Sopwith Dolphin - More work on wings

Right, I've made a start on the wing ribs, and here's how I'm doing it:

1. Using TurboCAD, trace over the wing ribs on a new layer and extend them as an alignment guide. Print the layer.
2. Tape wing to alignment guide.
3. Cut strips of masking tape about 2.5mm wide.
4. Apply strips. It takes two strips per inter-rib space.
5. When one side is done, take the wing off the paper alignment guide and wrap the strips round to meet at the trailing edge.
6. Spray a couple of coats of paint in a spruce kind of colour.
7. Take off masking tape.
8. Sand down carefully with 1200 grade wet and dry to remove ridges caused by masking tape.

The reason for using two pieces of tape between each pair of ribs is that the rib spacing seems slightly irregular; according to Windsock 54 at least. This could represent a limitation of printing at that scale; but I checked an unbuilt 1/48th-scale Blue Max Dolphin that I've got lying around and it's the same story there. Anyway, the point is, if you use two strips between each pair of ribs, you don't need to cut lots of different widths, and you can adjust each one to ensure that the ribs are a reasonably constant width.

Here's the result on the first wing. The strip of paper is designed to make it easier to peel the ends of the strip apart. It was inspired by the similar thing they're meant to do with the bit of sellotape on a fresh loaf of bread in a supermarket, but which they don't usually bother with.

At this rate, it's going to take me another three evenings just to do the masking. Then another evening to do the painting. But then it's a fun bit: fixing the lower wings on and building the upper wing assembly. I've already decided that the tubular centre section will be brass, for the sake of strength, and I'm going to try soldering the pieces together because superglue is hopeless for a join between two pieces of brass that's going to take any sort of load.

More soon.