This could be a story like the Phenoix rising from the ashes or making a silk purse out of a sow's ear. Mike decides to bring new life and appearance to his old much used/abused Fout Star 40 airplane
As I alluded to in Lee's Four Star build thread, I'm renovating my Four Star as well. The plane's had a rough life.
I had some grand plans to partially sheet the wing and even take some (or all) of the dihedral out, but decided against that. I re-worked the fuselage to get rid of the single seat/turtle deck look and gave it more of a cabin appearance, 
maybe similar to a Cherokee or a Mooney or such. I also converted it to tricycle gear. The vertical fin had been damaged a good bit by inverted landings, mid-airs, and mid-grounds, so it was scrapped and a new one was constructed. I'll add a dorsal fin to it this go around as well. The wings got new ailerons, and the tail surfaces will likely get a new rudder and elevator as well.
I just start covering it last night, so I'll try to grab some pics of it as I go to show the changes. Here's a shot of the fuselage showing the turtle deck changes: And one with the fuse on the wing with the wing covering about 75% complete:
I figured I've seen a lot of mods to Four Stars, but none involve converting them to tricycle gear. It seems everyone always wants to convert planes the other way, but I don't know why (I only built the Ultra Sport as a taildragger for the inevitable full speed touch and goes!). The wing came out a lot "bluer" than I had planned, I guess I should have made the white section in the middle a little wider. Hopefully I still like it when it's all done. Power will be a Thunder Tiger .46. I hear they pull Escapades around pretty well. I also need to decide what to do to get the remainder of the red covering off of some parts of the fuselage, as well as getting some old oil/fuel drawn up out of the wood where the covering isn't going to want to stick too well. I think I remember reading that hitting it with a heat gun will help to boil out the soaked in fuel, then it can be wiped away with a paper towel.
Finally making some progress on this thing.
The wing is all but done. Need to install the aileron pushrods and the wheels. I also need to cover the bolt plate and will probably add some trim covering as well.
Fuselage is mostly covered. Need to add some trim to it also, plus the "windows" which will just be black monokote. The vertical fin needs to be covered and glued in. I also still need to cut some new elevators and a new rudder as well. Servos were all left in the plane, so will just need to add some control horns and hook up the pushrods once I finish the covering.
Amazing how big of a difference just a few small pieces of monokote can make.
If I can motivate myself to make the elevators and rudder tomorrow, it could potentially fly by the weekend, but I wouldn't hold my breath.
Fin and dorsal fin have been added. I hope there's enough support for the vertical fin,
it's mostly just glued flat on the bottom of it to the horizontal stab but there is a little bit of vertical support in the form of the 1/8"-3/16" fairing I made. Triangle stock will go beneath the horizontal stab to the fuse, but I wasn't planning on using any on the top.
I also cut, sanded, and covered the elevator halves, and glued in the joiner bar. I cut the rudder out and will just need to cover it, then install it along with the elevators.
Mike flew his newly refurbished Four Star Forty and it did very well and I deemed it was too fast to get in any race with him and my Escapade. Mike did some mods to looks of airframe that worked real good, does not even look like a Four Star any more.
I'm not really sure how because I changed very little to the airframe, but I think the plane flies tons better than it ever did before. The excellent landing characteristics (Four Stars are notorious for NOT having those) due to the change to tricycle configuration could be clouding my judgment of actual flight performance. The new, larger ailerons and slightly enlarged rudder though definitely help as well.
The plane has a tendency to kick off to the left on its uplines, which now that I think about it I tend to remember there being a couple of washers behind the left side of the motor mount that I might not have put back in after the rebuild. Could probably use replacing those to give it a bit more right thrust.
I'm very happy with the finished result, and will proudly display its capabilities in Armageddon this year. Well, if it survives until then of course.