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My J-1T Build

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Aerowerx

Well-Known Member
Joined
Dec 1, 2011
Messages
6,092
Location
Marion, Ohio
Finally, after a couple of years of planning and scheming I actually got started on my project.

What I am building is based on the Janowski J-1B, except I will be using a T-tail as on the Janowski J-2.

The Aerowerx Flugzeugfabrik:

042.jpg
No, the table is not warped. That is a distortion caused by the camera. The table is actually flat and level to +/-16th inch. The stack of plywood at the rear is for my bulkheads and vertical tail spars. The wood below the table is some hickory (for the main landing gear) stacked on top of some very nice 16 foot vertical grain Douglas Fir (just visible on the right of the stack).

The first thing I did was to snap a chalk line down the length of the table that defines the center line of the fuselage.

The shape of the fuselage is defined by 4 points: the nose, the front bulkhead, the rear bulkhead, and the rear vertical tail spar. So I measured down the center line and drew their location.

This picture shows the location and width of the rear bulkhead. In this design the front and rear bulkheads form a pylon upon which the wings and engine are mounted. You can also barely see the center chalk line on the left side of the picture. Ignore the scribbled-out lines. It took me several tries to get things to come out right. As it is, the nose came out right on the edge of the table.
043.jpg

The next step was to put nails at the end of each of the 4 lines, as shown in the previous picture. A springy slat of wood was placed between the nails. This defined the outline of the fuselage side, which I traced with a permanent marker, which can be seen here:
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The slat of wood was not long enough to reach to the tail. Fortunately, the fuselage sides are straight from the rear bulkhead to the tail, so I only had to snap a chalk line at the appropriate angle

The left side (or right side if I build it upside down) of the fuselage is now defined. For the other side I will have to use a bunch more nails to hold the slat at several locations, since I want an exact mirror image of the curve. When I first tried it, it did not come out the same.
 
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