Build and Grow Planes

  The next set of toys in the build and grow series is the planes.  I had a lot of fun designing them.  As usual, they were a lot bigger in my mind than in real life.  They were a lot of fun to build even though they were on the smaller side.  I had to make some concessions with my design criteria.  I needed to introduce some nonstandard thicknesses.  The wings just did not look good on ¾” material so I reduced it down to 5/16” but ¼” will also work. 

There are four different planes and I will go into each one and some of the difficulties and things that I liked about them.  They all had all there difficult parts and it was fun working through them.  There are a couple of things that I did different with this design.  First was that I printed the patterns on card stock so that I could trace the patterns on the wood.  The second is that I am batching several of them out in different woods.

The Helicopter

It seems like a pretty basic design until I realized the cuts on two faces and the holes that I needed to drill.  So I marked out the pattern and the holes on the body.  Cut all the lines from both directions leaving about ¼” between the two cuts so that I do not have to tape the part back on.  After the body was cut out, I finished the cuts on the sides.

The next challenge was the small parts.  I realize quickly that there were a lot of parts that I was not comfortable cutting on the table saw or chop saw. I used the band saw a lot on these parts. I am now looking into an 1/8” blade for the band saw.  The skids on the landing platform I changed after I cut them out.  They were originally going to be doweled.  They are no longer that way.  There really was no reason to do so because it is face grain to face grain bond.  I also have widened them a little from the original design.

The Jet

This is pretty much a scroll saw and sanding operation.  There are small pieces but I liked how well it came out.  It is definitely the easiest of the planes to make.

The Bi-Plane.

This was another project where it was helpful to have the band saw around.  The only thing that I needed to keep together was the wings. I drilled the top and bottom wings strut holes taped together since I was making 12 of them.  I marked the top and bottom of each.  That face was sanded after everything was assembled.

The Prop Plane

This one was modeled after the first plane that I did.  The wings have a 5 degree tilt on them.  I was pretty confident that this plane would not be a huge problem.  I did the same thing with the multiple cuts as I did on the helicopter body.  I then cut the taper on the bottom.  When it came to putting the groove for the wings in, I had a problem.  The part was much smaller than the original design.  I needed some way to cut this groove safely.  I used a miter gauge and a sacrificial extension.  Looking back, I should have put the five degree angle on the extension.  I had a problem keeping the bottom flat because it was small and liked to rotate.  This did not give me a consistent groove depth over the part.

I liked how they turned out.  I was different using harder woods of half of them.  This is why I was grateful for the band saw.  I could do them with the scroll saw, but it would have taken a lot longer.

Twin Prop Airplane

I have always been a little bit apprehensive about making planes.  There are two main reasons for this.  The first stems from the first plane that I made.  It was delicate and I was never sure how to make it stronger.  I repaired it several times until the damage was too extensive and was thrown out.  The second is the whole shaping the part until it looks good.  I like straight lines.  I am not the shaping type of wood worker.  However I had a friend ask me to make a plane for her grandson and I am not one to shy away from a design challenge.  The first ting I did was look at pictures and found a twin prop that I liked.  There was some big unknowns with this project and a lot of them worked out easier than expected but not easily explained.  First is that I wanted angled wings.  Was not sure how to do this until I realized I could taper the bottom of the plane and the groove would follow the angle on the table saw.

Then I wanted a clean joint on the bottom of the plane where the wings came together.  When setting up the order of cuts, if I cut all the angles at the same time they would all match.  Since I wanted the plane to last, I wanted thicker wings than the 1/4" material that was on the last airplane I made, so I made them 1/2" thick.  That looked really weird so the wings had to also be tapered like a real plane.  That taper was not fun.  I cut the stop cut on the bandsaw, scored the waste piece and broke it off.  Then there was a lot of sanding.  After a lot of work and thought, the tapered wing looked good.
The landing gear was the part that always broke on the first plane, so I took the easy solution and took it off.  The tail section was the last challenge.  I wanted sturdy and doweled.  So I grooved the horizontal piece to accept the vertical piece.  Before I glued the vertical piece in, I drilled holes in the groove through the fuselage.  Then installed the vertical tail, drilled into the tail and installed dowels.
The propellers and engines were more of a challenge to cut than to design them.  I will be reinforcing them with pin nails just to be sure they will not fall off.  Glue usually holds very well but not during crash landings.
There are a couple of features of this design that I am proud of.  The first is that it is a solid design.  I want to see how my kids handle it.  I am pretty sure they will do their worst.  Besides the tapered wings the other design element that I though was clever was the thickness of the fuselage.  It is 1 7/8" thick. This is two pieces of standard 3/4" material and a piece of 3/8" thick material.  The tail pieces are 3/8" thick.  The stripe that runs through the plane was planned and designed in.
This is one of the projects were I enjoyed the design process more than the build.  This just was fun to figure out the problems.  I really didn't know if it was all going to come together the way I had planned in my head.  I am not sure if these plans will go up for sale.  They need a lot of refinement and I will need to add images to the directions.  It is too hard to explain the procedure.

 This plane is made out of maple and walnut.  I still do not like the shape until it looks good but a plane with sharp angles looks even worse.  I will have to say that planes are a little less scary to design now.

The Bi-Plane

This is another project from "Making Heirloom Toys" book that was given to me for Christmas. I guess this is the toy that caught April's attention when she bought it, so I had to make it. All I have to say is thank goodness for a belt sander. There was a lot of angled cuts I made with a band saw that needs a new blade. My cuts were not pretty and needed a fair amount of sanding to look good.

It has been fun flying it around my son's head because he likes to track it, but he does not like it landing on his tummy. Overall the planes tuned out well. They did remind me of a few safety rules.
1. Belt sanders and thin parts are not meant for each other. It is easy to get manicures trying to hold down the thin part. I tried to sand the wings on the belt sander and it slipped and embedded itself in the dust trap. This resulted in a nice sanded half moon in the wing. So I promptly removed the dust trap and continued sanding the wings letting them fly into the wall when they slipped. It is better than getting a manicure from a belt sander!!!
2. Make sure you keep your hands clear when machining small parts. The engine cowl was made with a lot of luck, but there is a radius that is put on by a router. To do this I put the part in a clamp. It is better to loose a clamp then a finger and I still have all ten of my fingers.