For the Spectre HLG wing assembly, what adhesive should I use to apply the carbon cloth to the wing?

From : Don Stackhouse

Epoxy. A laminating epoxy such as West Systems is best, it's fairly thin and soaks into the carbon well.

The 5 and 15 minute epoxies are usually too thick, they won't soak in properly, and if you try to thin them, you weaken them.

30 minute epoxy is usually much thinner than the 5, 15 and 20 minute types, and may be a good substitute if you can't get laminating epoxy.

Mask off around the area on the wing where you will be applying the carbon (this prevents smears of epoxy from messing up the wing surface around the carbon cloth). Wet out the carbon cloth on a piece of waxed paper, squeegeeing the epoxy into the cloth and letting it soak into the fibers well before scraping off the excess epoxy. Brush or wipe a THIN layer (just enough to get the surface damp for a good bond) of epoxy onto the spot on the wing where the carbon goes before you carefully peel the wet carbon cloth off the waxed paper and apply it to the wing. Put a fresh piece of waxed paper on top of the wet carbon and rub through the waxed paper to make sure the carbon is firmly bonde to the wing surface with no trapped air between the surfaces. Leave the waxed paper in place while the epoxy cures, then peel it off. This will leave a fairly smooth surface on the outside of the carbon, so you should need little or no sanding. Don't worry if the surface is a little wavy, it doesn't hurt the aerodynamics significantly.

For the fuselage/wing assembly, you state: "Remove the wing and tap the wing mounting hole in the fuselage using the supplied self-tapping screw as a tap." Which screw is the self-tapping one (the steel or the nylon)?

The steel one. "Tapping" is machinist lingo for the act of cutting threads in a hole. A self-tapping screw is a screw with a special tip that cuts the threads for the screw as you screw it in the first time. The other typical method for cutting threads in a hole is to screw in a "tap", a special tool that looks something like a long screw, but with a special tapered end and with slots running along its sides. They typically need a special wrench (called a "tap wrench") to hold them, and both the tap and the wrench tend to be expensive. For soft materials like wood or fiberglass, a self-tapping screw can do the same job almost as well, and they're cheap enough for us to include one in the kit for you.

I really don't understand this instruction with regard to tapping the hole with the screw. Could you elaborate?

You carefully screw the screw into the hole, being very careful to make sure it's going straight into the hole, parallell to the hole's axis. If it feels like it's starting to tighten up as you're screwing it in, unscrew it and clear out any chips that are clogging the end of the screw and the hole, then screw it back in some more, until the screw can go all the way down into the hole smoothly.

Is it ok to cover the wing with Ultra-Cote...

There is NO need to cover the wing at all, you will add gobs of unnecessary weight, and the heat from the covering operation will DESTROY your wing!!

The ONLY possible need for any painting is perhaps to add a little color to the underside (a dark color, flat black is one of the most effective) to make the model easier to see against a bright sky. MOst folks use Krylon spray paint or something similar for this. Even then, it's important to use as little as possible, fogging on just barely enough to tint the underside. Paint is heavy, and for your Spectre to perform and handle well it's essential that you keep it as light as possible, especially in the tail and the wingtips. Every GRAM is important! Also, if you get the paint on just the tiniest bit too heavy, the solvents in the paint can soak through the fiberglass skin and attack the wing's foam core, destroying the wing. ...and paint the pod?

It's possible to paint it without damaging it, but it just adds a lot of extra weight. You have to ask yourself, are you building this model to look pretty sitting on a shelf, or to fly well? At typical flying heights, you will not notice a pretty paint job, but you will notice the detrimental effects of any unnecessary extra weight.

Don Stackhouse
DJ Aerotech