Painted fuselage and progress on the rudders

 

At the welder repairing the missing and broken frame parts.

Fuselage powder coated at the factory

And safe at home!

Making some handle grips with the 3D printer.

Also for the control stick with push to talk

The dirty control connections ready for disassembly and clean up.

Everything cleaned up and ready to put in the fuselage again.

Johan repairing the directional rudder

Installing some extra support for more rigidness.

 On the horizontal stabilizer some bigger repairs are needed.

Work work work, a trailer, a wood work speed course and more work.

 The fuselage is totally stripped and Johan is checking the welds before it will get sandblasted.

In the mean while I bought a trailer to transport the Cumulus.

Had a good deal, for only 250€ I found a Ka6 trailer on segelflug. I had to drive to Baden-Baden for it (5h single), but it's better than making one. I would cost more and take a lot more time!

Some vintage gliders in the hanger at Baden-Oos, Grunau baby 2 , Ka2, Ka6.

The Cumulus being delivered to the company Vandermaesen in Tessendelo where it will be sandblasted and later powder coated.

    

Previous weekend and next weekend I will be following a basic coarse wood & fabric works organised by the VHZ (Vereniging Historische zweefvliegtuigen) this is a vintage gliding community from The Netherlands. www.zweefhist.nl/

            These are my first wood repairs, learned a lot! Picture below my attempt of repairing a hole in a ka6 wing. Not perfect at all I know but, I was pleased with my first attempt 

Repairing ribs

Fuselage is sandblasted, Francis and I packed it up to transport it to the welder for some repairs.

We discovered there are some supporting beams missing. These will be replaced according to plan.

Johan is busy on the rudders, removing all the fabric and paint. Inspecting and repairing if necessary.

The 2 ailerons are finished and ready for new fabric, now the rudder is being stripped.

The check up and first work.

I know... the glider was retrieved from the storage place in 2016. So why the long wait until the start of the restoration? Let us say building a house, having 2 kids and building my garage/workspace were the first things on the list. 

Before I start to work on the Cumulus I want to be sure it's worth all the effort.

A master/guru in Belgium if it comes to wooden gliders is Johan Kieckens, and it just happens to be that Johan is a good friend of Harry. 😄 Here Johan is inspecting the wings and fuselage.

The one on the ground is the original left wing with water damage.

Inspection of the metal tubing.

First assembly since 1967-8?

A test assembly with the left wing of the "baby cham", with just a small margin but it fits!

After the inspection and assembly Johan gives a GO! Let's work! 😄

Johan offert to help me by renovating all the rudders, in the mean time I will take care of the fuselage.

Moving the fuselage to my garage, Harry ready for the trip!

Bringing the rudders to Johan, they just fit inside the van.

Johan in his "mancave"

Fuselage being stripped

Some lost and found in the fuselage

Almost done!

Johan working on the ailerons

The aileron from the Babycham is in very good condition and only needs new fabric.

The original one is glued with casein glue and needs to be taken apart and glued back together.

Inside the aileron of the babycham, looks like new!

 

Three airworthy and a forth on the way.

What I like most about this project is the Vintage Gliding community. They are all very help full! 

With 2 Cumulus owners who I'm in contact with, giving me all the detailed information and helping me where possible.

In my previous post I said that I know of 2 airworthy Cumulus, in fact there are 3! 

Also one in a museum in Alabama USA but not airworthy.

Christoph Kroll (Flugplatz Düren-Hürtgenwald)

Andrea Schönemeier & Thorsten Kessler (Flugplatz Celle-Arloh)

?? (Flugplatz Achmer-Osnabrück)

3 Airworthy and one in progress. 

Southern Museum of flight Birmingham, Alabama USA

The Cumulus story

Little bit of history: 

The design was to provide a more aerodynamic fuselage for the well known Grunau Baby with an option to put an engine with push propeller at the back of the fuselage.

This fuselage could be self made with available plans.

So the wings and elevator are the same as a Grunau Baby 2 and 3.

There are models with and without airbrakes, and with and without main wheel.

Designers of the first Cumulus were Gerhard Reinhard & Karl Heinz-Kneschke, first flight on 25th of August 1951 at the Wasserkuppe. The two designers did the first 2 flights, the third flight but first official flight was preformed by Hanna Reitsch the day after. This glider had the registration D-6000 and was the first glider to receive a permission of build after WW2, last flown at Brasschaat early 1960's, there it crashed and dissapeared. In the year 1958 there were some experiments with a motor of 15hp and a 3 bladed fold propellor at the back.

There are about 20 registered builds, but I have no clue how many are still flying. For now I only know 2 that are airworthy.

D-5480 (my Cumulus)

The fuselage was made at the aero club of Münster-Telgte (Münsterland). First flight was made on the 22th of September 1956. The Cumulus was sold to Harry Vanmolkot, he flew there in the 1960's. He bought it in 1966 for 100 Deutsche Marke, back then it was 1250 Belgian franc, about 30,99 Euro. Harry moved to Congo and the Cumulus disappeared to a storage place of a club member at that time. In 2016 Raf Torfs a member of Diest Aero Club discovered the glider again. It was in a hangar of an other old club member.

We went to take a look and decided to move the Cumulus to the hangar of Diest Aero Club.

Harry decided to sell the glider to me for 30,99Euro 😉. 

Harry with his "D-5480"

During the visit we discovered the left wing had some serious water damage.

After inspection the left wing is damaged beyond repair, luckily there is a spare Grunau Baby wing which we can use.

This was also stored at the same place as the Cumulus. Probably with the intention to use it for the restoration. This wing was from a Grunau Baby 3 "babycham" from Diest Aero Club that had crashed in the 1970's. The pilot who flew the Grunau Baby climbed in a thunderstorm but had to make a crash landing in Tessenderlo, he survived the crash and only the left wing was usable. Lucky for us is this the wing we need!

Crash at Tessenderlo.