1/48 B-17 Group Build...ALL INVITED TO JOIN!

-Tiny- wrote:

Hammer - I knew it...well, it was my first attempt at salt crystal whear n' tear.  I think I'm gonna go get a little bottle of brake fluid and strip em down...that is the best thing I've seen to strip paint...i used to strip my crappy car paint jobs with it. It's all about learning the hard way...

Strip the paint on the blades, the hubs look just fine. You could probably just get away with litely sanding the blades and repainting them.

modlvr wrote:

What is the standard color scheme for the guns? The Revell kit come with them all black and shows Gun Meatl on the barrels but nothing on the gun itself.

I paint them with either the flat black in the small testors bottle, not the model master flat black. The regular testors, to me, looks more like a semi gloss. Any weapons being routinely maintain'd will be lightly oil'd giving it a little shine. The bracket I just paint steel.

modlvr wrote:

What is the standard color scheme for the guns? The Revell kit come with them all black and shows Gun Meatl on the barrels but nothing on the gun itself.

Old School method- I spray them flat black, after they are dry I will take a sharp # 2 pencil and draw over the details on the reciever and outside edges to make them pop out. The barrel will get rubbed with the side of the lead to give it that "handled used look"  looks real good when done. Or sometimes if it is just a smooth barrel I will make cooling dots with a sharp point of the pencil to give it some depth.

What is the standard color scheme for the guns? The Revell kit come with them all black and shows Gun Meatl on the barrels but nothing on the gun itself.

Flat black with gunmetal or darked silver drybrushing... On guns (in 1:48th) that don't have molded cooling jackets, I paint them gunmetal and "dot" the barrels with black for the cooling jackets.  Straight gunmetal is perfect for large scale (bigger than 1/32), but needs to be scaled down on models, getting darker as the gun gets smaller...

On the Forts, I do the frames for the flex-mounts (waist, cheek, radio) in light interior gray or OD... These are waist guns have OD frames with green zinc-chromate mounts, best I can tell...

You could look here as well, but keep in mind that they're restorations...

http://www.rougham.org/aircraft-b17.php

http://457thbombgroup.org/walkthru/b17-38.jpg

Well heres what I've done so far,

so many little guns, i always end up snapping a few barrels! 

B-17 Guy wrote:

I know exactly where your at!!!! We should meet up one of these days, trade notes. On topic....Your paint look's good from what I can see in the pic, the only critique I can suggest is that the demarcation lines (piant lines) on the engine nacelles needs fixed. You need to brring the OD down a bit farther past the seam lines of the upper and lower halves of the wings. Other than that, your golden, paint look's flawless.

any time.  i go by tim irl, shoot me a message if you like.  are there pm's on this board?

the paint is several years old, probably five at least.  it was airbrushed on while the bird was still on the spruce. that airbrush doesn't seem to have survived the move, or a least i can't place where it's at these days...

Added the toilet to the waist compartment...

'Bout ready to close 'er up.. Just gotta add floorboards to the waist gunner's stations and scatter the brass...

are there pm's on this board?

Look at the bottom of the post, Goat.  Click on the "PM" button and a window will open up.

Hi all,

 I am new here and am a huge Fort. fan and picked up the clear sided b-17 a while back and  plan getting to it as soon as I am able.  But I thought you might like to see some really up close picts I was able to get of the Belle a few years ago while in Memphis before it was taken to Ohio for more restoration.  The picts are pretty big and in a fashion that you might not get to see very often so I am going to post the links here so you can see them at your leisure.  Let me know what you think guys. 

Also having some issues getting links to work if they don't show please let me know. thanks

Good to be here.  Thanks Doug

torren_of_amber wrote:

Hi all,  I am new here and am a huge Fort. fan and picked up the clear sided b-17 a while back and  plan getting to it as soon as I am able.  But I thought you might like to see some really up close picts I was able to get of the Belle a few years ago while in Memphis before it was taken to Ohio for more restoration.  The picts are pretty big and in a fashion that you might not get to see very often so I am going to post the links here so you can see them at your leisure.  Let me know what you think guys.  Good to be here.  Thanks Doug

 Welcome! Yes, absolutely post those pics, soon! I wanna see them.

 Wow, that was quick response.  They are on photobucket and the links that I am using don't seem to be showing on my post.  Any advice???

Looks like you're using the wrong code.

Right-click on the picture, click "properties", then copy and paste the url shown on the properties in the image window that opens up when you click on the little "tree" icon at the top of the reply window here.. Also make sure that only ONE "http:" is in the url...

Hi Manny,

I am trying to do it that way and on my page after I save the link I get a little broken page in a box???   Should I just copy each link in a post???  Thanks for all the help.

 you should using code line "IMG Code"...

Then, it'll look like this:

Click on this little icon at the top of your reply window and paste your image code in the first box, making sure that you only have ONE "http:" in it.

Then click "insert"

[

Sorry for being so slow at this, I have never had this problem before. So here you go...Thanks again

You can take a break, far as I'm concerned, Doug... I'm not doin' the Belle or an F and I got stacks of B-17 stuff, m'self... 

If anyone else wants more, they'll chime in... Musta been a fun trip though...  The Belle was the first Fort I ever built, the Revell 1/72 kit, way back when... 

Hammer - Toilet paper roll to go along with your toilet perhaps??? hmmm.   I started re-doing my props last night, used some sanding sticks to strip off the black...they gonna be just fine.  I got the bomb racks today...thanks alot man, I truly appreciate it....I'm just waiting on my PE detail set to get here.  I don't want to stitch it up untill I get it. 

Feldmarcshall - Good to see you on the thread!  Keep up the posts!

I've got a couple "Fort's" started myself but don't see any spare time to work on either of them any time soon.  I found small nylon "ty-wraps" make good ammo chutes.  Some have the serations in them and others don't.  Depending on they type of chute you want to replicate they look pretty good.  They are a little hard to bend into shape but usually will stay after you have wrestled with them a while.  I was lucky to have flown in the CAF's "Texas Raider's" B-17 way back in 1979.  I'll never forget the experience!  It had been freshly repainted and looked great!  I would like to model it one day.  The tail number had the numbers of the Army Reserve Unit I was in at the time.  We were providing Helicopter Medevac services at the Air Show. I was in the 872nd Med. Det. 

Thanks for sharing all the pictures of the "Fort's" being built.

I got to fly right seat in "Raiders" m' self... Membership has it's privledges.. Helps havin' a tab at The Blue Max in Midland as well when Raider's flight crew is in there.

Glad ya got the bomb racks, Tiny... Sorry it took so long to get off my 4th point-of-contact and get 'em to ya...

Oddly enough, and I told Tiny about this, when he first discovered his kit was missing one of the bomb racks, I said I'd send him mine, since I didn't plan on using them.  I then dig into the kit (The old Monogram one) and find that I am missing the exact same part!  How weird is that?  So I sent him the racks from the Revell release..

update... getting ready to mask off for the final time and touch up the fort.  i'll have to do two maskings, to bring the od down a bit, and then to hit the engine cowling on the lower half.  trouble is i don't remember which color i used on the underside, so i'll just mask it off in whole and repaint.

i've got an airbrush on the way, so i'm gonna hold off, i've not had good luck with the spray cans from model masters, and have a few birds to dip into in the simple green.  gonna check that out.

the pics...

Goat - Lookin' pretty clean so far...are you plannin' beatin' her up a bit? Or are you gonna do a clean...off the line look?

i've never beat up an airplane intentionally... i'm no that good at it.  just happy to get semi-seamless joints and a clean paint job. :)

eventually i'll have to make the leap.

the round red/yellow decals that go on the face of the props are omitted from this kit, they only come with the tiny yellow lettering decals.  Not accurate and not as detailed.

I wouldn't sweat it... Blades had all that only when they came out the factory doors or out of a crate.  Blades that were repaired and refurbished in the field were over-painted black and the logos and stenciling were goners... 

Ok......smqall update, sorry no pics ...yet. I will get some soon. I sealed up the G, and now the F is sealed up. I was very mad when I forgot to put in the mounting for the ball turret BEFORE I glued the fuselage together! Tried to push it in anyways and the piece of floor got pushed up past it's mounting peg, had to dig out the needle nose pliers to get it down again, but the bracket went in thankfully. I masked and painted the neutral grey on the G's belly and set that off to the side. Then I started on my rather complex F model nose, see pic below.

I decided to install little guices to help everything go together better, hard to explain, you'll see when I can get those pics posted. But the lower part of the nose is glued on to the fuselage at least. Then the floor from the navigator and bombardier's compartment will be installed. I'm trying to figure out how to go about detailing the interior of the nose. I've gotta figure that out as well as just trying to construct it, then fill sand and paint. I think I might be better off painting each piece seperatley, building, fill and sand then paint again, who knows, we'll see what happens. Ideas are welcome

Goat......I dont see anything wrong with your OD paint, you say you need to bring it down? Do you just mean bring it down on the sides of the engine nacelles? Or were you reffering to the color?

Hans von Hammer wrote:

I wouldn't sweat it... Blades had all that only when they came out the factory doors or out of a crate.  Blades that were repaired and refurbished in the field were over-painted black and the logos and stenciling were goners...

Agreed, I would not worry about it.

uglygoat wrote:

i've never beat up an airplane intentionally... i'm no that good at it.  just happy to get semi-seamless joints and a clean paint job. :) eventually i'll have to make the leap.

Cheap and easy way to some weathering.......watercolors! Basic kids watercolor paint, applied with a brush, try it out on a old scrapped kit if you have one around. I use watercolors and black acrylic paint, cheap stuff.