Fuselage, part 3

Firewall and Turtle Deck are the next parts to fashion and glue. The fire wall was a redesign because I extended the nose section by 1/2" and the plans are build for a nitro engine. I drafted it according to the new nose opening dimensions and added and opening for motor wires and cooling air.

Once the fire wall was glued in place I designed the turtle deck sheeting. I used thin poster board cutouts to figure out the final shape and after a few iterations cut the 1/16" balsa sheet to fit (before gluing the turtle deck sheets I traced and glued the "instrument panel" semicircle):


Instead of filling the front section sides behind the fire wall with 1/8" sheet I decided to use small segments of 1/8" balsa and stick to frame the area.  The front section after some light sanding:

At this stage with the added frame members and 1/8" sheeting behind F3 the fuselage structure weighs in at 46 grams (1.6 oz):



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