The way Lockheed did it with the plywood shells of the Vega, Sirius, Altair etc. was to break down the parabolic shape to a series of 2-dimensional segments, long and narrow for one longitudinal ply, then short (longitudinally) and comparatively wide segments for the 90 degree ply, another long & narrow group, etc. These cut segments of plywood were taped edge to edge at their widest points and folded together for storage until needed in the mold. Air pressure was applied to a shaped rubber diaphragm which expanded to form the male form of the mold. The pressure during cure forced the plywood or veneer into a compound curve. I tend to believe Bowlus broke down the teardrop shape into similar plywood segments to create the molded BA shells. I understand Bowlus was able to reduce the number of laminated framing rings in the BA pod when he went to the molded skin. Creating these 2D skin shapes would be fairly easy to do using a CAD program which would most likely be able to represent a curved parabolic surface as a series of equal "facets" with single curvature, joined edge to edge like a molded canoe. Yes, I'm working on it - My project will be a scaled down Loughead S-1 biplane, a Jack Northrop design. If it works out I'll try a Bowlus BA shell. As far as scarfed rings, been there, done that, it works out very nicely too.

10kDA