My First Time Group Build

You know Bish I was awake for around 30 minutes or so last night at around 12:30 a.m. and thinking that I haven't contributed anything to this build in a while. So I got up real quick and busted the Dauntless back out. I've been concentrating alot of effort into the Fw190 GB (it's addictive!!!) and haven't paid the GB here as much attention as I should be. Will be grabbing my son tonight and breaking the blue bird out again.

Ok you guys. Here's the latest:

AS OF 7 FEB 13 BISH AND I ARE EXTENDING THIS GROUP BUILD FOR A PERIOD OF TWO MONTHS. THE OFFICIAL END DATE IS NOW 01 AUG 13!!!

This is to accomodate those who could not attain kits until a much later date than the start date, for those that were in the process of moving and getting re-set up and due to the fact that December was a busy month with the holidays so not much building could take place. Now lets resume building!! LOL, Joe

Thank You Very Much Gentlemen, That definitely takes some pressure off and certainly encourages me to give the Draken a bit more attention rather than sticking 'er together and calling it good just to make the timeline. I like you guys.

It does take some pressure off. But I'm also doing my P-38 for my local model club ( a Christmas present build). so it still has to be done by March 9. But I'm not seeing a problem with that.

I am pretty disappointed with this monogram P 38. Soem of the parts are warped and I'm afraid its not going to turn out as well as I hoped. So, I'm going to do a another one later on this year. Maybe this one will be a wreck on the side of my Airfiled Diorama. The version I'm doing is "Jeanne" Assigned to Capt. Roy M. Scrutchfield who named it after his wife. Then it was lost on June 16,1944 with Maj. Paul A. Lobinger being a KIFA.

So, which kit would be better to get? It's been a long time since I did any ww2 aircraft. And I'm not very good at scratch building. I do okay on somethings especially with cars and some on tractor trailers as well. Maybe I should read through the Scratch Building section here.

Thanks,

Ken Worth

Okay We're headed for the paint shop. Will post painted pics tomorrow

Looks like you're making excellent headway there Ken. Nice work.

As far as which P-38 kit to get next I can only pass on what I have seen and read. I personally have in my stash the Hasegawa 1/48 P-38 F/G/H, the Academy 1/48 P-38J and the Eduard Limited Edition P-38J European Theatre, which is a repop of the Academy but with all the bells and whistles. After having read a number of reviews and watching some builds it seems the Academy is your best bet. Like I said the Eduard is an Academy repop but, the extra resin and PE are really astounding and I'm defeinitely looking forward to buiding that one. Only drawback on that kit is the $70.00+ price tag. But, I can't complain it was a birthday present.

Joe - Thanks, I sprayed it last night, Now its setting for the next 3 days.

Lucky you didn't have to shell out your hard earned cash for it. It sounds great. Hmm, maybe my Rent Rebate will come in handy for that.

It's out of the paint shop

Coming along nicely there Ken especially for having the troubles you are having of it. Really liking the build, Joe

Thanks Joe, Yea, I think it will turn better than I thought it would,

Ken, You're doing an excellent job with that. Paint looks top notch. What paint did you spray that with?  

Looking good Ken.

P - 38 Paint

I sprayed the Brillant Silver on not knowing how it would look, After an hour of setting up, I thought it was way too shiney. So I sprayed the Flat Clear on it. I like how it turned out too.

The paint job is credit to my Dad. he painted 1/1 cars for a living all his life. even after 30 years of painting them, he still got runs in the paint. There is an easy trick to that. take a piece of masking tape and lightly touch the sticky side of the tape on the run in the paint right after it starts. Then spray a light coat over it and it disappears. I've done it countless times on my models.

Hmmm, nice. And I can get those for 15% off at the Ace Hardware store where I work. Man, I tell ya I'm willing to give that a try as it was my issues with Alclad that brought my P-47 to a halt. I have never quite determined whether it was something on my part or some other issue that caused just one single spot to blemish and no amount of attempts at covering over it worked. Thus, my desire to strip and redo.

Thanks Joe, I have a tanker semi trailer sitting up out of the way that I tried Alclad chrome on. It is NOT the least bit shiny. after that I came accross a You Tube video. that guy said if you get too much on it, it takes the shiny chrome out of it. I have yet to do anything with it. Actually I've been thinking about painting it white and putting Country Fair ( A local convienance store) decals on it.

With the P 38, the brillant silver paint was way too shiny for my taste. Thats why I used the flat clear.

I have managed to get some of the interior painted on my Mustang, albeit with a brush as I have yet to come across my airbrush while digging through the moving boxes still residing in the garage.  I had to take a frustrating pause on one of my modeling days due to poor prepping on my part.  I had stored all of my paints in ammo cans for the move from CA and decided to keep them stored that way until I get my shelves built.  Unfortunately I did not tighten one of the lids enough and it had leaked. Although the leak created very little mess it wreaked havoc on the bottles in the can.  The leak caused nearly all of the labels to fall away from the bottles forcing me to carefully remove each bottle as not to mix up the labels and then wipe and Sharpie what info I could directly onto the bottles.  This caused much frustration and once the task at hand was completed I had to step away from paints for a while.

I am hoping to get more plastic time next weekend as it will be the close of my current class and I can take a bit of a breather.

Jeez thats crazy deattilio! Glad you got the paints sorted out. Sounds tedious!! Whew!

I'm haveing a bit of an issue with spraying the Sabre. A few days ago i put on the Alclad in a couple of light coats. But in some areas it blistered and cracked. I tried poslishing it out and have just sprayed a second coat and its still the same. The only thing i can think of is that i has some residue of cleaner in the airbrush. Short of stripping the whole thing down and starting again, the only other option is to try and polish it as best i can. I think i might go with the second option and put it down as a lesson learnt. I'll get some pics up later so you can see what i mean.

Started putting the 40 year old decals on tonight. Surprisingly, I only had a couple tear on me. And I was able to slide them together. Will finish them tomorrow and get a few pics for everyone.

Wow. That is amazing Ken.  Certainly  gives me some hope with the ancient decals for my old Revell kit. Speaking of, I need to give my kit for this GB some attention. Keep it coming Ken.

the latest on "JEANNE" It's not done yet. I just need to touch a few things up on it yet. And maybe some weathering will help it too.

That looks good to me so far. Hey for something that will make this thing look even better than it looks now try out some EZ line for the antenna wires going from the canopy to each vertical fin. Bobe's hobby house sells it. Its like thin elastic that you can stretch, glue into place and cut. Its simple to use and apply and looks kick A when applied.

Just something for you to try if you haven't already. I use it on all of my planes. Just too easy and looks too good.

Very nicely done Ken. You've done a fine job on "Jeanne". As a final touch are you going to apply a wash to the panel lines? That would sure highlight your work there.

Oh yea, I forgot about the antenna wires. I've used regular black thread before. ( i used it on my Black Cat PBY and the Gato sub)

Update, I just went to Bobe's web site. I like what I'm seeing there. What size line should I get?

I'll try to do the wash, I understand how to do it,  but I've never done it before.

Thanks guys, you're making me feel better about this build.

Thanks for the info on Bobe's, this is a new one to me.

green, that is a great looking build. I would second the EZ line. I tried it the other week for the first time, after a push from Mustang, and it really is great stuf. As i understand it, both sizes can be used for 48th. And it stretches really nice so you can get it thinner that it originally looks.

Check the differance. This is my Stuka with fine fishing line, which i have been useing for a couple of years no problem. But on this it didn't look right.

And then i replaced it with EZ line, the fine one in this case.

It would have streched more, but i wasn't sure how well the mast would hold and didn't want to risk it. 

Thanks Bish, That is a really great looking stuka dio; WOW I like the guy sitting up on top of the fuselage. Reminds me of the older cars I had a long time ago, I was able to sit on the motor under the hood when working on them LOL I'm glad i didn't need a ladder to work on them LOL

Update, I just ordered some EZ line.

My poor raptor needs some serious attention. I've only been working on it when I get sick of the Mine plow for my M1A1 that I'm doing for the Gulf Wars GB. I almost have all the filling and seams done on the main body which will leave just the limbs then primer and paint.

Okay Added a touch of realism. what do you all think. Too much? I muddied up the tires, but it's hard to see in the pics. Who would be responsible for keep it clean? The Ground Crew? And how often would they wash it?

I managed to make a bit of progress on my Mustang – actually a tad more than the pictures here.  For the instrument panel I did a Google Image search and then saved and cropped it in PhotoShop followed by resizing and printing in MS Word.  I then attached it to a backing and glued it in place.  It may not be grand but is a step above the gaping hole straight from the box.  I also added a dam near the chin scoop to avoid a tunnel affect.  The fuselage is now in one piece, awaiting a bit of filler for the seams that can be expected from a 1974-vintage Snap-Tite mold.

greentracker98

Thanks for the info on Bobe's, this is a new one to me

Anyhows youre gonna really like the EZ line pal. Always looks good and works for control cables too.