Clunkmeister

Hieroglyphs

Surprise in the mail today. No cost, no money asked. But anyone who knows me knows I prefer giving more than taking, so, “Waaaaahl, I’ll fix HIS wagon, pilgrim!”

Woo Hoo! Mike, you da MAN! Noice!

thanks y'all. I'm trying to avoid a spectacular trainwreck here.

Well, the first bit of smoothing and the first coat of prime reveals this. And this side is a bit bulbous on the rear edge yet. A bit more slimming and we’ll be good. After that, I’ll use some Tamiya tape on the rear and lower edge to simulate High Speed Tape. Happy Me.

I'm really looking forward to giving the T-Bird a go one of these days and do an NMF Canadian bird.

Always a comedian... hehe (good one, Gus)

Yes of course, although we use a plastic like agent instead of silica sand, because it's gentler on 50 year old sheetmetal and avoids the nasty metal warpy warps.

I hope I'll see you there sometime, Mike.

Harv, I usually do my own, but this time I'm having one of my guys do this bit. I'm not that bad of a hand with a TIG or a MIG, but I just can't seem to find the time these days.

I’ve been spending time with my 59 T-Bird convertible as well, trying to fix any obvious issues. I found some rust in the trunk floor brought on by a previous bollocky repair attempt. So we add new sheet metal and butt weld it to the good existing metal. Someone actually installed a patch panel over the existing metal, them sealed it all up with caulking.

LOLOL. And I used the SWAG method the same as everyone else would. haha! I never actually thought about that. I'll need a disclaimer at the end.

AND, she'll fly in this scheme as well, Jeff! Whoop Whoop!

Iain, I agree completely with your take on 104's nose turret. That's exactly what I thought that they did. The gun runs for elevation are still quite prominent, albeit sheeted over. And the rest of the turret just looks like it was either sheeted in aluminum or something similar. Those portholes are hideous, eh? As for the greenhouse, all I can say for sure is that this particular aircraft was used for long overwater sovereignty patrols, and being that they no longer had a need to watch for enemy aircraft, they were more concerned about keeping the sun's heat and glare out of their eyes.

I’m glad they didn’t go with the “Yellow Submarine” look, like these guys did. I’m curious as to the amount of Weed that was smoked before this abomination burst forth into the world.

Thanks, Cees. I will say that the feeling I had when I slathered Apoxie on an almost ready to paint fuselage wasn’t a very good one, but it needed to be done. The Maritime Patrol Lancs had all their defensive armament removed, and the front and rear turret cupolas were seemingly modified almost whimsically on a case by case basis. There are plenty of pics of FM104 from when she was serving in the 60s, but it’s almost as though the photographers were purposely ignoring the mods and trying to concentrate on the unmodified wartime looking parts of the aircraft. So good close up detail pics of the modifications are nigh unto impossible to find. This is one of the only ones I found. It certainly appears to have been sheeted over, probably in aluminum, then painted. It was also faired into the fuselage with all gaps being eliminated. I suppose just sanding down the frames was another option, but I wanted the smooth, faired in look.

Exactly the effect I’m looking for, Hubert.

ahahahaaaa! I LOVE it! Hehehe!

OK, it doesn't look like it in the pics, but everything blends as smooth as a baby’s bottom. I’ll mark the rivets on the plastic, rescribe panel lines, then a quick shot of black. Then some Squadron green and a final smoothing. I’m going to lightly river where the frames would be and recheck my work. Yes, it looks like crap in the pics, but in person it looks dead on accurate Mission 90% accomplished.

Sanding the front turret for all it’s worth, aaaand, it’s looking semi wonderful so far

I know it too, Harv. But don't tell anyone I think so too.

Will this mount on a Kubelwagen? :-l

My plan is to smooth it out tonight, then LIGHTLY run rivet lines down the framework areas. I initially thought about just using a solvent based putty like squadron white or green, but then I thought about shrinkage and cracking. A two part epoxy is the only way here. If it doesn't look right in the end, I'll pull it off and replace it. we gotta remember, it's a piece of plastic, not our entire existence. If I need to fix it, I'll fix it, but I have a sneaking suspicion it's gonna be just fine.

If I’m going to do this, I want it more or less right. If this fails, I’ll see about casting one