DocRob

I haven't read that, have I ?

The gun ring looks so real, great work. I second your thoughts about annealing mostly. I use it only for non structural elements, which have complicated to bend forms. With brass and copper there are roughly spoken two grades of annealing. First level is to get rid of the inner tension and needs temperatures between 250-300 degrees C. Most people let the brass glow reddish and reach higher temperatures above 450 degrees C, which make the material soft in addition to the first effect. Cheers Rob

I've never seen a kit of this type, it's quite interesting though. Your chassis and axle are looking great. Cheers Rob

Good question, simple answer, it was a brain fart by me , it's the ZM, I have. Cheers Rob

My pleasure Carl , in surfing we call the one who is taking one for the team 'current dummy', which is the first guy out, paddling his lungs out and showing the others, where not to go . Actually, even if I had known about these sets, I would have chosen manufacturing the struts by myself, because that was one of the things, I wanted to learn through this build. But there is the idea of doing a second one in a yellow black diamond scheme in the back of my head,... Cheers Rob

Very interesting, how special interest kits get attention from people, who are willing to fix their shortcomings. This set will be handy for everyone with an interest into building one, especially the wing struts, with the already made up tripod. Great find Carl, thanks for mentioning. Cheers Rob

It's not the first time the Hiro kits got my attention. As an engineer in my former live, with interests in metals, I'm attracted and sometimes browsed through their offers, but too many different interests for me in the last time, to start with cars earnestly. But who knows, what you show here, is mouthwatering. I love the detailing of the kit, which is not possible only with plastic. Keep on your great work. Cheers Rob

Cool project, never followed a Hiro build closely, but they seem to be decent kits with great detail. Cheers Rob

Thanks Rowdy, I like to create depth through multi layer technique, like on the seat. It's quite simple, just add up layer per layer, very thin with a bit of translucency. Meanwhile I closed the fuselage and yes, all the rubber bands, clamps and tape were necessary to get the panels aligned with the help of considerable force. The fuselage will be left for drying until tomorrow. Then I switched to the wing, were I rescribed all the panel lines, because the existing ones were inconsistent. The wing was puttied, where it had some sink marks and sanded to shape. I pre drilled the holes for the struts with a 0,5mm bit and the holes for the aileron cables 0,3mm. Now I can start thinking about the way, how to achieve the four coloured streaking on the wing. Cheers Rob

Thank you Carl, blushing again . The partly suboptimal kit needs some solutions for it's weaker parts and as the Fokker itself is so appealing to me, it's well worth the struggle. Cheers Rob

Thanks Jeff, I'm blushing . Closing the fuselage will be a milestone for me, after that, I hope the build will be mas rapido. Cheers Rob

With lots of test fitting, cutting and adjusting, the fuselage halves were completed and seat and ammo boxes were added. The instrument bezels are from an Eduard set and some of the details too. The fuel pump is scratched, as well as the throttle rods. Some cables were added, made from lead wire and the steering cables were made from fishing line. The fuselage halves still fit together, after a lot of adjusting. To glue the fuselage together, will be the next task. Cheers Rob

Thanks Kai, I hope everything is still amazing, when brought together . Cheers Rob

Nice and dirty, love it. Cheers Rob

Sorry to hear about the rigging point disaster. Do you generally anneal the PE? I only do it when there are free form bendings necessary, as with rolled parts or seat belts. I can imagine, that heat treatment weakens the parts, as it softens the material by reducing inner tension. With brass, it's easy to heat to much, as there are two phases of annealing. With 250-300 C you lose the inner tension of the material, above it goes simply soft (450-600 C). If your PE is really darkened after heating, you might have been in the second level, which means too hot. With these tiny parts, where I believe, the bending lines are even weaker, because pre etched, I can imagine, that the material becomes too soft and breaks easily. Concerning the non broken, but detached parts, aren't the holes in the middle for attaching the struts through? I imagine, this would hold the rigging points in place. I hope you will find a proper solution for this problem as late in the build. Cheers Rob

@ Hubert, just for clarification, are you referring to AK's acrylic black primer or the dedicated Extreme Metal black base? After much praise, I tried Mr. Levelling and had the results you described, with the acrylic base and some AK acrylic colours as well as some Lifecolour's. I made my peace with the stuff, using it to thin Tamiya acrylics, where it works perfectly good. AK' Extreme Metal flat base is another breed and they recommend it as a base for their high polished shades like chrome and polished aluminum and that's where I used it without problems. Cheers Rob

Nothing too exotic in my stash size wise. The biggest boxes should be HK's Uhu and B-25 only outranked by an Italeri Vosper boat, all boxes fitted to the brim with precious AM. Cheers Rob

I use the black base only for chrome and polished aluminum, for the other shades I use Tamiya rattle can or Mr. Hobby. Cheers Rob

Building speed seems to come to a near halt with the preparation of all the bits and pieces which go into the fuselage. I used some PE from a Fokker DR.I set made by Eduard, which is really helpful. The steering column, one of the few better kit parts, got some etch and a lead trigger cable. Next I will add the different lines for ailerons and rudders. The holes are pre drilled with a 0,3mm bit The magneto is borrowed from a Fokker D.VII, where I have a resin substitute. I lost the lever, so I made one from flattened lead wire. Not on the picture are the scratched fuel pump and some parts for the throttle lever. The glazing on the compass looks a little blurred, but that's only, because the Pledge is not fully cured. Hopefully, I will be able to install everything and close the fuselage soon, as I really want to have that step done. Cheers Rob

I've used both and I find both smell terrible. I got nice results with Alclads but it depended on the metal tones Titanium is one of the very fragile shades. Some of their products didn't cover well and were very fragile, making masking afterwards near impossible. The metal shine of the Alclads altered a lot with a varnish cover. I tried the Extreme metals on different occasions and these are now my go-to metals. They spray well, they are more durable (I never had problems with masks) and I like their shine and fine grain. I had only slight alteration when gloss- or matte coating them. They were resistant to all my used weathering products For a NMF job, with differently shaded panels, I would use Extreme Metals. On single shaded bare metal jobs, you can get away with the Alclads, which also have a great finish. One Alclad tone, I especially like is exhaust manifold, which is better than what I got from Extreme Metals. As a personal biased verdict, I prefer the Extreme Metals from AK for their general usability. Some Alclad colours give a slightly better result and some have a finer grain than the AK's and therefore a better metallic sheen. In the end, they both smell and I always use a mask when spraying and cleaning the airbrush and I wouldn't use them in the living areas of my house. BTW, I alredy finished a NMF P47-D Cheers Rob

I use the Meng incarnation of the cutter since a year now and yes, I like the sharpness of it's blades, but can't find mayor advantages to my Tamiya cutter. One thing, I especially don't like about the Meng is, that sometimes with fragile parts the sharp of the two blades got stuck into the plastic and there is a risk of breaking the part while removing it. Cheers Rob

Thanks Phil, can't wait to make the next one on a Fokker D.VII, but next time with another cushion colour. After the Hansa Brandenburg, it's the second green one. Time for a maroon or dark red pillow. Like you, I absolutely love the AK metals. They spray perfect, have a fine grain and they are durable, that's the most important advantage over Alclads, where some collours were impossible to mask over. The waxes are great too, very versatile stuff. Cheers Rob

Thanks Carl, I hope, I get everything together fitting into the fuselage. I've seen different pictures of uncovered aluminum seats, not the least, the pic wich came with the Aviattic seat. How did you finish the seat of your D.VII, should be the same or very similar type of seat? Cheers Rob

Très cool Carl, what a beast. Cheers Rob

Thanks Jeff, one of the reasons of my recently arisen interest in WWI planes is the depiction of the various used materials. Wood, linen, different metals,..., it's a canvas for trying new techniques. Cheers Rob