sheets for each kit - the formers and the ribs. I wouldn't use any of the other stuff. So I ordered a bunch of sheets tonight and it is a good deal. Thanks for the tip.

[glassblade]

Just received the laser cut wood for P-40, FW-190, and F6F. It is the same heavy wood they've always used. Very stiff and dense. Good laser cutting, but heavy-ass wood. I weighed and is about twice the weight as wood I use for free flight scale. Disappointing, because the laser cut wood for the 400 series kits is pretty good.

[Steve Blanchard]

I'm just gonna put this out there because I've been thinking this for a while. It seems that very few specific people always get great wood and great customer service. I don't see anyone else getting this type of product from Guillow's. I have in fact heard some pretty unhappy reactions to requests for better wood when the wood in the kit is bad. It seems to me that whatever Scigs and very few others orders is not randomly selected by Guillow's and sent to him. It seems more like they cherry pick the stock specifically so they get the best of the best. Now, please understand I don't believe in any way that this is anything that Scigs is doing. I think that maybe he is a name that they have come to know and want to be sure that he is quite satisfied and therefore becomes a living breathing ad campaign for them. Does anyone else feel this way or is it just my paranoid delusions again?

Scigs, do you have any direct contact with the people at Guillow's so they know what you are looking for when you order?

I'm really just curious as I too would like to get the great wood that would build a somewhat competitive airplane. I don't often build from kits but when I do I don't expect to have to replace the wood and therefore scratch build the model. I certainly don't want to have to build 3 dozen of these to be considered a good customer either. Every customer should be treated the same way and get the same quality as the next. I would certainly order more kits from Guillow's if I was even slightly sure I'd get the quality wood that others have gotten. It's like a roll of the dice.

Steve

[scigs30]

Steve,
I mainly build kits these days, but for many years I built my own designs or others from plans. I could pick my own wood and make modifications as needed for a better flying contest build. Over the years as I have gotten older I am tired of spending time picking out perfect wood and making these changes so I am now building out of kits. Now back in the 80s I would never have built a Guillows kit because I knew I could never win a contest with these planes but I did build them when I was a younger kid. Now I like building and flying but I am happy with 20 -40 sec flights and that is what I get from Guillows. I do have contacts at Guillows but I buy most of my planes at the LHS. So far with these new laser cut kits the quality of balsa has been pretty good but I would not call it contest balsa and I am ok with that. The days of 27 lb/ft balsa seem to be a thing of the past. I have found Guillows to excellent customer service and the few times I needed replacement wood I contacted them for replacement but this was for the die crunched balsa. The choice for new builders is limited as far as kits go, so that is where Guillows comes in. You can get there kits anywhere and they are great for getting someone into the hobby. Now that the wood is laser cut anyone can build one of these kits and if they follow the instruction booklet they should be able to get the plane to fly. The biggest thing Guillows needs to do is replace the rubber band that comes with the kit. The 7 inch rubber band and 5 inch prop limits the flight to a few seconds. A better choice would be the 6 inch prop with tan 1/8 rubber. I have been in contact with Guillows about this but I cannot say they will ever replace the prop and rubber combo. As is the best flight I am able to get is 8 to 10 sec. Once I put in a short piece of doubled 1/8 rubber I get 20-30 second flights and this is with the 5 inch prop. The real challenge is going to be if I can get this Ruffe and Stuka to fly.

[Steve Blanchard]

Scigs,

I am glad to hear that you are picking these up at random and from a LHS. I compete so I do build mostly from scratch or from more competitive leaning kit manufacturers. I have to admit that there is just something so appealing about the Guillow's kits that I keep buying them. When I open them and look to build them I am sometimes happily surprised and sometimes disappointed. Either way thanks for the response. I will be picking up some 500 series kits for some fun winter flying. We fly once a month mini meets all year long and when winter comes along here in Connecticut it can get pretty nasty. Don't mind throwing a tough as nails plane in the air when that happens.

Steve