geedubelyer

Thanks for sharing this excellent news Kev. Glad to hear that Robin is getting back in business.
 
Coincidentally I just found my air cadet log book and now have the serials for a couple of subjects of this kit.
 
Look forward to more news and following your build of the original.
 
Cheers.

Thanks for sharing this excellent news Kev. Glad to hear that Robin is getting back in business.
 
Coincidentally I just found my air cadet log book and now have the serials for a couple of subjects of this kit.
 
Look forward to more news and following your build of the original.
 
Cheers.

Hi Tim,
 
From memory the last few years have been bright but cold.
Temperatures in early November can vary alot but are typically just above 0C, in the 5-10 degree range (40-50f).
It does n't often snow before Christmas but the mornings are often frosty.
 
HTH.
 
Cheers.
 
 
The show is really good though, if that helps. It would be good to plan to go for both days if you wish to see it all in any detail.
 

Hi Tim,
 
From memory the last few years have been bright but cold.
Temperatures in early November can vary alot but are typically just above 0C, in the 5-10 degree range (40-50f).
It does n't often snow before Christmas but the mornings are often frosty.
 
HTH.
 
Cheers.
 
 
The show is really good though, if that helps. It would be good to plan to go for both days if you wish to see it all in any detail.
 

Hi Tim,
 
From memory the last few years have been bright but cold.
Temperatures in early November can vary alot but are typically just above 0C, in the 5-10 degree range (40-50f).
It does n't often snow before Christmas but the mornings are often frosty.
 
HTH.
 
Cheers.
 
 
The show is really good though, if that helps. It would be good to plan to go for both days if you wish to see it all in any detail.
 

Hi everyone,
 
I took few minutes to assemble the upper and lower part of the fuselage to check the fitting of these exhausts and I do confirm that they are drop and fit.
They are just a little bit smaller in diameter as the real one are.
 
Just perfect.
 
Eric
 
 

Hi everyone,
 
I have just received this absolutely amazing exhausts for the Tamiya F-15 designed and 3D printed in South Korea. 
Pictures are much better than a long talk.
Enjoy!
 

 

 

 
They are so thin that they are transparent
 

 

 

 

 
Cheers,
 
Eric
 

evening all
 
back with a bit more Mustang mayhem...
 
..in trying to get the cockpit 'pod' in a state where it is complete and can be fitted into the airframe, I have had to take care of many small details I had earlier left, thinking 'I will do that later...'
 
first up this sidewall..
 

 
..I had added the straps for the flare pistol cartridge box (the four little beige tabs), the landing gear handle I made from brass in a previous post, some black switch covers in the top switchbox along the canopy slide rail and a completely missing thing - the bomb selector handle & cover (with a red top)..
 
maybe seen better here..
 

 
and bomb release lever..
 

 
..the cockpit floor was also finished with the canvas cover under the seat with it's pop-off fasteners, and the control column was added and the boot/gaiter - these canvas parts were made with household 3" masking tape which I think worked reasonable well..
 

 

 
..then a step right out of my comfort zone... I can make anything mechanical - I take a look, break it down into shapes and make thise bits - here though the parts I needed to make were the seat back life preserver (I think) and the cushion... two completely organic shapes..
 

 
..I thought the life preserver could be made of milliput on a base of lightly curved & distorted plasic card covered in foil tape so hopefully once complete I could remove it as it wouldn't stick to it..
 
..then it was a matter of playing with the milliput and trying to shape with cocktail sticks to get creases - the button like things were tiny punched plastic discs..
 

 
..I added some piping from sprue & milliput and tried to paint it (another weakness...)
 

 
..same for the cushion, though this time a strap was added at the front from folded tape & foil brass retaining straps...
 

 
..I am not 100% on it and may try painting it again, but for now it looks like this...
 

 
..and at home in the cockpit...
 

 

 

 

 
..getting there...
 
TTFN
Peter
 

hi folks
 
Thanks so much for all your contributions - it's what keeps threads like this alive - we all learn something new about an airframe, and if that happens, I have achieved a purpose in posting
 
I discarded the cushion on the basis the pilot actually sat on a parachute pack which served the same purpose and in some ways I am glad as then the work on shaping the seat bottom can be seen..
 
I amanged to put myself out of action for a few weeks as I sliced my finger - not modelling but drying up a vegetable slicer - what a dumbo..
 
it gave me some time to do some design work that was overdue anyway and as I had been messing about with tiny bits of wire trying to do seat belts, I decided to create a small PE fret of seat belt parts, which ultimately grew as I went through the manual into an A4 fret with all sorts of other useful bits including window framing, gunsight parts, templates for the U/C doors and another set of panels that go around the exhausts as I want to try annealing them to get better curvature...
 

 
..that was about a weeks work...
 
also renewed my Rhino 3D trial and finalised the mainwheel..
 

 
made the gunsight - its some kind of N3 type but not much reference on the net on this particular variant, but I did have a few good Lopes resto shots to base it on..
 

 

 
and I love this shot of the signal pistol - I have the mount in the fuselage wall, but not the pistol or the metal part it mounts to.. - I wasn't going to include it at all as the gun would be too hard for me to design, but had a brainwave that enabled it..
 

 
..and here is the mount..
 

 
..now for the brainwave - it appears 1/18 is the scale of collector soldiers, and a company on the internet does small arms for them so I bought a couple of .357 Magnums for $0.65c each - bit of modification and we have a flare pistol
 

 
..I only need the handle..
 

 
..now for some parts that have been bothering me since I started - seat belts...
 
when I did my Spitfire, they were the parts I was least happy with - made with ribbon, they looked a bit duff if you ask me..
 
after playing with different tapes & ribbon, I tried rolling some lead wire - it worked a treat, but was too narrow, so I cut some lead strips and rolled them out until they were the right size.. the fittings were all PE and it all seemed to work quite well..
 

 

 

 
..they were primed, painted & washed & the paint scraped off the metal fittings - here before the hooking latch was added..
 

 
..in place with the cushion, I am much happier with these than the Spit
 

 
..the cockpit is nearly ready to close up..
 

 

 
TTFN
 
Peter
 
 

woohoo - big day -the cockpit is in the airframe
 
..put together in a jig,,
 

 
and now a permanent fixture..
 

 
..with the skin bits..
 

 
..lots to do from here, but it's a big milestone for me

TTFN
Peter
 
 

Time to take a little break from tubing!
 
Here is the Weapon Main Unit, part of the control of the five stores hard points.  It' s a good warm up for the cockpit detailing to come.  The main box was printed along with a block of switches and knobs.  The clear cover was cut from Evergreen clear 0.010" styrene and scored and folded to it final shape.  The upper portion masked and sanded to create the frosted border.  Fairly simple paint job, black body, aluminum wire connections, switches and cover latches and dark grey wiring boots.  After a coat a Future decals were applied and a little thinned oil paint was used to pick out details and add some grime.  Finally a coat 50/50 flat and gloss lacquer to unify the finish and the cover was attached.
 
Plumbing is about half done so that's next....
 

 

 

 

 
More soon and thanks for checking in!
 
Timmy!

Took some iPhone shots today.  The majority of the hydraulic lines are complete for the top of the nose gear well.  I’ve added a wire bundle, that several hydraulic tubes will route over, was installed.  These tubes required a number of T fittings and check valves to be printed up and pieced together.  It’s not an impressive number of tubes installed since my last installment but between fiddly construction and hours of staring at photos to understand where everything connects they consumed that time span.  Lastly the torque tube that connects the aft doors to their actuator was installed.  There are some hydraulic tubes that will route over this tube necessitating it’s installment now.
 
On to the photos...
 

 

 

 

 

 

 
More soon....
 
Thanks for checking in!
 
Timmy!

Mesmerizing work Peter. Truly beautiful to see.
 
Have you considered cigarette paper moistened with dilute PVA glue? 
Another alternative could be a snippet of silk. That's pretty finely woven
Or, some ladies beauty salons use an adhesive backed material as a basis for false resin nails.....apparently......ahem.
That could work. A local salon might have some small bits that you could have?
 
Eager to see more. Keep up the stellar work. 

hello again fellow modellers
 
 
 
Hi Jay - it's just a cheap Chinese one, but seems perfectly adequate for my needs - I just need to learn how to use it
 

 
 
 
 
Ahh - that is one good looking Spit - but having done one, I doubt I will do another (especially as it was my favourite Mark..)
 
 
 
They are really useful - thanks Chek, I have lots of resto shots, but very, very few of it actually finished so these are brilliant!
 
..I have been away much of the week, so just a little more done - but each part is one more step towards completion!
 
..firstly, the control column was finished & painted - I just need to work out what to make the canvas gaiter from as all the materials I have the weave is over scale..
 

 

 
..and dry fitted in place..
 

 
..next, the rudder pedals... these are in Lopes Hope... a very obvious feature is the writing on the faces
 

 
..this was taken care of by making PE parts - here the rounded shape is being imparted by taping & rolling over some brass rod..
 

 
..soon the base pedals were made..
 

 
..then a kit of parts assembled, including the forks that hold them..
 

 
..I checked and only the bottom of the assembly can be seen, so all the upper gubbins was pretty much ignored..
 

 
..and these were then painted and some light scuffing - washes & weathering will come much later...
 

 
..thats it for now..
 
TTFN
Peter

Phenomenal Timmy! Like looking at reference photos of the real deal. Simply amazing.
 
I feel your pain with your eyesight It's a headache when you want to be able to add fine detail but can't really see accurately enough to do so.
Have you considered using the soft foil from around the tops of wine bottles for your labels? The sort of metal that wraps over the corks rather than the stiffer screw top version.
Some of it is even pre-coloured in black. It's easier to get square/rectangular shapes by cutting the foil than it is by painting. Also, scratching the paint off with the tip of a blade replicates the metal lettering of these labels, placards and data panels quite convincingly.
 
Can't think how I missed the start of this thread but I'll be sure to follow along now that I've found it.
 
Looking forward to more.
 
Cheers.

Well kids....
 
I started all over again...
 
New thread because the old one was just devolving into a endless stream of do overs.  
 
THIS THREAD SHALL NOT BE WHAT CAME BEFORE...THIS ONE WILL BE A FINISHED PROTOTYPE MODEL!!
 
So a few months back my good friend Paul Fisher lost his home and wonderful workshop to fire in Paradise, CA.  I am so happy he and his family escaped and in that light the mention of what comes next seems so trivial.
 
Paul was in possession of the masters I had completed at the time of the fire so an opportunity to build a better model arose.
 
Considering the magnitude of the work I previously completed, I started thinking about how to speed up the build.  As many of you know I have turned to CNC and SLA type 3d printing to augment the hand building of the model.  Until recently I had eschewed the use of FDM type printers due to the inaccuracy of the prints, and significant post processing required after printing model parts.  Cost also was a factor, nothing was worth the investment versus the risk of poor parts.
 
Enter the Tiertime Cetus MKIII.  This little printer was cheap, precise and worth a gamble.  The main feature that attracted me to the printer was the linear guide rails and bearing blocks.  These almost guarantee accurate movement of the axises of the printer.  With a price in the $300 US range it was worth a try.  With the printer in hand and after some tweaking with the assembly of the printer I managed to print dimensionally accurate parts.  One inch cubes were printed and were measured by digital caliper only a few ten thousands of an inch from true, and square adjacent surfaces measured with a machinist's square.
 
So I ordered up 7,000g of PLA filament and started a-printing.
 

 
On a similar journey I ordered up an Anycubic Photon MSLA printer, though this journey was much longer because the Photon required much more significant modification to get true parts.  Out of the box it made fantastic parts in terms of detail.  However, they parts didn't fit with others, they were skewed in the Z or vertical axis.  The modification was much too complex to detail in this post, suffice to say the machine was disassembled, parts were machined true, linear rails and bearing blocks added and a new parts were machined to make it all work.  Parts that came out of the machine post modification were exceptional!
 

 
Now that I have three machines working simultaneously part production has definitely accelerated the pace of this build.
 
I have also made some design changes.  Outside of getting another chance to improve the model's accuracy, simplifying and streamlining the build has been a chief consideration.  So the model will still be "skinned" in aluminum sheet but only where there are removable panels, the remainder of panel detail will be scribed in to a layer of primer paint.  PLA is a difficult material to sand and also hygroscopic and needed to be well sealed.  I'm using 2 part automotive epoxy paint (paint and hardener) to fill and "glue" the PLA layers together.  The result is a surface that is much easier to sand and finish.  You can see a few of the PLA parts were the black primer has been applied and finishing has started.
 
Lastly my machining skills have improved to the point where the acrylic parts now have machined in details, rivets and reinforcing layers etc.
 
Here's a shot of the parts so far.  These parts represent the main components of the fuselage from the nose to the engine faces.  
 

 
More detailed photos coming as assembly commences.  This will be a prototype model, so I will be finishing this one as I go, so you can look forward to finished assemblies going forward.
 
Thanks for checking in!
 
Timmy!
 
 

Hello again!
 
I’ve been busy printing and prepping parts.  The skeleton and first layers of detail are ready for final fitting and assembly.  Everything received a coat of black epoxy primer, for two reasons to seal the FDM printed parts and fill machine marks and layer lines on the CNC cut, and resin printed parts.  I mixed up some chromate color with Tamiya yellow and green and sprayed a base color layer.  A few days later I received some MRP paints...I've been looking a paint solution since the demise of Floquil.  Great paint, and I super happy with the results.  Anyway, I sprayed a thin layer of MRP chromate over the Tamiya color and I was pleased with the mottled effect and overall fidelity of the base color.  Details were painted in their appropriate colors, then the parts were sealed with Future.  A layer of lamp black and burnt umber oils, thinned with Japan dyer was applied, then  promptly wiped away.  This dirtied up the surfaces and created a good back ground for the details to come.  Assembly is underway, with some printing successes I'm looking forward to share in the next installment
 
White parts CNC cut acrylic and styrene, green/blue parts are resin printed, and the dark gray part in the middle was CNC cut, top and bottom halves the make up the cockpit floor and nose gear well overhead.  The nose gear well half had a printed detail appliqué added.
 

 
Primed parts
 

 
Base Tamiya color
 

 
Weathered parts
 

 
Detail composites
 

 

 
This stuff is coming up.  These are the console panels that were cut from 0.040” styrene on the CNC mill.
 

 
 
Thanks for tuning in!
 
Timmy!

Hi guys,
 
I‘ve started with some assembly and initial layers of detail.  The following photos are the left side of the nose landing gear well.   This detail is primarily the hydraulic tubing, and insulated environmental system tubing.   As a proof of concept idea I chose to try to print sections of tubing.  The aft most lines are laterally offset and have connectors that needed to be rendered.  Doubting my ability to bend and fashion identical parallel line by hand as well as keeping future production in mind a printing attempt was justified.  So the tube sections were modeled in CAD with portions tubing clamps at each end and sent off to my Photon.  I did print three copies of each section, as it turned out, all printed successfully but one of the three was perfect.
 
The remainder of the tubing was fashioned from lead wire.  Printed fittings and CNC milled tubing clamps were placed on the side wall using a paper template made from a 2d drawing exported from my CAD software.  Hours of studying photographs and tracing one line at a time, I managed to get all the pipes in what I think is the right place.  That is to say, every tube end landed on a connection point, no loose ends.  I know they are not 100% correct but, without a maintenance pub that shows a trace of each line....I’ve achieved a, let’s say, 98% accurate result.
 

 

 

 
Here are a few more printed parts.  I finally invested in a proper macro lens with a ring flash.  I think the photos are much better...two problems though.  1. You can see every microscopic flaw, even though I build with layers of magnification from my cheaters down to 10x jewelers loop.  ....and.... 2. I’m working on my f stops for depth of field.   So far my shots are hand held, maybe a little less laziness on my part and I should use a tripod and focus merge multiple shots.  Irregardess y’all ort git the gist of my progress.
 

 

 
Thanks for checking in!
 
Timmy!

This :....
 

 
Would love to get back to it one day.

This :....
 

 
Would love to get back to it one day.

Beautifully weathered Flanker. Great job.

This :....
 

 
Would love to get back to it one day.

This :....
 

 
Would love to get back to it one day.

This :....
 

 
Would love to get back to it one day.

This :....
 

 
Would love to get back to it one day.