Beginning the fire damage....
starting at the underside of the engine compartment.Remember the wreck is upside down with the tail up.The fire had time to burn through the thin plywood skin but not the bulkheads.Because it was burning towards the tail the bulkheads would act as a kind of fire break and the burning would be more confined to the aft side of the bulkhead.

Sounds good! I like it.

John , I'm simply just amazed on the craftsmanship !

Excellent John! Sometimes I forget to post because I am busy taking notes or picking my jaw up from mt desk. Your work is a right joy to peruse.

The gear assembly.
The gear will be up next.Quality wise the castings are poor but because my model will be upside down there is no need to strengthen it as I did for the Camel.I wont bother fixing dings and dents either for this accident victim ,a little weathering should take care of that.
Having built all of the Model Airways models,except the Wright's airplane,I think that this kit could actually be made into something quite nice.It would require new tooling and stronger material for the metal fittings.Also a little updating of the instructions and plans would be in order to make the steps involved clearer.
More accurate cutting of some of the laser cut parts to fit the supplied raw wood parts (example ribs to spars)Use of photo etch for fittings as was done for the Jenny.This would probably up the price a bit to the cost of the Jenny but well worth it in my opinion.Probably will never happen but.......

Another pic

Building upside down!
After I finish the gear I will then build the upper wing which is made as a single unit.The wing will be the basis for the rest of the build.I don't foresee any major problems as with a wreck you have lots of room for artistic license!

Looking good John!

On to the upper wing!
I haven't got around to weathering the cockpit yet but I think I will set this aside for now and build the upper wing assembly as it is really the base for the rest of this upside down piece to be built upon.
The upper wing is built all in one piece and I will leave it intact except for the odd ding here and there.The fabric will be mostly flash burned off so I will have to build all of the internal structure including the drag and anti-drag wires.

Most impressive !

Amazing work, John. Very impressive.

Mark

The first step is to spray lacquer both sides on the laser cut board before removing the ribs.

Now take a piece of pink insulation board,lay on the upper wing plan and put a piece of wax paper over that and pin down.Take your ribs and pin them down over the wax paper/plan.The ribs themselves are not numbered so be careful that they are in the right order.Don't worry about the varying sizes of the lightening holes in the ribs as the plans are just not that accurate.
Next take your rib stiffener strips and lay them over the ribs.Be sure to leave a little extra room around the spar areas, as these will need some filing out later to have the spars fit through the holes properly.
Secure the ribs using small pins and put a small drop of superthin superglue at each rib/stiffener joint area.

Another pic.

Another pic.

Shaping the spars.
First I take one of the ribs and enlarge the hole where the spar will fit through.This I use as a kind of template for shaping the spar.When this rib will slide along the whole length of the spar, the other ribs are then fitted to the shaped spar.I find that this is the easiest way to get a consistent shape from one end of the spar to the other.Next the spars will be tapered on all four sides near the tip.