Ju 87 Stuka GB

I hear you, Bish. When I started back I made up my mind to stay with acrylic everything. That's not working out. I have no proper spray booth and I don't like spraying the nasty stuff indoors either, yet I do. On the rare occasion with a rattle can (ie, Tamiya extra fine primer), I do go outdoors though that's not for the winter I suspect.

One of these days I'd like to have at least a filtered booth (not vented outside), that day has yet to come. Hope I don't blow up the house in the meantime.

I went years without a spray booth. I used to spray with a window open next to me and a fan blowing across the work area. That was fine in my barrack block when it was just me and I was wearing a respirator. But when I moved home I just couldn't especially as my bench is in the dining room which everyone else has to go through to get to the kitchen.

Now I am at the other extreme. A well ventilated shed, spray both and respirator. And I even gave up smoking this year, my lungs must think its Christmas every day lol.

Bish, I have to say good for you on all counts, mate!

Proud of you Bish...Quitting is NOT the easiest thing to do! Kudos to you!!!

Greg... I have a set up where I have a frame with a filter set in it, and the back side has a slight bevel that comes to a central collection point that I can plug the hose of my shop vac to and when the vacuum is turned on it does a pretty good job of drawing fumes and over spray away from the work areas.

My friend has a cool set up, I'm going to copy when I find one. He took the guts out of an old 32" TV set and put a filter in where the Back of the tube was and plugs his shop vac up to it. He even epoxied a small florescent light in the top. Works like a dream.

Doug

Well Doug 'ol buddy, that TV set idea sounds neat for sure. But beyond both my scrounging and ambition levels. :)

That said, your setup sounds rather intriguing and that sounds like something I could slap together. May I ask what kind of filter set you use? Do the filters foul quckly?

Greg -- fab work on that pit, mate! Sorry to be the last one to say so, I was away yesterday!

M/TB379

]Why thank you, Mike.

Working on the wings:

Kit required drilling little holes for the wing bombs and the dive brakes.

Got the pilot and gunner positions assembled.

Added little bits to the inside fuselage.

Even got the engine together.  Isn't much to look at.  Doesn't show up well in the photos, but I painted it with MM's anthracite, dry brushed with steel, rust and silver, then gave it a wash of straight black.  Drilled out the bracket holes, since they were solid-molded.

Probably a waste of time, since only the very top will be visible after it's installed, and I'll likely glue the cowl down, anyhow.

The instrument panel is represented by a decal, which doesn't look too bad in this scale.

And then. . .

And then, Greg posted his photo of his crew compartment, and I realized that there's a radio (isn't it?) behind the gunner. . .

. . .and the kit instruction just said to paint it 02.

So I went back and took a look at the crew compartments y'all had done and realized something was needed.

I found a couple of old instrument panel decals, cut them up and applied them for some sort of interest in there.  I know they're not accurate for the Stuka, since I know one of them at least was for a B-17, and maybe both of them.

None of you will tell, will ya?

Thanks, Greg, for your timely post of your interior!  It saved me from that embarrassing "bare-walls" look that interior designers despise.

Looking good there checkmate.

I have a small update on my build. Got the wings together along with the fuselage and nose section. They are all ready to be joined so it starts looking like a Stuka shortly.

Checkmate: Some nice, creative use of IP decals. Looking really nice!

Ernie: Your Stuka is looking very good as well so far!

CMK, I like your use of the old decals. They add a lot. I like your decal IP better than my PE one, to be honest.

On the timing of my post, I got most of my interior ideas from previous interior posts by others here. Then you happen to see mine. That's one of the things I love about GB's, sort of "pay it forward' by design!

I'm also questioning how much effort to put into my powerplant. The Italeri engine is really very nicely detailed, but I can't see that any of it will be visible at all and I may shoot some black and call it a day. Why is it so difficult to do that?!?!?

Ernie, good to see you moving right along. I see you have your engine cowling assembled. I haven't been so sure about the order of things up there. I think I'll go ahead and assemble my cowling. Thanks for the sense of direction, mate.

Good improvisation check.

Nice work there PJ.

Thank you, pj and SS.  Appreciate the comments.  There really isn't much there in the crew compartment to work with in the first place.  I doubt much will show through after the canopy goes down, either.

That's nice looking interior you've constructed, plasticjunkie.  I like the detail.  

It looks like just behind the gunner's position, where the floor ends, the fuselage seam is visible.  There's the same issue on Revell's Stuka, and I was considering how to deal with it.  Do you have any ideas?  

Thanks, Bish and Greg.  I appreciate the comments.

On the few occasions I've used PE IP's, it turns out they're not real evident after the canopy goes on.  I did build an F4F-3 Wildcat, used a vacu-form canopy left in the open position, and that made things in the cockpit a lot more visible.

But Revell's Stuka has a closed canopy, and I don't feel like messing with it.

Sorry check, I seem to have missed this post and have been neglecting things a little. I know what you mean about those IP's, especially in 72nd. I do usually try and have an open pit but even then it can be hard to see, especially if there is a large shroud over the IP. One thing I don't like is trying to open the kit canopies, I try and get a vac one if I need to do that. I don't blame you for leaving it closed.

Just letting everyone know I'm still here. Bench work to commence hopefully right after Xmas.  I really need to get some glue on my finger . John

Glad to see you back John. Not sure if you have seen it, but I recently extended the GB for 3 months, so still got plenty of time.

Thanks, Bish.  I installed the engine last night, and will probably post some progress photos soon.

Can't wait to see them check.

Anybody ever use Print Scale decals before?  I have the 1/72 Stuka sheet 72-014 and they look great but don't want to lay down on the model.  It almost seems as if the film is too thick.

I have got 2 of their sets but not used them yet. I am planning on using one for my 1945 GB build. This doesn't sound very good. Try outing a post in the decaling section and see if you get a response.

68GT -- for what it's worth I had exactly the same result from Eagle Strike just recently -- they would not pull into surface detail, had to be cut to go over raised stuff, and no amount of setting solution affected them in any way. The model looks good, but it was not the result you expect from AMs.

M/TB379

I need a little advice.  

What colo(u)r are the Stuka's main wheels?  Not the tires, but the wheels themselves.

If there were variations, I'm looking at the time frame of Dunkirk and the Battle of Britain.

I've scrolled through the first 50 pages of the GB, and haven't found an answer yet, so I thought it might be simpler and quicker just to ask.

The kit instructions call for "anthracite," which might actually mean RLM 66, but I'm doubting that the Luftwaffe used anything called "anthracite."

Thanks in advance!

Check, Anthracite grey was a colour the Luftwaffe used for its ground equipment early in the war. For Stuka hubs, I use RLM 02.I can't recall where I picked that up from, a lot of German aircraft wheels seem to be either black or 02.

Thunderbolt - I was trying to put the crosses on the fuselage and they sit there like a piece of thin sheet styrene and wont even lay along the model.

For my wheels I just used black and applied some gloss coat to break up the wheel from the tire.

Bish

Check, Anthracite grey was a colour the Luftwaffe used for its ground equipment early in the war. For Stuka hubs, I use RLM 02.I can't recall where I picked that up from, a lot of German aircraft wheels seem to be either black or 02.

68GT -- Dayum! And that's the first time I've ever used that word! It looks like the top surface of the decal is drier than the underside and it's curling away, but that's nothing short of bizarre! I'd grab some AMs if possible, even if it's only to replace the crosses with ones that'll actually lie down...

M/TB379

I've never seen a decal do that in my life. Yikes!

checkmateking02

Bish

Check, Anthracite grey was a colour the Luftwaffe used for its ground equipment early in the war. For Stuka hubs, I use RLM 02.I can't recall where I picked that up from, a lot of German aircraft wheels seem to be either black or 02.

Ah!  I had no idea anthracite was a real LW color.  Thanks, Bish and 68GT.  I'll go with either black or 02.

I only came across it because Xtracolour does that colour. I don't think it has an RLM code. I only found out about it through some searching. Its rather similar to Pz Grey and may well be the same colour.