Dr. Zooch Saturn V Fins Step 9 Part 3

Don’t remove the tape yet!

The picture shows an example of how the edge should look before removing the tape. Just a little thin line of black remains. When you sand off the remaining blackened edge, the taper is squared off, like a dull knife. 



For a little more strength, some medium CA was set down on just the leading edge using a Q-Tip. The instructions say to cover all the fin surfaces with CA for strength. Don’t let any CA get near the root edge of the fins. When gluing the fins to the fairings, white glue won’t soak into the balsa if it is saturated and sealed with CA.

After the CA glue dries, sand smooth with 400 grit.

Slowly remove the clear tape being careful not to pull up any balsa. This clear tape is more tacky than a masking tape.
If you had removed some of tackiness earlier, you won’t have any problem removing the tape.
 

Set the tapered balsa fin strip over the extended lines of the fin pattern. Use those lines to score and cut out the root and outside edges of the fins.

As mentioned before, I started this build before I had a new kit, using some older kit instructions for a fin pattern. The instruction illustration is slightly larger than the fin pattern supplied in the kit.