1/3 scale Scud 2 by Jilles Smits

[Cliff Evans]

The build of the Scud 2 is well under way, The builder (John Goldson) of Sandhays sends me Pictures of progress as and when he can.

[Paul_Williams]

Very impressive strut-work and jigging to achieve it.
Will you be adding the four hand-holds cut in the fuselage skin that allowed one to pick the glider up by putting your hand around the longeron ?
I supplied some drawings to help Mike N
Beach with his restoration of the full size and remember that you could just poke your finger through the tailplane D-box which had deteriorated with age. What is truly alarming, is the way the metal fittings were attached to the longerons - from memory, two wood screws and two spindly bolts.
Although the Scud 1 and Scud 2 were very clever designs, they were far from simple to build.
Paul

[Cliff Evans]

I cannot answer the question Paul as the builder sends pics now and then. He does like his scale though so, it would not be a surprise if he did add that detail.

[Cliff Evans]

Very impressive strut-work and jigging to achieve it.
Will you be adding the four hand-holds cut in the fuselage skin that allowed one to pick the glider up by putting your hand around the longeron ?
I supplied some drawings to help Mike N
Beach with his restoration of the full size and remember that you could just poke your finger through the tailplane D-box which had deteriorated with age. What is truly alarming, is the way the metal fittings were attached to the longerons - from memory, two wood screws and two spindly bolts.
Although the Scud 1 and Scud 2 were very clever designs, they were far from simple to build.
Paul

Paul, have you any photos of the detail you mention.

[Jilles]

Hi all, as the designer of this model some notes. It looks like a simple model but it was one of the more complex designs I
have done to date. the struts are the only items that connect the wing to the fuselage.
As shown in the pictures I added a jig structure in the NC kit to be temporarily fitted on top of the fuse to ensure the pickup holes in the strut tops
are at the correct location. It seems to have worked because the centre wing section looks to be in the correct position
My design used steel tubes for the struts but John the builder used carbon rods or tubes. A very good alternative.
the servo wires to the ailerons are an issue. if the struts are tubes they could be run through the tubes
An alternative mentioned is to have a separate receiver and battery in the wing centre section.
with the modern radios, this would not be a problem.
I got lots of pictures and details for the design project. non of them showed the mentioned handholds.
A factory drawing of the fuse does not show them either. If I can get details I could add these to the drawings.

[Paul_Williams]

Cliff, Jilles, apologies, I have been travelling and then my computer committed suicide, so I have only just seen your comments.
I have a fondness for the Scuds, as they were the first gliders I became aware of, through my oldest friends Martin Garnett, whose late father restored a Scud 3.
Decades ago I did siome work to recreate a drawing of Scud I and its possible that that I have misremembered the handholds being on Scud 2, as well as Scud I. I will try to find the Scud 2 fuselage drawing which is in the loft somewhere.
I do have drawings for much of the metalwork, including the nose hook and rear hold back ring, as well as strut fittings.

I was told that the ribs drawings were borrowed and never returned.
I have either read or was told that postwar, there was concern about aerotowing Scud 2 and the strength was recalculated and thought good for 6g ...... true or false ?
Paul

[Paul_Williams]

Jilles, I have now found the fuselage drawing for the Scud 2.
It is my understanding that it came from Baynes himself.
It clearly shows four hand-holds. My guess is that your drawing was from a set of homebuilder plans that differed from the prototype drawing ???

On Scud 1 each hand-hold comprised a pair of openings,one above and one below the horizontal longeron, so your hand cound be insterted and fingers wrapped around the longeron. These were close to the nose and also in the rear fuselage, so the glider could be picked up and moved about. To prevent the ply around the holes splitting wiith use, there were ply doublers around each hole.

On this original Scid 2 drawing, the hand holds are only below the lonegron but still have the ply doublers. I imagine that it would have been physically awkward to carry the glider this way, with your arm/hand rotated to get any grip.

Whilst the hand-holds are on the drawing, I don't recall any photos where they can be seen. Possibly they were abandoned as impractical or because they were an obvious source of drag or the source of a nasty draft to the nether regions !

The drawing clearly shows that on both sides of the cockpit, there were opening doors, to make entering the cockpit slightly less difficult than it is anway !
The doors are hinged at the horizontal longeron and extend upwards for half the length of the fuselage frame.

Scud 2 dates before release hooks and originally had a hefty steel bar open hook for bunjey launching and a metal loop extending from the tail comne, to pass a honld-back rope through to hold the tension until the bunjey was ready and then one end of the rope was released.

I am just awaiting a new laptop and will post the drawing in due course.
Paul

[Jilles]

Hi Paul, the only original drawing I received was for the fuselage of the Scud 2, see attached
Barry Cole sent me lots of pictures of a sample hanging in a museum and I got a 3 view drawing with overall dimensions
In many cases when I design a vintage glider model I have to guess some details because there is not much info available.
One can only work with what is available. In many cases I had lot of help from Vincett Cockett with details and pictures.
When there are other scale details come forward in due course, experienced model builders should be able to add these details as they see fit .

[Paul_Williams]

Jilles, trust me, I know just how difficult it is to find material on many vintage sailplanes. I applaud your efforts unreservedly.

It looks like our copies of the Scud 2 fuselage are in fact the same and that you have fallen victim to seeing a unique feature without realising what it is. The hand holds are actually there - the forward one near the rudder pedals and rear one on the mid fuselage.
However, as there are no photos showing the hand-holds, we can only assume that they were omitted from the prototype.
When you consider how you would have to rotate your arm, to hold the longeron from the hole below, it would be extremely uncomfortable, unlike the double hole hand-holds on Scud 1.
Paul

[Jilles]

Hi Paul, when I studied this drawing I found a strange way that the skid is fixed to the fuse
On attached drawing you see that the skid is screwed to a steel bracket that it bolted stiff the the fuse underside. All very ridged
So I wondered what the rubber blocks will do in this setup ?

the plane was not very heavy so I suppose to carry it with four people would not be to hard
In the 1960's I had my solo on a Fokket Baby the Dutch version of the Grunau Baby. it had a rod sticking out of the fuse sides just be fore the horizontal stab.
two people at this position and than two on either side lifting the glider with their backs under the wing struts. Not healthy for your back but health and safaty did not exist in that time.