Non-railway modelling

[Darius43]

22 hours ago, Barry Ten said:

One thing I enjoy about kits is that you sometimes learn something you didn't know before. Today I learned about vertical fin offset! The Airifx P51 correctly has the fin at a small angle to the airflow. It's much less obvious in the Taymiya and Hasegawa P51s I built before.

 

 

 

To counteract the torque from the engine/ prop.

 

Went to a talk by Dave Southwood at the Royal Aeronautical Society on Flying warbirds - excellent stuff.  If anyone recalls the BBC series “ Test Pilot” from the mid 1980s, Dave Southwood was the winner of the trophy at the end of the series.

 

Cheers

 

Darius

[Barry Ten]

54 minutes ago, Darius43 said:

 

To counteract the torque from the engine/ prop.

 

Went to a talk by Dave Southwood at the Royal Aeronautical Society on Flying warbirds - excellent stuff.  If anyone recalls the BBC series “ Test Pilot” from the mid 1980s, Dave Southwood was the winner of the trophy at the end of the series.

 

Cheers

 

Darius

 

I used to work under a David Southwood who was a fellow of the RAS ... but not the same one.

[Rugd1022]

Some examples of the work of a chap called Ian Saestrand....

 

 

[railroadbill]

 

Auster Antarctic serial WE600,   Auster T.7 (dual control version of AOP6)  converted to C.4 Antarctic version for Sir Vivian Fuch's 1956 Commonwealth Trans-Antarctic expedition. Sir Edmund Hilary of Everest fame was also involved in this. Another converted aircraft, WE563 was operated by the RNZAF during the same successful expedition. They were both used for reconnaissance.

 

A DH Otter used on the same expedition was the first single-engined  aircraft to fly non-stop across Antarctica and cross the South pole.

 

More on the prototype here:

https://www.rafmuseum.org.uk/documents/collections/1989-0305-A_AUSTER_T.7.WE600.pdf

 

This is the Airfix kit originally from 1958  (re-issued 2004-2006). I vaguely remember making one of the originals  back in the day...  I think the reissue is much the same with better transfers, the box had the original artwork.

 

 

 

Here's the original, preserved at the RAF museum, Cosford.

 

 

[saxokid]

Not realy model kits these oxford HGV"s 1:76 scale

but ive been buying stobarts up and respraying then adding my own bits to them..

[Trainshed Terry]

Since the world is in lockdown mode, I started this kit of a "Bedford QLR Wireless" by IBG. It has been in the cupboard for a year and it was the right time to make it.

 

 

[saxokid]

Started adding strap down loads to these now..

[Nelson Jackson]

Hello everyone! I just recently finished this diorama, I hope you like it! 

 

Here is a bit more information for anyone interested... 

 

Peenemünde, Northern Germany, 12th November, 1945. 

 

Anyone with a basic understanding of pulse jet engines will realise that the model as portrayed... Would simply not be feasible in real life. Hence why I have based it upon a "alternate" history, outlined within the title above. 

 

The kit was supposed to be a stand alone, few evenings worth... But this changed into a fully fledged diorama within a couple of days. The E100, is pretty much OTB with a camouflage scheme loosely based upon the heavily debated King Tiger "Octopus" example. The reason for the red primer sides is to indicate that the spaced armour, was removed to compensate for the weight of the V1 rocket and launcher. No actual vehicle of this type was ever considered and only a chassis for the E100 was completed by 1945, which was then later shipped to England for testing. 

 

The buildings are completely scratchbuilt from plasticard and texture clay, again loosely based on real life examples. This time from the rocket factory in Peenemünde. The site itself was not fully operational until 1943 utilising slave labour in an effort to increase capacity for the infamous V2 rockets and newer inventions. It's effectiveness was short lived, whenever 596 British aircraft heavily bombed the site in August 1943, forcing production to be moved further into central Germany. 

 

The figures represent a strong contingent that would have been evident in Berlin around April/May, 1945. I have chosen to feature Waffen SS "Charlemagne", and Volkssturm soldiers within the diorama and each of them are using a variety of weaponry such as MP44s, MP40s, K98s, and the ubiquitous Panzerfaust. 

 

Specifications: 
Base (LxWxH) - 17x13x15cm
Vehicle - Modelcollect E100 V1
Figures - Italeri SS & Pegasus Hobbies "Germans in Berlin"
Build time - Approx 9 weeks 
Total hours - Unknown (probably too many) 

 

Disclaimer: For everyone who can read or speak German, then please forgive my ignorance to "Verlassen", it was only after that I found out it did not mean "exit", however I can live with it, for now! 

Nelson. 

[saxokid]

1 hour ago, Nelson Jackson said:

Hello everyone! I just recently finished this diorama, I hope you like it! 

 

Here is a bit more information for anyone interested... 

 

Peenemünde, Northern Germany, 12th November, 1945. 

 

Anyone with a basic understanding of pulse jet engines will realise that the model as portrayed... Would simply not be feasible in real life. Hence why I have based it upon a "alternate" history, outlined within the title above. 

 

The kit was supposed to be a stand alone, few evenings worth... But this changed into a fully fledged diorama within a couple of days. The E100, is pretty much OTB with a camouflage scheme loosely based upon the heavily debated King Tiger "Octopus" example. The reason for the red primer sides is to indicate that the spaced armour, was removed to compensate for the weight of the V1 rocket and launcher. No actual vehicle of this type was ever considered and only a chassis for the E100 was completed by 1945, which was then later shipped to England for testing. 

 

The buildings are completely scratchbuilt from plasticard and texture clay, again loosely based on real life examples. This time from the rocket factory in Peenemünde. The site itself was not fully operational until 1943 utilising slave labour in an effort to increase capacity for the infamous V2 rockets and newer inventions. It's effectiveness was short lived, whenever 596 British aircraft heavily bombed the site in August 1943, forcing production to be moved further into central Germany. 

 

The figures represent a strong contingent that would have been evident in Berlin around April/May, 1945. I have chosen to feature Waffen SS "Charlemagne", and Volkssturm soldiers within the diorama and each of them are using a variety of weaponry such as MP44s, MP40s, K98s, and the ubiquitous Panzerfaust. 

 

Specifications: 
Base (LxWxH) - 17x13x15cm
Vehicle - Modelcollect E100 V1
Figures - Italeri SS & Pegasus Hobbies "Germans in Berlin"
Build time - Approx 9 weeks 
Total hours - Unknown (probably too many) 

 

Disclaimer: For everyone who can read or speak German, then please forgive my ignorance to "Verlassen", it was only after that I found out it did not mean "exit", however I can live with it, for now! 

Nelson. 

That's very nice!! top work here Nelson

[saxokid]

Been using some scrap plastic from model kit

to make some twin exhausts on my growing fleet of hgv"s...

[Darius43]

1:48 scale Antonov An-2

 

Before 1:48 injection moulded kits were available, I spotted this kit by an unknown (to me or anyone else with an ignorance of "Russian" text) manufacturer on eBay and subsequently won the auction.  The kit had few parts - primarily left and right fuselage halves and solid mainwings and tailplanes.  The tailfin was squared off, which made the kit an An-2M.  There were no clear parts as the cockpit was moulded in solid plastic with the main fuselage and the plastic parts were quite thick 3 to 5mm in places.  There were no detail parts - no interior required with no clear parts - and what little surface detail that existed was heavily engraved - sort of Matchbox on steroids.  On the plus side the plastic used was easy to cut and sand and responded well to liquid poly and cyano cements.

I scribed the ribbing effect on the top and bottom surfaces of both mainwings using a large knife and an old photoetch fret as a flexible straightedge - this was quite effective as the pains in my upper right arm testified for the next two weeks.   I marked the curved tailfin profile on the kit parts and cut and sanded the parts to shape - removing the rudder at the same time.

 

 

 

 

I considered leaving the solid canopy in place and painting the glazing panels black but decided that this would not look good in this scale so I cut away the solid canopy.  Thus both a new clear canopy and cockpit interior were required.  The former was produced by the plunge form method using the solid canopy and a hole cut in the lid of an old cigar box. 
 

 

The cockpit was scratch built from plastic sheet and steel wire with the help of some of Mike Grant's 1:48 scale instrument decals.

 

 

 

I scribed panel lines on the fuselage halves with an Olfa P-cutter and the aforementioned PE fret and primed the plastic with Halfords grey spray primer.  Halfords "Nissan Silver" was used for the BMF scheme.  The kit wing struts were somewhat thin and feeble and so I reinforced them by laminating them with plastic card.  I rigged the model with Aeroclub "stretchy" rigging thread and javelin struts cut form steel pins.  A spare resin engine from a Classic Airframes Hudson, spares box wheels and a prop from a Monogram B-29 (with the cuffs removed) completed the build.
 

 

 

 

 

 

Cheers

 

Darius

 

 

 

Edited April 23, 2020 by Darius43

[Darius43]

1/48 Sanger Avro Shackleton MR Mk 3 - a bit more on the Shackleton seen in earlier posts

 

 

Sanger are the company that produces 1:48 kits of RAF two and four-engined aircraft that other companies have so far avoided.  Unfortunately they are vac-formed kits of the "old school" requiring serious plastic cutting, sanding, scratch building and a big hit to the spares box.  In short they are great fun but not for the faint of heart (or sane).

I got my MR3 kit from Hannants.  It is packed in an insubstantial plastic bag with large vac-formed white styrene sheets containing the fuselage, wings. tailplanes, engine nacelles, part of the nosegear leg (unuseable) and mainwheels (also unuseable).  The cockpit, nose and tailcone transparencies are supplied in thick but well-formed clear plastic - you only get one set so care is needed when cutting.  The nosewheels (wrong tyre tread), maingear legs, engine exhausts, propeller blades, control yokes and cockpit seats (unuseable) are in white metal.  A large decal sheet provides codes that appear to be for an MR1 but does supply appropriate yellow wing walk markings.
 

 

The vac parts were cut from the backing sheets and sanded down in the usual fashion - sandpaper laid flat on a sheet of glass (an old refrigerator shelf).  The engines are supplied as left and right halves and require intake flaps to be cut in the sidewalls.  Based on photographs I sketched sideviews of the inboard and outer nacelles and marked where they were on each nacelle half.  They were then cut away to form the openings.  Pre-curved sheet was laminated and re-attached to fill the rear half of each opening and a thinner "flap" was attached to the forward half to match the photo images.  The vac-formed engine fronts were scored with a P-cutter and cemented just inside the front of each nacelle.  Offcuts from the vac backing sheet were fashioned to make the "dividers" in the engine fronts.

The outboard nacelle "tubes" are moulded parallel but the MR3 outboard nacelles have a bulged underside that is quite distinctive.  This was created by cementing curved formers to the nacelle underside and filling the gaps with offcut vac backing bits and finally Humbrol plastic filler.  Once hardened these were sanded smooth to form the bulged nacelle undersides.   The nacelles were then grafted onto the wings using super glue (cyano) and lots more filler.  Once I had removed much of this from my fingers it was ready to sand.

 

 

 

 

 

The tailpalnes are moulded with quite a bulbous thickness to them so these were ruthlessley sanded down to produce a more scale thickness.  The rudders were also separated to give a better effect.  Steel pins super glued into holes drilled using a pin vice secured the tail assembiles together. 

The fusleage halves have door and window locations indicated by embossed perimeters.  Unfortunately these are in the wrong positions and so they had to be filled and the windows marked, drilled and cut out in the correct locations - photo references helped a lot with this task.  The starboard rear door was re-scribed in the proper position.  The joint between the fuselage halves was reinforced with plastic strips (more vac backing offcuts) and sprue lengths from an old injection moulded kit were used to ensure the correct vertical separation - this prevents the vac fuselage halves from "squashing".  

There is no kit cockpit and so this has to be scratch built (using more vac backing sheet offcuts and plastic card stock) - a google image search helped with this. 
 

 

 

 

 

The main cockpit console was scratch built using laminated plastic card sheets but the kit-supplied yokes were used (hurrah!).   The seats were scratch built using thick plastic card and spare photo-etched bits.

The kit-supplied engine exhausts do not look like the ones on an MR3 so the exhaust bodies were scratch built and the white metal pipes were grafted onto these - only had to do this eight times!!! 

 

 

 

 

Once the cockpit was cemented into one fusleage half, the other half was attached superglued, taped and left overnight.  The joint was then smeared with humbrol filler and then left for another day.   After sanding - no joint line (phew).  Slots were cut in the fuleage sides for two thick plastic main wing spars (not a kit instruction requirement but vital in a model of this size).  The cockpit and tailcone transparencies were dipped in Johnson's Clear and once dry super glued to the kit (the Clear does prevent white misting) - although the super glue is applied to the joint using a pin point with the part taped in position.  Once the glue had set the clear part is masked and the joint filled with humbrol filler.  The filler having set, the joint is sanded (with the masking still in place) to result in a smooth joint - the masking protects the clear part from scratching during sanding.  The masking was replaced and the whole model primed with Halfords grey spray primer. 
 

 

 

 

The top of the fuselage was painted with Halfords white spray primer and sealed with a couple of coats of Clear.  Xtracolour dark sea grey was then brush applied to the rest of the kit.  I used spitfire mainwheels for the nosewheels and true details 1:72 B52 wheels for the mains - with scratch built hub inserts.  Xtradecal roundels and Carpena white letter codes were used along with home-made decals for the red serial and code inlays to the white decals (to give a red code with a white outline).  The octopus motif on the fins was scanned in and transferred to clear decal film.   The finished model depicts a Shackleton MR Mk 3 Phase 2 of 206 Squadron RAF based at St Mawgan in Cornwall circa February 1965 - the month of my birth!!!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Cheers

 

Darius

 

Edited April 24, 2020 by Darius43

[Barry Ten]

Flippin' Nora!

[Northmoor]

When all kits were vacuum-formed and you had to spend hours converting the parts into something usable, did experienced modellers dismiss kits with all parts on a sprue and which only required a little trimming/sanding, as "not proper modelling"?

[Barry Ten]

Vac formed?

 

Luxury.

[Darius43]

30 minutes ago, Northmoor said:

When all kits were vacuum-formed and you had to spend hours converting the parts into something usable, did experienced modellers dismiss kits with all parts on a sprue and which only required a little trimming/sanding, as "not proper modelling"?

 

When I were a lad there used to be kits where you had lumps of wood to carve to an outline printed on the sides.

 

Cheers

 

Darius

 

 

[durham light infantry]

Darius, where do you put your completed models? A real hangar?

[HonestTom]

I have a lot of friends who are into fantasy tabletop gaming, so I thought I’d try making a bit of scenery.

 

The basic shell was cardboard. The planking, door, roof shingles and window are card cut from food packaging. The bricks are cut from egg cartons. The chimney pots are push pins. The door handle is a ring intended for jewellery.

Edited April 27, 2020 by HonestTom

[Darius43]

1:48 B-47E Stratojet - 1:48 Scale vacform kit - Part 1

 

 

The kit itself

This is the Sanger 1:48 scale vac-formed kit of the B-47E.  This is an "old school" type vac-form kit and so needs a bit of care and attention during the build, not to mention a lot of scratch building, scribing, occasional swearing and what seems like hours of sanding.  In summary this kit does not fall together.  I started building in August 2006 and finished in May 2007 - with some large breaks to build smaller and simpler kits for the sake of my sanity.

 

The kit comprises several large sheets of vac-formed plastic for the fuselage, wings, fin, tailplanes, engine nacelles and pylons, main gear wells, wheels, and various fuselage bulkheads. In white metal you get gear (main and outrigger) legs, seats, yokes, main wheel hubs, outrigger wheels and engine intake fans.  One vac formed clear clamshell canopy is provided. There are no decals provided with the kit but Gerald Elliot of Sanger does provide a sheet that can be purchased separately and which contains the SAC "milky way" sashes, a/c numbers and US Air Force titles. 

 

 

 

Tailplane and elevators

The parts were cut from the backing sheet in the usual way - scoring around them with a sharp knife and then breaking them free. The fuselage outline is not too bad but the cockpit cut-out location is a bit vague so this will need to be done with care.  To ease into the project after removing (but not sanding) the fuselage and main wings I concentrated on the tailfin and tailplanes. These were removed from their backing sheets and sanded to shape on a piece of medium grit sandpaper laid flat on the cutting mat. The panel lines are well located but a bit indistinct so I rescribed them with an Olfa P-cutter.  To reinforce the tailplane to tailfin connections I glued a block of styrene made from strips of the plastic backing offcuts laminated together. This was cemented to the inside face of the tailfin and provides an anchor for the steel pins that will attach the tailplanes. Similar blocks were glued in place for the tailfin to fuselage connection. 

 

   

 

   

 

The vac-formed tailfin and tailplane halves were cemented with Humbrol liquid poly and set aside to dry. Once dry, the shiny outer surface was sanded to remove those little blobs of plastic that you find on the surface of vac-formed kits.  The mating surfaces of the tailplanes were profiled to meet the tailfin and blocks of laminated styrene cemented into the open ends of the tailplanes to act as anchors for the steel pin connectors. These are snipped from sewing pins using wire cutters and cyano glued into holes drilled into the styrene blocks. I also ran some cyano glue down the inside joint of the tailplane leading edges to reinforce them.

 

Main wings

Next to feel the sandpaper were the mainwing halves and once the fit was acceptable I rescribed the panel lines (after sanding off the vac-forming "dots"). In a fit of enthusiasm I removed the flaps, which now meant that I had to box in the flap wells.  I measured the internal gap between the wing halves using a piece of scrap cardboard and cut "walls" from the leftover backing sheets from the vac-formed kit.  I also added stiffeners for the engine pod attachment points - also cut form scrap backing sheet. The wing halves were then cemented together, clamped/taped and left to cure.   The flap well ribbing was marked on a sheet of plastic card and the lightening holes drilled in the card before I cut them out - it is easier to drill the holes at this stage and the plastic is less likely to tear during the process.  I cemented flat plastic card strips inside the flap well to set the positions for the ribs, which were then glued in place.  Additional strips were then added to complete the job.

 

 

   

 

   

 

Edited April 27, 2020 by Darius43

[Darius43]

1:48 B-47E Stratojet - 1:48 Scale vacform kit - Part 2

 

Fuselage part 1

I sanded the fuselage halves and removed the main gear doors and cockpit aperture from each half.  Sanger provide vac-formed main gear wells and gear door inner surfaces. The latter were cut from the backing sheet and skinned with thin plastic card. The gear wells were detailed with additional ribbing and stiffeners cut from scrap parts of the vac-form backing.   Sanger provide a set of fuselage bulkheads which are very useful.  I switched bulkheads A and F from their instructed positions as their shapes were better suited to the tail and nose respectively.  The bulkheads were super-glued (cyano) into the port fuselage halves along with the gear wells.  I also cemented strips of plastic card to the fuselage edges between the bulkheads to serve as attachment points for when I glue the fuselage halves together.  Lengths of old injection moulded kit sprue were cemented between these strips to maintain the fuselage profile between the bulkheads.

 

  

 

 

 

 

 

Cockpit

The cockpit was scratch built using plastic card and bits of sprue, as were the pilot and co-pilot's seats - using plastic card of various thicknesses, plastic rod, soft steel wire and some oxygen hoses generously donated by some spares box pilots.  For the main instrument panels Sanger provides printed panels on glossy paper that are reasonably representative of the actual panels (at least the ones that I have pictures of).  I copied the Sanger panels using the B&W copy function of my printer and cemented the paper copies to some plastic card. Once dry I drilled out the instrument faces using a pin vice and suitable small diameter drill bits.  The drilled plastic panels were cleaned up and used as overlays to the Sanger printed panels (a bit like photoetched panels).  Unfortunately the completed panels did not exactly (i.e not at all) fit into the fuselage so I had to cut them down a bit. Fortunately the offcuts could be used for the cockpit side consoles.

 

 

 

   

 

 

 

 

 

[Darius43]

1:48 B-47E Stratojet - 1:48 Scale vacform kit - Part 3

 

Fuselage part 2

I drilled and cut out the navigator's station windows in the nose and cemented the fuselage halves together using liquid poly and superglue (cyano) in the awkward places. The seams were then filled with Humbrol plastic filler and sanded smooth.  Feeling brave, I cut out the one and only kit-supplied vac-form canopy from its backing sheet and cut and sanded the lower edges to fit the fuselage curve using a cardboard template that I had inserted into the cockpit opening to mark the edge profiles.  After a couple of rounds of filling and sanding the fuselage seams I started the re-scribing process. To do this I rested the fuselage on a cushion, which made it easier to scribe the lines - the cushion stops the cylindrical fuselage from rolling around. For scribing I used an Olfa P-cutter, a steel rule and some old photoetch frets that can bend to follow the curved fuselage surface.

 

 

 

 

I re-primed the fuselage and inserted plastic card main wing spars through holes cut in the fuselage. The kit provides a vac formed tail "bulb" but no details for the gun turret etc. Using a Mattel vac-former I vac-formed a "cover" to the tail bulb and cut away the end to from the "turret". Slots were then cut using a razor saw for the gun tracks.   The whole was then super glued to the rear of the fuselage and a large amount of filler used to smooth the "graft".  Once dry the joint was sanded smooth and primed.  I glued the main wings and tailfin to the fuselage using cyano glue,  which left an approximate 2mm gap at the joint between the wing and fuselage surfaces - so much for my careful joint profiling!!!  I roughly filled the gaps with strips of plastic card and then spread Humbrol filler over the joint. Once set this was sanded using rough and then smooth grit papers and the process repeated until I was happy with the result.  The joints were primed and then re-sanded and finally re-scribed and primed again. This kit used up several cans of Halfords grey primer!!!

 

Engine pods

The engine nacelle haves were removed from the plastic card backing and sanded to shape. The plastic covering the engine fronts was removed and the openings shaped using a half round needle file. The same process was followed for the exhaust openings.  The kit supplies six white metal engine fronts. Unfortunately they are far too large for the nacelles and so they were discarded (future nose weights?). I made a new pair of engine fronts using parts from the spares box (two F-101 voodoo exhaust rings, & two sawn off drop tank tips) and plastic card. Two further F-101 kits in the stash were raided for the remaining four engines!!!

To create the landing light in the outrigger gear front fairing I cut out the white plastic fairing and vac-formed a clear fairing over it.  This was grafted onto the nacelle and then masked to form the clear light cover.  The vac-formed clear cover that I had made was coated with Johnsons Clear and cyano glued in place - the Clear stops the cyano from "white misting". The joints were filled with Humbrol putty and left to dry. Once set the whole was sanded, re-scribed and masked. I used Halfords spray white primer and Nissan Silver.

 

      

 

 

   

 

 

   

 

I separated the single engine pod halves from the backing plastic and removed the mangled plastic at the rear of these units - the pen-nib shape at the jet exhaust being too complex for the vac-forming process to replicate.   The shape was reconstructed by cementing bits of plastic card using cyano, which were then filled and sanded to shape. 

 

 

 

Edited April 27, 2020 by Darius43

[Darius43]

1:48 B-47E Stratojet - 1:48 Scale vacform kit - Part 4

 

Undercarriage

The kit provides vac-formed main wheels that to my eye did not look quite right - the white metal hub inserts are nice though.  In place of the vac formed wheels l used some Paragon resin wheels (intended for the 1:48 Italeri C-130), which had approximately the right tread pattern and diameter. I sanded down the outer hub inserts so that they fit snugly in the Paragon wheels.  The Sanger wheel hubs are only correct for the front main wheels, however, the back ones are a completely different hub, which I scratch built using various plastic offcut bits.  I used the Sanger main gear and outrigger legs but discarded the axles as they were too large. Using Aeroclub plastic tubes, plastic card bits and mild steel wire I added details using photos as a guide. The whole was sprayed Halfords Nissan Silver with the hydraulic lines picked out in Humbrol matt black.

 

   

 

   

 

 

 

   

 

 

 

Completed Model

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Cheers

 

Darius

[steve1]

You are a very brave and dedicated man...

 

steve

[Darius43]

54 minutes ago, steve1 said:

You are a very brave and dedicated man...

 

steve

Thanks.  Either that or as my friend Mark says: “mad as a box of frogs”.

 

Cheers

 

Darius

[saxokid]

Been finishing off my twin exhaust stacks again with silver paint...