How to make cockpit canopies.

[wonwinglo]

These pictures should explain the basics of making simple cockpit canopies,basically we have a balsa wood plug the shape of the item that is required,together with this a female mould from some ply offcut is created slightly oversize to allow for the thickness of the plastic material to be moulded,the sequence is to loosely staple an adequate sized piece of acrylic or plastic sheet to the wooden former,next hold the item over a gas flame or electric ring until the material becomes floppy,practise is the secret here in knowing just when to plunge the former into the hole thus drawing the hot shape around the carved shape,just pause for a few seconds until the canopy cools off and you will be rewarded with a fine home made moulding.

Save those clear plastic boxes that your wife/girlfriend or both get for cosmetics etc this material is just perfect for our purpose.

You dont need to stop at clear mouldings either,you can use ordinary plastikard sheet to make fairings or even small cowlings for your models by the same method.

[wonwinglo]

Another view of the simple moulding process,get the material too hot and the walls of the plastic will become too thin,too cool and the material will not give into the mould,you need to just practise a little but once grasped you will never be short of another canopy.

[Guest]

could i make a f-15 1/32 canopy? and how would i make the windscreen

[Guest]

could i make a f-15 1/32 canopy? and how would i make the windscreen

Yes, you could use this method to make the F15 Canopy as that is a nice easy shape to carve and then mould. This is probably the easiest method to do it.

Not sure what you mean by the windscreen part as generally the canopy and the windscreen are one and the same thing.

and if you need to tint the canopy, there are threads on here how to do that as well !! - this is just one of them :

http://www.scale-models.co.uk/tutorials/3588-tinting-aircraft-canopies.html

Ps.......Welcome to the site and hope you enjoy it here !!

Regards.......Mark.

[Guest]

Howdy Mark,

I think the distinction between the "canopy" and "windscreen" would be that the "canopy" is the movable portion and the "windscreen" would be the front, non movable portion under which the HUD is located. Atleast this is the way I have always precieved it since they are actually two seperate assemblies

have a good day,

Greg

[Guest]

Hi Greg,

Put in that context, I will certainly agree with you there. I think I was just trying to keep things simple.

and for BJackson:

The F15 Canopy is a basic teardrop shape and can be moulded all as one and then the necessary cuttings made for the front screen etc. I appreciate Barry was giving us a simple example on his mould but what hasn't been mentioned on his post is that even canopy frames can be included on the mould plug and they will come out in the finished moulded article too, making life a bit easier.

Regards.....Mark

[Guest]

The problem with the cockpit canopies on modern fighter jets is that they have undercuts and actually balloon out a little beyond the side of the cockpit to increase all around visibility.

With press moulding, the canopy would have to be vertical or ideally have a slight taper to ease removing the plug afterwards.

[Guest]

Good Afternoon Guys,

This is my first post, and is a very small tip re making canopies. you can use the boxes that ice cream comes in from the super market to make air intakes, blisters etc.And of course like beer cans they need emptying first!!

As my main interest is R/C flying models,plastic and metal cans are a nice light sourse of raw material

Regards

[Guest]

Howdy Mike,

Welcome to the forum, glad you found us. Thanks for the tip, i am sure that it will be useful. Now that you are here, feel free to jump in on any topic you see that you have interest in. If ya have photos of your work, we all would love to see them. Be sure to look around at some of the memebers galleries too. Ask any questions ya might have or give advice where ever ya can.



Have a good day and again, welcome,

Greg aka GEEDUBBA (GW)

[Guest]

Evening,

In the middle of building a Fairey Firefly and curious as to teh best way to go about making the front and rear canopy, will the aboves methods work well ? ?

Rob

From Dublin, Ireland

[Guest]

Flying Plastic Bottles

Flying Plastic Bottles



Over the years I have modeled with very little money and to that end I have found, used and scavenged any materials to attain an end result.

One of the latest objects I have found is the soft drink bottle, while looking at the base of a bottle and envisaging it as an engine nacelle or an engine cowl for a round motor I commenced to cut it to length and shape when I attempted to match it to the diameter of the fuselage it was so close to the diameter all I needed to do was warm it up and stretch the plastics over the edge and pin it into place. Using a hair dryer I found the bottle began to shrink in diameter … It didn’t work but later I thought about it and found if I carved a plug the shape of a canopy when forced inside the bottle and packed it from underneath so that the plug was tight on one side of the bottle and the packing was no greater in width than the base of the canopy, when the heat was applied the bottle shrunk and pulled down over the plug and gave a perfect reproduction of the plug, all that was needed was a trim around the base.



Later I found if the complete front of a glider from the wing cradle forward was carved several soft drink or cooking oil bottles with their necks and bases cut off could be slid over the plug and heated, as each bottle shrunk the next was slid into place with an over lap of 3/16 “ each segment would locate on each other, when all were heated and locked onto the plug a cut with a box knife from end to end underneath, the parts could be sprung off the plug reassembly by clipping each together and a strip of thin ply the length of the knife cut fixed to each of the segments. I used a staple gun, which shot through the plastic and into the ply. The ply was used to mount the radio gear and to fix the front section to the fuselage, the plastic forward of the radio will remain in place if just clipped on and dispense with the ply backbone as this will break if you hit hard enough. A nose shape was carved from a piece of pine and forced down the first plastic segment and fixed in place by the staple gun. I found that the plastic bottle fuselage was more durably than the other material used as it would bend and buckle on impact but would pop back out again ready for use. Oh! I haven’t spent much time honing my flying skills so my planes need to be resilient, Try breaking a soft drink bottle there is not a lot of selection in colours but if painted the plastic looks good. I can post picture of the method if you are interested