2016 OTS (1/72) SMALL IS BIG

Howdy All,

Nice progress by everyone.  Good to see all this interesting work going on with some great kits.

Lewbud, Old Crow is looking good and so is the Hummer.  Looking forward to see what you do with the weathering.

Sim, that rigging on the tiny camel is very fine work indeed !  Nice !  

Tony,  The Hunter quartet is very cool.  Any plans to do some from the other demo teams ?    One question . . .  When I saw the latest pictures I was wondering what happened to the yellow stripes that were in the pictures on the previous page of posts (pg 12).  Were those yellow stripes really there - or was it just a camera thing ?  Looks great either way.  The Spitfires are coming along great too.  Those are some very nice looking aircraft.  The Fokker looks alot like a P-36 (radial engined Curtiss Hawk). 

Theuns,  That MH-53's interior detailing work is really impressive.  Hope it's got some massive doors you can open up to see inside when it's all buttoned up.

I've been progressig a little bit on the Havoc.  Up until today it's been kinda slow, but today I had a few hours with an empty house and a beautiful day - so I moved my modeling outdoors and had a very relaxing time for a few hours.  

In the past few weeks I've done some of the interior PE Work.  Honestly, I don't like working with PE as much as I thought I would.  I think it looks just OK.  Kinda like somebody glued a bunch of metal foil parts on a plastic model (go figure) - not like somebody shrunk down a real A-20.  Maybe I had my hopes set too high.

Cockpit:

Today was different.  I didn't do any painting or PE work.  It was all assembly.  

Installed underwing lights.  Drilled a partial hole in the backside of the glass to "make" a bulb, then glued it in place with white glue and covered it with a little snip of aluminum foil.

I liked the result . . .    Wheel well detail will look nice with a wash.

Installed covers for what I think must be the turbochargers (?)  Fit wasn't great - needs some fill, and then I pressed too hard on one side and got a glue blob.  Should clean up easily - I hope !

Put in some tiny side windows, front gear bay, and buttoned up the fuselage.  Assembled the wing halves, tail halves and gear nacelles, put together parts of the dorsal turret. . . . and there you have it.

One thing I had to be careful of with this kit was just cutting parts from the sprue.  The sprue attachment points are pretty big in a lot of cases.  I armed myself with a new xacto blade and things went OK.

Next . . . a little filling and a whole lotta sanding and painting.

Chris

Damg I do like the stencling on the throttle quadrant !

As for my modling , I have been very lazy lately. It is winter here and although not near as cold as you guys have for me beeing a South African I don't like it atall if the temp dips below 10 deg C....we here are made for the heat LOL

I have changed my mind WRT the interior detail on the sidewalls of the MH-53. I had looked at loads of pix and there is so much detail to make that I think in this scale it will loose the effect and just look "cluttered" as it will be hard to see the difference between wire looms, hoses and pipes :-(

So while I was at work  (airframe teck)I looked at a piece of aircraft fabric and then it hit me - the texture of this stuff looks like the interior "padding" I have seen on some of the US military helos. I painted some of this fabric green and cut pieces to fit neatly between the fuselage formers. I am quite hapy with the effect.

Pix to follow as soon as I have painted the seats.

Theuns

Definitely looking forward to seeing that interior Theuns!

Looks like quite a bit of work is going into that A-20 Chris.

Theuns, I'm with Rob, that will be intrestibg to see. Sometime one can go overboard with detail and like you said it just looks cluddered.

Thanks Boss! It really wasn't as hard as it looks. Just fiddly. Anchored all the lines in bottom, threaded through the top, pull tight and add drop of ca just short of hole, and pull a bit tighter. This stretchy stuff is great if you happen to roll a thumb into the works, release thumb and it all springs back to normal. Your A-20 is looking great as well! Love the office!

its been awhile since I posted some mig27 pics just having fun with this 

Crown,

I'll be the first to admit that I don't know much 'bout MiG's.

But I never even imagined that they were powered by V-8's !

Chris

Lol thats my 55 Chevy engine that got in the shot . I do have a  crowded  work space 

Here is the basic effect. I need to touch up the paint on the fabric still. There is still allot of stuff to be made to go in the cabin...

That looks much cleaner Theuns. Once you have it weathered and closed up it will look great.

Crown and Theuns your builds are looking great!! LOL would use the V-8 for the start cart! They used twin 455s in the SR-71 start carts.

Love that Mig, nice work and the colours really pop out.

Here are my two Spitfire XIXs. The first replicates a scheme used by the BBMF, but I've chose to depict it in it's possible wartime weathered look. I didn't have the BBMF box set with this aircraft, so decals are Xtradecals roundels with some odds and ends from the spares box. I've also completed a RTAF version of PS888, however the only photo I could find of it showed it in a very decrepit state at the end of it's life. I've chosen to depict it some time before that, whilst still in reasonable nick. I have no interest in showing a Spitfire in that state. The Thai decals are from Jay's Models.

The final photos show my Airfix Spitfire XIX collection to date. I think I've got three more to go.

Cheers

Tony

Oh wow Tony, great job on both of them. Yeah I wouldn't want to turn such a pretty bird bad either.

Wayne will get you on the wall soon.

Please put this on the roster aswell. 1/72 Zvesda ANT-5.

I think it has to be one of the ugliest planes ever built! I got it for all of $7 and since our clu had a bi-plane chalange soon I will build it ....just because it is so different.

Hello All,

Nice interior work Theuns.  You got bit by the Biplane bug too eh ?!

Tony - that collection of XIX's is very nice.  Such a gracefull looking A/C - and you've finished them very nicely.

I've made a bit of progress on the Havoc.

Got the Fuselage closed up and the seams mostly sanded.  I have to go back with some filler in a few places and then restore some panel line detail.

Next . . . on to the landing gear.  And as I've encountered before with assembling fiddley 3-D frame structures  -  I ran into a few snags.   Some help from the instructions would have been nice - but they are rather vague and there are no written recommendations - so  I'm writing this to leave a few breadcrumbs on the trail for others who pass this way . . . 

This is what I was given. . .   looked pretty self explanatory to me.

I assembled the starboard side gear first, and found out right away that I had to drill out the holes in the bottom of the wing because they were too shallow (not "thru holes"). I added the two multi-piece truss parts.  At this point I realized that it would help to drill out the pivot points on the 2 main truss assemblies because they weren't big enough to fit the  pins from the other parts.  Then I started adding the other parts in a way that made the most sense for stability and allignment.  More hole enlargement was required on various connection points.  The length of some of the pieces seemed to be off a bit (some short, or others long - I don't know which).  I got it together and things just looked a bit wonky.  The glue hadn't completely set - so I was able to push things into place in a way that looked more alligned.  This pulled one piece from its attachment point on the bottom of the wing, but the whole assembly was stable and looked alligned - so I stuck with it.

For the port side gear I thought  -  "OK, now I know what to do" . . .  I pre-drilled all the holes in the bottom of the wing and other points . . . 

Made sure to assemble parts D10 and D14 before attaching them to the rest of the assembly as this had given me some difficulty on the starboard side.

OK - things definitely went more smoothly. but I'm winding up with the same short piece.  Looks like I'll need to add some reinforcement with styrene strip stock.  No big deal, it will be visible, but most people will just think it's a part of the kit.  

Now to slip the gear nacelle over the whole assembly to test fit . . .

Hmmmm.  Not quite fitting.   Feels like something is keeping the nacelle from sliding back over that edge, but I'm almost there.  Maybe if I just push it down and back a little b . . .  CRUNCH !   . . .  it.     That didn't sound right !

. . .  this was after I straightened it out !

Back to the instructions . . .

Looking at the nacelle . .  and the instructions . . .  I think I see what went wrong.

A little clarity could have helped here.  On which side of that raised lip was the firewall supposed to be glued ?     Grrrrrr !    But     I dry-fit the parts and it seemed like the backside of the lip was a better fit !    I'm blaming this one on the instructions !

So here I am.  Everything looks well alligned. . .  

. . .  only now I have to perform surgery of some kind so that I can fit the nacelles.  I'm thinking that the least damaging method would be to carefully cut out the firewall so I don't crack the nacelle seams, and then install new sheet styrene firewall on the other side of the lip.  There's no detail on the firewall.  So a plain sheet is just as good as the kit part.

But first I'm gonna take a break . . . 

Chris

Nice job on those two Tony, nice to see two differant scheme for these.

I started this kit in the new Submarine Warfare GB which started today and doing it as a crossover here. 

The kit was purchased a few years back by my daughter on Father's Day and I received the PE Big Ed set last Christmas. I didn't get the Pontos wood deck because frankly' I couldn't afford or justify it. Like I said earlier, the removal of the box from the stash sure leaves a huge hole  I need to fill the void.

Well here it is. I'm sure most everyone is familiar with the kit, have one in your stash, built one yourself or watched a few WIP builds. The hull comes in 4 pieces and is going to require some surgery to open the limber holes and flood hatches. I will also build a representation of the pressure hull which can be seen through the limber holes.

I have not built a sub before, I think one could go to town on it with weathering and it will still look good. Maybe I should get one. Problem is that I like the new generation SSN's and they are very featureless and dont rust LOL.

Theuns

Modern subs may not rust much but the waterline and below can get really nasty.

You're right, there is a lot of weathering that can be done to a WW2 sub. 

Are modern subs not coated with some sort of rubber to absorb sonar?

Theuns

Dang! that is rusted...

Theuns

Tony love the Spit! Also love the collection! Could it be a Spit-oon?

Theuns looking forward to the ANT-5!!

Boss Ouch! It looks like an easy save though. Looking good so far!

MC Looking fwd to seeing the Das Big boat come together!! Looking great so far!

Still haven't gotten back to the SM81. Gotten closer to finishing my E7K I'm building in the Floats and Boats GB. Would have entered it here as well, but just felt it was too far advanced in build. Had some decal issues with it I would say was do to the age of the kit. managed a decent save I think. Anyone want a look, come on over.

Oh what the hey, here's a couple pics of the top wing anyways lol

before

after

Great save on the decals.

Seeing as i have some spare time while i wait for the supplies to finish my panzerwerfer, its time i jumped in here with my entry. I will be cahnging my priginal one. I don't have the time to do the He 162, the 72nd kit is only one of 3 for that build. So instead, i will be doing a little OOB build of somthing a little differant for me.

So, my new entry is Eduards F6F-3 Hellcat.

The kit looks really nice and has a nice small PE fret and a good selection of decal options, and its going together very well.

I started on Sunday with the pit, putting some of it together but leaving a few bits off for painting.

After a coat of primer and interiour green, i did some light weathering, just a flory pin wash and dry brushing and got all the coloured PE parts fitted.

And with that, the pit was fitted, fuselage halves joined and wings added. This has gone together great and i haven't used any filler as yet.

I primed the wheel wells egtting ready to paint them befopre masking and doing the underside. But then i realised that they will be white as we as the bottom of the aircraft, so i won't have to mask those.

Also got the engine together, painted wirth Alclad and a bit of weathering.

More soon.

Nice! A Hellcat, though that does seem unusual for you.  Are you marking it in USN or doing a Fleet Air Arm bird?

Thanks Steve. All the markings are USN so i will be doing one of those. I was drawn to an aircraft from USS Intrepid. Then when i realised that was the ship museum in New York, that sealed it.