Gieseke Nobler for VSC

Yeah, What IS that butt ugly model airplane doing blocking my view of a beautiful powder blue chrome bumper MGB????

Bob

EXACTLY!

Okay.

Okay, that's enough.

Not nearly enough, early pull-handle MGB. You sure live right!

Bob

"Iris blue".. sweet!

I have a Gieseke Nobler kit. It will stay in its' box until I have more flying-experience. My dad gave it to me several years ago.




Best of luck flying yours Chris!

My favorite Nobler. I have had 3 of them and I recently acquired another one. All of them FP .40 powered.

Thanks guys. I bought my MGB from my mother, when I was 16. She bought it new when they were in England on vacation when my dad got off his probationary year at TWA. It was delivered to Chicago. I love Amco accesories (Mom ordered a radio, Talbot mirror and Motorola AM for weather and that beautiful chrome luggage rack) so found the Amco center console and I just put that Les Leston wheel on there, it had a Nardi I bought when I got it because my Dad was one of those guys that gets in using the steering wheel and said I couldn't drive it until I replaced the broken banjo wheel. I added a leather aftermarket shift knob and a black Talbot Berlin I got in a deal for three when looking for my Jamaican stuff.

This Gieseke Nobler is a UHP kit. I'm using an Aero Tiger 36 with a round 4 oz plastic clunk tank. They always work. It's tissue and dope except the wing, it's PolySpan.
I'm cleaning up the fuse and spackling the joins tonight so I can put the fillets on tomorrow along with a new nose ring (I originally built it for a Fox) and tissue the fuse. I plan on using fast drying lacquer primer a lot!
Chris...

Got all of the fillets on , finishing up the nose ring and cowl today and will tissue the fuse.
It'll be red with white trim and blue pinstripes like the World Championship colors on the old Top Flite box art scheme. Most famous scheme for Bob's Gieseke Nobler in my mind.

I actually kept working on the Gieseke Nobler. Here it is in red. I used West Wings base coat/clear coat system available in spray cans or liquid bottles. Using the white primer out of the large spray can was a good experience, nice spray pattern head and the materiel went on smooth and well.
The red cans were smaller and seemed to spray in a high velocity, splotchy and not easy to use. I was successful in getting it covered but was very worried about weight because the material seemed pretty thick. It laid down well over time and seemed okay.

I had used old masking tape and when I pulled up where I had back masked the white primer as my white trim, the red heavy coat had bled under the edges pretty badly. I had to go over every edge and scrape the red bleed off of the white with new Xacto blades for a couple of days.

After that exasperating experience I decided to camouflage any bleed by masking over the red a little more than I would've if the masking had been crisp masking line, and then using brand new blue plastic 3M masking tape I proceeded to remask the model.

I sprayed the blue color from the spay can to a bottle and thinned it with acetone as per the can's instruction. I airbrushed the blue with a medium tip and the blue paint went on very well. It was pretty opaque after two passes and when I unmasked the model with new masking tape the edges were very crisp and clean, success.

I then spent some time cleaning up and touching up the paint and then added some tape trim and decals. My 50 year old decals from AMA, the Navy Nats, etc were getting too old to work well and the adhesive was washing off instead of adhering the decal to the model, so I had them made in vinyl and a local shop and stuck them on.
I spent time detailing the controls and hinges making sure everything would go together well when i glued them in.

Then it was time to protect the stuff I had done and shoot the clear. A buddy had some really nice DuPont clear and offered his spray equipment in his spray booth. The result was spectacular . I am sanding the flaps and cowling still, but they will be in color soon and cleared. I can start color sanding and polishing the clear for that special touch.
Chris...

Hey, nice looking plane, but what about those shorts??

You did see that I've had an MGB since the 70's, right?
Chris...

I did finish the Nobler, but got sick over VSC 2020 and have never flown it! I'm rubbing it out this week while I assemble my new 25% Clipped Wing Cub ARF.

Thanks.
Aero Tiger .36, Phelps/Aero Products prop, 4 oz RC clunk tank. Exact set-up that came from a buddy's Nobler, the prop is CF from Randy Smith that he made just for those engines from a Jerry Phelps and Bill Werwage design. Should be p li entry of grunt.

The Gieseke Nobler has been on my to do list for nearly 20 years. I have 2 kits which the wood is so so. The Top Flite blue box versions were notorious for having the fuse shells split. One of mine is split bad but the other kit has perfect shells. Between the two, I think I can manage a decent weight.One of my flying friends no longer with us flew one for a number of years. Bob Gieseke flew it as well and signed the wing. This one was FP .40 powered and it had a very nice run to it. I always liked the glide when the engine cut.

Great Ken, from my experience making your own fuse sides from straight, light, matched A grain 1/8th with no cutouts in the aft fuse is best. The rest is standard, replace what you dont like, use what is good. My turtledeck and bottom are blocks but I like the shell idea from a weight and technology standpoint.
Chris...

Chris, the Aero Tiger should be absolutely impressive. I really missed the boat on that engine. We have a few of them amongst our club members. A fellow club member Jack passed away some years ago. Jack couldn't speak but he built a very good flying Gieseke Nobler with a FP .40. Jack would get frustrated trying to convey to people what he wanted them to understand. I was very patient with Jack and it was if I could pull the words out of him and he would shake his head yes or no. He was flying at the Nats at the time. Bob Gieseke flew his plane and signed it which was pretty cool. Bob would also fly free flight with my other buddy Dan.