The FlatCat's wing and tail sub-assemblies are completed, so now it's time to glue them to the fuselage to begin making something that resembles a real glider.
The tail is first.
After carefully marking the center of the horizontal stab and the fuselage, the unit is attached using a double glue joint. Careful attention is paid to getting precise longitudinal alignment.
The assembly is weighted down on the workbench to dry.
Here is the assembly after the glue has dried. I've also added small glue fillets to the horizontal-vertical stab joints and the tail-fuselage joint.
While the tail fillets are drying, I move on to attaching the wings.
Using some wood blocks to support the model fuselage, the wing is attached in the precisely aligned position using a double glue joint. A couple of other blocks support the wings in the correct 'roll' orientation.
A block of wood is marked at 2-1/2" to provide a guide for setting the wingtip heights referenced from the bench top (1/2" for the fuselage height, and 2" for wing dihedral).
Back in my old fleet days, I would introduce a slight tilt to all of my competition glider wing assemblies to cause a wide turn in the glide path. With this build I am going with mounting the wings with identical tip heights. I will be relying on trim clay to introduce whatever turn needs to be added.
Glue is now dry and the glider main assembly is complete.
The next step is to go over the fuselage with a medium grit sanding block to round over all of the square edges.
This is followed by an overall sanding with fine grit paper to smooth out all of the fuselage, tail, and, wing surfaces.
Finally, some thin glue fillets are added to the wing/fuselage joints to add a little more strength.
The FlatCat glider construction is now completed and the bird is all ready for finishing.
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