Bruce: Nice progress. Certainly looks like you've got the goods for sweet dio.

Lost: Just good to have you back in here building with us. Appears to me that you are moving along quite nicely.

Joe: Great work on the seatbelts. Good to see you're continuing to make progress.

Thanks lost. I will post some pics of the base later so you can see what i mean. I have been planning it out and i nee 2 more cobble sections and 2 more path sections.

Some nice work on the pit there.

Bruce, nice collection of parts there, lok forwrad to seeing some more as you go.

Mustang: That looks great, love those seatbelts. 

Lostagain: Thanks and I know exactly what you mean. I've hit some sort of modeling slump here, been getting very little done. What you posted of the cockpit looks great though. Really nice work. 

Bruce: Awesome, great to see you moving on that baby. And neat torii gate, Phoenix brand? I looked around the internet and that never came up. All I got was instructions on building your own and stuff for tropical fish aquariums! Guess I'm happy I went with the first, I did learn a bit about wood-working, hopefully it will come in useful in the future. 

Lostagain and Moff: I hear you on the slow progress. At times I think my Chevy is gonna be a cinch and it'll be done in a couple of weeks or so but one bad paint job later on the hood or interior trim panel on the rear door and it sets me back by at least a week. That interior is lookin' sharp BTW.

hogfanfs: Lovin' the progress on your track so far. I'm a far cry from giving one of these puppies a shot. One day...............maybe.

everybody:  I just keep pressing ahead and take small breaks from the Chevy and work on the Arado. The seat and seat belts have taken me longer than I have wanted but I've got it to a point that I think I can show some progress now. I have to pick out some aluminum details on the seat belts with a toothpick but here's a pick just to show some progress anyways. I still have the armrests to go on this bad boy so I aint finished with the construction of the seat yet.

Moff

Wow, I love those metallics!  

 

By the way, sorry for being MIA for almost two weeks. This has not been my year for model building, apparently. After a lot of procrastination, I'm almost done with the last set of tracks. 

 

Moff, that's terrible, I make it a rule to post every three months whether I have acheived anything or not, which I haven't really ;)

Given it has been three months, it is going to take me longer to go through you gentlemen's acheivements and get up to date. I have been keeping an eye on build progress all the time, don't worry.

Moff, the Waffentrager was looking very sharp. I do like a ridiculouly huge gun on a tiny chassis!

Hogfanfs (spell checker wants to say hog pants), looking forward to the Type 4 coming along.

Bish, the E100 is a real monster, and it's off to a flying start. Had to laugh when you said there just not enough cobbles to cope with it...

Trabi, the cockpit looks great on the Moskito, Dragon didn't do the wing so well. I may steal your idea to set the dihedral on my MB5 if and when the time comes.

And since it has been such a long time, I hadn't said anything about the Tiger either - great result with an unique scheme, I like the log protection too.

Tony, I am intrigued to see your spit in the Belgian colours. Nice touch with the PR version too.

Crown, the Meteor's engine has come up really shmick, looking forward to what you acheive with the rest of the model.

Dan, very impressed with the interior finish of the 110, hope you get over the fit issues and move forward.

Joe, looking forward to seeing the Corsair complete from the look of the cockpit.

Cliff, the Type 5 looks great in its setting, great detail and impressed with the geisha.

Mustang, the Arado cockpit looks amazing, looking forward to seeing it  being done up and in the bird. And don't worry about finishing times, I'll be keeping you company into 2018...

And while we are on Blitzes (Blitzens?) some great detail and painting from qlabs there.

Brandon, the completed Salamander looks very sweet - didn't relise there were 150 completed, did any get to fly in combat?

And last but not least, mc, the Prince really is the duck's nuts! The model and the lagoon setting, just fantastic.

So, since we last spoke, not much has happened. I had cut out and sanded back all the pieces. I spent a lot of time looking at bits trying to figure a logical and foolproof build sequence. Think I have some of it figured but definitely not all. Ihave made some progress in the cockpit, on the second and a half attempt:

I got the seat, column top and compass from a Barracuda Cast Spitfire set. The rest is (and looks)scratch built.  Ready for paint:

And with a coat of RAF Cockpit Green (Tamiya):

Put some NATO black on the IPs, and started painting some details and placing decals, including bezels from Mike Grant Decals:

So, some small progress in the cockpit. I have had a few days off so a bit more is being done now, but all the scratching is slow work.

So, slow work, but I am learning a lot about models and the limits of my patience.

OK, Gentleman, I'm back on the Type 4. 

Here is the hull as it sits now:

And some of the PE brackets that were added:

I started to sand the road wheels, as soon as I'm done, I'm going to spray the ends with gun metal, then I'm going to try the quick wheel to spray the centers with primer.

And here are a few extras I bought for the diorama:

Hope to have more progress to show soon.

Sorry it took so long to get back to this build.

taxtp

I've finally got back to my Spitfire XIV. It's the Academy kit, with a scratchbuilt camera port on the fuselage to convert it to an FR Mk XIV. I'm using Aeromaster decals to depict a Belgian aircraft from 1946.

Here's the current status.

Cheers

Tony

 

Taxtp,

I apologize, I missed seeing this post. Nice start on the Spit. Very interesting, I never knew these aircraft were fitted with a camera in the fuselage. I'm looking forward to seeing the camo scheme of a Belgian Spitfire!

Thanks Bruce. I'll try and pick out anything you might want to watch out out for, but with only a few small bits to add, theres nothing major.

@Trabi,

Nice start on the 154, but, sorry to see the warp in the wings. Glad you to see you have a good plan to fix it!

@Bish,

Very nice start on the E-100. I'm looking forward to seeing how you build this beast. I have one in the stash too!

I gathered more items for the Type 4, mainly a MiniArt Japanese figure set. I'll be posting pictures soon.

JOE RIX

Bish: Sweet start. Man, That is going to be epic.

Joe: Looking forward to some pics of the progress.

 

Thanks Joe, i hope joe.

mustang1989

Tony: Great progress on that Spit man!

Trabi: I had some problems with an Eduard 190 a few years back with warpage. Some boiling water straightened out alot of my problems. How long have you had that kit? Your build is looking great aside from that.

Bish: Great start on that E-100. I can never get over building all that track. Sheesh!!!

I started work on the pilots seat and seat belts this weekend. Still real slow on the progress................for now.

 

Thanks Joe. I break the tracks up into small chunks over a couple of days. Trying to do over 100 links in one sitting would drive me bonkers.

Moff

Nice Bish! I like your approach to painting and weathering. I can't wait to see the hull camo take shape.

The kit engineering seems pretty good, and the subject matter is great. I might have to grab that kit and build it....

 

Thanks Moff. I don't normally paint and assemble this way. But i want to paint the rest of the vehicle with the side skirts ***, so this seemed the best method. Generally it is well done though there are a few bits which i think could have been done better, i will point those out in the update. And while the tracks were a match for new Dragon kits, other featureds reminded me of Itaelri kits.

Gamera

Ohhh, nice work there Bish on that giant beast! And love those workable tracks, they seem so much easier to work with than the cemented link tracks.

 

Thanks G, indeed they are, easily on par with the best Dragon tracks.

Bish: Sweet start. Man, That is going to be epic.

Joe: Looking forward to some pics of the progress.

Tony: Great progress on that Spit man!

Trabi: I had some problems with an Eduard 190 a few years back with warpage. Some boiling water straightened out alot of my problems. How long have you had that kit? Your build is looking great aside from that.

Bish: Great start on that E-100. I can never get over building all that track. Sheesh!!!

I started work on the pilots seat and seat belts this weekend. Still real slow on the progress................for now.

Nice Bish! I like your approach to painting and weathering. I can't wait to see the hull camo take shape.

The kit engineering seems pretty good, and the subject matter is great. I might have to grab that kit and build it....

Ohhh, nice work there Bish on that giant beast! And love those workable tracks, they seem so much easier to work with than the cemented link tracks.

With my other two builds rapped up, its time to get this monster to the bench. The E-100 Jag pz is my biggest armour build to date and will be my first urban dio in a very long time.

I'll be adding a PE set from Voyager, which is the smallest and least compliucate of their PE sets that i have seen. And the one piece kit tracks will be repaced with Trump indy link workables. Plus i will be keeping an eye on the spares box's to see if their is anything from those i can add. I know for certain i will be replaceing the old style exhausts in the kit with muffeler style ones from a Panther kit.

I was able to get a head start on this just over a wek ago when i wasn't able to work on the other builds. My main focus has been on the running gear which is now complete. First thing to tackle was a couple of wheels. As is often the case with German steel rimmed road wheels, they all had a seam that had to be removed.

After primer, it was time for an early painting session. I am doing the whole vehicle with a green base with the DY and brown on top.

After a coat of future, i did a raw Umber oil wash and some light dry brushing. The rimms got a coat of Citadel steel and a raw umber wash. This will be it until they get some dirt effects and pigments with the rest of the vehicle.

The suspension was rather easy, certainly not Dragon head banging. Its just one long piece on each side with all the springs on and then just the axel arms to fit.

This was then just given a coat of green, you can't see any other this behind the wheels.

And the tracks. This went together really nicely, but were a pain to get ready. There are 51 links each side with 4 different parts. the parget part had 4 sprue attachments on each piece and were a pain to clean. But once done, they are really nice tracks, and fully workable.

And very long.

A primer coat was followed by Tamya NATO black followed by a stel dry brush.

And another Raw Umber oil wash.

And tonight, all this was put together.

And i have also been able to do some work on the gun. Its not often i use two piece plastic barrels, so i wanted to get this done. The muzzle does have holes in but needs cleaning up and the instructions recomend a 1.5m dril bit. I thought this was a bt big, but it worked out fine. I am leaving the barrel off to make it easier to paint inside the mounting.

And thats it for now. With the otehr two builds done, i can now focus on this. I plan on starting on the base soon. I am useing a building, path and cobbel section from Great North Roads. But i did find one issue. When i was planning it out a couple of weeks ago, i realised the cobbels and path are not big enough, so i need to buy another section of each next month.

More soon.

Trabi: Wow! That is one serious issue with the wing warpage. Looks to me like you have sound plan for fixing it though. Would trying to dip the wings in hot water and straightening them out help in any way?

Moff: Simply looking forward to any progress at any time you can. I can certainly relate to your situation. 

Trabi: Some serious wing warp there, I don't even think a B-52's sag that much. Clever idea there, looking forward to seeing how it works out.

Moff: Sounds cool, looking forward to more photos. 

Wow, I love those metallics!  

By the way, sorry for being MIA for almost two weeks. This has not been my year for model building, apparently. After a lot of procrastination, I'm almost done with the last set of tracks. 

Nice to see you started, good job on the seat's. Those wings are definatly off. I often hear ba things about Dragon 72nd kits, but i have never found any issues, i guess it must be kits like this people are reffering to.

Bish

Got you on the roster.

Thank You Bish!

Some progress with Focke Wulf:

I searched referens pictures from internet and found review of this kit wich said that wings of this kit are warped. I checked those and looks like Dragon had molded those wrong. Wings looks like this:

And those should look like this:

Kit looks so sad and tired instead of vigorous as it should be.

So bit extra work in sight. I bought 3,2mm x 3,2mm square brass tube and inserted that through the fuselage. That holds most of it, but it doesn´t fit to wing tip so I think I put some springsteel rod to wing tips.

And here is finished cockpit. Because this is Revell packing instead of Dragon the kit doesn´t have any photoetches with. And my local hobby shop is open only from thursday to saturday I didn´t want to wait untill I can get seatbelts. That´s why I made those in old fashioned way, masking tape and wire. For the throtles etc. I used sheet metal from mustard tube and wire.

Thank You for watching!

Nice clean build there Tony, doesn't even look like you had to use any filler. 

Nice Tony, i like the look of the camera port, good job on that.

Rippin' fine start Tony. Good to have you in it. Quite interested to see your Belgian sheme.

I've finally got back to my Spitfire XIV. It's the Academy kit, with a scratchbuilt camera port on the fuselage to convert it to an FR Mk XIV. I'm using Aeromaster decals to depict a Belgian aircraft from 1946.

Here's the current status.

Cheers

Tony

Nice job on the metalwork, Crown!

-BD-

@Trabi,

Nice choice for this GB. I'm looking forward to the WIP on this kit, because I'm interested in adding that kit to my stash. And great start on the office!

@Dan,

Those are some intimidating gaps. I'm sure you will get them sorted.

@Mustang,

I'm always in awe at you guys who can scratch build like this! Who thought you could make a German Arado 234 look just like a '54 Chevy Sedan Delivery!

Seriously, the Chevy looks outstanding! And, looking forward to seeing more of the 234.

@Crown,

The Glostor engine looks great! The Alclad paint and washes really makes it pop! Great job!