WWII Carrier Aircraft Design GB (Starts Now -- Ends November 30, 2006)

PanzerWulff wrote:

Gwaihir O "Wind Lord" *) another good source of heavy foil often overlooked is the foil used on the tops of yougurt cups to seal them as i eat alot of yougurt i always have a decent supply on hand when i need it * true geek that i am i studied tolkien elven Wind Lord is the translation for Gwaihir if ya didnt already know

Thanks for the tip, and I'm geeky right along with you! Nice!

Leon

Gwaihir O "Wind Lord" *) another good source of heavy foil often overlooked is the foil used on the tops of yougurt cups to seal them as i eat alot of yougurt i always have a decent supply on hand when i need it

Tryintomodel the pit is looking good keep up the good work

My hurricane is ready for weathering i hope to start that once my problem with jittery hans dies down TTFN

* true geek that i am i studied tolkien elven Wind Lord is the translation for Gwaihir if ya didnt already know

Tryintomodel,  Good job on the Hellcat pit.

Regards,  Rick

If you are in no huge rush, I may have an extra set of pe seatbelts laying around that I could send your way. If you are interested, I can check tonight. If you are in a rush, when scratch building, I go for the aluminum foil type wrapper found on wine bottles and solder for buckles - no where near as nice as the pe, but acceptable. The only hard part of that was getting the foil (I don't drink, so had to ask at work for donations of the foil ) Anyway, let me know if you want me to check for an extra pe belt. (If I have one, it would be the unpainted type - I wish I had a painted to give - those are extra cool).

As for the picture taking. Your pictures really aren't that bad. If you can choose an aperature mode (f-stop) and set for the largest number available (big number = small opening = more distance in focus) it might help. You would probably need a tripod for doing this.

Leon

  No progress on my end.  Another group build has hit critical mass so that's where my focus is.  But, it's good to see a lot of other's moving along.

TryintoModel wrote:

Hey, espins1, I'm building that same model.  I just took a look at mine to see what you were referring too.  I haven't gotten that far.  I'm currently painting all the interior detail, but it won't be long before I start putting the cockpit together.  I messed around putting it together and dryfitting it into the fuselage.  My advice would be to not glue the headrest on the rest of the cockpit yet.  By looking at it, I would say glue the headrest in where it goes in the fuselage.  You'll notice that it has grooves that put it at the angle it should be.  With the firewall attached to the front of the cockpit, you can fit the cockpit in and the headrest will be at the right angle.  Then you can glue the headrest to the base of the cockpit.  At least, that's how I'm going to do it.  It will take that guesswork out it. Lemme know if that makes any sense to ya. Dave

Totally makes sense, I'll just use the fuselage as a "jig" to get the alignment right.  Thanks Dave! 

Is anyone else building the 1/48 Tamiya F4F-4 Wildcat?  I'm having a tough time getting the big flat piece behind the seat in the correct postion.  It appears that it should go somewhat vertical, but there is so much slack at the base that it leans back against the squared edge that comes up about a 1/4 inch.  Is it supposed to lean back a tad or be vertical?

PanzerWulff wrote:

JOE All I can say is OUCH hope the reclamation on the hellcat goes well well painting commenced last night with the light grey underside I woke up masked the demarcation lines with 3M Blue and applied the RAF dark sea grey. once i do a few touch ups and give it a day or so to dry Future & decals await. Here is a pic of the paint scheme I'm using but not the markings for this particular aircraft Have a good weekend gang TTFN

ALAS !  All is not lost...

After posting I returned to the scene of the tragedy (read as "workbench"0 and was inspired by a packet of new #11 blades.  In a strange way a bit of morbid irony actually.  The packaging of the blades inspired me.

I cut the fuselage out totally and took pieces of the clear packaging from the #11 blades and filled the mistake.  Next will be Bare Metal Foil masks...I had seen this done before by iothers and decided to give it a shot my self.  I will post some photos of what I am describing within the next few days...

I was thinking about your Hurricane and want to say there may be some photos of your subject at www.uboat.net and also in the Time-Life Series on WWII Battle of the Atlantic.

JOE All I can say is OUCH hope the reclamation on the hellcat goes well

well painting commenced last night with the light grey underside I woke up masked the demarcation lines with 3M Blue and applied the RAF dark sea grey. once i do a few touch ups and give it a day or so to dry Future & decals await. Here is a pic of the paint scheme I'm using but not the markings for this particular aircraft

Have a good weekend gang TTFN

Small tragedy at the bench in Virginia will make someone in Texas happy...

Yes the folks @ Squadron are going to be getting an order thanks to me and my #11 blade.

Italeri 1/72 Hellcat, cutting out the small windows directly behind the pit..too big...tried to repair..HA, hands of stone brain of cheese!

I am going to order the Hasegawa, use the Italeri cat mouth decals fix my up on the Italeri and turn it into a F6F5.  This evening at the bench was too close to the kind of work week I had...anyhow my 'Cat collection will grow by two...

any harm in doing a French Navy post war F6F5?

I found 1 gap in the wing/fuselage seam i filled it with a thin sliver of strip styrene and smoothed it out I'm off to paint tomorrowCaptain we shall be ready to defend the convoy soon!!!

I've made a decision to stop working on my Avenger that I was doing alot of detailing on. It's too big a project for me at the moment. I can't sit down and work on it for long enough at a time. So I've put it aside for a while and I'm now starting on a second Avenger. This one is the Italeri re-issue of the Acc-Min kit. I'm working on the cockpit at the moment. Sprayed the green, washed and dry-brushed.

Will post pics when it's ready for show.

Looking good Mike.  Nice start.

Regards.  Rick

Got a start on the Hellcat the other night--  I can't say I am overly impressed with their instrument panel-- details are sort of sunk in- but I use what I have....

Hope to move to step 2 soon ;)

TryintoModel wrote:

Anyone gotten started here?  I'm workin on my F4F cockpit, I'll post something as soon as it looks respectable (at least to me).

Sadly, no. Thought I would have, but with some unexpected problems on other builds, might be a couple weeks. Looking forward to seeing your progress though...

Leon

Mike, Daniel and Dave...

Thanks for the verification that I am not loosing it.  Good stuff on he wheel wells.  I was recently at the Udvar Hazy Center at Dulles International hee in Northern Virginia and was looking up into the wheel wells of an F4U1a (yes UP, because it hangs from the ceiling) and saw the wells were white. 

The Hellcat they have is gear up.  But I was thinking "is this a Museum shortcut?".  Thanks Rick...

pingtang wrote:

Joe - There were definitely some Hellcats out there with shark mouths on the nose. Like you said, they were VF27 aircraft. The ones I have seen were painted in the tri-colour scheme with red insignia surrounds. So you're not going mad (unless I am too.......)

I can concur as that is the scheme I am going with thanks to my AM decals!!

Joe - There were definitely some Hellcats out there with shark mouths on the nose. Like you said, they were VF27 aircraft. The ones I have seen were painted in the tri-colour scheme with red insignia surrounds. So you're not going mad (unless I am too.......)

Also, I'll back Rick up on those wheel wells. Same colour as the underside was pretty much standard. Same goes for gear leags and most wheels. There are exceptions, but not too many.

My Avenger is still coming along. I'll hopefully be ready to take some pics of the firewall, engine and cockpit soon and post them. It's been a long time coming.