CANicoll

Martin, Excellent! Thank you. You are an amazing source of great information. I really do appreciate it. So there really are two RLM 78 colors, 1941 and 1942: Somewhere after November 1941, RLM 78 was changed to a slightly lighter shade, while RLM 79 was changed to a darker, browner shade both for the tropical regions. Apparently, this 'desert pallet' was also used on the Eastern Front. Eduard may be looking at the 1941 color, while I'm looking at the MRP version which is much closer to the 1942 RLM 78. MRP may be a BIT too bright so I may look at toning it down just a bit with some white, or maybe some light gray...Time to break out the paint mule... Looking at the article, I am impressed at the huge range of AK Interactive colors - they tick every box! Further down the article are these two color pictures which are immensely helpful: RLM 78 Early: And this one, RLM 78 Late:

Definitely helps maintain sanity (and the budget...).

I love the creativity of this hobby. I also have used various adhesive tapes and paper for various purposes to benefit from the textures. But not to the extent or the successful result that you have, Rob. Brilliant!

Peter, thanks for this. I like the color on the Eduard sheet, but am pretty happy with the blue so I'm going with that. If for no other reason than I have it.

Nice start!!

The next question regards color: MRP's version of RLM 78 for the underside color is a LOT bluer than the Eduard call-out. However, current pictures of the Bf 109s show a much bluer underside from what Eduard calls out. Not that all museums are the most accurate for reproductions. Thoughts? Printing issue? Here are some of the underside bits I just painted.

Beats me. I have not seen that before either... The rest of the fit of the kit seems to be good. At least it was a simple fix.

Hubert - I did both, mostly thinning from the top. Very strange tho.

I'm with you on the knock-offs. I have two counterweights on flaps, as well as a long thin probe molded into the wing. I'm figurein 10:1 odds that any of them last to the weekend... Looking good, though. Nice progress!

Really like the look of the PE radiators and grills, especially after the Metalizer Burn Iron, followed up with a dry brush of Vallejo Metal Color GunMetal and topped that off with a drybrush of some Vallejo Metal Color Rust to give it a bit more color. The gunmetal highlighted the framing and grills, and the Rust added some nice depth. And I am SO DELIGHTED I went through all of that, for this: That is one small opening. Oh well, WE know it is there, right? Ran into another very unusual problem. adding the tunnel for the landing gear, I found that I could not close up the wing: I adjusted and moved and fitted and sanded. No matter how I adjusted the piece, the wing would not close up on that side. After a fair amount of sanding, was able to close the wing, but this should NOT have happened. The other side fit much better, but trimmed it down just a bit anyway. Really not sure why this didn't fit better. There is not a lot of variability as to where it fits onto the wing... On the "how long do you think these will stay in place", added the two counterweights to the ailerons. For now, going to keep the pieces on the sprue while I paint the bottom color. Since the topside has a camo pattern, will add these to the wing when I'm the top of the wing.

Awesome build and you'll still have plenty of time for the GB.

Peter, that seat looks amazing, excellent work there! I also followed Kevin's lead on purchased the nail art-brushes. I've used the 7mm one quite a bit and it seems to work very well. And is very inexpensive. Here is the link on Amazon, and you can't go wrong at $6.99! If you like pink you can get the set for $5.99.

Looking good John!

Live life while you can. Fusions are not nice, but hopefully the cruises will bring some good memories. Listen to her, btw.

Progress, but nothing really interesting to show other than the radiators. Primed a lot of the pieces with MRP white primer, and then some RLM 02 on various bits and undersurfaces. Tomorrow the radiators and wheel wells will come together and then the wing can come together. Thinking carefully about weathering - and looking at the pictures Martin sent over as well. Here are the Profipack PE radiator grills on the kit's styrene parts, before and after the Model Master Burnt Iron Metalizer paint. BTW, Notice how parts 33 and 34 are not rectangular. On both pieces the side with the sprue attachment has an extra couple of horizontal grills which fits the shape of the Bf 109 wing, of course. But it seems like the challenges German industry had with manufacturing that they wouldn't just go for an easier-to-manufacture rectangular radiator? On the 109-F-4 there are SIX different sized radiators (parts 35 and 36 actually have an angle on the right sides in the photo below) - again I wonder about manufacturing efficiency... The instruction call-out is for Burnt Iron, but I don't think of that color when I think of radiators. Will probably do a very light dry brush with Aluminum or Steel or maybe even GunMetal.

Mike - Thanks!! This is the benefit of a 1/48 kit. If this was a 1/32 Bf 109 I think I'd still be on the cockpit. On my bench right now I have all of the radiators ready to get a coat of the Burnt Iron Metalizer, have the elevators ready for paint - since their camo doesn't extend to the fuselage it makes it easier to paint them separately, and finish the tail with its camo, then assemble - and have laid out all of the flaps, ailerons, wheel well parts, etc for their painting. Moving so much faster than the Phantom!! I hear you on the different paints. I think I'd like to try the AK Interactive paints but mostly I watch what Peter is using to see how he likes it. 👍. I'm kind of stuck on Vallejo acrylics (but am less and less happy with them in general), The Vallejo Metal Color paints (which I think are terrific) and then the lacquers which is mostly MRP and Alclad. I do have maybe 50 bottles of Model Master Acryl still, too. The Model Master Metalizers are a lacquer and spray wonderfully, but I think are OOP. Shoot me a PM and I'll send back the list of what I have (about a dozen different bottles I think?) and if you need something I can run a bottle over to you. I have some of their buffing metalizers, meaning after you spray, you can polish them with a cloth. Kinda cool. They are a lot like MRP - they spray incredibly thin so a little goes a long way and I spray them at about 10psi. They clean up easily with lacquer thinner.

Great series!!! Band of Brothers marathon was on this weekend, too...

I only have two 1/32 SH kits, one is the P-39 which I built and didn't have any real issues with it - the other is the Tempest which I will get around to. But I'm scarred for life by KittyHawk and their P-39Q kit. The most expensive kit I've ever had to bin. I bought it a couple of years after it came out, and had to completely trash the entire nose armament after spending a huge amount of time detailing it - the fuselage simply would NOT close unless I butchered it to the point where it made no sense to have it in there. Second major problem is that NONE of the panels (wing, fuselage, etc) would fit into their openings. Nearly all of them were at least 1-2mm too small in each direction. Peter, I think when we were on the other site you talked me down off the ledge a few times... I even spoke to the Kittyhawk folks when they exhibited at my local club's annual show, and they blew me off saying it was one of their earlier kits 'so you had to expect some issues'. They are still selling that kit for nearly $90 retail. Ugh. So for me, SH is not so bad and I understand KH actually has some nice kits now. But I just can't bring myself to pick one up. I know you, however, will work your magic on this build. Can't wait!

Peter - One question I have regarding the camo - when you use masks, how do you avoid having a raised line of paint that shows under a decal?

The seat is a project onto itself, nice work!!! Macro photos of the 3D IPs are not pretty, but at least to the eye they look nice!

Ditto....

The South didn't!

Amazing what you can learn from even the older, simpler kits... As posted elsewhere, I only NOW figured out that the Eduard masking sheet can be cut up and used for additional masking. It's pretty useful and already in various stripes. Yes, I feel dumb... I've been using Tamiya tape for years.... Tornado is up on its landing gear and the canopy is masked and in place. Started on a few of the decals. After painting the canopy, the nose art and fuselage decals can be applied.

Nice catch!

Finishing the Tornado while getting the 109 going... Only NOW just figured out that I can cut up the rest of the Eduard Mask sheet to fill in the canopy masking instead of using liquid mask or other tape. Doh...