BlrwestSiR

Thanks for checking in folks. Healthwise, I've got a follow-up appointment with my cardiologist for early Dec. Dog wise, Zoe is closer to her old self with the odd stumble when she walks and her head is more or less cocked to one side all the time now. We finally met the new puppy and get to take him/her home in around two weeks. Still haven't decided on which one we're taking. Back to modelling, I've gotten a bit more of the interior done. I've been trying to get as much weight into the nose area as possible to prevent having a tail sitter. I've filled some of the boxes that go in the front of the plane with Liquid Gravity. Not much but I figure every bit helps. I continued the assembly of the bombs. I masked off the yellow and hit them with some olive drab. I then added the fins and did some touch ups. Finally I I installed them in the bomb bay. One thing that needs to be done before closing up the fuselage is the nose gear. I have the Aerocraft brass inserts so cleaned those up a bit. On the MLG legs, the tie down loops are cast solid so I drilled them out. You can see the first one I did in front . Then I started adding the kit parts to the inserts. The fit isn't perfect and needs a bit of tweaking. That's where I am at the moment. Carl

Peter, thanks for the step by step and the comparison of techniques. I've always gotten mixed results with decals so this will help take some guesswork out of it. Carl

John, the tracks aren't that bad. They include a jig to help you get them together. I generally only used the bottom part of the jig and didn't bother with the upper half. I put a small drip of Tamiya Extra Thin in the locating hole on part F3 and then press F6 into place. Once you get started, you fall into a rhythm building them. One thing to remember. Leave F2 on the small runners until after you have the pads joined together. Hope that helps. Carl

Can't wait to see how the Red Fox details work as well. Nice start to the build. Carl

Thanks for sharing the pics Dennis. That Lib very inspiring. Carl

Great pics Martin. I'll get back to it soon enough. Just plugging away at the Lib. Carl

You could do it as a Whiffer?

Honest Harv, I'm not trying to make it a race. Honestly the biggest scare was our dog when she collapsed last week and couldn't get up. We thought we'd have to put her down but she's mostly back to her old self now. Except her head is now permanently cocked to one side to counteract her imbalance.

Thanks guys for the good wishes. I'm mostly healed up back-wise but had a scare with the heart and spent last night in the ER. I was getting chest pains so everyone felt best I go get it checked out. The docs couldn't find anything so I got sent home after a couple blood tests, x-rays and a CT scan. I'm to follow up with the cardiologist though just to be sure. Anyways, I've managed to get a bit more done. The bomb halves are together and I got the yellow touched up. I need to mask the stripe off and then hit them with some OD. Meantime, I noticed that although the belly turret had been removed, I imagine they used the raising and lowering mechanism for the radar dome so I decided to put that together. I figured that the ammo cans would be superfluous so hacked those off. Most likely you won't see much of this. I also started painting some of the interior details. Finally, I've started assembling the interior bulkheads. Hopefully I can get back to chugging along.

Nice progress on the Mustang there Peter. Your choice of markings is great too. Not one of the usual suspects. Carl

I had the Revell kit too. Sounds like I didn't do much better on it. I'm using a Tamiya kit to do the same markings. Didn't like VF -1 for the longest time, then nostalgia kicked in. Carl

For some subjects, I like the link and length tracks. They speed things up a bunch and still give you decent detail.

I think those are Pegasus model kits. They use ABS plastic for some reason. But Tamiya now has ABS cement...

Smitty, can't wait to see the Tomcat build. So, hi-vis or low? For me it' would have to be hi-vis. Carl

Wow.

Looks very nice. And much cheaper than the Border Lanc too. Carl

Too bad it's not the bubbletop or I'd help you out and have it sit in my stash to never get built instead.

Peter, here you go. It's a very easy conversion if you use the AML set. Carl

Nice choice Peter. If you want to improve the accuracy a bit, Barracudacast does some nice resin updates that are mostly plug and play. I built one as a Mk Vb and still have another to do with the Barracudacast bits. Carl

Nice! I finally got an airbrush holder after using my cleaning jar for the longest time as a one. Should have done so long ago.

A nice assortment of subjects there Rob. Carl

Rob, I'm glad you found it helpful. The antenna are definitely going to be a bit more work to get done not only cleanly but aligned properly too. Carl

Thanks Rob! It's my lower back too. I saw a chiropractor and I'm much better but still not 100%. I need to work on my core muscles so will start that once I'm a bit more healed up. I'm really enjoying the Lib and the more relaxed approach to building it. I'll still do some crazy detailed thing at some point but I think this is the way to go for some of my builds. Like the other 4 engine heavies in the stash....

A squadron of Mig-21s in RCAF service? https://www.google.com/amp/s/theaviationgeekclub.com/cf-121-redhawk-program-the-true-story-behind-canadas-purchase-of-30-soviet-built-mig-21-fishbed-fighters/

With my back on the mend, I've finally spent a bit of time at the bench. Just enough to work on the bombs a bit. I did say a bit. Hopefully I'll have more in the next update.