US CARRIER AVIATION GROUP BUILD 2013

Thank, you! I don't think my English is that good though. I can write quite well, but I have a heavy austrian accent!

Your german aint that bad either! It must be a lot harder for you to learn German, than for me to learn English, as English is the easier language IMO.

Cheers, Clemens

Clemens:

Wish I would have known that a couple of months back. I'm loading up my RoG 1/72 Eurofighter and I did it Luftwaffe, but they had Austrian markings as well, I would have done it that way in your honor. I'll post that up in Aircraft as soon as she's done.  Also have a F3 Tornado with the roundels that is awaiting gloss coat, decals and weathering.  And so this build is actually more than I should commit to, but the GB concept is something that I've been trying to get into as well.  

Nice work on your 'pit, mine is not going to be that detailed unfortunately.

Ich bin aus Bayern am kindergarten, mein fater war USAEur im Garmisch-Partenkirchen. Studiert Deutsch am Universitat Colorado, und trinken gut Oktoberfest bier 6-7 jahre in Munchen!

Thank you Marty!

I don't deserve that honor anyway

Clemens

Well, let the building begin...  

Good luck, y'all.

The building has already started, Dre!

Look at the former page.

Clemens

I've started on mine.  I'll be doing the remaining Hellcat in my Eduard dual combo pack as a night fighter operating off of USS Block island and the F-14D will be VF-31 Tomcatters.  This will be my fourth Eduard Hellcat, I can pretty much build them in my sleep.  The F-14 will be a bit more labor-intensive.  I've built the A kit from Hobbyboss so I know what to watch for.  I'm not planning on fiddling with any of the open gun bays or radar options the kit offers.

Little snippet of the start of the Dauntless (sure wish Bish would stop doing that darn Jedi Mind trick thing on me so I'll stop with the 1/72 stuff! ).  These little guys are hard to see.  Started the cockpit, glued bomb halves, and AB'd the initial color on fuselage and top of wings.  

Eagle90

Looking nice guys!

It's good to see all the progress so far and so early in the build.  Having to work late tonight, I didn't accomplish much, except some photos of the box and sprues.

For scale, I've posed one on a Guinness bottle cap. 

Sprue removal and clean-up of the parts will be the next order of business.

According to The First Team, there were somewhere between 11 and 16 Wildcats in the air from Lexington on 20 February, 1942, so that's what I'll aim for, although the individual plane numbers are not known for every pilot.  This was the day "Butch" O'Hare earned his Medal of Honor.  Jimmy Thach scored victories, too.

Dang Checkmate those are somesmall aircraft

That are some really small parts, Checkmate!

I'll be watching with great interest how you are going to paint them!

Clemens

The real problem I had with 1:700 Devastators was with the propellers.  I broke every one of them.  I need to think of a new method for holding them while sanding the sprue gate.

I have a pair of spring load tweezers that I bought at the hobby store I use when sanding small parts. Sit it so that only the part you want sanded is sticking out.

I haven't started my huge(hah!) biplane models yet,,,,,,,,,,,,,,but, I did buy more Naval stuff at the LHS today,,,,,,,,,,I think I should have listed a Scooter for this GB,,,,maybe after a couple of months

I might include a EA-6B as well. Italeri's 1/48 kit. But only if I have some spare time aftercompleting all my current projects.

Clemens

shivinigh

I have a pair of spring load tweezers that I bought at the hobby store I use when sanding small parts. Sit it so that only the part you want sanded is sticking out.

Since I'm waiting on a reference book to arrive, I didn't start this build in the cockpit, but with the wings and other easy to glue assemblies...  so, last night's work.

main wings and flaps.   Still a lot of cleanup and seam work to do.

rear stabs and tail fins, cleanup to still do..

AIM-54's and fuel tanks...  the molding on the weapons is just fantastic (I have no idea if accurate, though).

Trumpeter has done some really nice engineering on this kit- well above their usual efforts- and most of wing seams fall along natural panel lines and are on the underside of the wing!   Very little cleanup to do here.

Eagle, nice start. I would highly recommend an magnifying head band if you don't already have one. I was building 72nd for years with no problem. But after my 5 year break, I did notice my eyes aching. Got one of those and I was sorted. Now, what should I do with my Jedi power next.

Check, I see another amazing ship build in the pipeline. Eagle, if you think 72nd is bad, you wait till you see what the ship guys do in 700.

Looking nice, Dre!

I thought about picking this kit up too, but decided to wait untill you are finished wit hit, so I have a nice building review from a pro!

Clemens

Bish

Eagle, nice start. I would highly recommend an magnifying head band if you don't already have one. I was building 72nd for years with no problem. But after my 5 year break, I did notice my eyes aching. Got one of those and I was sorted. Now, what should I do with my Jedi power next.

Check, I see another amazing ship build in the pipeline. Eagle, if you think 72nd is bad, you wait till you see what the ship guys do in 700.

Hey Bish!  Yeah, I HAD to use them when I was putting the bombs together.  Wanted to make sure they were mated straight.......but just couldn't focus on them!   So I broke out the magnifiers.  

Jedi Mind trick......shot, you had me looking at my stash of 1/72 AGAIN last night and thinking, hummmm, let's start another one!  Stop it Bish!

1/700!!!!!!!  Oh my Lord!  I don't even want to think about it!

Who's a pro?   I'm just some guy with a model....

You are some SKILLED guy with a model => pro

Clemens

checkmateking02

shivinigh

I have a pair of spring load tweezers that I bought at the hobby store I use when sanding small parts. Sit it so that only the part you want sanded is sticking out.

I

 

That sounds like a good idea, shiv.  I'll look up a pair when I get to a hobby store.  Hopefully Friday.  It sounds like it would work with small PE pieces too.

 

Thanks for the suggestion.

I'll enthusiastically second Shiv on the tweezers--I've got about five different pairs of cross-lock tweezers of different shapes and sizes, and they're the only tweezers I use. Great for grabbing and holding tiny things.

Also useful are these:

They go by various names, such as nut starters, mini grabbers, etc. About the size of a pin vise, it's basically 4 tiny wire fingers operated by a spring-loaded plunger. They can hold tiny and even really delicate thing with surprising strength and stability. The ones shown are from MicroMark, but I'm sure they're available at a variety of outlets.

Thanks, Greg.  I'm seeing that I still don't have enough tools!

checkmateking02

Thanks, Greg.  I'm seeing that I still don't have enough tools!

Well, I ordered the last items that I will need for my Skyhawk from Sprue Brothers. I do not plan on starting my Scooter for a couple weeks yet, so everything is looking good at this point!

Dre, those Tomcat parts look great! Are you planning on arming it up with all six AIM-54s?

Stik- I really haven't decided on the load-out yet (and quite surprisingly, there's only a few sprues of ordnance in this kit, not all of them like they do on their Russian kits).   Compared to the Russian weapon sprues, these US weapons are molded so much better- really a night/day difference.  

But...   I do like the look of AIM-54's because what's a Tomcat without those?

I started on the easy assemblies for something to do until I had a chance to dig into my ref. book (which arrived today!).  Now that I can see great photos, I can start doing the awesome stuff.

SchattenSpartan,

This will be my first group build, and you picked my favorite class of planes. I have several F-4's, F-14's, and F-18's in the stash. Not sure when I'll get started, but I'll probably have a few of those built before the end of the year. Would it be a problem if I added more planes to the list throughout the end of the year?

Put me down for a Hasegawa F-4S Phantom in 1/48 scale.

Thanks,

Bruce

Here are some shots of the Hellcat cockpit.