Over the past 2 weeks, I have been working on a couple of mods for my FMS P-39. This airplane is a great model, but has a few main problems in scale accuracy. First and foremost, the stance of the landing gear was completely wrong. The model sat at a nose level, or even slightly nose down angle. The full-scale sits with a distinctive nose-up stance. In order to replicate this, I shortened the main struts to 2 3/8" from the end to the axle. This looked excellent on the ground, but the mains could no longer retract, since the outer loop of the strut interfered with the retract motor casing. So, I had to hunt down a pair of retracts with the motors on the opposite side of the retract, leaving the gear free of interference. I ended up ordering these as they seemed to be the only pair that fit my requirements: http://www.hobbyking.com/hobbyking/s..._AUW_Max_.html. However, with the motor on the other side, these are much longer than the stock retracts, and the flap servos had to be removed and relocated to accomate the retract body. I also made new gear mounts using 1/8" plywood to hold them in their new position.
The next mod was a correct flap setup. The full scale P-39 used split flaps, not the conventional flaps installed on the model. I cut away most of the flaps, and reattached the upper skin to the wing with balsa joiners. Then, I fabricated the flaps out of .03" styrene and a few small square CF tubes. Still have to mount in the servos and wiring, but the majority of the work is done.
The next mods I will do are a correct exhaust, gear doors, and a repaint. The full scale "Hells Bells" was a P-400, the export version of the P-39 that featured a 12 stack exhaust and it had 12-stack exhaust versus the 6 stack provided with the model. RCG member "Redhood" was kind enough to 3D model the correct exhausts and put them up on shapeways: http://www.shapeways.com/product/XHQ...ionId=60554062. I have them ordered, and should have them in by the end of the week. I'll post more as I make progress on the airplane.
The next mod was a correct flap setup. The full scale P-39 used split flaps, not the conventional flaps installed on the model. I cut away most of the flaps, and reattached the upper skin to the wing with balsa joiners. Then, I fabricated the flaps out of .03" styrene and a few small square CF tubes. Still have to mount in the servos and wiring, but the majority of the work is done.
The next mods I will do are a correct exhaust, gear doors, and a repaint. The full scale "Hells Bells" was a P-400, the export version of the P-39 that featured a 12 stack exhaust and it had 12-stack exhaust versus the 6 stack provided with the model. RCG member "Redhood" was kind enough to 3D model the correct exhausts and put them up on shapeways: http://www.shapeways.com/product/XHQ...ionId=60554062. I have them ordered, and should have them in by the end of the week. I'll post more as I make progress on the airplane.
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