Some misc things I'm working on

Aaronw , very nice WIP pic's .

I really like the USCG HO4S and the USMC H-19 builds . The paint finish on your coast guard bird is excellent

 I also have started on a big push on some of my 1/72 Helicopter kits this last week . I've airbrushed the interiors of Italeri's H-19 USMC , H-34 Seahorse , Wessex HU-5 , Wessex HAS.3 , two HH-60H Rescue Hawks and two UH-60 Aussie Blackhawks .

I've got Sea Stallions ready to sand , Huey's and Kiowa's in the paint shop , Apaches waiting to be decaled , so I'm trying to make a small dent in my Helicopter stash .

In some cases I leave the fuselage halves still attached to the sprues and sometimes I'll remove a few interior items and airbrush them seperatly . Basiclly I try and get all of the Interior bits and pieces painted so when I start the kit everything is ready to glue and close up the fuselage halves. Perhaps I'll post a pic of my assembly line . 

Excellent builds Aaronw , I look forward to seeing more of your finished Helo's

                                          Kind regards John

Very nice builds, I have the 1/48th scale H-19 and 34 I plan on building one of these days. I love the older helicopter compared to the newer ones. I wish Academy or Trumpter would start producing these fine older helicopters in a 1/35 scale with new molds and lpts of good PE. I would biy a bunch of them.

Again, great job and can't wait to see them finished.

Charlie

Aaron,

  Really nice stuff!  I like the yellow scheme a lot.  I'd really like to see the H-21 with the bare metal finish.  Your decals look great by the way.

     Ray 

I've finally got bitten by the finish some stuff up bug which is a lot nicer than the glue some bits together and start something else bug I've had the last two years.

There is just something about these older helicopters I really like. Some of the new helicopters are really interesting too but I definately favor the Huey and earlier. Charlie I would definately have to try a larger scale if any of these were available in 1/35. 

The NMF on the H-21 actually came out pretty nice, I'm fairly airbrush inept so an option for a NMF that doesn't require an airbrush sounded really interesting. It is a coat of gloss black with SNJ powder buffed into it, then coated with Future. Some one posted some experiments with this technique sometime back and I've just been waiting for something to try it out on, I was quite pleased with the result. 

Thanks for the comments on the decals, my wife talked me into getting an ALPS last summer, so I've been trying to get some use from it (well not so much talked into as I kept talking about it so she told me to just shut up and order one). After a few false starts I think I'm getting the hang of it.

The rotors on the HUP have proven to be a real pain, each one is made up from 9 pieces and the blades just attach to the side of the hub, no pins or the typical overlap you find on most rotors. I had to repair each one twice just mounting them to the fuselage.

The H-19 is straying a little from the instructions, I found a pic of another USMC H-19 with these red markings and liked the way it looks.

The H-21 with the orange bands in place, obviously its going to need a little clean up where some paint got under the tape.

Finally a group shot, I didn't realize how big the H-21 was before I started to build this one. For reference the H-19 is roughly the size of a Huey (since I'm sure everyone here has one of those in their collection).

Aaronw ,

Their coming along nicely . That HUP looks really small compared to the H-19 , I also have the A Model kit in my stash , so after you mentioned how much trouble the rotor blades were , when attaching them to the rotor hub , I went and look inside my kit box and I see what you mean . Thank's for the tip , I made a note and put it inside the box for future reference .

BTW , am I right in thinking that the HUP helicopter was the one in the movie with William Holden and Mickey Rooney , if so the HUP didn't look that small in the film ???

Anyway the builds are looking really good

                      Kind regards John

I think with the HUP it would be worth drilling a small hole in the rotor and hub so you could insert a small piece if wire to reinforce the connection.

I think the movie you are talking about is The Bridges at Toko Ri (spelling?), I just saw that again fairly recently but I can't remember what helicopter they used. It could have been a HUP but I'm thinking it was a Sikorsky HO3S (H-5).

Another useful tip you might want to add to your kit, dip the clear parts in Future if you don't normally do that. It made a huge difference in the quality of the parts.

Also if you want the rotors to turn you will really have to spend some time on them. There is a "Pin" that comes from the bottom but that is basically what holds the rotors on. I made sure the rotors could turn while assembling them but they are now basically fixed in place because the head of that pin is what holds the assembly to the fuselage. It may be better to glue that pin and leave the rotor head loosely attached.

Your right Aaronw ,

It was a sikorsky H-5 . I wonder if this helicopter is available in 1/72 scale ???

Thank's again for the extra tips and advice

                                              John

There are four I know of

Mach 2 & Aerodrom have done plastic kits

MPM did a plastic & vacform kit

Britavia did a vacform & white metal kit

RotorheadTX had a post on the various H-5 kits awhile back, he seemed to prefer the Britavia and Aerodrom versions, but I think the Mach 2 is the only one currently available.

I just finished my USMC HRS, and am close to wrapping up the USCG HO4S-3G and USN HUP-1.

Love your HRS and other builds. Can't wait to see them finished.

Charlie

Looking at your first post I was wondering if you only build interiors!

Great looking builds you have going on here!

Thanks, Mel 

Avus wrote:

Looking at your first post I was wondering if you only build interiors! Great looking builds you have going on here!

Sometimes it feels like I only build the interiors, that seems to be the first hang up point.

Well here is the latest on my USCG HUS-1G (H-34). The USCG had bad luck with these so they had a short service life. They bought 6 and lost 3 within a few years of adoption and further examples were not acquired. 

This is the Hobbyboss UH-34D kit, the Italeri kit is quite a bit more refined but I needed the earlier style bent leg landing gear. Like the HO4S-3 I made the decals myself.

Here is the HUP-1, it has turned into a bit of a chore getting this one done. None of the glass fit without some serious reshaping and there are few locating pins to line up parts. I think it was worth it though, I'm pretty happy with how it came out.

The HUP 1 was one of the USN's first rescue helicopters.

Finally the HO4S-3G

Aaron,

  Waht can I say, man. Those are gorgeous!  I really like high vis schemes and your birds are so atypical of the builds being done everywhere else.  Great stuff.  What's your next project?

     Ray

All your builds came out beautiful. They are just awesome!

Charlie

Thanks, these were fun and its always nice to have something different.

Ray, not sure whats next. I'll keep working on the HUS-1 and H-21. I've also got a Testors 1/32 HH-43 that has been sitting unfinished for a couple of years.

It's never hard finding a new idea for an H-19 or H-34, but the CH-37 looks interesting and I've already made up some decals for the Ft Rucker trainer you gave me pics of. Maybe a Seaking or Wessex... as always way more ideas than time.

Can't wait to see your H-37. I have two and I plan on using screen mesh on the engine cowlings. I bought the correct R-2800 resin engines and plan on building up the engine interior sections. For the screens I cut up one of my wife's gold screen coffee filters.

Charlie

I am really impatient to start the H-37, but I know its going to be something to take my time with. I want to make sure I'm going to have some uninterupted time with it.

It's also bigger than any helicopter I've built so I'm thinking I should warm up with something like an HH-53, CH-46, Seaking etc before taking on a huge multi media kit.

I just got this

it may not be next, but it looks fun.