ScottsGT

Hey Mike, I use to be heavy into RC airplanes. Not those ARF things, but the balsa, aircraft ply and sometimes fiberglass. And woodworking is a hobby of mine. You might be on to something. But I really don’t have a good place in the home to put one up for display.

Wow. Always wanted to do a wood ship model. No way I could even come close to this. Question though. How does one go about dusting off this much detail? Around my house it would be covered in dust and cat hair in no time.

Two or three days now fixing the surface of all the boogers and issues that would be ugly with paint. Each time I shoot primer the spots are getting better. This stage reminds me of when I was prepping my ’66 Fastback for paint. Wife kept walking by and asking when the hell was I going to paint it. It looks just like it did three weeks ago. Oh no it doesn’t!

Another from the files of “What the hell were they thinking?” SNJ gets an antenna in front of the cockpit. So yea, let’s punch this big hole here for everyone! Again, a dimple on the backside so builder can drill it out. Besides, my antenna was short shot and was in two pieces with 1/16” missing in the middle.

Such a shame since they at least put out kits no one else would do. But if folks aren’t buying them, can’t fund the business. Ernie did mention that the Chinese IM plant made changes from their original design and made things worse. Maybe I’m too much of a conspiracy theorist, but it’s kind of odd how bad the changes made were and then bought out by another Chinese company. Intentional destruction of a company? Trumpeter still has not released them. Maybe reworking the bugs that were put in intentionally? OK, tin foil hat off.

Yea, that project is long done and gone! It was a build for my GP/MD. He’s a back seat rider to get air time as the flight surgeon. It was a gift I built for him. He loved it. And of course him in the back seat with his latex glove on I was so familiar with.

John go slow at building? LOL. Yea, that’s funny right there. 😆

This was a major pain. Wings go together with obvious gaps. All the pre-fitting in the world, I could not close these up. I tried the old white glue trick. After 10-15 applications of thinned glue I gave up. I wound up taping off and using putty.

Wings on!

Welcome Scott! Good to have another here from South Carolina, and with the right name too! Your work is stunning. ….Scott

Not sure if it’s my imagination, but before the pandemic mess it seemed we were getting new decals from various companies on a regular basis. When McEntire ANG base showed off the new wild weasel tail art, decals were out ASAP. When Shaw showed off their new stuff, decals came out shortly after. Couple months back Nellis showed off the new F-35 Splinter scheme. Crickets. Nothing. Nada. Caracal announced he was going to put out decals for the Revell re-release of the old Harrier kit. Then he announced he was no longer going to do 1/32 since they were such slow/bad sellers. Didn’t Two Bobs also get out of 1/32 as well?

She was a true class act! What a life story.

Here’s where I stopped for lunch and to update this thread.

Two areas I had some difficulties with were the top of the fuselage where it sits on the dash panel. I really had to file the top down and open up the area on the bottom it the top where it meets the dash. I glued one side down, let it sit overnight and came back the next morning and pulled the other side down using a miniature industrial wood working clamp. Seems to have done the trick. Once that was dry, the engine firewall went into place. That took some work to get it to sit flat. And to walk around the edge with a file, and had to smooth out the inside of the fuselage opening since there are three glue joints that will fight you if not perfectly smooth. The other area was the back of the fuselage. I guess someone wanted to design this with a removable hatch so you could see the equipment behind the cockpit I refused to build in. Unfortunately, that hatch is made slightly too small. Once again the miniature industrial wood working clamp came in handy. Glued one side, let it dry overnight. Came back next morning and hit the other side and clamped in place. A little filler was required. Maybe more. I’ll know after shooting on some primer. EDIT: My next Texan build I’m going to try adding some Evergreen stock to the bottom of this panel to see if it fits better. Yea, I have another kit in the stash.

And here’s progress from the past couple of days. One thing I did was to go back and read every build on this kit I could find . I found a few with some bad fitting fuselage parts so I did a dry fit with just the two main cockpit bulkheads before I assembled the cockpit cage I got some pretty good alignments with just putting a few touches of the file on the edges of the bulkheads. Once I got the cockpit cage done, I glued it in place and noticed it is very easy to get it slightly cocked at an angle. Had to soften the glue a little and move it slightly. I also made the decision to ditch all the engine mount details that are hidden anyway and simply glue the firewall into place after everything dried.

Well another Derp moment for me. I started trying to align the cowl onto the built fuselage and the blocks would not line up with the notches in the back of the cowl. I was asking myself could KH have gotten this way off? Fortunaly for me, I numbered the parts on the back side with a pencil when I removed each one and cleaned it up. And then I proceeded to build it backwards. 🤪 Yea, I cut new notches and I’m going to have to fudge this one .

Yea, about that cowl…. It went together yesterday as well. And it took almost all day to do it. If others can design 1 piece cowls like the Trumpeter Corsair, why couldn’t KH?

Did that kit come with an optional toupee?

And from the “You ain’t gonna believe this ****” files… two female locate pins. Well, pin holes. I made one out of plastic stock.

Got some bench time in today. Well, almost all day. 🙃 And the gear location correction!

Peter, agreed with the Connie. Very graceful bird. I remember years ago there use to be one of those real hardware stores here in town. They carried every nut and bolt ever known to mankind. In the main office up front there was a balsa built Connie with about a 6’ or 7’ wing span. It was a beauty. I think it had TWA markings, but that was 20 years ago. I have all 3 of the Heller kits in the stash. I did buy the Fisher engines and Radome corrections for the one kit, but did not “splurge” for the nose correction. One just sold on eBay last week for almost $200. I figured between Fisher and DMold it wouldn’t be a problem down the road. Boy, was I ever wrong.

Yea Hubert, I’ve read about the hodgepodge issue. But like you mentioned, I one that can easily live with it. I did finally find the write up Mike West did on moving the LG outward and it shall be done! I’m seriously thinking my second kit will be covered in aluminum foil

Man, that would be great. Just took a quick look at his website. I like the A-26 wing root correction he did. Something like this and an inner section of the wing top would fix it right up. This would convince me to also get the D model as well.

Yes, such a shame. I did at least get a set of the nicer turrets for mine. But that wing, oh that wing….. My plan is to hang it up and hang it high so I don’t have to look at it.

Rob, I completely forgot the Nautilus was on my list as well. But the Disney version. Yea, I got one and it was a bench clearing kit. Its 31” long. Kit is some sort of black resin by Masterpiece Models. It took a lot of detail reworking to get it there, but I’m very satisfied with the outcome. The finish started out painting it silver, shading the rivet lines and then applying a true iron paint and then spraying it with a acid that promotes the rust. Kind of cool watching it rust before your eyes. If anyone is interested: https://masterpiecemodels.com/product/20k-submarine/