Sabre F-86

Might as well. Getting the last tiny bits taken care of is a slow process. Too much else going on. I just noticed that the canopy has framing molded inside. First time dealing with that, and masking is a slow process. Can only do one or two panels before I have to take a break. Be a few days yet, but once it's done I'll take it outside for some clear sharp shots on a neutral background.

Cleaning up the canopy, and gluing the broken bits on, I'll get some more photos soon as I can. Miserable rainy weather up here right now, too wet to get out on the balcony.

Spent an hour last night chasing down, filling and fine sanding all the little divots and over scribe marks, cleaning up the fill on the wing and elevator joints. Next thing to do is the scribing of the widened plate on the of the wing spars. About the 5th time now, made up a new template, hopefully this will work.

Be a while before I get going on this. I really need to finish the two Zeros I have going. Not to mention having a look at the aftermarket stuff.

Older kit, from 1992. Still designated as ST-5 instead of the more recent 8055. Virgin kit, no additions at this time. Not sure which scheme I'll do, probably Man O' War. Or... captured by the Germans and used for training.

Is it allowed to enter the same model in two group builds? I have a Hasegawa P-51D, with nose art. If not I'll put it into the Hasegawa group.

I'm calling this one finished. Some parts fell off, bad glue joints, but all that's left is repairs and some missing PE bits that took off. Got the number on the rudder changed, still a tad small but overall I'd say she looks pretty sharp. Remembered a lot of things not to do, having done them once more. The fit could have been better, but overall it was a good build.

Here's another mystery. Ever had the pigment coagulate and settle out of the paint? Vallejo White, 71-001, with their thinner, and flow improver. 15/10/1 ratio, well mixed. Clogged the airbrush almost instantly. When I looked at the mixing cup you could see the pigments clumped together (like curdled milk) and clear medium. Bought some Tamiya white this morning, thinned with IPA, got a nice fine mist. Neither one of the guys at Panther hobbies had ever heard of it separating. Anyway some pics First on is kinda dark, not much light on the east side after about 10am. Fuselage donut and tail number. Yup, too small. Getting short on time, if I still have some I'll enlarge and replace it. Lastly, the underside markings. I cheaped out and cut the frisket too short, and the cutter skewed the sheet half way through cutting the last mask. Reusing one, not any problems, the adhesive is pretty good. Sticks down tight several times, but peels off cleanly. TTFN

Bottom RLM76 now painted, didn't turn out too bad over the mottling. Flipped her over and masked for the RLM 74 gray green. Going to let it dry for a few hours, then mask for the other color, the RLM 75 Gray Violet. Went a little too heavy on the mottling, but the effect seems to work out fine. Having a problem using the double action airbrush, either no paint or full balls. I have another airbrush, I'll give that one a try. The one I'm using is a cheap Amazon one. So, time to do some writing. BTW if you people are into good stories based on your favourite TV show, movie or book, check out Fanfiction.net. Lots of fan written stuff, some excellent ones and a lot of fairly good ones. I'm into an Anime called Highschool of the Dead, posting a story called Sabredancing with the Dead. Check it out if you like.

The first few comments all show the IMGUR image not available message. Now that I've seen its a Kate, I too have to wonder why it's 1/35th. Very little Japanese armor out there, and what would a torpedo bomber have to do with that anyway?

I've ordered some scotch brite pads, expect them tonight. Have to see how thick they are. I think I can whittle them down with a heavy duty Olfa cutter.

Beats hell out of me why it won't stick in some place, but does OK In others. I washed everything with dish detergent before I started, and wipe things down with IPA and a Q-tip. Anyway, onwards and upwards. Some fresh photos, just taken. Prop and spinner done, put a piece of tubing into the nose, so the prop can be removed. Just stuck the cowling down with white glue, prior to painting. The nose is as good as I can get it, the upper cowl is a tad wide at the nose, probably because of the bad molding. Looking down, it's not too noticeable, but for a ground shot, it will be visible. From the port quarter, the canopy is being masked with bare metal foil and the flaps are still off because I have to jigger the camo markings as there is a gap when the flaps are down. Two shots of the cockpit. The joystick popped off, needs to be reinstalled. Another shot of the prop. That spot of red is sacrificial bleeding, not on this project, but from the shelves I'm knocking together. Spring cleaning in between letting the glue or paint dry. Lastly, the underside. Not sure why there is a gap between the oil cooler and the wing LE. The wing is in the correct position, as is the oil cooler insert. The back joint took some fairing and still needs more rescribing. Wheel wells given a wash of Van Dyke Brown oils and mostly wiped away. So far, so good. I expect to finish the scribing tonight, and start shooting the last of the Alclad aluminum, and then on with the black mottling before the camo scheme. I'm going to go easy on the mottling, While the few photo seem to show a lot of staining, I'm thinking these were new machines and the Japanese couldn't have flown them all that much. I'm also gonna try masks for the first time with my cricket cutter. I have the approximate dimensions for the strip and hinomarus. I'm looking through my fonts list for a good match to the numeral, otherwise I'll have to make it up with the cricket software. All the paints are on hand as of yesterday.

Still chugging along. Fuselage is together, wings on, and the tail planes. Taking care of all the dings and dents where the divots are. The nose is a scream, still trying to get the upper cowling to fit to the fuselage, the end surface where the prop butts against was badly messed up. Got a question. For some reason, the glue doesn't seem to hold very well and pieces keep popping loose. I use tamiya extra thin. Have started to paint parts, need to go get some more paints. My Gunz Sangyo seems to be drying up. More photos tomorrow.

I'll be following this with great interest. I've started to learn Blender, and have a Phrozen Sonic Mini printer. The Dornier Wal I started about 12 years ago still exists but the dimensions were pretty bad. I've since picked up a 1/72 model of a Soviet Wal, and am going to measure parts and scale them up. Being slab sided, it should be relatively simple. Only question is when.

Gettin' there, slow but steady. I should be able to close up the fuselage tomorrow. Or rather, today, it's 0030 here. More pics. Cockpit coming together, the PE is good practice for when I do the Trumpeter USS Langley. Bought all the PE for it, acres of teeny tiny little brass bits. Cockpit Landing gear hoses. Almost done, trim and touch up paint still needed. Picked up some placard decals, next on the list of things, then a wash, and some pigments, for the cockpit and the gear.

Things are progressing well. First photo, some of the sub-assemblies, grouped together. Secondly, close ups of the exhaust, landing gear strut, and the basic cockpit. Apologies for the somewhat out of focus pics. Next time I'll use a stand. The landing gear hoses were added to the plastic pipe with 30 gauge wire wrapping wire, left over from my college days. The wire is 30 gauge but the insulation is really thin, so much so that it can't be stripped with a 30 gauge stripper. You have to nibble the ends off. Not sure where you can find it, I ordered some 30 gauge from Amazon but the insulation is much thicker and the stripper works. OK if you want the wire, but I use the stripped insulation as hose, with the wire as the coupler.

I've replaced as many of the photos as I can, sadly some of them have vanished. At the moment she's sitting on the shelf again as I entered the Turning Japanese group build. I'll get back to her once the group build is finished.

PE has arrived, bits are coming together.

I still have them. I'll see what I can do. Have to take a refresher on FTP and websites. Been ages since I actually did anything with that.

Still waiting on the PE but the subassemblies are coming along pretty good. Now I know what overtrees are. Some of the parts are not well formed but workable, and with a fair bit of flash. Wing main part done, tail planes, cockpit floor, so far. From the instructions I have for the Adler Angriff kit, I see there are some cockpit bits that can be assembled without the PE, next on the list, along with the landing gear, prop and spinner. Ailerons, flaps, elevators. Nothing worth photographing yet, I'll post some later on as building progresses.

In the early part of the war, Japan had a couple 109s sent over for evaluation with the idea of building them under license. It didn't pan out but they did acquire the rights to the DB engine. They also had an Fw-190 A5 or two for the same purpose.

Well, the Hamp is just about at the painting stage. I still have a bit of rescribing to do, but the wings are on, she sits level with the fin vertical, the stabilizers horizontal and both wingtips the same distance off the mat. Did a lot of filling and rescribing, all I have to do is the two upper and lower stringers per side, out at the wingtip. I'll be painting it with a first coat of Alclad, then mottled black as Thunnus did with his BF-109. Shoot a coat of hairspray, then the green and grey, and chip away. I've been working my way through the shelf of doom, and have half a dozen on the go, pushing to get them completed. Mostly tanks, even finished the Chevy Chevelle I started long time ago.

I'm in, with an Eduard Bf-109E-7. Bought several of the overtree sets, and have ordered some PE from them. Virgin kit, untouched. I'll start with subassemblies that don't rely on the PE, although it was ordered back on the 16th. Should be here soon. The painting will be the standard for the period, with Hinomarus, a red stripe with white borders and the numeral 1 on the tail fin.

Thanks. I'm revamping my web page to serve as a photo album, Gonna be a while yet but it's nice to know most people see the pic.

Should see the Italeri 1/72 scale DC-3 I built decades ago. Did this for a client, turned out not bad but all my pics were on Photobucket so now I'm gonna use my web page as the host if this works.