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Scott Anderson’s 1/6th Scale
Bates F6F Hellcat |
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Scott
brought in his 80” span Grumman
F6F Hellcat project that he had
purchased last fall from an esta te
in New Ulm. The model was
originally built by Rick Alpitz
of New Ulm. Rick had a
lifelong passion for RC
airplanes. As a proud
member of the New Ulm Wingnuts
Flying Club, he spent countless
hours building, flying, and
sharing that hobby with friends
who became like family. He had
a fine eye for detail.
The Hellcat
is built with a fiberglass
fuselage and is currently being
re-engineered and Scott is
looking for suitable retractable
landing gear. He’s spoken
with Darryl at Sierra Giant
Scale but they are out of stock
for the smaller 80” Bates and
don’t know when they will make
more.
Darren
Bitzer of AARC Warbirds, the new
home for Century Jet Models,
tells us that they will have
replacement gear for the Bates
80” F6F Hellcat this spring.
Scott is first in line for the
next model. |
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Sherwood Heggen Shares his new
Book ...
“Airplanes on my Mind” |
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Sherwood
Heggen has been working with
David Andersen in creating his
new book, “Airplanes on My Mind”
. Memoirs and Fictional
Stories about Building and
Flying Model Airplanes.
Sherwood has
been building and flying RC
Models since the mid-1960’s and
had been writing stories for the
Twin City Radio Controllers
“Flare Out” Newsletter over the
past 50 years. |
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This book
will be a consolidation of many
of the most interesting and
humorous tales. We should
be able to order a copy on
Amazon shortly!
Congratulations Sherwood! |
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Darren Bitzer’s AARC Warbirds/CJM's
Update |
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Century Jet
Models has delivered the Convair
F-106 Delta Dart to RC Geeks
(Facebook) where they are
posting the build. You can
follow along on The RC Geek
channel on Facebook.
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1CazA2pvZd/
In the
meantime, Darren is in the
middle of a production run of
CJM pneumatic and electric
retractable landing gear sets
for the Top Flite GS P-51.
These are being built to order
and are not planned to be
inventoried at this time.
After this first 5 sets are
completed, they will be building
a set of pneumatic CJM retracts
for Scott’s 1/6th scale Bates
Hellcat. |
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Our LAST meeting of this
building season will be Friday
April 17th @7pm! Please bring a
project/experience/story to
share! |
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Brandon Archer’s AT-502 Air Tractor
Conversion to AT-802U Sky
Warden/OA-1K Sky Raider II |
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Brandon shared
two projects, his Eflite 1.5m span
Air Tractor and his MIG-29. He
acquired the Air Tractor at the
February TCRC R/C Auction.
It was a bit worn and damaged, but
he was intrigued by the full-size L3
Harris Air Tractor and their
military conversion to the AT-802U
Sky Warden ISR Strike Aircraft. |
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The platform was
chosen by L3Harris as the platform
for their
SKY RAIDER II INTERNATIONAL™.
The US Air Force is designating it
as the OA-1K Sky Raider.
Brandon started
by repairing the damaged nose and
creating a two-man cockpit (pilot &
weps) by
combining two standard canopies. The
FLIR targeting system and weapons
systems were 3D printed by a 3rd
party using a impregnated carbon
fiber filament system.
The change from
yellow to gray was performed using
Rustoleum rattle-can gray primer.
As usual, Brandon has been adding
fine detail using airbrush
techniques that he had recently
demonstrated at a Grassfield R/C
club meeting. |
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Dylan
Archer’s Curtis P-40B Project |
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Brandon Archer’s
son, Dylan presented his 1/48th
scale model of the Curtis P-40.
Dylan recently completed a 1/48
scale Revell P-40B, with some help
from his dad on the painting.
They used Tamiya pain ts
and an airbrush to replicate the
73rd Pursuit Group stationed in
Hawaii.
The process
included light weathering,
particularly on the aircraft's
underside. Despite needing to
re-glue the landing gear several
times following a few "hard
landings," they finally finished the
model with a clear coat and have it
proudly displayed in their workshop.
We look forward
to seeing more of Dylan’s projects
in the future! |
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