Fokker D.VII Paper Build

[Blauer Baron]

I cannot find any info on anyone building the card Fokker D.VII by Pudenziati. Despite trawling the site as usual and fruitless searches.
I have bent the top wing to make the aerlion shape and it fits the narrower under wing piece, but I now have gaps at the wing ends. What solutions has anyone else had to plug the end of the wing ? Thanks in advance, for tips or references to pictures of the finished model. Pictures of build progress so far, to follow later. Blauer Baron

[Nightbomber]

My friend, Joaquim, AKA here as Blackronin is an expert in building paper airplane models in 1:144; shoot him a PM, maybe he can help you

[pstapleton53]

I normally use a burnishing tool, which looks like a 3mm steel beed on the end of a rod. I rub along the outside edge wings from the inside, with the ball completely inside the wing area, following along the curve of the wing tip. This causes the wing tip to curl slightly to the inside. When the two wings are folded together, and a little glue added to that area, the top and bottom pieces can be worked together to form a seal.

[pstapleton53]

Since I was perusing this while taking a break from a Prudenzio Fokker DRI that I was working on, and the next step was the lower wing, I made a few quick pics to show what I meant in the previous message.
First, the lower wing and the burnishing tool. (Probably could find one at Michaels)

Next, rounding over the inside edge of the wing tips.

Here you can see the slight curve left on the wingtip after burnishing.

Next, the upper wing airfoil curve is added.

The wing is folded over (it was scored on the top side along the leading edge before cutting out)
and a thin layer of glue is added along the training edge.


The edges are then pressed together, making sure the top and bottom trailing edges line up.


This gets us to the problem you were talking about, the gap at the wing tips. However, you will notice that they slightly curve towards each other now, and the stiffness of the paper has been somewhat broken down by the burnishing tool.


A toothpick is used to insert a very small line of glue inside the wingtip, and a small pointed tweezers is used to squeeze the two edges together.


Leaving us with a fairly decent looking rounded end of the wing.



Hope this helped!

Pat

[Blauer Baron]

Hello Pat, perfect!! This was a nice surprise, becasue my E-mail had only logged one short reply, so I was not expecting to find an answer today. Magnificent. I have a dentists tool which will fits the bill. I will move over to the "production area" immediately. Thank you very much for taking the trouble to take and post the pictures!! I will report on my efforts. Kevin.