The P-51"mustang" Group Build. 2008

raptordriver wrote:

Outstanding work Arki! That is one nice paint scheme. Now that your gone this build will now probably die.

Nah, it will probably be like the Spitfire GB, no insecticide known to man nor beast can kill it.  I'm going to join with a 1/48 Collect Aire P-51H that needs to be built. 

arki30 wrote:

Dupes, deep breath!  Andrew's young.  I believe you and I have discussed prior that year-long GB durations are never a good idea because there is little pressure to maintain a solid build pace, so I agree with your statement.  BUT, it's also the responsibility of those that join to manage themselves.  How many guys have we seen join too many GB's at a time with no chance in of finishing anything, much less on time?!  It's especially irritating when they are clearly joining because "the badge is cool!"  The noobs seem particularly vulnerable to this shiny object syndrome. Life certainly gets in the way, but I find far too often that life has had nothing to do with participants not participating in the GB they signed up for.  It's usually the inability to control and manage themselves.  How many of the guys in this GB are in that predicament?  Hard to say.  But if one or two keep plugging along this GB will continue to see life till the end.  And I hope (know) you're one of them.

Hmmm...perhaps I came across as a bit grumpier than I was shooting for.

Arki - I agree with you absolutely about GB theory. I wish more people would sign up with more realistic intentions of completing a build within the original period of time...I, however, am not one to idly join a GB - my Mustang will be completed well within the parameters!

Andrew - you need to remember that as the GB leader it is partially your responsibility to keep the group build alive! Perhaps you need to crank out another Mustang?

Hi everyone!

I'm sorry for being away so long! Partly due to that life actually came in the way, partly due to too many GBs and partly due to that I was ashamed for not showing up!
Since I started to work I had to narrow down my building quite a bit and also the number of GBs I'm in. First of all I'm trying to finish a Spitfire before the end of this month! Then if nothing else comes inbetween I'll try to finish as many GBs that's possible!

As for the Mustang I'm working with, I intended to do different shades of NMF, but I think I might leave that be and start finishing the kit instead!

Cheers,

Azgaron

dupes wrote:

...I, however, am not one to idly join a GB - my Mustang will be completed well within the parameters!

Cheers to that!

Welcome back Azgaron!  Now finish what you signed up to do.

Cool there still is some people here!

Jeaton welcome aboard!

Azgaron welcome back!

To the rest, yes I won't make a build again this long ever! But I not about to make a new GB thread for a very long time!

Thanks Arki and Andrew!

Arki, I'll try to do that! Nice build btw. Forgot to say that!

Cheers,

Azgaron 

Greetings to all

OK here we go. As some may remember my entry was a 1/72 Starfix P-51 I found in a dollar store years ago. Its not big on detail and accuracy as you would guess for model costing a whopping $1.

After seeing an episode of Dog Fights they made a brief mention of how the Germans used captured P-51s to infiltrate the bomb groups. This concept caught my imagination and with some help from some people here I was able to find some pictures to use as a guide.

One photo stood out above the rest and I ran with it. This plane is not meant to be an accurate representation of an actual operational German P-51. Despite what I had to work with and my lack of skills I had fun building it.

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Ouch, I just caught a huge mistake. Oh, well you live you learn.

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Maybe some day I'll revisit this and fix what I can but for now its time to move on. This is the first of what I hope is many more to come.

I started on my Collect Aire P-51H yesterday and had a fair amount of time to spend on it.  It is going together pretty well, certainly very well so far for a resin kit.  The cockpit details are pretty accurate compared to the photos I have.  I put some interior green in the cockpit, as in the first years of the airplane's service.  An all-black cockpit doesn't seem like it would be much to look at.  There was a pretty good resin panel in the kit, but was became operative somewhere between washing the parts and finding it when it came time to deal with it.  I modified a P-47N Eduard panel and used it instead.  Has a better snazzy quotient anyway, I think.  I'm going to pose the cockpit closed to emphasize the different shape of the H compared to the D, so I went through the cockpit buildng pretty quick.

Dirk, very nice work on that captured Stang! Looking good!

John, nice looking pit! Looking forward to seeing more!

Cheers,

Azgaron

Moving along on the P-51H.  This thing looks like a Mustang after it got the Salvador Dali treatment.  sort of like everything flowed.  I have been trying to keep this build simple to see what the result is when I'm done.  I found that when I built the all resin kit before this one, a Ju-388K by Planet, that the more I handle things, the more things I break off, ding up, and just generally foul up.  I am undoubtedly NOT the most graceful model builder on the block.  There aren't many parts to the main part of the kit and everything has fit unbelievably well, though a fair amount of superglue and Tamiya putty has been used, and a little bit of Milliput fairs in the front of the windscreen.  There are no pour blocks on the parts, just wafers to remove from the detail parts and that is where a lot of time can go on most resin kits.  The surface of the resin is not as smooth as a nice plastic kit, so the nmf is not quite as good as  quality plastic kit can be, but it came out nice.  If I tried to smooth it down I am sure I would lose a lot of the fine surface detail, so I left it as it was, and it is acceptable to me.  I doubt it would be good enough for some others, but I have a couple thousand more models to build here before my planned air fleet is complete and I aint no spring chicken.

It will be in the colors of the Polish branch of the Massachussetts ANG, I like the red trim, and the spinner will be alternating red and white rings.

Dirk Great Build Thanks for posting! That starfix kit does look like a mess.

Jeaton, Thanks for posting the WIP the NMF looks great to me. A awsome red paint scheme as well. Resin kits don't sound very hard. Its the vaccumformed ones that do but that is a whole different topic entirely!

LOL - you guys kill me.  I gues nobody loves the H!  Except me...I LOVE the P-51H.  The sharper nose, the tall tail, the twin antennas...sigh, I'm in love.

Jeaton, you model looks awesome, man.  Great work on her!  Looks like you're close to done.

I hope you guys wont mind me showing off the P51H i did a couple years back:

OK, this one is headed for the display case.  It was a nice build, but for some very delicate Invisa-Clear decals it was almost hassle free.  When I mentioned the H was a Dali-type Mustang, my thought was it looks like a Mustang, but things are just not quite right, like it has gone off just a bit Martin Baker MB-5-ish.  Look at the side view photo and you will see what I mean.  More photos of the build and comments are on my web site here:

http://yolo.net/~jeaton/mymodels/p51/p51h/1p51h/1p51h.htm

Nice model, Jeaton.  Your NMF has a very nice sheen to it.  She looks good next to that F-86!  Another fine pony rides out of this build, eh Raptor?

Answering your question, my kit was the Classic Airframes kit.  It's a really good kit, but it can be hard to find these days.

Good looking Stang John! The NMF looks great!

Cheers, 

Azgaron

Although I have been mostly consumed building a B-58 for the IMS2 GB, I have been able to peel away from that kit from time to time.  I've been performing some odds and ends on my Mustang model over the last couple weeks.

A while ago, while reworking the seam around the cockpit, I accidentally separated it from the fuselage.  No biggie, and I intended to rebond it.  However, while shopping at Squadron, I saw a AccMini P-51A vac canopy and I threw it in the shopping cart out of curiosity.  I was suprised by what I received, as the P-51A vac canopy is molded with the adjacent part of the FWD fuselage.  I liked this feature alot and decided to go with this new canopy.  So I cut away the dash part of my kit to match the canopy seam.  Tonight I scratch-built a dash panel that I hope will look OK when it's painted and detailed.  Also, I've been working on painting and weathering the prop, although the photos don't show much of its detail.

Looks like I better give my pilot some eyes!

Very nice work IL! That canopy looks nice!

Yes, perhaps some careful painting of the eyes will do the trick!

Cheers,

Azgaron

Jeaton and Windhawk -- superb Hs, guys, squirelly builds of the squirrelly 'stang. Looking at them reminded me I got a RarePlanes vacform conversion many years ago, H fuselage halves to which most of the rest could be added by raiding a D. Even now, I shudder at the thought!

Still hoping to contribute, but that Tamiya -D never arrived, the mail swallowed it between Hong Kong and here, and took a StuG III/G with it...

Cheers,

Mike/TB379

Hi Raptordriver,

I hear you! But to be fair, when a Tamiya 1:48 is offered for a quater US shelf price you gotta take the hook... And it's the only package from that seller that's actually gone missing. And at the same time Great Models Webstore have totally screwed up my faith in them by not delivering on my first order to them!

A Tamiya 1:72 Mustang did arrive, though, and I'm considering doing something with that!

Cheers,

TB379/Mike

Gee quarter of the price! I would take the hook! If it was reliable.

 So how long have you been waiting for your stang Mike?

Hi Andrew,

Yup, a quarter the US shelf price, or pretty close to. Could you resist new Tamiyas for $9.99? 1:72s for $7.80? No, neither could I... Unfortunately, he also cheats on the postage and charges for protective packing that doesn't get used, so kits arrive crushed in the mail, and eventually one dosen't arrive at all. It's a lucky dip. But they are cheap.

That package was mailed at the end of March by surface (no point in airmail, it overbalances the savings), so it's never going to show up.

By contrast I deal with a trader in Beijing who saves me enormously on Trumpeter (a quarter US shelf pice on many older armor kits, and I'm talking $100 less than shelf price here in Aus on some deluxe items) and somewhat less on Dragon, and packages always arrive, even if they are never packed as well as I'd hope. The Post Office accepts no responsibility for packages from China unless they are fully insured and packed to withstand a weight of 40lbs placed on top of them -- China Post's rep is that bad... And to claim insurance you have to surrender the goods and then they'll think about reimbursing you. So you get used to new stock arriving looking second-hand. But they are cheap...

Mike