Estes Honest John, #7240 Build, Part 13, Ends and Edges

I did a tug test on the pre-made parachute shroud lines. They easily broke!
Another kit needing shroud line replacement.






A painting dowel was stuck into the engine mount and some paper towel strips stuffed into the back to keep the paint out of the engine mount.
The body tube was slip over the fin can, no glue yet.
A piece of rolled copy paper was pushed into the front open tube end.
The model got the first coat of gloss white paint.

TIP: Here's one way to knock down any paint inside the lip of a launch lug. Gently turn the pencil in the launch lug end.
The sides of a sharpened pencil are a little rough and just enough to rub off any paint and re-round the lug.

Estes Honest John, #7240 Build, Part 12, Gluing The Band Wrap

A wrap of copy paper was taped around the body tube for a base line.
The top of the paper strip is 4 3/8" from the bottom of the tube.
Setting the punched band on the top of the paper strip will center the wrap.
The bottom edge of the wrap will end up 4 3/8" from the bottom of the body tube, not the fin unit.

The wrap band (I made two) was taped down to a piece of card board. It was lightly sprayed with 3M adhesive.
The instructions show white glue being used but the glue might pool up on the punched holes.
Go light on the adhesive, it's easy to spray on too much.

Here's the band in place.
The inset picture shows the kit supplied wrap with the laser cut notches. On the wrap I made the holes are cleaner.
The home wrap holes might not be perfectly in line but sometimes kit upgrades are a compromise.

Estes Honest John, #7240 Build, Part 11, Band Wrap Center?

The instructions don't say whether to center the band or set it on the top or bottom of the 5" mark.
The band wrap position at 5" from the bottom looks too high to me.
A quick search online and I found the G. Harry Stine drawings:
CLICK HERE and scroll down.

The kit face card and the Stine plans show the band at the middle of the body tube section.
5" from the bottom would set it up too high.





Even the older Estes Maxi-Brute Honest John (Image at right) shows the band centered in the middle of the tube:

The online Centuri instructions look like it is centered but they are too hard to read. I'll center mine.







TRIVIA: In that same Honest John article is an old Centuri ad showing the Honest John in the Estes kit face card paint scheme.
In a post on TRF, John Boren said that was where Estes got the colors for the new HoJo release.
We've still not found a picture of a real Honest John in these red, white and black test round colors.

Estes Honest John, #7240 Build, Part 10, Lug Gluing and Band Wrap

The lugs were glued in place before the body tube was shot with primer/filler.







The laser cut band had small circles cut into it. You have to remove the circles by cutting through the hold down ticks. The problem is getting a clean cut of the small hold down tabs.
No matter how I tried I was left with small rough edges. I didn't really want to glue this onto the model. I wanted cleaner, round cut holes.

I marked off some 110 lb. card stock as accurately as I could.
Before punching all the way through the card stock I pressed the rotary punch just light enough to make a light circle impression. This way I can make small adjustments before punching the final hole.

Here's my first attempt had a few punches that were off. The picture has pencil marks showing the high punches.

More card stock and pencil marks finally gave me a more accurate band.

A third try gave me a usable piece.
I ended up making two by punching through two layers of folded card stock.

Estes Honest John, #7240 Build, Part 9, Fin Primer and Launch Lugs

The fin tabs were masked off and the fins sprayed will filler primer.
After that dried I noticed a laminate edge was lifting.
No big deal, some glue was slid underneath on the knife blade then sanded smooth.

The primer was sanded down.
The fin on the right got some "fine tune" shaping. You can see where more of the grey primer was sanded to straighten out the raised ridge down the center.

The launch lug standoffs are two pieces glued together.
No need to sand off the burnt laser edges before gluing.

A clothespin held them together while they dried.

After the glue dried the standoff sides were sanded smooth.

Two 1/2" long pieces are cut off the 2" long supplied lug.
I'm building two kits so I cut four lugs.

These were slid over a dowel for cutting. They stayed on the same dowel for a coat of CWF filler and sanding.

Estes Honest John, #7240 Build, Part 8, Fin Shaping

Look at the final picture in the last blog post. You can see the center line at the root edge isn't very defined. I could have sanded the fin thinner but I decided to build up the center line to make a sharper taper.
Some CWF filler was brushed on the center near the root edge. Don't get any filler on the inside root edge.

After it dried I went back to the block with 220 grit.
You can see the edge being formed. It's just a little higher that the balsa would have been.

Here's a shaped fin.
The raised center line now goes all the way across the fin.
The picture is a bit confusing, the darker area at the leading tip is a shadow, not sanded off filler.








I looked back at the laser cut fin sheet.
You can easily see the angle of the root edge, especially on the low end.

Estes Honest John, #7240 Build, Part 7, Fin Shaping

If you've never sanded wedge shaped scale fins before, don't start with the kit fins!
Cut some extra fins out of 3/16" thick balsa and practice on those! Trust me, you won't get the technique right on your first attempt.

The leading and trailing edges shouldn't be shaped to a knife edge. This makes them very weak and they won't last through the first rough landing.
The instructions recommend sanding to a 1/32" thickness.
I start by sanding that 1/32" edge width first.

The inset picture shows the contrast of the black ink width.

I use my left thumb as a guide to help keep the block sanding in a straight line.

These fins (and Nike style fins) are thicker at the root edge and thinner at the smaller outside tip edge.

Notice the pencil line to the left of the center. You will be sanding over the center to the lower half of the fin.
When you sand the lower half that (penciled) line will be raised back to the center and the small outer tip edge will end up thinner.

At the top and bottom you can see the middle layer of the fin showing after the outside layer was sanded down.
The inset picture shows the diamond shape of the outer tip edge.

Each fin took me one hour to shape. If you don't have the patience, don't tackle the shaping. Simply round the leading and trailing edges and it'll still be recognized as an Honest John.

Estes Honest John, #7240 Build, Part 6, Fin Shaping

The Great Planes Easy Touch sanding block is indispensable for fin shaping.
If you don't have one - get one!
That, and some 220 grit self adhesive sandpaper.

I've explained this technique before.
When sanding the light beige balsa it's hard to judge the thickness of the leading and trailing edges.
We'll darken the balsa edges for better contrast. But, seal the leading, trailing and outside tip edges first. Don't seal the root edges!

Medium CA glue is applied with a Q-tip. In addition to sealing the edge it also strengthens the fins.

After the CA glue has dried, quickly run a permanent marker on just the edge. Make this a quick swipe, don't let the ink soak in.
The CA glue will prevent the ink from soaking into the wood, but still go quickly with the marker.







Here's the fin ready for shaping.

Now the fun really starts!

Estes Honest John, #7240 Build, Part 5, Fin Gluing

Here's how I set the glue down on the outside laminate pieces.
I wanted good coverage but not so much that the laminations could slip out of alignment when set under weight when drying.

EDIT: After painting I noticed some very slight lifting on the outside laminate on one fin side. Use enough glue to guarantee full adhesion. After the glue was applied as in the picture, smooth it out before bonding to the center core piece.




While the glue was still wet, the fin pieces were set against the tail cone. I was trying to see if I could coax a curvature into the root edge.
While the fins were being pressed into the tail cone the glue was warping the outside laminates away from the center piece.
I knew I had to get this assembly into a heavy book soon, before the glue started to set up.







I found this interesting -
There is a slight gap between the root edge and the recessed band on the tail cone. You don't see this gap in the instruction drawings.

Estes Honest John, #7240 Build, Part 4, Fin Assembly

I'm not sanding the fin root edge here, I set the fin on my flat sanding block so you can see the curvature on the root edge. The sanding block was just a handy flat surface to show the slight curve on the root edge.

Normally I sand off the blackened laser cut edges. Don't sand all the fin edges until after all the laminations are glued together.

The only edges that should be sanded for now are the center lines of the outside lamination halves.
On the left is the top and bottom outside pieces before sanding the inside edges.
On the right is the edges after sanding.
Again - lightly sand only the center lines of the outside lamination pieces for a tighter fitting center joint.

I glued the outside halves together with CA glue.










After that quickly dried, the glued edge and flat surfaces were sanded smooth for a better flat gluing surface.

Estes Honest John, #7240 Build, Part 3, Tail Cone

The instructions are vague about how to cut the fin slots, just a knife and some arrows.

Instead of trying to cut around the corners with a knife tip, I rolled the blade back and forth underneath the rounded end.
Please note: I'm not carving away the entire raised rib. I'm just working around the rounded ends
Then cut the long sides. It's pretty easy to cut down the raised rib.

Most of the slots cut clean except for one.
The inset picture shows the slot with the rough edges.

The slots were cleaned up using a flat file.
Don't do what I did, I opened up the slots a little too wide. The center TTW tab of the laminated fins is only 1/16" thick.

Estes Honest John, #7240 Build, Part 2, Tail Cone

The ends have to be cut off the tail cone.
The instructions show a hobby knife being used. You can use a knife but I have better results with a fine tooth hobby saw.

The inside flash has to be removed for the centering rings to fit in the tail cone.
Remove the edge by shaving it off with a knife. Make small cuts.

Round off the inside edges with 220 grit wrapped around the engine mount tube.
The engine mount tube is a thick walled BT-50 size.

Estes Honest John, #7240 Build, Part 1, Parts

This is an exciting new release from Estes, the 1/14th scale Honest John. 

The main body is a BT-60 and it takes 24mm engines. Many were curious about the paint pattern. The only place I've seen it before was in the old Centuri catalogs.

Here's all the parts.
Lots of 1/16" thick balsa here! The fins are three ply laminates.

The parts of interest:
The wrap band is laser cut, the holes are purposely offset. The holes go to the top.
The centering rings have what looks like a small hole for a engine mount Kevlar tie! No Kevlar is included in the kit, maybe Estes cut the hole so the builder could add Kevlar if desired.
I wasn't expecting the motor retaining rings.
The BIG nose cone is well molded with a slight seam.

YORF Post from John Boren of Estes: "Read your build of the Honest John. The hole is in the upper centering ring because it is of a different size then the lower one. I just needed the builder to get the right ring in the right place.

John Boren