Pica 1/5 Spitfire IX

Back in 1987, a club member had the Byron P-51D Mustang, which he let me fly a few circuits as a 14 year old.  I was hooked!

Peter Hildebrandt's Byron Mustang and Bob Parkinson Hornet at Welland, 1989

 So, in 1989, when Pica came out with their 1/5 Spitfire, I wanted it bad!

Around 1991, my dad and I went to the local hobby shop to buy the kit, but it was sold.  The owner said he could order another one, but my dad said something like, "I'm not leaving without an airplane", so we ended up with the new Top Flite Gold Edition Corsair kit instead.

It would be many years later, 2006 at the Toledo Show, when I would find a then discontinued 1/5 Pica Spitfire kit!  The guy had a table in the swap shop and as I was walking by, I glanced and saw a bunch of kits, all Pica.  I kept walking, then something made me turn back and look to see what was under the Cessna 182.  There it was, calling me!  He wanted $170 for it, so I went to the nearest ABM and the rest is history.  I got one of the early ones with the wrong CG on the plans, but thankfully, I was aware of that potential problem.

The reason that the CG was wrong is because of bad landing gear design.  It sweeps forward as it extends, but on this kit, with short struts, the pivot point is too far aft.  With the correct length strut ( I ordered from Shinden Machine with wheels from Glennis ), one must cut away the bottom spar.  I decided this wasn't going to affect structural strength, because the rails are hardwood and the spars are balsa wood.  The wing ribs ( 1/8 plywood! ) in which the rails are attached are reinforced with plywood doublers.  In effect, the hardwood rails are in themselves, spars.  Also, the wing is set at 0 incidence, whereas the real airplane had +2 positive at the wing root.  This would further move the gear forward.  I modified the structure accordingly.  I couldn't get a full 2 degrees out of it ( without major mods ), but 1.5 is close enough.  With these modifications, the CG can be placed a good 1 inch further forward, where it should be.

Then, there was the issue of a powerplant.  If there's one thing I can't stand, it's cylinders and spark plug leads sticking out of a huge hole cut into the cowl!  I almost went with the MVVS 58LC ( liquid cooled ), until I realized that it too would be sticking out of the cowl anyway.  So, I ended up choosing the Moki 360 inline twin as the most compact solution and with plenty of power.  Cooling still might be an issue but with proper baffeling and minimal cheater holes, it should be ok.  The propeller is a Zinger 4 blade, 20 x 8-14.