1/35 MaxxPro w/ scratch built RPG netting - Afghanistan 2014 * WIP

Chris, that soldering looks great! I don't know if you know or not, but Adam Wilder has a superb liquid solder that makes solder just flow like water into your parts joins. I have used it on some PE, and couldn't believe how much easier it made everything. It's in his NitroLine stuff.

Soldering Flux

I would say that the most important thing I have bought for my airbrush in the last five years is an air regulator. If you don't have one, get one. It makes controlling your flow and spray so much easier.

I hadn't seen that, I noticed you used a lot of cool products from him on your Vorpanzer build. I'll have to go through that page and see what else he has. The flux I've been using has been more like a paste and much harder to control with any kind of precision.

And thanks for the regulator tip, when I picked up the new airbrush, I got myself a new compressor too. It's got a 1 gallon tank attached to it, and then the airs fed from the tank through a combination regulator/moisture trap. I just need to figure out what kind of PSI I should be setting it at for different applications. Right now pressure sits around 30 PSI when the AB isn't in use, and as soon as I start spraying it drops down to a steady 10-13 PSI which I've found gives me enough control to either do coverage work or finer detail depending on how I play with the double action leaver. But I still need to figure out how I should adjust it for more control in ether setting.

Here's a link to some test work I did with it on my Hetzer-Starr if you hadn't seen that yet.

Hello Chris!

Nice work on the PE! I usually glue them together and there's a trick to it - wipe the parts to be glued with lacquer thinner (also works great for plastic glue) and then apply the CA - sets faster and holds much stronger then. But soldering is a very handy technique, too - you can either use the paste mentioned earlier - like the one used for so called reflow soldering, where you put some paste between the eleectronic parts and the board and then put the whole thing in an oven to solder itself, so to say. You can also use the soldering wire, just be sure to use the really thin one. Whenyou already buy it, you can also do very realistic cabling with it, it's very pliable - painted black looks just like electrical cables or hydraulic lines. The soldering wire has some flux in it's core, so if done right the soldered spot doesn't need no corrections like sanding or filing. But it can be done easily - like you noticed solder is very soft. I usually solder things that I fabricate from wires. Like those babies on my M42 Duster:

Hope it helps, good luck with your build and have a nice day

Paweł

Thanks for the tip Pawel! Love that Duster detail, I remember that one. By the way, do you have anything on the bench? I'm an avid reader on the Vietnam war and it's one of my favorite modeling subjects, I'd love to see anything if you're on a project right now. Just went through your website, I've missed a lot over the years.

Chris-

PE work looks great, good job. I have to say PE gives me heartburn....    I'm also impressed with the flexi-straw duct, it really looks the part. I'd thought about using one for the accordion boot at the base of a gun tube, I think I need to.

Thanks I appreciate it! I can't take too much credit on the straw, got the idea from an old Verlinden HMMWV update set. They suggested the straw in their instructions. Good Verlinden suggestions? In their instruction?!? I didn't even think half their kits came with instructions.. Who knew!

Hello Chris!

Thanks for looking at the website and your kind words! Right now I'm tackling an aircraft - a Vietnam-era EKA-3B Tanker/Electronic Warfare aircrtaft. Parallel to that there's a Volkswagen Bus - I guess you could call that related to Vietnam, but it's really related to my new job at VW. Next up is an M728 CEV - that could be interesting to you. I'll let you know when I start the thread here.

So good luck with your project and see you on the forums, have a nice day

Paweł

Chris

just dropping in from the old timers club.....outstanding work. love it. Glad to see you back. I will be watching from my observation bunker!

Rounds Complete!!

Pawel- that is pretty cool, there's actually a full size M728 CEV on the side of the road a few blocks from my barracks, I probably couldn't climb into it, but I could take some photos of the exterior if you'd need them. Though I will say it's been used and most likely updated post-Vietnam because it has tan paint on top of the old green.

Mike! Hey, thanks for dropping in. I appreciate your feedback, I always remember looking to you for any kind of artillery/military knowledge and a real museum quality in the way you present your models in their natural military environment. It's pretty cool to see some of the 11Cs set up their mortar pits and lay the guns in having seen you build bigger artillery pieces in 1 35 scale first.

Quick update, I don't know why I've been putting this rear ramp off so much... the PE wasn't complicated at all, I think I've just been concerned with the fact that the kit stairs are so bad and the only real reason I bought the Voyager PE set was for these replacement stairs so if I screwed them up it would have been real upsetting.

But they came out fine, at least as good as I'd expect or want them too. Maybe some solder in the holes, but I can weather that into dirt and gunk as plenty of the holes got clogged on muddy days.

Here's a close up of the real thing. You'll maybe notice that our real ramp had one detail I'm not too worried about, and that was that under every step, there was a hinged door that allowed the crew in the back to use the voids under the steps (kind of behind the steps once the ramp is closed) as a storage locker (we packed them all full of MREs). This way with the ramp up, you could open the hinged door up, and reach down into the void to pull out whatever it was. Interestingly enough, even with the ramp down, we cram packed so many MREs into that void that we could open the door up without them all spilling out, grab the one we wanted, and close the door. The locking mechanism was a pain, and prone to breaking, two spring loaded pins on either end of the door, that (as you can see) were tight enough that even when they weren't locked in place, would have enough force to scrape the paint, making the doors very annoying, even if they weren't broken...