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PAnderson

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Posts posted by PAnderson

    Problems logging in

    in Problems? Suggestions? Tell us!

    Posted

    Sunday night I had trouble logging in. LSM would not accept my password no matter what I tried. It would just dump me back to the login screen whenever I tried. Tried changing my password 2 times. Still did the same thing. SP&R was the same way. It finally worked again Monday morning on both sites. Now, LSM will not remember my password, it makes me login again each time. Does anybody know why and can someone tell me how I can get LSM to let me stay logged in? SP&R is working fine now. What gives? Any help would be great.

     

     

    Thanks, Paul

    National Museum of WW2 Aviation

    in General Discussion

    Posted

    Hello All,

    This new museum opened in Colorado Springs a year ago and has been working diligently to bring to the public a new view to the efforts of our brave aviators in that campaign of war. Here is a link to their website.

     

    National Museum of WW2 Aviation

     

    Every year the United States Air Force Academy graduates their senior class and they are lucky enough to have the Air Force Thunderbirds do a ceremonial flyover of the graduation proceedings. Due to "sequestration", an ugly word here in the States, there will be no Thunderbirds flyover of the graduation.

     

    Instead, some patriotic souls offered this, a flyover performed by some pristine examples of WW2 aircraft housed at this museum and others that flew in just to perform at the graduation. I have some political views on why our government feels they can't "afford" to keep up a tradition that has been a part of the Air Force Academy forever, but I won't state them here. Let's just say some people stepped in to make this graduation memorable for those cadets lucky enough to graduate on Monday.

     

     

    So far, 2 B-25 bombers, 2 P-51 Mustangs, a P-40 and a gaggle of T-33's will perform the flyover of the graduation ceremonies. At the museum, there will be another flock of aircraft, on the ground, awaiting visitors to look them over. Those will be another B-25, a zero, a Corsair, a Wildcat and 2 TBM Avengers. What a show!

     

    InTheMood_B-25_zpsa7ea1322.jpg

     

     

    P-47_zps1c107458.jpg

     

    Avenger_zpsb7d0ea13.jpg

     

    When I was living in Colorado Springs, I signed up to be a volunteer before the museum opened. When I moved in 2012 it still hadn't opened. No sooner do I move and guess what? They opened to the public.

     

    Here is a link to their Facebook page also. They have some fine examples of WW2 aircraft and next door to them is WestPac Restoration, which is a private company that works in conjunction with the museum to restore aircraft. On this Facebook page are other examples of aircraft being restored, like this F7F Tigercat

     

    National Museum of World War II Aviation

     

     

    F7F-Tigercat_zps9914a15f.jpg

     

    Gee, I wish I still lived there. Have a good weekend

    Micro-molded parts, only a matter of time.

    in Modelling Discussion

    Posted

    Cees, micro-molding is almost the same as regular injection molding. But because of the smaller size of the parts, injection pressures are lower. Mold size is smaller too, obviously. I quit building molds back in 2000 but at that time we were making some pretty small parts with standard technology, nothing like those though. Our specialty was thin walled parts, .5 mm to 1mm in thickness. I'm sure you see some pretty small and thin parts in the kits we build now. Tamiya is getting really good at it with their new kits. WNW is doing some pretty phenominal stuff too with the long thin parts like hoses in scale. Long, thin parts are hard to fill and when you see them on the same sprues with larger parts, that is a very good job of balancing runner size and gate size. Current model kit molding is not meant to be functional in the sense that assemblies will actually work. At least not for long. Some of those part above, like gears and stuff, are meant to function as good as other, larger machinery. Imagine an insulin pump the size of a small coin, implanted, and meant to last years. Now trivialize that and imagine a fully functional aircraft in 1/32 scale. Think it's impossible? Nope, we already have them. There's no reason kit manufacturers can't use this technology to give us better kits. I'm not saying they will but we are seeing them get pretty darn close already.

     

    Paul

    • Like 1

    Micro-molded parts, only a matter of time.

    in Modelling Discussion

    Posted

    Hello All,

    After seeing the wonderful work from Taurus Models with their resin engines and actually buying one and planning for another, I wonder when we will see the first injection molded examples from someone. The technology is there and the detail possible is there also. See the pictures below. I do not want to take away from the wonderful examples we have seen to date but it is only a matter of time. After building plastic injection molds for about 20 years I am surprised micro molding has not come to our hobby as of yet. I admit I know very little about micro-molding per se but it is not a black art any more. I also don't know what the quality difference would be between plastic injection and resin. This is more a question than an answer. I imagine tooling costs might be less given the numbers of examples needed to be made to satisfy need to our hobby. Here are some examples of micro molded parts.

     

    An assortment of parts with a scale example. Imagine the detail for engines and other components.

     

    parts_match2_zpsaf74ec6e.jpg

     

    15_optics_micro_connector_zpsf0579d08.jp

     

    micromolding_zps402deb8e.jpg

     

    These examples do not even show the smallest parts possible. I believe the better model kit builders should be looking into this technology. They all make parts this small but most of them look like just blobs of plastic with true detail somewhat lacking.

     

    Here are a couple of examples of Metal Injection Molded (MIM) parts. Why not a metal engine in 1/32?

     

    25_26_bellcrank_needle_holder_zps5fd148d

     

    14_mim_end_caps_1_zpsd596a0df.jpg

     

    We are very lucky to have the level of technology devoted to our hobby thus far. But I believe we have not reached the pinnacle of possibility yet. It will only get better. Thanks for reading this.

     

    Paul

    Soo.... What did you just get???

    in Modelling Discussion

    Posted

    What I just ordered. I have had Revell's Arado 196 for a while now. Started it briefly about a year ago. The desire just wasn't there at the time. I love this kit and the recent example posted made me want to start it again with more enthusiasm. Then I saw this and it made my heart skip a beat.

     

    HPH32004Catapult-AradoAr196_zpseb0d1691.

     

    So, it is on it's way and I will build both in between the Great War GB's. This should be fun. Next up is this company's resin canopy for the Ar 196.

     

    Paul

    • Like 3

    Tamiya Corsair up for pre-order.

    in Modelling Discussion

    Posted

    I just pre-ordered the 1/32 Tamiya Corsair from HLJ for $93.00. I thought all of you would like to know. Looking at the latest pics, WOW! This looks better than they're previous releases. Up another notch, I do believe. I have to say, I waited a long time for this. I resisted all other 1/32 offerings when I bit the bullet for other lesser kits. Why did I wait? This is why. I am going out today and buy lottery tickets.

     

    Paul

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