It Floats and Flies

A bunch of work has been done on the H-4, but unfortunately, none of it is very picture-friendly.  I've spent about a week (and half a tube of putty!) on a seam about 9 inches long.  My problem is that, because I plan to finish it in overall aluminum, the seamwork needs to be flawless.  I've finally got it acceptable (not perfect...), but there's still a few feet (dare I say yards?) of seams left to finish.  This is gonna take a while...

Wish me luck!

Count me in with a Hansa Brandenburg W.29 by Toko,

Cheers,

Eric

Fred,

Thanks for the link.  Here is the photo...

Some interesting notes on the bird:  They used Hartzel (sp?) 3 blade props and the cockpit side windows were blisters to ease observation.  It is black and orange to aid in location if the plane went down.  This plane is now in civillian use paineted blue and white.  According to ken this is bad.  Not easily picked out in snow or on a glacier.  Seem that the glaciers from altitude have a blue cast to them.

The man in the door is the pilot.  P51 pilot from WWII, shot down when he pulled up out of a cloud bank into a gaggle of 109's.

JoeRugby wrote:

Okay so I am way over committed on GB's this year.  But for about the past year I have p**sed and moaned about not having a personal connection to any of my builds.  You know like my uncle or grandfather flew this or drove that. Well this build will solve that for me.  I want to jump on in with the Sword 1/72 Goose.  Registration number N781.  Flown by the Alaska Department of Fish and Game out of the Ketichican/Petersburg Area.  Warden Officer Ken Gilpin (my friend ad fishing/hunting buddy) is my inspiration. I will post a photo this evening of the actual plane as well as give a breif description of the modifications done to this bird.

hi aurora

 count me as confrimed one martin sp5-b marlin as requested. i  may be late but you never know i may get a fire light under me and build like a mad man.

Okay so I am way over committed on GB's this year.  But for about the past year I have p**sed and moaned about not having a personal connection to any of my builds.  You know like my uncle or grandfather flew this or drove that.

Well this build will solve that for me.  I want to jump on in with the Sword 1/72 Goose.  Registration number N781.  Flown by the Alaska Department of Fish and Game out of the Ketichican/Petersburg Area.  Warden Officer Ken Gilpin (my friend ad fishing/hunting buddy) is my inspiration.

I will post a photo this evening of the actual plane as well as give a breif description of the modifications done to this bird.

If it's not too late, I'd like to jump in with a Matchbox D0-18 too...

            greg

Hi all is it ok to do a model that is in another build? I am doing a PBY-5-A in RAF coastal command livery for the Battle of the Atlantic GB

and as for the P-38 floater heres some pics of one they actually built the F4F Wildcatfish

neat lookin lil bird huh?

Aurora-7 wrote:

Fred, where'd you get that P-38 on floats? That'd be great to see done up as a model. Maybe for next year we should do a "What if it could Float and Fly" build.

Float Plane

One of the most unique aircraft designs during the war was with P-38 floatplane. It never came to fruition as an operational aircraft, and never was tested. This design called for a P-38 to be fit onto large floats while its regular landing gear was retracted. These floats would then be filled with fuel allowing the aircraft to be ferried across the pacific. Early in the war, the American aircraft presence in the Pacific was woefully inadequate. Bases still were using outdated aircraft such as the Brewster Buffalo, which were no match against Japanese fighters. There were heavy bombers such as the B-17, but they were not effective against moving shipping targets in the ocean. Though the Battle of Midway was a decisive victory, the aircraft being used were mismatched. The victory would be attributed to knowledge of Japanese codes, perfect timing, courage of the pilots, and plain luck. General Arnold knew that the American forces needed a boost in available, modern aircraft to fight the Japanese. By December 1942, P-38s were being used in operations in Buna and other locations in the southwest Pacific.

As with problems getting the aircraft to the field of battle in Europe, many were questioning how to get adequate numbers of aircraft to bases in the Pacific. The floatplane design in theory would allow P-38s to be able to fly extreme distances until it needed to refuel. This idea also called for the P-38s to make landings in protected waterways, where they would be refueled and resume their flight to their new base of operations. Once the P-38 was within range of the home base, explosive charges would remove the floats, and the aircraft would then land normally. One problem that needed to be addressed was the tail section. The tail would pose problems during takeoff and landing on the water. One way to address this problem was to raise the entire tail section. Wind tunnel tests revealed minimal performance loss. However, since the Battle of Midway put the Japanese on the defensive, it would not be dangerous to ship the new P-38s to Australia, where they would be ferried to their bases of operations. This idea never got off the drawing board, but a P-38 was tested with a raised tail. Kelly Johnson was interested to see how it would be affected by compressibility. No substantial results were obtained, and no further raised tailed P-38s were tested.

Aurora-7 wrote:

Look at this fictional floatplane fighter: http://www.scaleworkshop.com/workshop/monsoontm_1.htm

Here is the Albatros with the wings on now and floats

Messed up on the paint on the tail as you can see in the first pic, but lucky for me a decal covers that spot.

Tomorrow I will gloss coat the Albatros and decal Monday.

Thanks Fred.

I am going to try to mix the doped color for the wings today, so I dont have to wait four days to get a bottle. Might as well paint the floats today also, pics later.

Here is the fuselage painted with Testors Wood then dry brushed with Tamiya XF-10 Brown

Need to glue the engine in now and the guns and a few other parts.

Aurora-7 wrote:

Dave, at your rate your gonna be done well before summer. Plenty of time to do another 'floater'

 I think I will start another one, once this one is done. The Rufe may get built yet or I will order up the late version of the Albatros this week.

Lucien Harpress wrote:

bwr1-  Awesome pics.  The BVv 238 is one of my favorite aircraft (it's big and rare- what's not to love?), and it's only been recently that I realized there was a kit for it.  I totally get it when you say your kit is made of putty.  My H-4 is the same exact way. Two more things- the cheapest I've seen a Bf 109 kit is about $4.50 for the Airfix version, and the Academy version is about $8.00.  (Of course, shipping will bump both those prices up)  Second, even though this makes no difference now, I heard that Wings Models is set to release an improved vacuform kit of the Bv 238 with resin details, including the engines, in the summer of 2007.  I'm going to wait for that one. Other than that, keep up the good work!

Thanks!

And thanks for the info - I'll look into the Bf 109 kits.  Trouble is I need 6 kits.  I spent some time tonight cleaning up one of the nacelles, opening up the intakes and exhaust ports.  I may try to build a set of exhausts (6 - one side of the nacelle) to see how much effort it would be to make 12 sets (that's 72 total cylinders to deal with).  I found some good reference photos to work from.

Wings Models has a lot of interesting kits on their schedule, but I think the whole schedule slipped quite a bit when the owner suffered a ranching accident last year.  But if my building this kit leads to a better one being released, I'll take one for the team.  Won't be the first time.  I finished the Nimrod vac kit a couple of years ago, and now there's an injection molded one coming out.

Big is good.  I was working on an An-22 but put that aside to work on the Bv 238 and the An-225.  I also have an An-8 on the bench that's far enough along that I want to finish it rather than set it aside, so it's sucking up a fair amount of my time right now too.  That kit is also made of putty (three different kinds - I used it as a putty testbed, as well as using superglue and Mr. Surfacer on it)

Bruce

bwr1-  Awesome pics.  The BVv 238 is one of my favorite aircraft (it's big and rare- what's not to love?), and it's only been recently that I realized there was a kit for it.  I totally get it when you say your kit is made of putty.  My H-4 is the same exact way.

Two more things- the cheapest I've seen a Bf 109 kit is about $4.50 for the Airfix version, and the Academy version is about $8.00.  (Of course, shipping will bump both those prices up)  Second, even though this makes no difference now, I heard that Wings Models is set to release an improved vacuform kit of the Bv 238 with resin details, including the engines, in the summer of 2007.  I'm going to wait for that one.

Other than that, keep up the good work!

FrogFoot- Very nice nice progress.  Keep up the good work.

I only have an update I already posted in other Forums on this website.  I took a few comparison pics of a mostly complete H-4 mockup with a same scale B-17, and of a foot long ruler.  Enjoy!

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v296/LHprs/compare1.jpg

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v296/LHprs/compare2.jpg

The only major update for the forseeable future is a whole bunch of sanding.  Stay tuned!