One more time: Vacuform kit tips?

[Digger1]

Anyone have any tips in plain english about how to work with a vacuformed kits like how to carve out the pieces, how to reinforce them, how to join them, etc?

[Kenny]

One thing I always planned to try was masking the edge you want with that old style tape that you use to name items, the thick plastic stuff so you can get a good straight knife line over curved surfaces

[Wug]

A good start would be hunting down a copy of Building and Improving Vacuum-Formed Model Aircraft written by E. Richard Staszak and published by Kalmbach in 1984. ISBN 0-89024-047-7. It's only 52 pages long but it's packed with good information. I didn't realize it's 22-years old until I looked at my copy. Maybe there's a reprint.

There are loads of helpful websites. Here are two:

http://www.largescaleplanes.com/tips/La ... /f105.html

http://www.internetmodeler.com/2005/mar ... cuform.php

Good Luck! What are you building?

Mike

[Digger1]

Well, I've finally contacted JT about his Oberth class and I'm hoping to get a DY-100.

I had two a few years ago. One was the Oberth and the other was a Constellation class. When I got them, I felt like I was in way over my head. All I did was trim some parts from the sheet and that was it. I wound up trading the Constellation class and scrapping the Oberth.

Now that I have a tad bit more focus (both with age, diet, stability and ADD meds), I feel like I should be able to take on vacuformed kits.

[TER-OR]

http://www.modelingmadness.com/reviews/ ... slepv1.htm
I have some tips in there - it was my first vacuformed kit, so I tried to make it as much diary as possible.