Yes, I bought a stock of sheet from SLEC a couple of weeks ago.

Maybe I'll use it to make a model wind turbine.

Colin

Balsa grows very quickly, which is why it's so light. According to Ian at SLEC the Chinese have bought up all the world's balsa plantations and their produce for the next N years.

Has anyone seen anything but bad news for the last six months? I think I'm going to take up cloud-spotting…

Dave M

I seem to remember that Solarbo have their own plantation (in Indonesia?????) so there is likely to be some availability but at what price I don't know..

Tragically this all sounds like another reason to cut down some tropical forest.

A lot of model aircraft are now now made of foam and even that has problems as the favourite foam for amateurs was Depron & you cannot get it any more.

Dave

I thought lite ply had a balsa core. Is it another light wood?

Tim

Liteply is made from laminations of Ceiba; it has no balsa content. Apart from the uses for the timber its seeds are a source of kapok and they can also be pressed to produce oil. The tree is also known as the silk-cotton tree.

Just because something is upheld as 'common knowledge' doesn't make it factually correct.

Happy to bust another myth!

DM

I suspect the myth came from one website that comes up on google. Whether it was correct once upon a time, or a one off or just plain wrong I don't know. What I can say is that I love lite ply, it just has to be used with a bit of common sense. My last two fast scale models sail well largely because of the light weight structure lite ply makes possible.

When I first bought some, I knocked up a little box, just to get the feel of it and try different glues. Then I tried different finishes for the same reason. I'd recommend most people to do something similar, A bit of practice before using it for something important can pay dividends, in my case I learnt not to over sand it, and that basic surface preparation and a light surface filler make life a lot easier.

Chas

What did I learn? Don't squeeze it!

Colin

Hi Chris E, what did I learn? I'm not sure I can be much clearer than I was in my post, but I'll have a go. Lite ply is just another type of wood, it's slightly different to other types, but it's still wood. I learnt to use Balsa as a boy, thanks to Vic Smeed and his famous designs. I learnt how to use modeling ply thanks to aerokits, it wasn't difficult, I was just a kid and I managed ok.

It's much the same with lite ply,, get some, try it out on something to learn on. I'm only talking about a few minutes effort, their isn't anything magical, difficult or wierd about it.

To summerise, surface preparation helps, I got that from another poster on this forum some time ago. Use a favourite glue, I like aliphatic resin glues, but pva works too, just like other woods. Finishing, so many different ways to do this, just like other woods, the most popular is probably a finishing epoxy resin often used on Balsa models. I do my own thing, just because I'm a bit set in my ways. Handle it with care, store properly, again just like other modeling woods ( or plastics) . It's all common sense.

Chas.

I think that the main problem folk have with liteply is that they try to handle and use it as if it were birch ply. It isn't.

I wouldn't disagree even a tiny fraction with what Chas has written, but I certainly would take issue with the man who rang SLEC and told them what a pile of junk it is; that he would never buy another of their liteply kits, and that he would say so to al his friends. I doubt if that will take him very long, whereas SLEC aka Balsacraft aka Precedent Kits has been making liteply-based kits for 40 years and continues to do so.

The only other significant thing to mention is that Liteply will bend very easily under the influence of a little steam, and hold the curve well. That makes cutting and fitting skins a doddle. You can even sand off one lamination and it will bend like card! I've dealt with finishing it in an article elsewhere on this website, which was updated in an issue of MB earlier this year.

Dave M

Peter

No, it's not waterproof without further treatment but it's not birch ply.

Soak it and it will delaminate, because it's not birch ply.

Try and bend a thin section of it sharply across the direction of the surface grain and it will likely snap because it's not birch ply.

You don't need much steam to bend it because the adhesive between the laminations is not a hard resin type. It quickly softens and allows the layers to slip over each other, whereas the resin in birch ply needs a lot more application of steam or heat to soften it.

Is the message becoming clearer? Frankly if you just forget the word "ply" then you'll get on much better with the stuff. Regard it more as being similar to three layers of hard balsa glued together with PVA. I do use resin-bonded ply for some parts e.g. motor mounts which need to accept screws or thin sheets which have to form sharp curves (funnels, Perkasa cabin sides). It's a question of using the appropriate material for the job in hand.

Dave M

Edited By Dave Milbourn on 29/09/2020 18:30:12

Chris, wood isn't waterproof, birch ply isn't waterproof, balsa isn't waterproof, that's why we put a durable finish on it. Did you see my note about applying finishing epoxy? As for impact resistance, can you imagine a balsa model being described as impact resistant? Yet there are hundreds of models decades old, made of balsa and still going just fine.

As for finishing, I can't imagine anyone with enough brain power to breath in and out making a working model boat without waterproofing the interior in some way, even if it's just sloshing some old paint around the inside.

Presumably you are already a modeller, so surely you already know all that?

At the risk of repeating myself, may I respectfully suggest you just get some and try it.

Chas