Bruce- That ammo run on the 51 is sweet! Nice work there sir 

Eatthis- loving the alclad work you are doing. That group looks pretty imposing. 

29 Build update: The repair of the right wing paint tabacle is complete. After sanding, I took a piece of landscape wiring and stripped it to reveal stranded wire. Then I took a single strand and pulled it through a small puddle of clear parts glue and touched each panel line and removed the wire. It left a small ridge of glue to simulate the raised panel line...not perfect, but may just be enough. I proceeded with a few touch ups to sanding and polishing...and then on to masking...she is ready for cladding. After that is done, I will revisit some additional panel work as necessary.

Some WIP below: (including engine/prop assemblies)

Masked bottom side-

The assemblies close to their homes...tempting huh?

Smelling the build assembly finish...undetermined yet on washes. Decaling and detail work pending.

Just for fun...I tested the metal plate buffing over a spare part that had been painted and dipped in Future and was completely dry...when attempting to buff, it appears that the metal buffing spray ate through the future and softened the original paint. so when trying to buff to a polish shine, it removed all back to the bare plastic or grey primer. FYI...

that b29 really does look special!

can i enter another quick build?

i built this today in about 3 hours very few parts pretty poor fit though.

this is another for a what if gb on another forum (whif ww2 was 1944-1955)

heres another interceptor the saunder roe sr53 is a stepping stone between my twin engined spitfire and the monstrous ee lightning.

it was a real design with a small jet engine suplemented by a rocket motor

Bruce: Nice work there, I also love how the ammo belts came out.

Eatthis: Cool - the NM on the P-51 and SF53 looks perfect.

Rich: She looks all ready for the NM now. I did the same thing, painted her all black and then masked off the black leading edges before spraying. Not sure what happened with your buffing, I've never tried it before. I suppose you could lightly buff Alclad but I've been able to get the shine I wanted so I never tried.

buffing alclad doesnt increase the shiney it just rubs through it lol its VERY thin

I was unclear on the buffing...I was trying to buff the Silver Plate Metalizer (rattle can). I used that on the cowlings and came out great. The reason I was testing was I had painted the prop hubs silver (testors small bottle-hand paint) very early on in the build and dipped them in future after the decals were applied. Since the cowlings came out so well, I considered doing just the hubs with Silver Plate. So...I painted>dipped in future a spare part and let dry over a week > then sprayed the Silver Plate > attempted to buff and did not work.

No intention on buffing the alclad...which got first light coat applied this morning. Probably needs 2 more light coats before I peel the masking and work on the 2 other alclad shades for panels.

Sorry for any confusion

if you give alclad a few coats can you mask to it or will it still pull off?

Oh I'm sorry, misunderstood you. Afraid I'm not really sure, you have the right idea there, try something out on a test piece or old model before you try it on a good one.

......Hi....almost ended.....almost.......!!Ciao Enrico

Awesome paint work!

as above!!!

Well, I'm enjoying this balmy spring weather but it's been way too windy to take any photos outside for the past two weeks. So since the lighting is good in the office I took these photos there- please excuse the file cabinets! So here finally are my photos of 'Gladys'! 

Applying this filter got rid of most of the weird green neon effect on the yellow nose I had from the outside photos- so here's pilot Hans von Hornet ready to take 'er out! 

Gamera- Gladys looks great!! Love the detail work you put into her engine in behind that prop.

Gammera - very very cool !!

Thanks guys! That darn drop tank looks crooked to me, same as the last P-47 I did though!

looks ok to me. maybe you are pished :-) or i am....

it looks like its pointing slightly to the left if anything

hi all......I can see metallic beauty all around the Gb...compliments to all!!!......my preferred is the B-29!!

The P-51D is ended.........Good Easter from Italy.....Enrico.

She looks great, Starfighter!  Love that checkerboard tail.

Gary

brilliant!

She's beautiful Enrico! The more I look at the checkers the more I love them!

Happy Easter to you and your family sir.

Happy Easter to all...

29 build update...the cladding of the 29 is complete.  She received 3 shades of clad including: airframe aluminum, dull aluminum, magnesium and also took on some silver plate buffing metalizer, (which I really liked the control of even though it meant extra work!)

Wing tabacle abated...but I'll let you folks be the judge on that! LOL...the shortcomings of the overall result is in the base coat and sanding (surface prep before clad). I would definitely do some things different now, but feel I made a "fair" recovery. Intrigued to see??

...doing some touch ups this evening and should get images up by Tuesday/Wed.

Enrico- all I can say is  followed by  and lastly...

Here we go...

Wing before:

Wing after:

Her cladding:

I think the first image of cladding (after the wing before and after shots), is the best of the cladding as it shows more of the true shading because of lighting adjustments.

I failed to get an underside shot, but it looks slightly better than these because of limited surface work I had to do on it. You'll get a chance to see that after the assemblies have been secured in place.

Thanks for looking.

Rich: Hey looks great to me!!! I just sprayed my small B-29 all the same colour other than the cowlings. A huge plane like this looks better with the NM broken up a bit- very nice work!

hi Z...good B29 I see......came on with the decals!!!!!!!!!!ciao Enrico.

I started with completing the build last night > then moved to adding decals....

I have to wait a day or two for more printer ink to arrive before I can complete decal work...  

Remaining "to do's":

1. clean glass

2. print and apply custom decals and underside decals

3. engine exhaust wash

4. touch up detail paint 

5. install two port side pitots-waiting until after the Mission to Albuquerque custom decal is applied so I don't have to fight around them to get it on.

I'll hold off on posting many shots until completed...but, for my own personal enjoyment of "antsy-ness",

Here are a few shots of one of my "creative latitude" efforts in customization that I could not resist in getting a pic of: (The mission credits-bombs, do not appear in any image I have of Z-8, but in the true fashion of honoring her and her crew...I'm giving them to her). The third of four Z-8's in the pacific theater was credited with 7 missions and was lost on her eighth mission on 17 March 45 over Kobe. No credit was given for this last mission...

for the last image today...the writing next to the mission credits is barely visible under a 3x magnifying glass, but my camera picks it up well from 8' away! (it has a 250mm zoom lens on it).

I cut the rest of the text off because the next line was the serial number for one of the two kits you could build OOB and did not apply in this custom kit build.

Looking forward to completing her soon and thanks for looking!

Nice! Though I'm not sure most people know enough about the serial numbers to tell that it's wrong for the B-29 you're building!!!

Well all its been busy as all get out here on the home front. My niece finally popped and gave birth to a 5lb 2 oz baby girl and my little start up business is starting to take off. All that and 4 birthdays in the family all at once..........jeeze I need a rest.

Eatthis I dont recall your Starfighter being in this group or the last one. I will say that chrome alclad is bright for sure on your Lightening !!!!

Dogfish I am happy to see your monsdter P-51 back opn the bench again Love the detail on it, the engine, gun bay, and that figure ! I really like it.

Gamera yes those new pictures are great man ! Hey if you ever get tired of Gladys let me know I would put her on my shelf in a heart beat. The finish is flawless from my point of view. However you may...... well I hope you dont mind but ummmmm well ? I used the picture with the funny color on the cowl . I just couldnt get past how good it looks with the figure and the old black and white kind of thing going on in the picture and the background. I just couldnt pass it up.

Italian Starfighter whowa man !!!! That is one nice looking pony ! Those hand painted checkers really add huge to the detail of the build, they look so much better than decals. A sweet build sir.

Z Square 8 GREAT SAVE on the paint mishap man !! She is lookin really really good ! I am afraid I am going to have a rough time keeping up with your Superfortress.

I have my figures about ready for paint once I get that done I will post some pictures. I went through almost my whole collection of figures just to come up with 4 for the flight deck that I think will do

The front page has been updated with your finished builds guys. If you can allow me the weekend I will get your badges finished and posted for ya.

Randy: Thanks! There are a few issues but for the most I'm quite happy with how she turned out. I'll be buying more Tamiya P-47s in the future for sure.

And I'm cool with the photo, I was fooling around with the settings on Photobucket and really like how it turned out.

Hey Randy, CONGRATULATIONS on the new family addition!!  Hope mom and baby are doing fine!