Larry Wolf Memorial Close Air Support Group Build 2021 Needs YOU!

There's nothing about black that's magic, in my mind.  Also, what you see when you look at a shiny object is what it is reflecting, and on a good day that's blue sky.  I've used different dark blues in the past with good results.

Insignia blue for alclad base eh? Interesting...

jeaton01

Thanks, CB.

Here it is after some more filling and sanding, and a good coat of insignia blue as a base for the Alclad aluminum.

 

 

Thanks, CB.

Here it is after some more filling and sanding, and a good coat of insignia blue as a base for the Alclad aluminum.

First images of my WIP on the A-10 Warthog:

Looks good John , should be a beauty when done. 

After some fiddling I got the R-1820G's mounted on the A-18.  There is not a lot of clearance between the prop tips and the nose.  It reminds me of the Grumman F5F in this regard, as well as in the size of the nacelles relative to the fuselage.  The engines from Mark Tutton, Starfighter Decals, are excellent, as well as very reasonable in price.

Nice build there castel, thats some load you have there.

Time for another update. I got the cockpit fitted which go in from underneath. It was a very tight fit and i had hope to dry fit. But i couldn't remove it for risk of breaking somthing so i ended up clamping it in place as it could have done with some sanding down. One very nice touch on this kit is the addition of the pilots target viewing window. Its attache to a box structure which i had not seen before. I can find any pic of a B pit where you can see it. But i did find an image in a new book i recently got which show in from a training manuel. What is mssing is the external cover to the window which always seems to be closed when on the ground. Fortunatly the Eduard set has that part.

The recess around the centre bomb carrier was fille. Not perfec as there are a couple of small openings. But once the bomb is attached this should not be noticed.

And then all the final touches to get it ready for priming. The instructions only have you fit the siren mount but the kit does include the sirens. The only image of the aircraft i am doing is a profile in an Osprey book which only shows the mounts. But as i have no photo of it and there is no saying the sirens were not *** and later removed. As i have no Stuka with the siren, i felt it was well over due. So i fitted it. I also added wing guns and pitot from Quickboost.

Now its all together, i can see that IMHO, this is the best 72nd Ju 87B. Clearly the detail is far better than the 30+ year old Fujimi kit. Other than sliding in the pit, the fit is very nice, just a touch of filler along the wing join with the fuselage. The addition on the window under the fuselage is a nice touch. There are just a few small things which stop this kit being perfect. A cover for the window and a larger Trop filter would be great additions. Its also missing the IFF antenna from under the fuselage. oddly Eduard does not include it even though they do on the set for the Fujimi kit and hopefully i have a spare Fujimi one in the spares box.

The one thing i really don't like is how Airfix mold the open canopy with the pilots section molded onto the fixed centre piece. Will have a pic of that next time.

Well, it is done now

The other bombs came with the kit so I though what the hack, lets include them. If lewbud returns the 5th pic can go to the front page.

Cheers...

Thanks Bish

Frank, after seeing some of your work I know you wouldn't have any trouble with checkers.

Thanks Hutch!

Having the Infini cutting mat made it so much easier since all of the squares were a consitent size

JBRaider

Not perfect but I was really happy with the result

I wouldn't be happy with that, I'd be positively delighted!  Great job, well done!

JBRaider, the checkerboard tail is well done. I've been tempted to paint a checkerboard tail myself. Your paint job just might be the inspiration I need. Thanks for sharing.

Thats looking really nice, you did a great job on the tail.

lewbud may just have missed your post, it can be a bit hectic hosting a popular GB and its easy to miss a post or two.

I am hesitant to post my P-47 progress as Lewbud never responded after I requested to join in back in February. 

Between work and home repairs I was able to get a lot done, just at a slow pace. 

Cockpit was painted up and most of the major assembly went by quick, just not a lot in these 1/72 birds

I wanted to do the checkered tail but I didn't trust the Academy decals so I decided to try to paint them on. I went out of order by painting the checkers before the rest of the plane in case I messed it up and had to start over. 

I started with XF 3 but went back over it with a little orange mixed in to match the decal color

Using my Infini cutting mat i cut out the squares and hit it with Flat black

Not perfect but I was really happy with the result. The rest of the primary colors went on last weekend.

I started my Stuka a couple of weeks ago so time for my first progress post. This is my 7th 72nd Ju 87. While i do like the Fujimi kit, this new Airfix one is clearly a step up in detail. I know the Fujimi kit is a little oversize, i have not yet compared this one to scale plans but i will at some point. Going over the kit, there are a few things i think they could have done better, but to some degreee these are largely personal preferance. As its a Stuka, i do tend to be a bit picky.

I will be ading some Eduard PE and Quickboost resin.

The first thing i checked when i got the kit was the supercharger intake. At least one of the marking options is a Trop Stuka, but unfortunatly Airfix did not include the larger Trop intake. This still leaves only the Italeri kit with this option. This is not an issue for this build as i won't be useing the kit markings, but i would pike to have the option of doing Trop Stuka's and unfortuantly the AM market has still not provided any option for this.

As usual, i started with the pit. The kit detail is very nice as it is, so the PE spruces up whats there.

The gunners seat should just be a frame, but as i am adding the gunner, its not an issue.

This was a bit odd. Never seen this reccess underneath before, i had to look it up. There should be a fairing over this. Its a nice option for a dio scene, but it would have been better is the fairing was included. All the pics i have seen in flight show this covered and i can't imagine they would leave it open and rick damage to the wiring. I will use some filler for this.

After paint and dry brushing, i added the pre coloure PE.

And then got the fuselage together. The centre piece with the seats wil fit up from underneath later.

More soon.

I've been making slow progress on the A-18, not much of which has been picture worthy.  However, the fuselage is together now and the wings and empennage also.  I started working on fitting the engines and have decided the ones in the kit are more the size of an R-985 than an R-1820 so I'll have to wait a few days for some engines from Starfighter Decals.  The vacform canopies are also fitted and masked.  There is another window in the fuselage just forward of the aft cockpit on both sides that looked like trouble, so I cut out an oversized area and put in some plastic from a CD case and polished it out level with the resin fuselage.  The broken landing gear has been fixed with music wire and the prop blades have been installed on the hubs.

There was some mold mismatch to work on on both nacelles, this is the worst.  Fixed with CA and dental alginate and sufficient work with a heavy file.  The resin is very hard but not brittle.  The seats are PE which I soldered together.

The window work and the interior bits.  Much resin was removed from the cockpit floor befor things were happy.  I can't imagine much will be visible.

The darker resin engine is from the Special Hobby Grumman FF-1 kit and is about .020 smaller than the proper scale size of the engine, right at .75 inches.  The kit engines are .600 and look lost in the cowls.  I can use them somewhere else that needs a 9 cylinder radial like an R-985 or R-975.

I sent him a PM, but he hasn't replied yet.

The F7F looks good, Frank.

Nice work guys.  I hope to get to my 111 soon.  I think Lewbud started a new job recently, maybe that's taking up his time.

The Tigercat received Mr. Color Navy blue paint today. This model is the biggest model I've painted in a very long time. The paint was thinned 1/1 with Mr. Color Leveling Thinner and I still used almost the entire bottle. I think I have enough paint left in the bottle to even out the color a little better tomorrow.

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Any news on lewbud?

Ditto on that. 

cbaltrin

 

 

plasticjunkie

Now that you mentioned it, there isn’t a completed build page either. Has anyone tried to pm him? Doesn’t sound good.

 

 

I emailed him a few weeks ago. no reply.

 

I hope he’s ok.

plasticjunkie

Now that you mentioned it, there isn’t a completed build page either. Has anyone tried to pm him? Doesn’t sound good.

I emailed him a few weeks ago. no reply.

cbaltrin

Anyone sighted lewbud? Sure hope he is ok... Have not seen a post from him since last year...

 

Now that you mentioned it, there isn’t a completed build page either. Has anyone tried to pm him? Doesn’t sound good.

Here's the Tigercat wearing white Stynyl Rez primer. I just finished wet sanding the primer for a nice smooth finish. I used the white primer to aid me in showing the sun faded Navy blue paint on a Korean airfield. I know the paint on Navy and Marine Corps aircraft was better than the paint used during WWII, but in the harsh environment of the Korean war zone, I'm sure aircraft showed plenty of wear and tear on the paint. Tomorrow the airplane gets some pre-shading then we go to paint. I have some Mr. Color H54 Navy Blue for the camouflage. Stay tuned.

tempestjohnny

 cbaltrin

Anyone sighted lewbud? Sure hope he is ok... Have not seen a post from him since last year...

 

I was thinking the same thing

 

Now that you mention it It's been a while.  I hope things are good with him.

Nice job on the A10 68GT!

Got started on my little Sea Hawk

cbaltrin

Anyone sighted lewbud? Sure hope he is ok... Have not seen a post from him since last year...

 

The nice clean 1/72 Academy A-10 is done.