Bstarr3 Posted January 23, 2018 Share Posted January 23, 2018 Beautiful work on the cockpit. Very nice details and painting, Karim. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
seiran01 Posted January 27, 2018 Share Posted January 27, 2018 It's just not right. The level you build at Karim, with every genre you build in, is AMAZING! To me the largest difference in your work vs the other 99% is the absolute realism that you achieve with your painting and weathering. The depth of the colors is stunning and blows me away every time. 100% agreed. Think it's time we start breaking some bones until Karims builds stop making ours look like crap by comparison? karimb 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
karimb Posted February 1, 2018 Author Share Posted February 1, 2018 Karim mt Friend Are you kidding me ... strike any thoughts of Gaboon Viper heading for the Shelf of Doom .. way to much incredible work to even let that thought cross your mind! WOW, Eduard's PE surely was a life saver in taking care of business with the injector pin marks as an extra added bonus to it's primary detail function. WOW, do those seats look good and with the belts ... two gems. One fantastic front office .. looking real good Keep 'em comin Peter Peter my friend its great to read you and to know you are following the build of Gaboon Viper! The idea of parking her on the s.o.d keeps floating around but then i walk off for a while and then walk back in and the mist dissipates... it's one of those builds where you need alot of steam to keep powering you through, most of the times demanding builds like that tend to end up well, so i am pushing along trying to get her done! thanks for leaving a word and checking in my friend! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
karimb Posted February 1, 2018 Author Share Posted February 1, 2018 Fantastic! Kev Thank you Kev! glad youre follwing the build progress! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
karimb Posted February 1, 2018 Author Share Posted February 1, 2018 That sure is nice. Sincerely, Mark Thank you Mark! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
karimb Posted February 1, 2018 Author Share Posted February 1, 2018 Karim, what a beautiful build so far my friend! Amazing attention to detail! I love the scratch built parts and raised rivets! Keep going!! And, thanks for sharing! Cheers Alan Alan, thanks for stopping by and leaving a word! let's see how deep this rabbit hole goes Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
karimb Posted February 1, 2018 Author Share Posted February 1, 2018 Beautiful work on the cockpit. Very nice details and painting, Karim. Thank you my friend for leaving a word! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
karimb Posted February 1, 2018 Author Share Posted February 1, 2018 It's just not right. The level you build at Karim, with every genre you build in, is AMAZING! To me the largest difference in your work vs the other 99% is the absolute realism that you achieve with your painting and weathering. The depth of the colors is stunning and blows me away every time. Tony my friend you are too kind with your words... To be honest i am kind of walking blind on that build, i don't know what the correct colors are so i am kind of winging it, i am glad the weathering is kind of covering up for my incompetence I am super happy you're enjoying the build progress and i am super happy to have you here with me! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
karimb Posted February 1, 2018 Author Share Posted February 1, 2018 100% agreed. Think it's time we start breaking some bones until Karims builds stop making ours look like crap by comparison? Mike, Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
karimb Posted February 1, 2018 Author Share Posted February 1, 2018 Hey everyone, straight out of Miami! Time for an update, it's overdue and the work i will post today was completed around a week ago. Between flights and going home for 6 days to see my daughter i didnt have neither the time to update the thread nor access to the macbook as i left everything back in doha. I have decided i was not going to keep complaining about this kit and will take it as it is from now on, although i will keep giving pointers concerning fit and things to watch out for. I don't want the negatives to drown out an overall okay build that just requires extra work and extra time, but for whoever is planning on building one, you have been warned! Now on to the juicy stuff. A milestone has been reached and successfully waded through. The fuselage is now closed up albeit after alot of colorful language and swearing, and repetitive sanding filling and resanding, so here goes... Initially i noticed in the reference photos i have that both IPs are missing the landing gear extension lever. i have scratchbuilt both the front and back one from styrene rod and then added sandwiched circles of styrene sheet which i had punched out using my RB punch. The Eduard pe ip of the pilot has strangely a slit on the left where the gear lever should be but it is mentioned nowhere that there is a missing lever. oh well, box ticked. I then added the small metal clips for the oxygen hoses made from lead sheet cut to size and folded. It doesn't really show well but under scrutiny you can see them around the top of the o2 hoses running up the side of the seats. The pilot ip+ip cover don't fit on the front of the cockpit, so by dryfitting with the front windscreen you can make out that the small gap between the coaming and the side will not be an issue as it will be covered by the painted side of the front windscreen. more on the glassware down the line. I have finally distributed the wiring harnesses where they should go and just gave them a quick spraying of random very thin brown and sand so show some dirt on them. I added the kit weight to the bottom of the cockpit floor and it didnt fit, so i had to cut a bit off the locating tabs that are either side of the cockpit tub. I painted the nosebay and nosebay area white with a drop of tan to break the starkness of the white and then added a wash of dark brown which i clumsily wiped off leaving the wash in the recesses and dirtying the whole area at the same time which was what i was aiming for. I might go back to that area and add a bit of washes from the AK landing gear weathering set, as soon as i find the missing landing gear wash bottle. It is probably buried in one of the drawers dedicated to the weathering materials. The fuselage at the back closed up fine, so i tacked them together and worked forward to get her closed up. The center part bottom remained with a gap of almost 1mm although i had made sure that everything was in the right position. Oh well. I can at least attest that the panel lines do line up on that bit. I filled the chasm with multiple pieces of styrene sheeting which i then cut flush and filled the whole seam with ca and microballoons. The initial sanding of the joint came up with a couple small areas that needed touching up with i did with tamiya putty this time. Once all was cured and dry i rescribed and reriveted the whole affected bottom area. The nose of the kit was easier to handle and took much less time. I used a sanding sponge this time in order to keep the natural curvature of the nose rather than risk altering it with sanding sticks. During the process i had to sand the ram air inlet flap on the top of the nose and i restored it with a piece of styrene sheet cut and sanded to shape. I considered cutting the ram inlet open and positioning the ram air inlet flap open but the thickness of the fuselage would have warranted undue work in thinning and trimming so i just left it shut. We now have a complete fuselage. The hard part was joining the wings to fuselage. There the fit was horrendous and i wonder if this was from my own doing since there were no locator pins on that assembly but it seems not as the top decking of the cockpit is too high to get the wing assembly sitting flush with the fuselage. I sanded the curved area on top of the circuit breaker box and worked on installing the wings as best as i could working from the back to the front. At the end all went well although i haven't attended to the step on the lower wing to fuselage mating. To be honest i still havent decided wether i was going to fix that part of not. What i might do i sand down the fuselage mating side down a bit to reduce the size of the step but to have it smooth is going to be a bear to do so i'll work it out as good as i can when the time and patience is available. I also had to add shims from styrene sheet to the front of the wing assembly so that the back window rests straight instead of having to fill the gap at a later stage. I like living dangerously but not to that extent lol! I also added the cargo door in the closed position and that part fitted well, hence i still am wondering why the wings didnt. go figure. I then added two placard decals to the inner left part of the seat where the harness locking mechanism is and dryfitted the seats to see if the scratchbuilt top of the seats would interfere with the glassware. I open up the glassware box and to say the least i am not happy with the quality of the transparencies. there is an overall distortion effect going on on all the parts, with varying degrees. that will need to be handled in the near future. I am happy to say though that the seats are clear of the top transparencies and the fit of the glass to wing and glass to front windscreen is good. I have included some photos with the glass just dropped in place to show you what the bronco will look like. Overall i am sort of satisfied with how things are proceeding to this point and haven't touched the kit since then, so i have saved up on quite some 'steam' to push this project forward at the next occasion. The order of things to come: Micromesh and Novus treatment to get the clear parts acceptable, then dip in future. Addition of the connection between the ejection seats and the bulkheads, along with the wiring for the headsets on the flight helmets. Addition of the maps for the navigator and pilot. Addition of the guns to the port side and the internal assemblies required there, along with the addition of the lower middle point fuel tank attachment. well, here goes the photos in no specific order as usual I will be flying back to doha after tomorrow and will have a couple of hours at the workbench before flying back home for another 6 days off. It feels like i am spending more time stateside than i am spending anywhere else lol! Until our next update stay safe and happy modeling everyone Karim LSP_Kevin, johncrow, Out2gtcha and 2 others 5 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bstarr3 Posted February 1, 2018 Share Posted February 1, 2018 Karim, that's got to be one of the best cockpits I've seen in any scale! The wiring looks really give it that extra level of detail and "busyness" that make it look real Out2gtcha 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
karimb Posted February 1, 2018 Author Share Posted February 1, 2018 BradG, Out2gtcha, johncrow and 3 others 6 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
karimb Posted February 1, 2018 Author Share Posted February 1, 2018 Karim, that's got to be one of the best cockpits I've seen in any scale! The wiring looks really give it that extra level of detail and "busyness" that make it look real Oh thank you my friend! It's encouragement like yours that keep me going on that build... it is quite a handful to keep the momentum going... take a look at the clear parts, that's going to probably take another day to get up to scratch before dipping lol. I am really hoping she will end up looking swell at the end otherwise she's going to fly off the shelf in a 'wind tunnel test' ... hopefully not lol Thanks for leaving such kind comments! Karim Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RLWP Posted February 1, 2018 Share Posted February 1, 2018 Karim, that's got to be one of the best cockpits I've seen in any scale! The wiring looks really give it that extra level of detail and "busyness" that make it look real You are not wrong, it's spectacular! Richard Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Shawn M Posted February 1, 2018 Share Posted February 1, 2018 wow that looks fantastic! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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