The In My Stash GB

Doom, Nice builds!   I really love that Corsair.

Arki, nice start on the Maachi.  I just bought the 1/32 21st Century kit so I'll be looking forward to your build.

Nucmed, awlright!  I'm looking forward to seeing your build of the schnellboot. 

Finally got back to doing some work on the Snowberry.  Still got some work to do on the hull before I paint it.  Some of the plates on the 4 piece hull didn't line up very well so I've got some puttying and scraping to do.

Doom- Your AS-90 came out great and The Crusader looks good too!

Arkii- Is the Macchi the Hasegawa kit? I built one a while back, it was a preety nice kit. Used the true details cockpit set, only problem is the cockpit opening was so small you can barely see the detail.

Well, I''ve got one progress pic. of the schnellboot.

It's good to actually get started, I quess you can take me off the turtle award list Kenny!

Thanks, Kenny!  Good to see our fearless leader is still alive and kicking.

Doom, love the Crusader.  The mistake on the intake is minor in my opinion and the markings look great.  Sanding might help on the blurriness of the last picture with perhaps a clear coat after   Or maybe just a shot of JD

Heh, thanks for catching my mistake, Arki. My real #2, the 1/72 Academy F8-E Crusader:

Here you can see how I made the white paint come up to0 high on the cowling. I thought it followed the panel line and didn't catch my mistake until it was way too late. 

The underside isn't too exciting... and a bit blurry. Wonder if some sanding could fix the blurryness.....

The fit was pretty good on this kit and I like the panel line detail. The decals are the absolute worst I've ever even seen. No amount of decal solvent would do anything. At least they didn't explode. 

Oh, and thanks for the focus point tip, Arki. I'll look for a way to fix it. The camera only has 2 zoom settings, though. Maybe I'll use someone else's from now on.  

Looks pretty good, Doom.  Yes, a gloss coat is definitely needed before decaling, but I can't really see any silvering in the pictures.  Your focus point is behind the AS-90 which makes the foreground blurry. 

What happened to your real #2, the Crusader?  And what's the last picture of?  Not an armor guy so I can't tell at a glance.  Edit: Reread your previous post.  The Academy Tiger I take it?

On my end, I'm finishing up the cockpit of the Macchi.  I've already decided to build this with canopy closed so I'm not going to get fussy with the detail and finish.  OOB except for the exceptional Ultracast seat.  For the Italian colors I'm trying a different paint line, Lifecolor, that I haven't used before.  This is Lifecolor Italian interior green.  Sprays a little thicker than I'm used to, so I'll still be experimenting with this paint as the build progresses.  I'm a little worried about it's durability too as it seems to come up fairly easily if I gently scrape it.  Hmm, we'll see.

Yay, pics!

AS-90 

There it is. Please excuse the terrible image quality. This is my first model with camo. The flat coat I put down really messed up the colors and made them really dulled down. The decals also silvered. Yay! Lessons learned: always use gloss before decalling, and use fresh tape to mask (my stuff was really old and not too tacky).

 And I have started on my #2, Here it is so far. Not much going on yet. 

Great job on the Avenger Arki. I remember that turret, and how frustrating it was. Never the less yours came out way better than mine.

I finished my other projects so I hope to start my schnellboot this weekend. Will post pics as they are available.

Nice build arki

 Good luck on the Macchi

Thanks Doom and welcome back!  Yes, most definately post some pictures of your builds.  Hopefully they survived the trip. 

I said I'd take a couple of weeks off, but I lied.  Couldn't help it.  Last night I broke out the Macchi and washed the parts trees.  <sigh>  It's a sickness. 

Hey everyone. I'm home from "vacation"!

Arki, that plane is just plain awesome. My only criticism is that you're not sending it to me!

Contrary to (most likely) everyone here, my stash hasn't grown recently. I've placed myself on a strict kit diet. Well actually I don't know if I could call it a diet because that would be refraining from building kits... not buying them...

So I hauled a whole bunch of model-building stuff to my vacation spot. Along with a halfway-done F8-E Crusader and a fresh AS-90 SF Howitzer. Finished them both! The truth is that I just realized that I haven't unpacked them from their packing-peanut-filled box yet so I don't know their conditions. Eek! I will do so immediately and post pictures ASAP.

So I dare say, my #2 is complete (after my #1 met a very unfortunate end [intentionally crushed]. In my defense, the little pile of junk was just plain begging for it). And one of my tied #6's is complete. Who said we can't jump around a bit? Okay, to be fair, I will begin my #3, a 1:35 Academy Tiger I. Woot!

arki30 wrote:

My stash has grown as well.  I blame it on aliens

As long as the aliend doesn't pop out of your gut.   Though you'd make every supermarket tabloid and thus be able to pay for the aliens' addiction to plastic in the form of little airplanes.

Dave I'm 43 also and my growing stash is part of my retirement planning or so I keep telling my wife(it's working so far).  If my memory serves me well your birthday is around the same time as mine in November is'nt it?.  If ever you come to Montreal you have to go to Udisco & Hobby Junction they will take care of that raise of yours, I took my brother there last weekend it we spent a good 4 Hrs adding to our stashes  it was quite fun.  As for the Lanc I just need to find out if my uncles aircraft had nose art & if so what it was and have some decals made, now I only have building to do.

Cheers

Bear

Muchos gracias, Dave and Bear.  Appreciate the comments!

My stash has grown as well.  I blame it on aliens  

Hi Dave  It's nice to be around again, works been keeping me rather busy as well as the stream of visitors.  The Lanc is coming along nicely althought very slowly the wings are on and I'm working on the gears.  I'm taking my time till I can get my painting skill up a few notches  I DO NOT want to screw up this kit.  On another note I've been a bad bear of late the stash has seriously grown in the last 5 months   If my yearly build count is right I've got enough kits now to last till I retire.  Now I tell the missus that the kits i'm buying are for my retirement

Cheers

Bear

Excellent build Arkii!   I look forward to seeing your MC 202 as well.

Il2, nice progress!

Bear, nice to see you posting again.  (how's the Lancaster coming?)

Arki Very nice you did a great job well done. 

All I see some great progress keep up the good work guy's

Progress report:  The last coat of Tan was put on this weekend.  I'll leave it for a few day's then I'll pull & pray (remove the tape and silly putty) I hope it comes out ok it's the first time I try a three tone camo scheme. 

 Cheers

Bear

Ahh, success I walked away from the turret for awhile, then came back to it and with a little careful persuasion it finally slid in.  Whew...

I'm calling this finished!  I present the #1 pick from my stash as voted on by the esteemed members of this GB, 1/48 Accurate Miniatures TBM-1C Avenger finished in the markings of the plane former President George H.W. Bush was shot down in, VT-51, White X3. 

OOB except for Ultracast pilot's seat and True Details main wheels.  I don't typically weather my aircraft, so it's just a light watercolor wash in wheel wells, gear and hubs.  I tried something different this time for the panel lines using a .03 mechanical pencil for highlighting.  Certainly faster than a wash, but the results are less than satisfactory to me.  Live and learn. 

I think I'll take a break for the next couple of weeks to focus on some other life issues and then jump right into pick #2, the Macchi C.202.  That's the plane I really had hoped would get picked first, but second will work just as well. 

Enjoy, and comments/criticisms welcome!

turret !!!!!

I'm literally finished with everything except installing the turret in the fuselage, except it's not cooperating.  I'm using Acc Min's instructions on their website and I still can't get the thing in there.  Grr...

yeah, thanks Ark.

I forgot to mention how nice your build is coming along.  The paint looks great.

Il, for all the extra effort and bondo required, that is looking really nice.  She looks like a Mig-31, and that's half the battle.

Eagerly awaiting paint progress

Here are the progress photos of the Mig-31 I pormised:

I sanded the fuselage sides so much, there were no panel lines left!
I rescribed all of them.

Painted cockpit.  Every panel line in this photo was scribed

I bought some aftermarket decals for the kit, because the ICM decals
simply sucked.  The aftermarket decals also had all the aircraft stencilling
that is so essential to making an aircraft look realistic.  Anyway, they also
included some pretty cool cockpit decals that i used. Because the canopy
will be closed, these decals will provide just enough detail to make the
panels look right.  Also, you can see the inboard bypass vents on either
side of the cockpit that were completely rebuilt.  These scratch-built
vents are my biggest concern. I think I blended them well, but I won't
really know until the primer layer goes on.

I grabbed a couple of 1/72 figures from an ESCI Nato ground crew set.
Their suits and helmets were almost a perfect match to Russian gear.
These guys were originally standing with their hands over their heads,
holding tools.  I had to cut each of them into about 6 peices, then use
superglue to reassemble them in sitting positions, because the rubbery
plastic material did not respond to plastic cement.  Putty and paint.  
I actually highly recommend this figure set; the figures are well-molded
and highly detailed, and it was cheap.  Getting them in the cockpit is a
bit of work, though.

Almost completely assembled.  I just need to put the canopy down before
I move into the second half of this project: the paint stage.

This is the aircraft I am reproducing.

Thanks Kenny. 

She's Futured now, so I'll begin decaling later tonight.  Started assembly of the turret also. 

dan and arki coming along nicely cat wait to see more

sir il great to see you

I use polyscale Steampower Black quite often.  It's my "go-to" flat black.
I can hardly imagine it as a gray, because it makes such nice flat dark surface. 

As for the Mig-31, let's just say that I've become one with the sanding stick.
LOL It might have been easier to carve this Mig-31 out of a solid brick of wood. 
All that said, I feel like I've finally made enough progress to move out of the
sculpting phase of this project.  I'll post pictures soon.

I'm almost ready to paint with primer.  Then I'll find out if I am done sculpting. 
Doubtful, though.

You're right. We model railroaders model stuff that is usually black, and the ugliest black too, but never use black. Steam power black, weathered black etc.

It's all gray, which is a mixture of any or all colors. Gray comes in warm (red) or cool (blue) shades and you've got to use your eye.

There is a Balao class sub in dock in my City, but it is light gray so I cannot give you an opinion.

Thanks, Arki, yes, Nato Black is kind of greyish and flat, however, since I have darkened mine with black, under artificial light, it looks black but in sunlight you can still see it as being greyish. That is also the reason that the preshaded welds don't show on the photograph.  I have choosen this because plain flat black doesn't really appeal on a large subject, now if this was a 1/400 or 1/700 ship I would have used black (the 1/1 Gato was black) but one has to keep the scale aspect in mind.  For instance if you look at large ship from a distance it will not show black, while indeed it may be black at close range.