Hi there

 Here is the next up date!

  I have spent the last few days getting the fuselage structure built...I started with the lower half and then moved on to the upper half...almost symmetrical or but a few millimeters here and there!.

  Here are the two halves.......

So to try and explain what the plan is for this phase of the B17 build I have tried to put a few arrows here and there.......

The blue arrow at the rear shows you where I am intending to detail the radio room...including the camera bay that is under the floor of the radio room. There will be doors on each bulk head as in the real B17. The Red arrow indicates the Ball turret position and I have done a rather naff diagram of the turret in red using a computer mouse!!  The bulk head just after the turret will be as it is...open ....and as it is in the real B17...which is handy as you will be able to view the turret easily.

  Ball turret!...aaaggghhh!....not looking forward to trying to replicate that...I have some ideas but I'm sure I will change my mind when it comes to doing it!

  I will be starting with the bottom half first which means it's time to get out the yogurt pot supplies!!...some of you know what I mean...will explain in my next post!

  Thanks for dropping by

  Fozzy

Hi....its me again!

Got to keep at this else I might run out of life! ....

 The last two days were taken up by constructing with Balsa wood the area for the camera hatch and the ball turret.

I mapped out where each hole had to cut and then made a frame in said area!...for want of a better description!...here is the hole for the ball turret.

...and you can just see the frame work for the camera hatch on this next photo...

After it was all sanded down and checked this is what we have....

Here is a view from the underneath of the radio room and turret location...the red arrow denotes the camera hatch aperture and the blue arrow the turret aperture....

I have started to look round for a sphere shape that is the same size as the ball turret which I can use for a kind of template for the turret...I thought it would be a tall order ...but this morning I went into a Lev shop (pound/dollar shop...depending where you come from!!) and found this kids rubber ball.....and it is just shy of 3mm in circumference.....which I am going to live with!

I checked for fit even though the ball wasn't up for it judging the expression on its face!!!

Ok so that's it.....should have the initial skin on the inside and outside of the fuselage in preparation for some detailing this week end....

Hi chaps

Here is a quick up date on the problem that shall be named......."The bl#@$y Sperry Ball Turret"

I wasn't going to start this part yet because I knew that I would have problems with it!....just kept putting it on the back burner!....I thought that if I cant manage to scratch build the ball turret then the whole B17G project would come to a grinding halt!...so I started trying to think of ways how I can replicate it with the least amount of fuss and specialized tools...that I don't own!!

That little yellow kids ball kept staring at me!...taunting me!...because it knew that it would be useless if I tried to use it for a mold for vac forming....not solid you see....rubbery little thing....but I just had to give it a go!

I made a do it your self vac forming kit a few years back and I dusted it down ready for a trial run on the yellow ball.

The Henry hoover was got out of storage....(I hate hoovering!!)...and was put to good use for once!!....all connected up and ready for the off....

I started on the first attempt to use some plastic food packaging......it was pinned to the frame and popped into the oven for a few seconds....hoover on for suction and.....................failure!...the little ball stood up to having very hot plastic wrapped around it but I reckon the plastic was too thick. So next attempt I used a sheet of plastic card.......no.....too thin!.....so in the end I tried a sheet of 0.5mm and hey presto a result!..........

Then I thought that the plastic would get stuck to the soft ball ,but I didn't have any problems extracting the ball!....so I re loaded another 0.5 mm sheet of plastic on the frame and popped it in the oven (making me feel hungry all this talk of ovens!)...

The next 2 photos show the two halves together......roughly!!

So....so far I think so good.....the test will be later when I try to marry up the two halves......but first its down to a load of detailing...starting with the lower half of the ball....blue ink marks the spot!

I am going to start trying to cut out all the glazing first....then on with all the detail....so I will be back when I have managed to do that!

Me too!  This is true scratchbuilding craftsmanship!

That is some simply amazing work. Can't wait to see what it looks like when it's finished. You sir, have some beyond impressive scratch building skillls.

Hi guys

Time for an up date on this Ball turret!

 So after a lot of cursing the designers of this turret...namely Mr Sperry!...I finally managed to complete the outer parts of the bottom half of the turret..... leaving me to start next on the dreaded interior!

The hardest part was trying to replicate where the 50 cals go into the turret....I tried all sorts of ideas but in the end decided to use wire insulation. Very fiddly I have to say and a few attempts had to be made before I was kind of satisfied that it looked the part.

 Here's a photo of me in the process of making them..............

I have done this method many times before but this time it seemed harder due to the circular shape they had to be attached to!...Each piece of insulation was 1 cm in length and had to be opened up and cut to shape.....and a small piece of plastic with a hole drilled out that will take the barrels later on........

Here you have it......

Next up was also pretty dam difficult and that was cutting out all the glazing positions.....but finally the bottom half of the turret was ready for glazing.............

After the glazing was done using cut pieces of an old food clear packaging plastic...I then placed all the framing around the glass.

Here it is then ready to start the detailing of the interior........

...and with the top on to give some sort of reference that it is.... in fact... supposed to be a ball turret!!!

Simply Amazing!  Dear lord I have enough trouble putting together plastic kits.  Can't hardy wrap my brain around this one

l love watching this amazeing work.

thank you for sharing

Thanks guys!

Hi guys

I have managed to finish detailing the lower half of the Ball turret.

I really had to think carefully how to approach doing this...because A. ..there is a hell of a lot going on in there!! and B....what I scratch build in the lower half will eventually have to marry up with the top half!.

Luckily I have of photos of "said subject" but of course no dimensions!....and so this was all done by eye balling the photos and trying to scale it in my head down to 1:20.....how ever I am used to this and this is the part of the build I love doing.

I started by building the two 50 cal Browning's.

So it was time to get out my favorite box and tin of the only materials I seem to ever use when doing this................

Scrap plastic and bits of wire!....and I think I used a Christmas card some where in bottom half of this turret!

So here we have the two Browning's ready for a bit of paint...

The guns were placed into the turret ..(that was a nightmare!....took ages!)...and then on with a few more parts to be scratched.

Here for example is the air regulator and heated suit unit that are tucked away in front of the armored plate that protects the gunners under cart!.....

and here are the Air pressure gauges on their panel....

...and with a little colour attached....

There was times I built a part and then had to start all over again....mainly a scale issue...but got there in the end!

Afternoon all!

OK then.... I took photos of the bottom half of this turret this morning so that I could show you the progress that I have made so far. I have to say that I found researching the Sperry Ball Turret fascinating and it was ...and still is...pretty difficult to put it all together!...If I thought the lower section was hard it will be nothing compared to the upper half!.,..as I said in my last post it was difficult at times to know which part to scratch build first...wires and cables were hidden behind parts so I really had to think it all through!....this is my excuse in case you see any flaws...and believe me there are a few!...

But I am happy with the way it turned out....so far!

So here are the photos then......I think that the whole thing will look better when the top half is joined..........

...and just so you can get an idea of the scale.......

The next few photos show all the bits and bobs that go into the lower half of the ball....

So ....thinking ahead of the upper half I think I am going to have to think outside the box on this one as so far with this project I have put the emphasis on being able to see the internal workings of the B17G.....EG...the nose section was only skinned up to the cockpit plexiglass...so you could see into the cockpit....same as the last section I built...the bomb bay...although I think I might have to re visit the bomb bay as I don't think you can see into the bay very well....and so to this radio room....and to that end this Ball turret....I think I will design it so that the top of the ball is open enabling you to see down into the ball......its a load of balls really......but I think you know where I'm going with this!

It looks excellent. Beautiful work sir.

Bakster

It looks excellent. Beautiful work sir.

 

cheers!

This is friggin' crazy off the charts!!!!!!! I think I'll be subscribing to this thread. This is definitely different and definetely cool!!!!

mustang1989

This is friggin' crazy off the charts!!!!!!! I think I'll be subscribing to this thread. This is definitely different and definetely cool!!!!

 

 Cheers mate!...glad your coming along for the ride!

Hi there Lads and Lasses!

I am off to the UK tomorrow but was able to do a quick update before I set off.

I haven't done much but its a start to complete the ball turret part of this build.

Looking at photos convinced me that the next best thing to scratch build should be the ammo cans that are inside the ball!....they sit just above (and I mean just above) the gunners thighs!....I can see why the ball turret gunners had to be small...there is just no room to move an inch!...no wonder they got cramp!.....lying there in that draughty enclosed space ...dangling under the belly of the B17 with the deafening thunder of the 50 cals a few inches from their ears!....... great respect for them!

Scratch building the ammunition cans was a huge task in it self and I hope that they look something like them....I built them from a small block of balsa wood and then covered it with some yogurt pot plastic....just to save some of my plastic card!

The rounds were made by cutting teeny pieces of telephone wire and gluing them on a strip of paper.

 Here is a photo of the can's and some of the ammunition that will be seen before painting.....

The rounds were then glued into position and the whole thing was painted......

Then the real tricky part started!......fixing the whole lot into the small ball.

....and here is what it looks like with the top of the ball temporarily attached...

You might notice that only one side of the ammunition cans are painted....this is because a lot of detail will be attached to the un painted side later.

Afternoon guys!

I have just returned from UK and I am now back in my office and can get to my bench!....the last time I posted was 15 March and of course not being able to do any modelling this post is going to be a small update.

So its the continuation of the Ball turret that seems to get more and more complicated the more I look at the photos. I have many photos of different angles of the interior of the turret that I have collected over the months and its a real slow process of interpreting what I see!....not to mention that some of the equipment I have scratch built will be able to be seen but only if you look carefully in all the nooks and crannies!.....as in  the real turret there isn't a spare scrap of space!

So I continued with building an electrical control box that sits on the front of the ammo cans.....here it is.....

The last 3 photos show the progress I have made by looking at the white un painted parts.......

So as you can see....real slow progress for such a small part in this B17G project!

Dont know why all my photos have disapeared...I hope its not going to be another Photo Bucket muck about....havent had any problems with Post image until a few days ago...any one else having problems?

I think postimage was hacked , I believe everything is alright now though . because I really like what's doing in this build too .

steve5

I think I found the problem and have now rectified it.....(hopefully)....we shall see!!

Hi there chaps

 Been a while since I last posted due to the fact that Spring is here and every year I have to fix house problems tend to the garden etc etc also add to the mix that this turret build is pretty complicated!

I am also experiencing problems with these posts as the photos keep disappearing..( Photobucket springs to mind!)...since Photobucket went silly I have been using.... Postimage....I haven't had any problems until just recently.I found out that they had been hacked....but I was told of a solution which works...some times!I am going to replace all the photos of this build one more time and hope that this time they stay here....but I'm not sure if they will...if they don't then this whole Radio room blog is just a waste of time!....I will try again......is anybody else having this problem?

Any way on with this post............

I have a method in scratch building this turret now and that is to build it in layers!...from the top of the ammo cans to the next piece of equipment and then the next layer would be another part of the system to the next part and so forth. ....because of the amount of stuff that's packed into the ball its the only way I seem to be able to do it!

So here is the next layer! .....

As you can see all the white parts are the detail that I have added since my last post.......

This shot is looking in through the gunners hatch.........

So with a bit of paint added here is what it looks like so far........

Hi everyone

Just when you thought that it was impossible to cram any more equipment into the turret Mr Sperry thought it was best to install the K4 gun sight!....and it isn't a small piece of equipment either!...it sat just above the gunners rib cage!

I made the gun sight by shaping a small piece of balsa wood and then covering it with some plastic card....then all the bits and bobs were simply glued on!

Here it is before being painted......

So here are some photos of the gun sight squeezed into the turret.......poor gunner!

Looking through the gunners hatch.......

Here is a shot through the front glass on the ball turret showing the (blue) sight glass.......

For the life of me I can't imagine how anyone could squeeze their body into that thing. It must have been really uncomfortable.

JohnnyK

For the life of me I can't imagine how anyone could squeeze their body into that thing. It must have been really uncomfortable.

 

The maximum height for a ball gunner was 5 foot 4 inches....even so ..it must have been a tight squeeze!