600 size OH-58A Kiowa Build

F106DeltaDart

Elite member
A few months ago, I picked up a blade 550X at a swap meet, and have been trying to figure out my next project. After some consideration, I bought a Funkey 600 size Jetranger fuselage for it, and stretched the 550 to a 600. However, I didn’t want to build your run of the mill Jetranger. Instead, I will be converting it to a Vietnam War OH-58A. Although most of these scouts were unarmed, a select few were equipped with a side mounted M134 minigun.

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Here is the overall to-do mod list for the moment:
Scale cockpit with cockpit doors removed
New tail fairing
Move Tail rotor to left side
Scale blade rotation
New extended mainshaft
Surface detailing and add minigun
Paint

Plenty of work to do here, so the build will probably be pretty slow. But, it will be an interesting project, and I’m hoping to have it airworthy for the summer season of flying events.
 

Liam B

Well-known member
I know nothing about helis, but I really enjoy your heli projects. Very fun to watch come together.
 

F106DeltaDart

Elite member
Thanks guys, Glad to be building another heli again! Started off the modification to the airframe today as well as finishing up a few things with the mechanics. One of the great things about working with a blade 550x, is that the shaft doesn’t have a step machined into it like the Trex version. So, making your own mainshaft is simply drilling 2 holes in some 10mm rod. Right now, the head is sitting a bit on the high side, so I’ll go back and drill a lower hole later. Also got to test fit the blades. Not only are the blades scale, but they have an assymetrical airfoil, and are designed for CCW (scale) rotation. Hoping that this will allow me to lower the headspeed enough where it begins to sound more realistic in flight.

On the airframe side of things, I got the doors and intakes cut out, and the old tail fairing chopped off. The lack of doors really takes a lot of structure of the hatch, so it will definitely need some sort of reinforcement. I am really debating the next step for the tail boom as well. Most OH-58As few without the tail rotor driveshaft covers installed, so it would be more realistic to cut it off. However, that would mean a LOT of fiberglass work all the way down the boom... the driveshaft would make a great place to run the tail rotor pushrod though, hmm..

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OH-58 without driveshaft cover:
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On a final related note, I found a very cool reference for a lot of the cockpit detailing and layout; a copy of the original OH-58A pilot’s manual! Planning to start CADing up the panel and console next.
 

PsyBorg

Wake up! Time to fly!
Nice start to another cool project. I will be keeping an eye on this as it goes. Have you managed to get any more air time on the Apache or has weather grounded you?
 

F106DeltaDart

Elite member
Nice start to another cool project. I will be keeping an eye on this as it goes. Have you managed to get any more air time on the Apache or has weather grounded you?
I've gotten in a few more flights in early December. I've been grounded for a few weeks now, due to a trip home for my brother's graduation and Christmas, and then subsequent bad weather. Today after work looks like a possibility though, it's the only day in the forecast so far that looks flyable. I'm still trying to diagnose and fix my tail rotor hold issue on the Apache in left sideward flight. That makes it very iffy to fly on windy days. My Little Bird on the other hand, handles winds up to 17 mph without any issue, and I'm hoping the Apache is capable of a similar flight envelope.
 

PsyBorg

Wake up! Time to fly!
Thought you had worked that out. Probably should bounce to that thread for this discussion tho huh.
 

F106DeltaDart

Elite member
Thought you had worked that out. Probably should bounce to that thread for this discussion tho huh.
Yeah, probably but I'll make it quick here. I thought I had it fixed for a few flights in a row, there was no sign of any issues. Then, on a gusty day it happened again. Conditions were definitely more extreme, and it was only a second or so, but that feeling of your bird giving an commanded input is well.. not good. Luckily, its very easy to get out of if you know what's happening, just lower the collective and get some forward speed. My biggest concern is losing tail for a second near the treeline, and losing orientation. The green paint blends in very well, so you really rely on it going exactly where you tell it to when its at long distances. I'll see what happens on the flight today, if I get it again, I'll post something on the other thread.
 

F106DeltaDart

Elite member
Finally got back to this project this weekend. One of the main changes I wanted to make to the airframe was to remove the tail rotor driveshaft cover to replicate most OH-58s in Vietnam. The majority of aircraft flew with them removed for both the weight reduction and ease of maintenance.

First, I cut the driveshaft covers from the tailboom, leaving a large open gap in the top of the boom. Using some 1/32 balsa, I filled in the gap to create a solid base for fiberglassing. I then applied 2 ply of fiberglass cloth, and did a wet layup over the balsa wood.

After a bit of trimming and sanding, I now have a round boom with no drive shaft fairings! Still have to do some priming and sanding to get the finish smooth though. Next will be the tailcone fairing and bearing blocks for the false drive shaft, which will conceal my tail rotor push rod.
 

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F106DeltaDart

Elite member
Finally pulled this bird down from the project shelf again after starting and finishing many other project since then, and after having moved from my small apartment to a house.

First order of business was to sand out and eliminate all the original paint and surface detail. This took a while as much of the original surface detail is actually thin tape underneath the clear coat. I filled in these lines everywhere except for the rear door seam lines.

I also removed both the engine bay doors and fabricated new ones to match the original OH-58A cowlings. The doors themselves were made from styrene with 3D printed vent detail behind them. I also 3D printed a new pilot air vent for the nose. The model was then coated in primer, and rivet detail applied to the rear section.

One of my major gripes with the Funkey Jetranger fuselage was always the placement of the hatch seams. I could never stand how it sliced through the middle of the rear door and fuselage along no existing lines. Most other manufacturers try to hide a hatch by making it follow a seam line. So, I decided to redo it, and move the hatch seam above the rear door. Still working on the mating surfaces between them, but it’s already an improvement In my eyes.

Next is more work on the hatch seam, and adding the tail rotor drive shaft to the boom.

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PsyBorg

Wake up! Time to fly!
SWEET!! So good to see you back here showing us the awesome things you do with your birds. hopefully I come across an update for the one you were working on last time you were around on a regular basis. Oh and welcome back!
 

PsyBorg

Wake up! Time to fly!
Finally pulled this bird down from the project shelf again after starting and finishing many other project since then, and after having moved from my small apartment to a house.

First order of business was to sand out and eliminate all the original paint and surface detail. This took a while as much of the original surface detail is actually thin tape underneath the clear coat. I filled in these lines everywhere except for the rear door seam lines.

I also removed both the engine bay doors and fabricated new ones to match the original OH-58A cowlings. The doors themselves were made from styrene with 3D printed vent detail behind them. I also 3D printed a new pilot air vent for the nose. The model was then coated in primer, and rivet detail applied to the rear section.

One of my major gripes with the Funkey Jetranger fuselage was always the placement of the hatch seams. I could never stand how it sliced through the middle of the rear door and fuselage along no existing lines. Most other manufacturers try to hide a hatch by making it follow a seam line. So, I decided to redo it, and move the hatch seam above the rear door. Still working on the mating surfaces between them, but it’s already an improvement In my eyes.

Next is more work on the hatch seam, and adding the tail rotor drive shaft to the boom.

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Hey what's the poster board in the back with all the signatures?
 

F106DeltaDart

Elite member
SWEET!! So good to see you back here showing us the awesome things you do with your birds. hopefully I come across an update for the one you were working on last time you were around on a regular basis. Oh and welcome back!
Don’t know if I’ll get back to that one immediately either. Maybe after the 58 gets finished up. Here’s a few heli projects that I finished/are in progress in the time since I last posted.
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F106DeltaDart

Elite member
Hey what's the poster board in the back with all the signatures?
I moved programs at work a bit over a year ago. That was my going away gift from the previous flight test program. Working drone stuff at the moment, and hoping to get back into testing manned aircraft in the next year.
 

F106DeltaDart

Elite member
Getting back to this project yet again. Seems like I end up working on every 6 months or so. First thing is, I finally chose which aircraft I wanted to model it after. I knew I wanted to replicate one that carried the mini gun, so that severely reduced my options. I did however find some great photos of one machine, OH-58A 68-16936 of the 3/17th Air Cav, A Troop, “Silver Spurs”. It appears to have an ammo box mounted to the side of the copilots armored seat to hold extra smoke grenades. There was just one problem.. I couldn’t make out the text on the upper cowling..

Like any good scale modeler, I started a deep dive for reference photos. All searches turned up empty. I contacted Veterans who were in the unit, and no one remembered the name. I even contacted the Army Aviation Museum, who redirected me to Army Records at Redstone. Many emails were exchanged over several months, and I had to file a Freedom of Information Act request to get them to look for records of that airframe. And they told me that the records were missing for that airframe..

In the process of this search, I learned a great about the history of the real 936. It survived the Vietnam War and served in the New Mexico National Guard until the mid 90s. The airframe is currently listed for auction. The cutout for the mini gun mount is still visible in the rear door. I became set on modeling this airframe, but I still needed to figure out that marking, or at least make up something..

Finally, I had a breakthrough. My brother, a software engineer, has able to apply filters to un-distort the text visible in the photo. With some photoshop and squinting, we were able to discern that it reads “Chef’s Special”. With the markings solved, I finally moved back to actual work on the airframe.


936 in Vietnam:
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936 Today:
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F106DeltaDart

Elite member
One of the first things I wanted to tackle getting back to this, was to correct the tail boom angle. The OH-58 has a few degrees of up angle in tailboom relative to the floor of the cockpit. The stock Funkey Jetranger fuselage has these parallel, and doesn’t look quite right. So, I got out the dremel and removed the tailboom. Both surfaces were sanded flat, and the appropriate angle was added at the seam.

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Before re-attaching the tail, there is some further work required. I will be relocating the H-stab to the scale position (farther forward) and to a scale scale angle of incidence. I will also use this opportunity to fabricate the tailcone extension, and mount for the Vertical fin.