08-29-2013, 08:59 PM
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Master Modeler
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Join Date: Jan 2009
Location: Fairbanks, Alaska
Posts: 6,507
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Originally Posted by Mark II
The other day I got the idea of using soft ink stamps and stamp pad ink of various colors to decorate gliders. I was thinking of the cheap $0.35 balsa gliders that I used to get when I was a kid. They had details on them (cockpit outline, USAF insignia, etc.) that appeared to have been applied by stamping them with ink. Those simple gliders flew beautifully. The ink was bright and the printed details were big and bold, so they were quite visible at the 10'-25' altitudes that these gliders typically flew at.
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An excellent idea! While today's gliders of that type that Guillow makes today may be machine-printed, I wouldn't be at all surprised if the North Pacific, Guillow, and other bagged balsa gliders were hand-stamped 'back in the day.' I lost some North Pacific "Strato" gliders due to their high performance. As well:
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Originally Posted by Mark II
It has always been my understanding that putting any paint, even a very light coat, on a glider would give it the flying characteristics and sink rate of a brick. That Fake Wulf that Bob H posted is truly a thing of beauty, though, and I am very heartened to hear that yes, if it is carefully applied using the right type, one can actually give a glider a full paint job and still see it glide. I am very interested in experimenting with it in my gliders now.
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It didn't bother my father's Estes Astron Falcon at all; it had just enough orange lacquer paint sprayed on it to color it. The Estes Space Plane, Sky Dart, Orbital Transport, Scissor Wing SST, (mini motor) Condor, ARV Condor, Multi-Roc, and Firefly boost-gliders also had/have full paint schemes with decals. |