Fuselage stained and first coat of poly!

After trying about 50 different combinations of stain/poly/thinner I finally settled on a darker color for the fuselage.  The light yellow color of most of the natural-wood planes was too difficult for me to replicate in balsa, so I went with a darker reddish color as portrayed in the picture below of Albatross D.Va 7177.17 - Cpl. A. Bartkowiak's plane.

I found that Minwax Red Mahogany replicated this color fairly well.  After applying a wood conditioner and staining the fuselage, I found the result to be a bit more splotchy than I had hoped, but it looks really good regardless!  I also had to go over all the spots where CA had been applied with a brown sharpie because the CA apparently seals the wood and doesn't allow the stain to penetrate (leaving very light patches).

Below is a picture of the fuselage after the first coat of polyurethane tonight:

I have the fuselage set up in a rotating drying rig (powered by some old Lego gears and a motor) to keep the poly from pooling on any one side.  Close up of the rotating mechanism below:

  

I plan to put on three coats of the poly with sanding in between, and will do the cutouts for the cockpit and motor prior to the last coat.  

And a very exciting video of paint drying:  (I know, it's not paint, but close enough).  Maybe next time I'll post a video of grass growing ;)

Fuselage is fully sheeted

Finished sheeting the fuselage tonight.  It looks really nice so far.  I'll have to sand down the uneven edges and fill the gaps.  I've built a test sheet, glued to a frame of pieces similar to the stringers in the fuse, to test the staining and/or clear coats for color, finish, and to see if they will warp the sheeting.  I'll also have to test wood-fillers for color after the stain/clear coats.

Below is the top view of the sheeted fuselage:

And the bottom view with the battery hatch off (it's sitting upside down on the table below the fuse)

Here's a view from inside the fuse, looking astern from the battery hatch.  The elevator and rudder servos can be seen (the ship was upside down when I took this), as well as the battery lines to the ESC.

And another view inside.  This is looking astern as well, but from the front of the plane, looking through the motor shaft hole in the firewall.  The three esc-to-motor wires can be seen, as well as the Castle Creations 75amp ESC.  The battery trays sits below (above in this picure) the ESC tray.

Next up is figuring how to do the stain/clear coats.  I plan to test the following:
- minwax stain + polycrylic clear coat
- polycrylic clear coat alone
- "coffee" stain + polycrylic (I read about staining balsa w/ instant coffee mixed with water...thought I'd try it)
- fiberglass + polycrylic (I'm interested to see how "visible" the fiberglass after it's put down with the clear coat, may be useful to reinforce some parts of the sheeting if necessary.
- test all of the above with & without sanding sealer.

I may also try premixing the polycrylic with stain or coloring of some sort to give the right look.