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AIMS Ju388 L1 conversion - Finished!


Wouter

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Hi all


 


After receiving the alternate canopy from John I started with his Ju388 L1 conversion set for the Revell Ju88. I've started this build for the 1945 Luftwaffe group build on LSM which runs till December 2016, but I'm not sure if I will make it in time. I have only half a year left and it's a lot more work then I anticipated. I figured I could post the wip here as well for all of you to enjoy.


 


On to the build then. This was my starting point  rolleyes.gif .


lpcX5an.jpg


 


 


Cheers, Wouter


Edited by Wouter
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First off some preparing and preliminary construction on this bad boy. While not as big as a B17 it still is a pretty large kit with a 70 cm (27,5 inch) wingspan. I have just enough room to handle it on my workbench.


I did get the replacement canopy's from John (AIMS) and it took all four of them to get one decent fit. This has also something to do with my inexperience with vacuum formed canopy's but nonetheless it still pretty hard to get it right.


 


My first findings are that the big parts of the conversion will go on pretty well, nothing an average modeler can't handle. The cockpit won't be so easy, there's a lot of scratchbuilding to do. This is kind of a disappointment, you pay big money for this conversion. I know it's a one man job and one has to applaud John for bringing this conversion on the market. Having done all his research I still have the feeling he could have taken it a step further. Besides that, the castings are not as sharp as I would like them to be, thus another point of major attention to get it right. This is certainly the case for the engines, which are just bad copy's in my opinion. You can say, hey, you won't see the engines anyway, but as I said, If I'm paying + 200 euro I expected a little more. Nothing that can't be fixed, so let's see how things turn out.


 


rY2mZA0.jpg


 


yM9253G.jpg

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Getting you guys up to speed. After the first preparation my attention went to the smaller parts.


 


At first I started with a few bits and pieces for the cockpit. A lot of PE, and with some patience this is perfectly doable


ZwVjjLa.jpg


 


Then my attention went on to the engines. A bit of a warning here as I mentioned earlier, this part of the conversion is not the best in my opinion. The engine facings are really bad copy's from a Hasegawa fw190. There's almost no detail and some parts are obscured by others. The good thing is, you won't see much of it anyway. I brought them to life with a bit of painting and some copper wire.


tJ16iqO.jpg


 


Next part is the fan in front of the engine. This is a very fidely part to build since you have to align 12 PE blades. The good thing is that the resin part has some pre drilled holes so you don't have to worry about the right distance between the blades. The bad thing is that the blades, once glued are a bit too long and the fan doesn't fit in the cowling. Careful trimming with about 0,5mm per blade will fix this.


 


XZjdMk9.jpg


 


Here's the engine within the cowling


7onEMJ7.jpg


 


and with the fan in front. As I said, you won't see much of it luckily


4JWGpHM.jpg


 


On to the engine cover then. As you can see from behind the resin is really thick (the grey resin is cast by MDC by the way). As the engine is a little bigger on the topside the the junkers engines provided in the Revell kit you get a step of about 1 mm. Instead of applying putty and try to let it blend in i removed the excess resin from the inside of the engine cover. 


rLd7qWP.jpg


 


Here's the result


r0bAVys.jpg


 


and from the top


M9itYnt.jpg


 


and from behind


Bngonpa.jpg?1


 


and a picture from the real thing (take note that the exhaust is shaped a little different as this was an early itteration for the exhaust)


V1G4U37.jpg


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On to the radiator flaps on the backside. First a picture of the real thing. Look at the inwards curve (arrow)


pyBWXPa.jpg?1


 


Here's the kit engine. Take note that the inward curvature is not steep enough. If you glue the radiator flaps they will lie flat on the engine (as I found out the hard way). It's near impossible to create a cone shape from a flat piece of PE. In the end I cut the entire lower back part of the engine and did some plastic surgery  biggrin.png .


LzFzk5B.jpg?1


 


here's the result with the radiator flaps installed, much better if I may say so.


yJVARH6.jpg


 


4RE8aF2.jpg


 


Last but not least some other bits and pieces


Zv9vmGQ.jpg


 


and the wingtip (to thick, needs lot's of sanding to blend in)


uRRoELZ.jpg


 


 


That's it for now. On to the right wing en engine. I recon this will be a little faster now I have worked how to install and fix/adjust certain parts.


 


Cheers


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Thanks for showing your WIP here on LSP. Wouter!  :thumbsup:

 

I wonder how you managed to get the prop hub into the propeller cowling? My parts have a wall thickness that needs a fully charged Dremel to try to thin the walls of the propeller hubs...

Maybe I could try to do some vac replacements?

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Thanks for showing your WIP here on LSP. Wouter!  :thumbsup:

 

I wonder how you managed to get the prop hub into the propeller cowling? My parts have a wall thickness that needs a fully charged Dremel to try to thin the walls of the propeller hubs...

Maybe I could try to do some vac replacements?

Ah yes, the spinners... The casting is really thick and the instructions tell you to thin the out. I used a sharp blade to cut the part from the inside out. But what is worse, is that the spinner openings for the propeller hub have a different width, it's almost impossible to get them the same and looking like the real thing. I was thinking about acquiring two fw190 hubs or those from a Revell He219 (about the same shape), but then you have a hub with three openings instead of four thus requiring more work ....

 

So I'll work with the once provided, but again as with the engines, it's a bit of a let down on this conversion.

 

I'll try to get a picture to show you what I did Thomas.

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