The Officially Shameless PBY/Halloween '09 GB

I roughed out the SLAFCO tail. Restructured the horizontal tailplanes, mounted the rudder and dryfitted all the parts.

 Top shelf stuff Eric!  Really inspirational all that scratch built stuff and it looks so darn good I'm jealous!

Bondo ! Two Updates in two days?  What in the world?  Real progress I wish I was able to be as diligant!  Hope this next week is a better one for both of us!

Very nice work Eric and Bondo,  looks like we're getting some momentum on this build! I love the airline style seats in particular Eric, very nicely done! And the tail mod is equally splendid Bondo, I really like the look of the rudder slightly off axis. Stop giving me ideas! This buid is slow enough as it is!

So I'm still plodding along on mine to get my Vector engines to fitt. I decided to move ahead and finish them off as intended rather than trying to sand the edges of the engines down. I went ahead and cut the cowl and am adding some styrene to enlarge its diameter, we'll see how it looks when I'm done. I do have a set of cowls from another kit that look more to size and if my adjustments of the PBY cowls don't look quite up to my tastes I'll try and modify them a bit...decisions decisions!

Tony

simpilot34, sfcmac, Glad you like it.

Everyones comments is a real motivation to get these models done.

Bondo Glad to see the progress on your bird, your a real inspiration.

Lot a work to mod that plane and should really inspire others to try it. 

Hot-Pb glad you like the seats, they where inspired by the Netherlands plane that is on so many aircraft sites.

Love those engines, might have to pick up a set when I get to my 1/48.

Eric... 

Bondo! Like Aaron said, two updates in as many days!!!! Thats really great, considering I haven't even started! Looking Great!!! Really can't wait to see 'er all painted up and lookin' pretty!!!!

Tony, hope all goes well shoehorning those 1830's!!!! Now that I see how you are going about enlarging the diameter, this is hindsight now but I would have quartered the cowl and shimmed the cuts then glue it all up and sand it back to shape. That way you will have an equal enlargement of the circumference. Just my and a bit late now i know.

simpilot34 wrote:

Tony, hope all goes well shoehorning those 1830's!!!! Now that I see how you are going about enlarging the diameter, this is hindsight now but I would have quartered the cowl and shimmed the cuts then glue it all up and sand it back to shape. That way you will have an equal enlargement of the circumference. Just my and a bit late now i know.

NOW you tell me! Haha... 

Hey all,

The Forum has been ominously silent of late. I hope the BVD hasn't completely drowned in torpedo juice. Anyhow, just to clear the cobwebs I figured I would post an update photo.  This build has taken me waaaay too long so I'm trying to make a push and finish it off this week so I can spend more time on my next build. Anyhow, here she be. Still have to seal the decals, do a wash, glue on some of the knick knacks (antennae, etc.) and then mount ordnance. I'll post photos of the completed build when it's all done. Whew...this one's been a slow haul.

Tony

simpilot34 wrote:

Tony, that looks awesome!!!!!! Looking forward to seeing the completed pics!!!! Well Done!!!

Thanks simpilot34. Of course the down side of finishing it off is figuring out where to display it! It's a beast.

As an aside, I was looking for some pictures of how the PBY's mounted Mk. 13 torpedos and came across a copy of the PBY flight operating manual on Google Books. Has some great photos for reference if anyone finds it useful.

Also, I'm planning to use the Moskit metal exhausts and I notice they look a little bit too long. Anyone else used them? Do they need to be trimmed to fit properly?

cheers,

Tony

Looking Good.

I thought I posted a link to some good pix of the Torp mount a few pages back.

I had a slight setback.

I was about to seal up the fuselages and discovered I put the mounting hole on the wrong plane..

The up side is it kept me from accidentally sealing it up without weights in the nose.

Hope to get them sealed up this week after I get some weights.

Eric... 

Yeah. I'm not really worried about the hole since it's will be sitting so low to the ground and it's hidden behind the wheel.

Eric... 

Here are the torpedo rack pix I have.

Eric... 

Just found this tiny pic as well.

Here's an update. This has turned out to be a great project. Airliner/ firebomber/ highly modified.

I like kit bashes, so I took on the nose, the rudder, and the upgraded 2600 engines.

That took a lot of time.

The only AM was: the resin wheels and eduard masks. And decals.

Donor parts; a B-25 from the bargain bin at the LHS that yielded a set of R2600's, props and cowlings.

Life goes on. I'm at about 100 hours, and am close to "I'm calling it done", but still have a whole project with vhf/ uhf and cell phone antennas all over the cockpit.

More later.

Where's the BVD?

All Done!!!

Haha...finally. For me, this one took me quite a while and I was eager to get it finished up and move on to my other builds. In retrospect I'd have done a couple of things differently, but overall I'm pretty happy with the results. Here's some pics I took this morning...thanks for looking.

Tony

That turned out great.

Love all the little details on the guns and the torp.

Where did you get the feed shoots for the guns?

Eric... 

Division 6 wrote:

That turned out great. Love all the little details on the guns and the torp. Where did you get the feed shoots for the guns?   Eric...

 Thanks Eric...the guns are the 1/48 Aires waist guns to which I added the Eduard 0.50 cal photoetched ammon belts.

Tony

Here comes my entry into the GB. The Super Cat, as modified by Slafco and featured in the film "Always". Originally a PBY-5A, she was retrofitted with R-2600 engines, a new fore deck and a larger rudder.

My model started with the Academy 1/72 PBY-5A "Black Cat", and included Draw Decals set for the aircraft, new engines, cowlings and props from a donor Italeri B-25, kit bashed nacelles, resin tires to replace the really inexplicable Academy rubber ones, and a scratch built rudder. Eduard masks, which are wrong for the blisters but will have to do.

This took a fair amount of time but I'm pretty happy with it.

Photographed at Buchanan Airfield, Concord CA, May 2009.

Thanks for looking.

Nam I hope you are following this. This one is for you, my friend.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JkE24axSBTI

bondoman wrote:

Here comes my entry into the GB. The Super Cat, as modified by Slafco and featured in the film "Always". Originally a PBY-5A, she was retrofitted with R-2600 engines, a new fore deck and a larger rudder.

Spectacular work Bondo! Well done....  

And the photography is outstanding...you got the scaling perfectly.

Holy smokes!  For some reason I didn't get any e-mails showing the posting here!  I thought  things had hibernated but wow!

 Hot Pb! That is one tough looking PBY!  I really like your work with the ventral at gun and ordinance!  It really turned out sharply! ery sorry for being so slow to reply!

Bondo that looks like it flew right out the movie!  The colors had to be tough!  Mine woulda turned out pink!  I can't say how well I think it turned out and very clever photography! It could pass for a real aircraft on the Tarmac!  I Always new you were smarter than the average bear!

Very spectacular looking work on both counts fellows!  Rumor has it that there is a 1/72 scale steering yoke part in his basket! 

Well, it's taken a long time but I finally got there. Back from the dead, here is my Promodeller PBY-5A in 1/48, with aftermarket engines, cockpit, wheels and exhausts. The bow rope was replaced with wire, MVP lenses and brake lines added along with a bit of etch.

It's finished as A24-104, ZA-T, from 111 Air Sea Rescue Flight RAAF in New Guinea early 1945. Toward then end I just wanted to finish it and so I made a few mistakes, especially in the paint chipping which got a bit out of hand! In any case, I'm not unhappy with it. It needs a few more little things to finish but is 99% there. Eventually I will make a suitably grubby setting for it.

All the best

nick

Sunnas wrote:

Well, it's taken a long time but I finally got there. Back from the dead, here is my Promodeller PBY-5A in 1/48, with aftermarket engines, cockpit, wheels and exhausts. The bow rope was replaced with wire, MVP lenses and brake lines added along with a bit of etch. It's finished as A24-104, ZA-T, from 111 Air Sea Rescue Flight RAAF in New Guinea early 1945. Toward then end I just wanted to finish it and so I made a few mistakes, especially in the paint chipping which got a bit out of hand! In any case, I'm not unhappy with it. It needs a few more little things to finish but is 99% there. Eventually I will make a suitably grubby setting for it. nick

Great work Nick! The detail work in particular. Are the fishtail exhausts the Moskit set? If so, I'm curious how you liked working with them?

 cheers,

Tony