P-38 Lightning group build - Are we there yet???

Guys some nice work going on here although some of what I see on the Academy kit is a little scary.

I'm making very slow progress and don't really have anything to post yet, my PE seat didn't work out as well as I'd hoped so I scratched one from plastic card, I'll get some pics up in the next day or two.

Cheers...

Spike190

Guys some nice work going on here although some of what I see on the Academy kit is a little scary.

If it weren't for a decision to step away from the bench for five minutes to clear my head, you'd be seeing one Academy P-38F shattered on my garage floor...

Even after days of filling, sanding, filling, etc, I hit the kit with a bit of primer in a few places last night (I was priming the P-47), and it's VERY obvious that it's been puttied. Not obvious in a smoothness/no panel lines way, but in a "it's obvious it's been puttied and the fit still sucks" kind of way. 

Fortunately, in this pic the real P-38 looks like it's been puttied too. 

Hang in there doogs. Swear to it that you are gonna win and show it who's boss!

The plane in that pic looks like heII. Something that modelers seem to forget sometimes, most of the prototypes weren't perfect either. I've yet to see a perfectly smooth and flawless warbird, original OR restored. In fact, sometimes it looks like certain panels were screwed to the airframe then beat into shape with a hammer.

I'd like to throw my hat into the ring if I could.  1/72 Academy P-38J.

Is there such a thing as a P-38 kit that fits? I built a 1/72 kit back in 1990 or 91. I think it was a Hasegawa kit but not positive. Don't remember if it fit well or not.

Sorry to hear of your troubles Doogs, keep plugging away and I'm sure you'll get the better of it.

Here is a picture of the seat I scratched to replace the kit one, I've also been adding some PE and making a few little changes so I can add more as the PE set is for the Hasegawa kit.

First time I've scratch built anything so I'm quite pleased how the seat came out.

Bench time isgoing to be pretty quiet over christmas but I'll pick up in the new year.

Cheers guys and happy holidays,

Spike190

Sorry to hear of your troubles Doogs, keep plugging away and I'm sure you'll get the better of it.

First off - FANTASTIC job with that seat! 

As for my troubles...yeah I plan to keep plugging away. Just really needed to move the Lightning aside and make meaningful progress on the Jug. 

Pulled the P-38 off the shelf tonight and sprayed it down with Tamiya AS-12 silver. I suck at rattlecans, but kinda figured at this point it couldn't hurt. If anything, it'd help pinpoint the worst areas. 

And it actually came out a lot better than I'd imagined possible. Very few really nasty seams visible from the top, and those mostly at the boom joins just behind the wing. The nose actually looks extremely decent.

Still need to get the canopy bits and the cockpit masked properly, but hopefully I'll be putting paint on it before too long. 

Way to go doogs. It's gonna look super with paint and weather on it.

I've been working on the booms, getting radiator stuff worked out and attempting to remove the toylike look of the kit by refining scoops and such. The nacelle faces behind the props pass the 3ft glance test but under closer scrutiny they are ugly. I'm attempting to build the trunking into the part and add oil coolers or whatever those things are inside, to add some life to the part and get rid of the clunky detail.
Next on the list is wheel well detail of which the kit provides zero. I'll box the wells in and add some pipes and hoses. Once I'm happy with the result I have rescribing to do so it looks like the majority of work I'm going to do on the kit is going to be boom corrections and detail

Hey gang, Christmas (and the pre-Christmas rush at the office) has assaulted & battered me this past week . I'll be checking out the progress tonight while working on my own builds. Catch you this evening,

hey guys... keep up the good work.. ( from your lurking co-host)

Don't let the Lightning get you down.. their beautiful birds when done,, and those Revellograms still stand the test of time...

Remember, its almost like working on 2 planes at once.. so.. keep plugging !!

Can I do a little braggin'? Straight A's for the first semester. 4.0 Not too bad for a 54 year old that hadn't been in school since '74 huh? lol

I haven't touched the P-38. I promise that tomorrow nite I will have pics of what's been done so far. Did get a new airbrush and have been playing with it a little. Hope to get two other projects done while playing around with some paint.

Tony

Hey lads, I am glad to see I am not the only one battling with this darn P-38

I is the hasegawa 1/72 but man the fit ot the booms to wing were bad! I had to fill and sand and this inevetebly lead to the raised pannellines going MIA!

Ah, well so we learn hey! The detail in the wheel wells are non existing, but I don't realy care abuot it as my fun factor with this kit had long gone !

Hoping to slap some paint on it soon.

Theuns

PS. How does one qualify for a GB badge and how can it be added to my profile?

Cheers Doogs, glad you liked the seat. Hey despite your woes your P38 is looking really great , looking forward to seeing the paint go on.

Thuens keep at it, it's looking good in the picture.

Cheers...

Some non-cell phone pics of the silvered-up Lightning. It really looks a lot better than I'd imagined. There are some rough areas, but I'm going to be beating so far to hell with the weathering that they'll probably be pretty difficult to pick out.

So Doogs, a lot of filling and sanding with this model huh? I've decided not to build a lightning for a GB as I dont think I'd be able to keep a dead line with it so I will build it a bit at a time. Test fitting didnt seem too bad on mine, just around where the engines fit into the wings, with a few minor other places.

Talk about alignment issues!  I glued the booms together just aft of the wheel bays.  Once that was completely dry, I taped the booms to the wing and then using a right angle square, I squared up the inside rudders to the rear wing.  I modified Swanny's technique a little so they'll be aligned 98% correct I think. Now just have  to glue the rest of the booms together and then to the wing.  But after pulling the tape the outer rudders showed the extent of the misalignment.  See what I mean:

Sorry, fell asleep last nite. Here we go...

First, the obligatory box and sprue shots.

Parts trimmed out...

Little bit of paint...

Finished pit...

Pit in place and wings glued...

A little work on the cowlings. First I used a cylindrical burr in the die grinder to remove a little material inside the cowlings.

Then I stuck a piece of the brass screen to some tape to keep it from unravelling when I punched out some discs. They needed a backing anyway. 

 Got two photos out of order here but I cut some short pieces of .125 Evergreen tubing and then trimmed off one side a bit. Then I cut some longer pieces of .062 tubing and slipped the .125 over it. The discs were .125 so they set on the .062 and allowed them to be slightly recessed. I glued the tubing together and the discs to the tubing and glued them inside the cowlings.

 The wall thickness could be a little thinner and I turned one the wrong way when I glued it in but it will do.

That's all for now. Started trimming out some sheet to make radiators for the booms and will get back to that after Christmas.

Tony

Wingman,  Great looking start on the Revell kit.  Those little details really dress up an out of the box kit.  I'm following your lead and just getting underway on my twin boomer.   FYI Vance, I'm doing a F-5E Photo Recon version by Academy.  It was a tough choice, But I was looking for a little something different.  I'll take a shot at an European Theater 8th or 9th Air Force aircraft.  It will probably not represent a particular aircraft, but a fictitious bird.  My concern will to try and create a representative color scheme.

I got a good start on it this week.  I'm pleased with the cockpit.  I've put in an Eduard instrument panel, seat harnes, and some placards.  I scratched in throttle quadrants, bezels, and some wiring.  I like how the little details and some clutter just bring the cockpit to life.  It a shame that the cowl will cover up half of all that work.

I've begun the work on the main wheel wells.  I'm going to busy them up a little bit.  I'll try to share some good shots as I go.  Wheels Up!   Rick.

Wingman, way to go on that kit. I've done something similar to the nacelle fronts on my own build and in a day or two I'll have some pics. You have a good looking cockpit there too.
I'll be watching to see how you tackle the radiators. I opened up and thinned the outlet doors, added a radiator face made of styrene and some coarse mesh I had laying around, removed the overly thick panels in the outlets and replaced them with card, added actuator rods to the outlet doors, and installed a blanking plate to prevent any possible see through.
Right now they are cemented together, waiting for gear well walls and detail, as well as some rescribing of lines. I'm stalled at the moment with the holidays but should be able to get going in ernest next week.

BTW, Wingman, congrats on the grades!

Wabash, great looking pit!

Thanks guys. I appreciate the comments. Gonna try to tough it out with this kit but don't know what the end result will be. The boom/wing join is going to take probably 3/32 of styrene to fill the void on the underside. On each side of each boom. It's going to need shims at just about every mating surface. Otherwise, the only thing to glue between wing and boom is where the top of the gear bays touch the wings. But the top surfaces of the booms are flush with the wings where they should be. Don't know if that makes sense but I'll try to post some pics tonite to show what I mean. And btw, I gave the wrong dimensions for the tubing I used on the cowlings, instead of 1/16 and 1/8 it was 1/8 and 3/16.

Wabashwheels, that's a nice looking build you have going on there. I really like the cockpit. The hobby shop down the street has that one, Glacier Girl and another that I don't recall which version it is. I almost went with the one you're building. Still may end up with one of them. lol

hkshooter, that's a lot of work. I don't imagine scribing a clean line in this plastic is any fun. My plan is to cut some sheet to fit inside the booms, glue on some more brass screen and use another piece of sheet to make a frame to lay over the screen to give a solid edge. Not sure how to blend it all in.

Hate to expose my ignorance here but, what are the teardrop shaped things that go on the side of the booms ahead of the radiator openings?

Tony

That is an air intake for the turbo-superchargers. They provide cool air that feeds up through the wheel well to the bottom of the turbo-superchargers.

Mike

Had to post some pics even though there isn't much obvious progress. Here's a pic of the nacelle front showing the new oil cooler (or whatever they are. I should look that up) and the new trunking for the the center intake. There are supposed to be tiny ribs, three of them, in the roof of that intake. I omitted them.

I had already decided to do something with the wheel wells when today I found myself staring at them. They are actually way to shallow and I don't think added detail, while adding interest, would look right.

So this area has to go. And my oh my what have I got myself into. Why can't I just build the silly kit and call it good?

I removed the shaded area, refined the hole, test fitted lots of card stock, and added strip and more sheet to clean up and add detail to the bay. As it sits now this side is almost done, there is only one panel left to make and install. I'll post pics of the bay once the panel is done. After that I have plans for pipes and such to busy up the area. Then I have to do it again. And again. Because the front bay gets the treatment too.
And there's scribing to do too. Ugh.
Maybe I'll get it done by the end of the build date.

You took on a major project there! The outer intakes are for the oil coolers and the center one is for the intercooler.

Wabash, Just a note on that F-5E. Academy got the nose wrong. They made it like an over exaggerated F-5B nose on the bottom. The panel on the bottom where the camera ports are is flat. I maked it in yellow and also note the lip just before the nose well circled in red. I didn't fix it on the first one I built but will on the next one.

Mike

Mike, thanks for the information. Makes sense now.

hkshooter, you are a glutton for punishment. I look forward to seeing how they turn out.

Won't overload you with pics tonite. I was getting caught up before and tonite the batteries died after a couple shots. Didn't get a lot done but did whittle out a backing plate for the front section of the radiators. Now just have to duplicate a few times. That was after killing the batteries though. Here's the gap on the underside between the wing and boom. You could see that in hk's picture too.

Maybe not as big as I estimated but still there. Don't recall if I mentioned this last nite but the glue on section for the fronts of the radiators are kinda small on my kit so I glued them on a piece of sheet and will carve them out and shape them. Added a second piece of sheet behind the two smallest after this pic.

Not much progress tonite but I did get a little time in. Did some painting on another project too. Hopefully I'll get a little more done tomorrow nite.

Tony

Yeah, Tony. I know. Some times I hate myself. I did finally draw the line though. I had actually considered cutting out the same portion of the wing to get more depth for the wheel bay but after factoring in adding the main spar and other things I dropped the idea. That plastic is super thick and this looks better than before.

Another thing that made me axe the idea was how the gear attach. The hole in the ceiling of the bay is for locating the gear leg at the proper angle and also to prevent them from folding up. I'd have had to rework how the gear locate and figure out how to keep them from folding up. As it is already I plan to add missing retraction links to the gear. And the actual pockets the gear legs locate in on the sides are to close to the edge of the opening and should be up higher in the bay. This would mean lengthening the gear legs and relocating the pocket. After considering all this I decided in the interest of sanity and time I'd stop here and go on with the build. Not to mention I'd have to do it all twice.

Because of that decision the ceiling of the bay is at an angle that matches that of the bottom of the wing, something that grates on me but it's gonna have to do. I never wanted this project to become as big as it has already.

Tony, don't forget to add weight somewhere.

Here are some pics of the right side boom wheel well. There are some errors but the general look is there.

I couldn't figure out an easy way to put the relief for the retracted tire into the ceiling of the bay so it's flat there. The hydraulic lines are routed on the opposite side of the bay because where they are supposed to go they would get in the way of the locating post for the main gear.

The door retraction ram is made of tubing but is a bit oversized. It'll do. When I add detail to and install the doors I'll add the links to the shuttle on the end of the ram. I've decided to leave out the control cables and pulleys that attach to the ram and side wall. Gotta draw the line somewhere or this thing will be a shelf queen.

Tonight I started messaging the seams on this boom. Once those are smooth I'll rescribe some lines then prime the part to look for FUBARs for correction. Once this boom is attached to the kit and the gaps are curing I'll restart the whole process on the left side boom.

That's cool. It really is. You've really captured the look hkshooter. Not to play the devils advocate but maybe a little piece of vacform from a cookie tray or something similar would give you the wheel recess. I want to do it now but since I've already glued the wing and fuselage the nose gear well would be kinda tough so I'm just gonna stick with my plan. That is just to add a few things that can be seen while it's setting on the shelf and to keep light from shining through where it shouldn't.

Got my batteries charged and a little progress tonite. Here's the radiator inlets I built up. Still need a little clean up and to be thinned a little but they won't look too bad once in place. Better than they were.

Then I got back to work on the radiator plates. I'll just call them bulkheads.

Got the first one dialed in and used it as a template for the rest. They vary a little from piece to piece but it's a start.

Four down...

And four to go...

Next I'll glue on some screen and trim and make a little frame for the exposed sides. FIgured I'd leave the excess on to make handling and positioning them easier. Before I glue them in I'll work on the rear doors and opening a little. I'm just going to make bulkheads for the front and rear of the gear bays to close them and let it go at that.

Tony

HK ; wow ..awesome work !!

Everyone !! great stuff so far.. !

Sorry boys, haven't even been lurking, but will check in tonight. The short story: Uhh, Christmas + grandmother with a double-stroke + sister-in-law in the hospital + sinus cold = little building in y household. I'll check in tonight after the meds take over!!!