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1/32 Trumpeter F4F-3 Wildcat: 3/21/2017 Final Update


Joel_W

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Well, this is my 1st build since making the move to 1/32 scale, and my 2nd 1/32 build ever, the 1st being the F2A-3 Buffalo, as well as my 1st LSP buiild Blog.  The kit I decided on is one of my personal favorite Grumman aircraft, the F4F-3 Wildcat, kitted by Trumpeter. The build started a month ago so the 1st 3 or so updates are already in the books, and I'll post them a few days apart.
 
1j2Rxs.jpg
 
This isn't one of their newer generation kits, which I understand are quite good, but rather one of their earlier releases that have some issues which range from minor to major. So I'm going into this with some intrepidation and caution. I've seen several of these built, so they're certainly buildable. The issue is to be able to bring it up to my latest person standards. My 1st choice was to do their -4 with the folding wings, but as the earlier of the two kits, it has issues with the shape and profile of the fuselage. The 2nd kiting, the -3, has an all new fuselage amoung other corrected parts, including non-folding wings. To do a correct -4 you would need to buy a -3 just for the fuselage. That's another project for another time.
 
The instructions of course start out with the cockpit, but with consultation with my brother Peter, I opted to start with the Pratt & Whitney R-1830-66 Twin Radial Wasp engine.  As usual I planned on just adding spark plug wires and  other details to enhance the look.  The engine itself is a miniture kit.  These are the parts needed just to build the front bank of cylinders.
 
whhNMw.jpg
 
 After doing some basic research on a few other builds, it became quite apparent that the engine has some issues. The most visual issue is that the push rod tubes are all to short and the valve covers are at the wrong angle in repect to the angle that the tubes are. I forgot to take a few pictures, so please forgive me.
The 1st order of business was to cut off the pushrod tubes and drill out the ring.
 
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I cut .035 Evergreen rod to make new tubes. After test fitting a few rods into the valve covers, the gap is basically gone, but the angle is just as bad. I thought about filing down the tops of the cylinder heads but rejected that as there is a tube that I'll be adding that goes across and it won't fit. Also the profile would be completely wrong. The issue is that Trumpeter just dreamed up the valve covers. Here's a picture of the real engine. You can see that the valve cover is cast so that the top is angled directly down the pushrod tube, while the bottom half is directly facing down the middle of the cylinder head.
 
vjOnH2.jpg
 
Now that I know what the problem is I had to admit with my limited modeling skills there is no way I could scratch out those covers, so I just opted to live with what's in the kit as the cowling lip covers the offending valve covers.
I painted both cylinder banks, crakcases, and the exhaust MIG AMMO Black primer, then the cylinder heads, tube manifold, and wiring manifold were airbrushed with Alcad 2 Dark Aluminum, followed by a Black wash using Tamiya's Black recessed panel line wash. Then the pushrod tubes were installed and painted Tamiya X-1 Gloss Black.
 
RPzOzg.jpg
 
Next I made the collars that secure the pushrod tubes to the valve covers from tape. Once painted flat Aluminum, they should fool the viewers eye. Here's a picture with them painted on the right and just tape on the left.
 
l3hWRD.jpg
 
I dry fitted the engine and wasn't happy with the color of the crankcasing as it's just to light, so I repainted it a darker shade. The pushrods with the collars fill up the space in the valve covers and the overall look does seem much better then the stock parts.
 
Next up was the wiring of both banks of cylinders.  Now I've always thought that the plug wires were rubber encased, but a friend whose a living expert on all things B-17 said that for most of the war they used a bronze colored braid to house the ignition wires. The Rubber casings weren't used until very late in the war. Sure enough I checked my resources, and what I thought was just an upgrade in restorations were actually Bronze braid. Thank you Karl for that bit of information. Who would have known but a expert.
 
wvUjEj.jpg
 
So I wired the engine with .4mm lead wire from UMM-USA, and then painted them with a Bronze Yellowish color. Wiring took 3 days for each engine as the ignition manifold for some reason has the wire attachment fittings facing inward. No problem for the back bank, but for the front bank of cylinders they were almost completely under the cylinders. So I very carefully had to re-drill each hole after I had glued the manifold to the crankcase. How I didn't screw it up is beyond me.
Here's the almost completer P&W R-1830-66 engine. I still have some wiring on the crankcase to do as well as the rear housing. The crankcase is just dryfitted at this point.
 
VAOvdr.jpg
 
Hznvuz.jpg
 
lAbhkQ.jpg
 
Next update in a few days.
Joel

Edited by Joel_W
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Guest Peterpools

JA

Nice work on the P&W radial and I sure had a hard time understanding the braided Bronze casing until I saw the photos for myself. Of course, I truly know how long you suffered over the push rod problem and your solution worked out just fine.

Keep 'em coming

Bro

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JA

Nice work on the P&W radial and I sure had a hard time understanding the braided Bronze casing until I saw the photos for myself. Of course, I truly know how long you suffered over the push rod problem and your solution worked out just fine.

Keep 'em coming

Bro

 

Pete,

  Glad that a few pictures solved the understanding issue. As you know it drove me nuts for days on end.

 

 Starting with the next update I'm going to  use a header with the tabs option.

 

Joel

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Nice start, Joel! Good work on that engine. I've just fixed a couple of your image links that weren't displaying properly. Looking forward to more!

 

Kev

 

Kev,

  Thanks for the help posting those pics. Moving forward I'll use the picture icon option instead of the old manual way.

 

 And thanks for appreciating my efforts on the Wasp twin.

 

Joel

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Joel, could you be more specific about the paint you used for ignition wires. Thats the closest I've seen them done.....Harv :popcorn:  

 

Harv,

  My usual paint of choice is Tamiya acrylics. I started off with XF-4 Yellow Green (which is also very close to YZC) but it was a tad to light. So I went with 12:1 ratio with XF-69 Nato Black. an issue with Tamiya acrylics is that they don't hand paint very well. Clumpy and tend to pull up the previous coat. To remedy that I added 2 drops of Winsor & Newton flow enhancer  which really helps to solve those issues.

Joel

Edited by Joel_W
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Harv,

  My usual paint of choice is Tamiya acrylics. I started off with XF-4 Yellow Green (which is also very close to YZC) but it was a tad to light. So I went with 12:1 ratio with XF-69 Nato Black. an issue with Tamiya acrylics is that they don't hand paint very well. Clumpy and tend to pull up the previous coat. To remedy that I added 2 drops of Window & Newton flow enhancer  which really helps to solve those issues.

Joel

Nice looking Wasp, Joel! FYI, Tamiya now has their own retarder; it makes brush painting a pleasure.

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Awesome, Joel...Looking to follow your build. Ooozes quality (but then I already knew that from ARC)!

 

Shaka Hi,

  Thanks for thumbs up. I'll try to make it an interesting build along the way.

Joel

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