AIR RACER GROUP BUILD BECAUSE WE FEEL THE NEED FOR SPEED

Nice scratch building, John! I can't wait for the final results... she's gonna look mighty fine.

I'm calling it on the Spitfiretron. The Academy MkXIV is a great kit to build. Not a Tamiya or Hasegawa but simple and fun with a good fit and no hassles. I'm definitely going to pick up another in the future.

A little overkill on the shine but she's lookin' pretty good nontheless...

Hope you like her.

Now... just need to figure out what will be my next victim.  

I've started work on the Turner Special.  It's an old Lindberg kit that will need a little help, but the fuselage and wing shapes are workable.  So far I have filled in most of the fabric detail on the fuselage and removed it from the control surfaces where I will add subdued rib detail later. 

The cowl has had some reshaping done, the original has a slight onion shape in the forward 2/3.  Lindberg did it as one piece with a straight taper largest at the rear.  The propeller has had some work.  I removed all the blades from the hub, and then added various plastic tube and spares bits to replicate the early Hamilton Standard two part bolt together hub, the 3 blade counterweight mechanism, and the front external piston.  The blades had a concave rear surface and they necked down too much near the hub so plastic card and putty were used to reshape them.  They still need sanding to shape in the photos.

I built an interior structure in the cockpit area.  I have pretty good references, mostly an article by Ken Wilson in the June 1974 Wings magazine.  Plastic rod and sheet and a throttle quadrant from the remains of a 1/32 Monogram Mustang left over from 1968 were used so far, with a few more details to add, in addition to an instrument panel yet to come.  The seat is all from plastic card.  Usually I don't have enough patience for all this, but in the large scale I am having a good time.

I'm doing the decal on my ALPS printer, double duty here because a friend and I are also bulding 1/5 scale R/C models of the airplane.

Jeremy- You may have to build up the color in the panel lines with thin water color paint , very lightly wiping off each coat with a damp, soft(very soft) brush between coats. But, if you feel that would still scratch the shine? Don't. The shine of that finish shows the panels nicely.

MIflyer- Thanks Kev. They took a little figuring and attempts to get them to look right. Just wait till I do the larger ones for the radiator inlets on the undersides. 

 First I'm going to finish off the bodywork and 1rst prime the model. Then scratch build and kit bash the cockpit from the underside then I'll tackle the radiators, inlets, and cooling exhaust. After that I'll finish off the shaping and smoothing of the undersides of the aircraft. Followed by another coat of automotive sanding primer. I'm going with a look of most panel lines having been filled and smoothed to reduce as much aero drag as possible.

Randy- I would like to add 1/48 Revellogram T-6 to this build. I'll use it as a nice decompress build after the F-82 and my Lib. It will be OOB except for paint and markings. I plan on it being a companion piece to the Daddy 1 race team. The twin 'Stang will be my ride and the Texan will have my daughter as pilot. It may be a little while till I get a start on it and I plan on involving my girl with the actual building, doing some off the painting and gluing with my assistance. Maybe a Jimmy Buffett themed "Little Miss Magic" . Should be a hoot. I know she'll get a kick out of it.

Thanks for the compliments guys!

Attempts at a wash have failed. If I mix a wash up thick enough to show, wiping it off scratches the paint surface. If I mix it thin enough to flow in the panel lines, it doesn't show due to the shine. I should have sprayed her with future but I was afraid I would lose the polished look. I'll try again on the next one... promise.

John - Don't give up hope man! Try contacting Accurate Miniatures for a replacement canopy and door. May cost some but beats throwing out the kit. I wish I had a spare for ya.

Howard - Niiiiiice!

daddy1 wrote:

Wow, scratchbuilt NACA scoops! You rule, dude!

Kev

Fermis -GGG (Great Galloping Ghost). The wash adds a nice nostalgic feel. I like to use my daughters watercolors with a drop of dishsoap in the water. Some of those paint sets have many colors . Greys, browns, of course ,black and white. I find the Crayola brand has the richest color and quality ,but Rose Art works well too.

Jeremy- The Spitfiretron looks striking. Definately need shades to view. Can't wait to see how a wash sets the panel lines against that shine.

John- Makes me want to cry. Probably the first call for the new ambulance. Hang in there.

Chris - Darned ,new fangled electronic gadgets. I'm sure it looks great.

 Here's a couple pics of the new carb air intakes  and cylinder head bumpouts. They still need a little more spot filling.

 Note I've cut out the flaps to drop them down and also will droop the elevator a touch. Ive also blended the back of the cockpit opening a bit more. Almost ready for a first coat of primer.

 Thinking of a small vignett display with a couple ground crew polishing, or maybe pilot and crewchief preflighting , or something . Not a lot, just a figure or two in coordinating team jackets to bring the display to life.

Hey guys,

haven't been around in a while...  Eagle scout project (now finished) and school took up a lot of building time....

well, I'm back at it!  Here is the victim:

Oh yeah, finally got around to getting a new camera.  Pictures from now on should be much better.

Also, here is some work I did with the spinner to close up the cowl and streamline the front end.  More pics to follow later:

Jon:  Oh jeeze... I thought what happened with John Sharp's craft was bad...must've lost power on the takeoff rollout...  But hey, keep at it!  The cockpit (or what I can see in the picture) looks GREAT!

Cheers, 

-Chris 

EDIT:  Oh, nuts...  A curse on all your houses, the pictures didn't show up!!  May take me a little longer than I thought to get these up...

Sorry guys.

Cheers,

-Chris

Jeremy, the Spitfiretron looks awesome!!!! Beautiful finish with decals!!!

John, I will see you at dawn.

Well I am glad to see others are having better luck than I am.

I had the P-39 in my "paint booth" a.k.a. on a box on stool in my garage when my wife comes home and backs into the garage and bumps the stool over. She didn't notice anything unsual. I go out to find the empty stool and the P-39 strewn across the floor! Chunks of paint missing and the left door no where to be found. To add insult to injury, inspite of three light coats of primer, and two smooth coats of red, the third coat orange peeled horribly! I don't know what to do now. If I should try sanding out the orange peel, try striping it, or throw it out and start the second P-39 that was supposed to built as "Cobra II". I will have to come up with a new left door and a new canopy since the existing one is cracked lengthwise and has a chunk missing. I normally do everything by brush, and for projects involving difficult colors like large areas of red or yellow use rattle cans. Just when I was getting back in the swing of building again!

Got the decals on the Spitfiretron.

I'm kinda sorry that I went the polished aluminum route as the clear film on the decals really shows at certain angles. I cut the clear film from the larger ones but wasn't about to try it with the small letters. 

Now I need to think about a wash, landing gear and tackle that dang canopy seam.

Wow Jeremy, beautiful job on the Ghost. Looks used but not abused, like she just finished a lap and is being put back to bed for the day.

How did the decals treat you? I bet if you sent a couple of those photos to Keith, he would post 'em on his website.

Kevin

Awesome work Fermis! Your Mustang looks perfect!

I have been in a model building slump since June, and I suppose it's time I start working on my first entry to this group build. Between family, paying job, and putting a new Ambo in service at the FD, I just have'nt had time or energy to start on anything. It feels great to be working on something again.

Here is proof that I am actually working on something for this group build I just started this morning:

This is what I had been working on getting it ready to go in service. 

Fermis Yup ya nailed the Galloping Ghost ! Looks great, the decals look good too. How did you like the Pegesus decals ? Any problems with them ? The water colors make a great wash in MHO, I have been using them. Oh and yes I did update the front page in both groups

Looks like I am gonna have to pull out  Miss America and get her going we need more builds on the front page.

 Thank you very much!!!

 The wash is just some cheap craft paint(water based), raw umber, thinned with water and a drop of Dawn(dishsoap)

 It came out a bit dirtier than I had hoped, but, I'll take it!

   Beautiful!  

I may have the shine but it will be hard to get her looking as good as yours!

I gotta know... what did you use for a wash? I love the way it came out.

Absolutely stunning!

 Well, it's nowhere near as shiney as that spit, but, it's done!!! My first entry for this GB.

 Hasigawas 1/48 P-51d with Red Pegasas decals, "Galloping Ghost" in it's 1948 markings. It has since been highly modified and is still in the game.

 I used rattlecans for all but the NMF, which is my usual MM Metalizer, followed by a coat of metalizer sealer, decals, and another coat of sealer. I did a light wash on the panels of the NMF and just the control surfaces for the wings and tail. A bit of pastel powder finished off the exaust.

        FERMIS

Thanks for the help guys, will try it again Thought i set the pressure too high so dropped it and dropped it...hahaha

richard

Kermit - I agree that you need to thin the paint. Do what Randy says... always do some test spraying before you start. Also, be careful with paint straight from the bottle. If you don't strain it, check it good. I opened a brand new bottle of paint once, thinned it and sprayed it on. The bottle was full of little pieces of black debris and it clogged my airbrush and left some wierd splatter marks on my plane.

John - Welcome! That Turner Special sure is a gorgeous plane. Can't wait to see that one!

Jeremy,

Nice work lad!  Can't wait to see the rest of her.

Jmabx, Thats about the shiniest and most flawless NMF i have seen on this forum sofar! You sir are an artist And thank you for explaining how you did it.

Makes my next question a bit of the right timing....

As you all know i was getting into this air races business ([;]) with a fictional Lavochkin LA5... Finished construction, filled the seams and masked the canopy.... so far so good, done that a few times now so that wasnt too hard to do...

I went and took it into my spraying booth and sprayed it in a gloss black color, using the airbrush ready revell enamel variant. Used them before and never encountered any problems sofar; just screw the lid off and hang it on your airbrush and youre good to go...

Misted the first layer on, much like jmabx did and left it to dry for 30 mins.... then a heavier coat.....left it to dry....and a third one.

For the second time now the paint is feeling like there is a layer of sand in that jar of paint. The surface should be smooth as a babies rear end but it feels really rough and not glossy at all...

Too much pressure...? Too little? Should i thicken or thin the paint more?

I feel like a greenhorn right now and slightly embarassed to ask these kind of questions but it has been the second time over now and i never really encountered this problem before

Any and all help is very welcome at this point as i am in a right mind of binning the model and start another one for the group...

Richard