The bigggest news I have is the arrival of an 900cm carriage lathe and a medium sized milling machine, which have allowed me to start to build what remains of the door latch (the completion of a project that fell through..)
and to build the primer mechanism out of all brass.
A small side project replaced a cracked plastic retaining block in the radiator shutter lever with an aluminium one and replaced the plastic button with aluminium also.
Slowly I am building the skills required to finish off the sim to a standard I can be happy with and this should lift my work up another notch or two!!
After the indefinite deferral of the Spit Mk V, I am now thinking seriously about converting the cockpit back to a Mk I but with "some" updates. Actually these will be "regressions" from where I am now but will look like updates.
I plan to make "blank" covers for the second fuel gauge and button and for the flaps gauge. These will then look "deleted" even though they never actually made it to the cockpit in the first place.
The undercarriage control unit is tweaking my conscience a little....if the other upgrades were done, it is almost certain that the current powered hydraulic unit would have been fitted...but the Mk I hand pump is just SOOOOO damed cool and
I now have the gear to build it.
The real thing:
Of course it would mean relocating the slipper tank tap/release but I think that is a small price to pay. I may relocate it to where the map box should be low and left or rear right ... or I may just put it in a box next to the old U/C Unit....or sell them both.
Choices, choices, choices....
The P8.....
The compass. The spider is mounted on a stepper motor and board hacked from a Flight illusion cessna compass that used to just be mounted in the main compass body. That compass was a whisky type and so the spider needed to be made to fit on top and the compass card had to be removed altogether.
The outer ring rotates to set course, the stepper turns the spider and it all works just like the original...which is NO compliment, I assure you!!! (see earlier post)
Cockpit and new screen also the extra Navigation Panel with ADF and the "second engine" panel on the right
A small detail but it all helps..the Cabin heat label now on (this encoder actually controls oxygen flow altitude/rate)
The Primer mechanism...a slide pot which will use FSUIPC to send "open", "pump" and "close" codes to the sim via FSUIPC at different points on the axis. The brass rod is threaded so the primer lock can still be screwed closed/open. It will be tapped into the primer pump handle.
The hardest job so far, really, the door latch. The latch handle and rods were made for me (swapped for some laser work) but I've finished them from the rough blanks. The latches themselves were a lathe/mill combination job,my very first!!! with the square hole of the latch guide being hand finished. The claws are made from round and square steel stock and threaded together (saving me using an independant 4 jaw chuck to turn them and mill them from a single square piece.
I'm quite happy for a first try at "fitting". Making things "mate" is not at all easy
The whole assembly so far:
The (front) claw and guide assembled... square holes are fun!! The finish is reasonable but not perfect..it does look a bit better "in person", the light of the flash does emphasise the ares that are not perfectly smooth....still, no excuses.
The claw of the rear latch..the second guide is still to be machined when I get some time.
And finally, an aquisition from yesterday, the very rare and, in this case still fully functional, Harness Recoil Reel. This will make the Sutton Harness fully functional and allow for the extra cockpit checks on takeoff and landing.
Not much to happen over the holidays as I am off trekking over mountains again....getting too old for that, just haven't realised it yet!!!
Darryl
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Each are both excellent unique experiences, and very fun to compare/contrast their quirks between the three. I personally find myself in the P-40 a little more because it seems to 'fit' my personality. I also find it a little better suited to low level scenery exploration, but I enjoy the Spit and P-51 equally as well, and enjoy the different challenges they provide. I think you will enjoy seeing which plane 'fits' you the best too. 
lol
