Veron Avro 504N

Hi All,

My work bench has been clear for a week now and I need to build again. Having finished my Dornier I had three model in mind to build next and after a looking through the pile of un-built kits and thinking well maybe this one or that one and one day but not today, I finally made the decision on the Avro 504 kitted by Veron many many years ago in fact even before I took up this great hobby.

I purchased this kit just over a year ago to replace one I sold a few years ago and regretted selling it, so this one gets built and I have everything I need apart from covering. I even have a choice of engines. Although, the instruction say that it will fly with a range of 2 strokes 23 - 36. The engines I have are an SC 36, OS 40FS and an OS 52FS.

Having unfolded the delicate plans, they are 40-50 years old, and placed each engine on the plan. Having done so I think the OS 40 FS will fit the bill and is the same size as the dummy engine blocks.

The model is for rudder and elevator though it should be not too difficult to add ailerons.

Has anyone out there built one of these kits?

That's all for now, going to make a start

Regards

Robert

I'm pretty sure it's a Veron 504 N that a club mate has been trying to fly recently. He built it several years ago and a relaxing flyer it is not, so be warned. He's converted it to electric but I think he had it glow powered originally. He has ailerons on his and thinks without them it would be totally unflyable. Even one of the club's best pilots had problems.

He was having a successful flight as I arrived a few weeks ago but, when I congratulated him on it because it looks great in the air, he commented it was a lot harder than it looked. There are no obvious faults in the comstruction and Les's models usually fly OK so it's mystery why this is so tricky.

Geoff

I think my 1 1/2 Strutter from the Veron kit is a similar size and used to fly ok on a 20 2 stroke so the 40FS should be plenty. It's rudder only and doesn't need much rudder movement or it dutch rolls. When I had better thumbs it could be thrown around a bit.

Hi Geoff,

That's a shame because it looks like it should be a nice flier.

I once built a 48" Tiger Moth a DB plan which was for rudder / elevator and flew very well. I built a new lower wing and added ailerons and this totally transformed it's handling and was not a pleasure to fly. I wonder if adding ailerons and keeping the dihederal as per plan has anything to do with it?

Some thoughts perhaps

Regards

Robert

I'm sure one of my clubmates built one of these for electric power not so long ago. I don't know exactly what happened but it didn't last long. He'd fitted ailerons and said it was very difficult to fly and that he thought he'd have been better off leaving it as rudder and elevator only.

Tom, I don't know whether they could be flown free-flight or not, but the plane was certainly designed for rudder, elevator, throttle. That's the only configuration mentioned in the instructions and Phil Smith's original flew superbly on a 29 2-stroke, at around 5 lbs.

Edited By brokenenglish on 13/10/2019 20:04:20

note the date !

I don't know the whole story (except the somewhat adventurous nature of the flights I saw about 6 months ago) but it did fly better when I saw it a few weeks ago. I'll probably be seeing Les next Sunday at the Ashbourne scale day and I'll ask him. I may even persuade him to have a look here.

I certainly don't know if he changed the dihedral before fitting ailerons but anything's possible.

Geoff

A, sadly departed, clubmate had one many years ago. He was usually a nervous flyer but the times I saw him flying his 504 he never had any issues & always seemed to enjoy flying it. I'm pretty sure he didn't modify it for ailerons.
Only problem was that it was a pain to rig, de-rig & clean. His car wasn't big enough to transport it RTF.

Bob, the Veron 1 1/2 Strutter was a much smaller model, I had one that was nicely powered by a pre-Schnuerle OS Max 25. Lovely relaxing model to fly, alas one of those models that I later regretted selling,

Yes, the Avro is a fair bit bigger than the Sopwith. I think the .40 FS should be fine, especially if it's the more powerful Surpass.

Personally, I'd check whether the kit has the scale dihedral angle. If it's been increased to turn on rudder, I'd be inclined to reduce it to the scale amount and fit ailerons, although it will almost certainly need some rudder in the turns as well.

Lovely looking kit, I am envious!

Les doesn't have that problem. He's a self employed joiner/cabinet maker and he has an enormous van. He only lives a couple of miles from the airfield and arrives with several ready assembled models so he's up and flying whilst the rest of us fit wings

His boss lets him have afternoons off if the weather's good, too. I just get kicked out the house.

Geoff

What a lovely project Robert! real good old fashioned aeromodelling.

On a simular vein I'm seriously considering a mercury tiger moth as my next project, kits available from the vintage model company and outerzone have the plan.

Do keep us posted with progress.

Hi All,

Wow what a fantastic start to a new thread, thank you all for your posts and I have enjoyed reading the magazine article, which was published a few months before I left school all those years ago.

I spent much of yesterday looking over the plans and sorting through the wood. My thoughts were to start at the rear end as I usually do, but I will follow the instructions and start with the fuselage followed by the wings, that way I will not end up cutting the wrong bits of timber, use the longest first.

Also I had a look on google and found that the full size had a dihedral of 2.5 degrees on both wings. The plan asks for 2 1/4" under each wing and using a protractor it is just over 4 degrees so that may account for the difficult handling with aileron wing and 4 degrees dihedral.

Regards

Robert

Edited By Robert Parker on 14/10/2019 19:10:10

It is the one still flying [ now and then ] with the Shuttleworth trust at Biggleswade. One of the most produced aircraft ever, over 10,000 were made.

Hi All,

Building has started and one side of the fuselage is made just not joined together yet and the other side is on the way.

There is plenty of sketches on the drawings to add to the instructions which are good but I would prefer if when giving the material sizes they would have included which length to cut from, so far it is all small sections which are easy to replace.

Tomorrow, I'll bring up the second side up to the same level.

That's all for now

Regards

Robert

Hi All,

I've had a very successful building weekend and the basic fuselage is completed along with tank and engine positions sorted.

First airframe I've built without any formers just 5 1/4 x 1/4 cross pieces and the bulkhead

Back end pulled together, although I am going to strengthen the back as the two 1/4 x 1/4 just butt together and not shaped so there is not a lot of gluing area especially when you take into account of the large hinge for the rudder.

The cabane struts there is very little difference in the front and rear hence the tape

Engine and engine mount in place the tank needs to come up a bit and is a snug fit between the engine bearers.

Next is the cross bracing for the cabane structure, putting my soldering skills to the test.

That's all for now

Regards

Robert

... indeed, a very productive weekend, Robert.

Looks like you are intending to maiden it together with your Dornier...

Cheers

Chris

Hi Chris,

I think things will start to slow down a bit as the build gets more involved.

But it could be possible to maiden them both

Regards

Robert

It'll certainly slow down as you've got 4 wing panels to build and possibly a couple of wing centre sectios depending on how it's designed Personally, I like to get wings built first whilst I'm still enthusing about the project and then get onto the interesting part as far as I'm concerned - the fusleage.

My current build, a DB Sopwith Pup, also has 2.5 degree dihedral on each side. I wonder if that was a rule of thumb for designers of full scale biplanes in that era?

Looks good so far.

Geoff

Hi Geoff,

Yes, the wings will slow the pace down a bit plus two centre sections. There is a fair bit of work in the wings as well as the tailplane.

I like the look of the DB Pup a nice size and I saw the prototype last year when Richard brought it up to our club which Richard is a member, he did not fly it then but said it flew well. I'm watching your build and it's coming along well.

Keep up the good work,

Regards

Robert