scratchbuilding extra parts for Strutter model

[davegee]

Sopwith 1 1/2 Strutter details:

A buddy of mine is currently building a Sopwith 1 1/2 Strutter Proctor kit. He decided to build one similar to one that was featured in a TV movie about a young Indiana Jones serving with the Royal Flying Corps in WWI. The Strutter was used for a number of missions early in the war, one of them being aerial reconnaissance photography. I captured a couple of frames from the movie that showed the camera mounted onto the side of the fuse that the backseater would operate over enemy lines.

I tried my hand at scratchbuilding this camera, based solely on these photos and some guesstimates of its size based on the airplane model. I'm not done yet, but when finished, I'll send it to him to install on his new airplane. Sorta a fun little project. Took two days to design and put together.

[Twowingtj]

Great work. Nice attention to detail.

[davegee]

Thanks. I ordered a couple of 1/6 scale male doll trousers belts to strap the camera to the bracket, per the movie stills, but they come from China so it might take a couple of weeks to get here. I do a lot of scratchbuilding, so if I have at least one picture of something like this, and some basic dimensional data, I can usually come up with something that will work. I think it will look good and believable on the Strutter when it is completed.

[davegee]

Some updated photos of the progress on the Strutter 1 1/2 for anyone interested. My friend sent me a pic yesterday of the completed structure for the "tail feathers." He's coming along on the fuselage and will start tackling the wings soon. As I stated earlier, my friend is going on 85 years old and doing all this incredible work!

I volunteered to help out with some of the detail items and will post pics of them, too, before I shipped them to him for eventual installation in the airplane, besides the reconnaissance camera that was mentioned in a previous post. The rear observer/gunner had a rotating ring and frame for his Lewis gun to defend themselves from attack. This gun assembly can move up and down, and rotate left and right. It will have a figure manning the gun when finished.

The Spandau gun was operated by the pilot. Might try to add some scale looking bullets to feed into the gun, not sure.

The control panel was made up from a lot of bezel rings and other stuff in a kit. The control panel itself was carefully cut to size out of plywood to neatly fit in the tight cockpit.

The control stick was fairly straight forward, some gluing, sanding, priming, and painting.

The "fake" engine that sets in front of a 4-stroke glow engine had to be designed so that the center crankcase would allow the front of the glow engine to pass through it so that the prop could be attached for flight. A third friend made a 3D printed crankcase and the engine cylinders for appearance. A lot of the fake engine detail will be covered by the cowl, so many details like spark plugs, wires, etc., that I normally do was omitted since it won't be visible, anyway. I did the usual assembly, priming, painting, and weathering of the fake engine.

[davegee]

I was waiting to get some scale doll belts that I could use to strap the camera onto the bracket that holds it to the airplane. But these apparently have gotten hopelessly lost in the mail between China and my house, so today, I decided to fabricate my own belts to finish this little reconnaissance camera project for the Sopwith 1 1/2 Strutter. I'll attach some pics of the just completed part. I got some 3/16" wide leather straps from Hobby Lobby today, and fabricated the buckles out of small diameter aluminum rod that looked about right for scale, based on the pictures of it in the movie. They're less than 1/16" in diameter. Bend very easily with a special pliers, and there you go. Should work ok for this project.

[SanExup]

Nice work Dave!

[davegee]

Nice work Dave!

Thanks, Clayton. It was an interesting little project, without having Any plans or decent photographs of the real camera, only those "stolen" by taking pics of the tv screen with my I Phone! Still, it was enough to go from for a reasonable facsimile of this important tool that is still used to this day in airplanes and satellites. It was fun. I just shipped it to my friend in Denver who has made many beautiful WWI rc airplanes. It will take a few months before he is ready to add the camera to the plane, but having it in hand should be helpful to figure how he wants to attach it to the side of the fuse, in the meantime.

Cheers

Dave