Originally Posted by JumpJet

I haven’t had a lot of time the last couple days to work on the Navaho but hopefully I’ll get much of it done this weekend. For those who aren’t real familiar with planking I wanted to show a few close ups, so you have a better understanding of how it’s done.

I first started with many sheets of 1/8” balsa. I then ripped the sheets into 3/32” wide pieces on a table saw. The strips didn’t come out perfect but they don’t have to. The final thickness of balsa I want to obtain over the entire model is 1/16”. As you apply each strip, you may or may not need to bevel the edge of the piece you are applying so there is NO gap between the sticks. If you were to simply keep gluing square cross sections sticks together you would end up with V-Shaped grooves between each piece of wood and you would then have to use some type of filler over the entire model. By taking your time to make sure each piece of wood is applied, so there is no gaps, or grooves between the pieces you will not have to apply any filler and have a stronger model.
You will notice that some sticks our sticking further out then others, and at first glass it looks like a complete mess. I still need to sand the entire surface of the model to remove 1/32” of balsa to get down to my final 1/16” thickness. Also notice how one section of strips are applied in one direction while the others are applied in a different direction. It would be impossible to plank a constantly changing contour with strips of wood that are of constant width. You would need to taper each and every stick to match the needed width at ever former and that’s just not possible to do. For the top rear center section of the model I was able to use 1/16” sheet, which save a little time.


John Boren