The Gulf Wars GroupBuild--Operations Desert Storm & Iraqi Freedom (2/8/08- 28/2/09)

And she's done!

Thanks to dupes for the tidbit on the DIY photo studio.  Still trying to get the lighting right, only have a single 40W bulb from the left of the box, so the photos are lightened a bit artifically "post-production" I think they call it in the biz. 

Enough with the babble... on to the pics!

Thanks for making my first GB so much fun, even my wife says that I'm improving...uh, model wise that is...

BigSmitty - overall it looks very good...really like the dusting on the lower half.

Looks like your left side track isn't touching the road wheels?

Glad to see that the macro-box worked out for you - add a light of some sort above and you should be good to go. Try taking pics with some different background colors as well - often you get very different effects depending on the contrast between your base color and the backdrop. 

So what's next?

Thanks, dupes.

I have yet to glue the tracks to the road wheels, there are a couple of spots where they aren't quite meeting up.  When I took the pictures, I hadn't melted the rubber band tracks together, and the left one popped off as soon as I took the Challenger out of the photo booth. 

 I think I'm going to get a second 40W "snake light" for the opposite side.  For some reason, even with my chandelier directly above the booth, I was getting some serious yellowing on the pictures.  I wonder if it has to do with the size of the booth I made, from a 24x24x18 Office Depot box.  I'll have to play around with backdrops, light blue, black, etc and see what works best.  I'm also using an older (but FREE) Sony DSC camera without a macro, which makes it a bit difficult to get in close.

Up next... I got the 1/72 Tamiya P-47D Razorback (one of the latest of their "Warbirds" collection) that is closed up and ready for priming.  GB wise, I'm putzing with Dragon's OLD (1993) Me 1101 for the Fantasy Fliers GB.  That's a beast of a kit, though, and I'm getting spoiled by Tamiya's engineering of their kits.  I also have a couple other GBs, the USAAC/USAAF with AMT's mid-90s A-20G.  Parts are washed, just trying to get the motivation to actually put paint to plastic on that one.

DONE SIR DONE!

 this is the DML 1/35 BRDM-2 (BRDM-3 on the box) w/ AT-5 missiles. its OOB and is my first completely completed model. i painted the base color with model master spray cans of dark desert yellow. i applied washes with tamiya acrylic black, and weathered with artists chalks. hope you like it!

I'm calling it a build (although I still have to put a couple of coats of poly on the base and permanently affix the acrylic rod to both the base and the model).

I built the Revell F-15E Strike Eagle 1/48 with the following inspiring photograph from my alumni magazine

A special thanks to Buddy (Lewbud) for providing me with the AMRAAM missiles and GBU bombs.

Looks like a sharp build to me, Aggieman! The A+M flag is pretty neat touch.

How'd you make the base? I'd love to be able to do some builds gear-up with having to hang them from the ceiling.

The base is a clock face piece of wood I picked up at Hobby Lobby.  I didn't want to buy a bigger piece of wood from Home Depot or Lowe's and have to rout the edges and cut it to shape myself (guess I'm getting lazy).  I cut the picture to fit the base and glued it on with ModPodge (something like that, borrowed it from my wife who uses this stuff in scrapbooking).

I got some acrylic rod, cut it to length and held it over my range just long enough to make it pliable, and bent it around a big jar.  Drilled the hole for the rod with my drill press.  Now I just need to glue the rod in place so that there is no future accidents.

Sweet. Where can you find acrylic rod? I definitely want to give this a shot!

Hay dupes I'm sorry I have bean gone for a wile. I wanted this build to be just right so I went to a site where I could get the best help ever. I know some of my photo will not show a lot but I'm working on a alot of othere models at the same time. "But" here's some of my work.

Now I started this project on the roof of the rear of the Bradley and started to work my way over the turret and down to the interior. So that is what you will see in my photo. As I have a lot I will ony post part now and let some hr's go by and post more later to day.

Now I'm going to stop here as I said I have a lot more for you all to see so I will post more later to day. The chassis will help out a lot of you guys that have never known what's past the tracks and wheel. I now know and will show you what you cant see or have looked over in mini real photo.

Ok here's some more work:

M3A2's and A3's should not have those small view ports.

As for the chassis I marked off the places were the larg shocks should go, an I had to move the upper roller wheels.

(Mock up only)not the parts that will be used.

This photo is just before I moved the upper roller wheels.

Ok that's it for now, next you will see photos of all the shocks and the rear tension wheel arm.

heres the sa-6 im working on, it will be finished as an iraqi sam. this kit is awesome, its my second armor build and while some parts were a little iffy for me to assemble (mainly the fins on the missiles and the elevating part of the turret),it fits awesome and the details are nice and crisp. its going together fast too, this is my second day of working on it. any advice/critiques/BS is appreciated!

Well, I finally got started on my Italeri 1/48 OH-58A.  This weekend I had a fair amount of extra time on my hands, so I got most of the cockpit done:

This is the same aircraft I flew in Desert Storm.  Unfortunately I have not been inside one since 1992 and when I started digging through pictures to refresh my memory on what the interior looked like, I realized that I have very few photos of the interior  The instructions said to paint the interior light ghost gray.  That may have been correct during the Vietnam War, but I do remember that my aircraft was flat black inside, so that is the color I used.  The seats are not correct; the front seats were an OD nylon mesh over a tubular frame, while the back seat was a very thin (and uncomfortable) foam cushion covered with an OD color nylon.  But since I want this to be an OOB build and do not have the skill or time to scratchbuild seats, I went with the ones supplied in the kit. 

The interior wear and tear drybrushing may be a tad bit overdone - I may tone it down a bit (it is amazing what flaws appear when you take a digital photo ).  Anyhow, I hope to continue to make reasonably quick progress on this kit, as it is fairly simple and straightforward.  I am dreading the exterior.  I am not very good at making monochrome paint jobs look realistic.  I will post more as I make additional headway.

Russ

i took the PE saw that came with the kit and cut off the saw part and kept just the sheath, all the pics ive seen of iraqi sa-6s have the saw off. im just trying to figure out how to make the clamps that go in the empty holes. im thinking a bent piece of PE.

i colored the glass just a mix of purple and blue, really couldnt think of anything better. all i got left now is the tracks which i attempted and its really not getting me anywhere so i might just get the aftermarket set, and the 2 missiles and travel lock.

If it's still possible, I would like to join this GB.

We have just started a Gulf War GB at Modellbygge iFokus, a Swedish modelling site. One of my entries there would be right here too, so i'm in with a Sukhoi Su-22M4R Fitter-K from IqAF. The kit is MasterCraft #020170 in 1/72.

mick,

 i looked at your site there and even tho i cant read swedish i noticed that one of the guys there is building the RF-4C from the 106th, that was the squadron my father flew in Desert Storm, they made a decal set with my fathers name on it, but i didnt know if that was included in the kit or not. can you ask because he only has one set and im trying to find another, if thats the case then i will look around online for that kit. its lt.col. susnik.

@ rufioizgrreat: 

Sure! Will do!

@ rufioizgrreat: 

I have asked him and I have a scanned decal sheet. We DO NOT find any name on the sheet. Sorry!

If you want me to send you the picture, please let me know.

And if someone of you all (who's building something from the period 17-07-1990 -- 09-04-1991) would like to join our GB at Modellbygge iFokus, you are very welcome to do so. Altough the site is in Swedish, most of us understand English quite well so I don't think there will be any problems. For us Swedes, that is! We don't have any English version of Modellbygge iFokus yet, but we have a English-speaking information page under construction. Meanwhile, just join and we will try to help you in the right direction.

Gruppbygge #8: Gulfkriget  

mick,

 thanks anyways! i know that squadron made the decals, i just didnt know if it was the same sheet that might have been in the kit. thanks tho!

Is there still time for me to join in this one as well? I have a couple Hummers from Italeri that I ahve been wanting to build.  I could do one of them for this build...

Please let me know.  If I can still be included I can get busy on it tomorrow morning first thing!

I'm finally done with my Warrior "Operation Telic" build. I used Eduard PEs but I was only able to use the generic pieces as this set was not designed for a Warrior during Operation Telic. I also inserted a brass wire to the bottom of the hull periscopes and the one on the top of the turret so that it rotates. I have not finalized yet how the gears will be arranged so nothing has been tied down yet. Here are some photos: