Over the last two days, I got a fair bit done on my Airfix 109 submission- I went from virtually untouched kit to fully assembled airframe, ready for primer and painting. The build starts with the cockpit, and it fits with typical airfix new-tool ease. There's a fair bit of detail as well, and I haven't installed the IP yet.
I assembled the cockpit as one sub assembly, and began painting. I pre-shaded the interior frames with NATO Black, and sprayed the cockpit with Vallejo RLM 02. Once that dried, I used oils to build up a bit of grime in the framework, and picked out details. Here is the only picture I apparently took of some cockpit detail pre-installation.
As I prepared to join the fuselage halves, tradgedy struck! Due to my own benchtop negligence, I unwittingly dropped the left side- (in my shelf, the DISPLAY side) into a pool of polycement. This was the damage.
A gob of putty and some sanding later, however, and the disaster was averted. With the hole filled, I assembled the rest of the airframe.
I then came to my first bit of indecision- whether or not to detail and display the engine. On the one hand, the engine provided is pretty nice. On the other hand, however, it is pretty simple. In the end, I decided to go ahead and do it. I just wanted to add a couple of distinguishing details of the E-4's engine. Looking at pictures, I tried to find prominent features I could add at the scale. On the right side, a very noticable (presumably coolant0 line was visible. So, using stretched sprue, I added this to kit engine and painted it blue. I also added a little joining cap to the point where the pipe enter the engine block proper. On the same side, I cut a little bit of stretched sprue, and added the electric starter onto the gearbox.
On the left, I simply painted the engine block. This section was painted black first, with the grey mount handbrushed with RLM Grey and 'grimed up' with burnt umber artists oils.
The engine done, I sanded down my seams and sprayed primer. Tomorrow, I should be able to get a fair bit of painting done.
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On the Bench- Tamiya 1/48 Raiden, Rufe, Buffalo, He 162; Academy 1/72 F-89, Eduard 1/48 F6F-3, Accurate Miniatures 1/48 F3F-2, Minicraft 1/48 XF5F, Academy 1/35 Hetzer, Zvezda 1/35 KV-2 (Girls Und Panzer)
