Starfighter

Brilliant, thanks a lot Iain!

Iain, I certainly have missed the information, but may I ask where you got the clear 1,5mm HIPS? I've made a google search but couldn't find anything so far. Thanks in advance for your help!

Absolutely stunning - there isn't much more to say. I just love the extremely neat execution of your builds and the Tempest is no exception. What's next?

Brilliant work - I am not into armor, but I am following with huge interest. So you are happy with the Snapmaker? I've had a look at it several times already but always doubted its usefulness. Would you be willing to do a small presentation of the machine and how you use it? If it works well, I'd love to add it to my tools! Keep up the great work!

Nice, good idea!

Thank you! Sadly no progress to show at the moment - stupid me somehow managed to lose a readily painted front wheel while trying to fit it to the front landing gear. It fell on the (wooden!!) floor and was never to be seen again. I've spent at least an hour on my knees, moved all furniture nearby but no luck. There must be a black hole or something like that in my modelling room... I mean, a fully painted wheel looks rather "flashy" IMO - strange how something like this can simply disappear on a wooden floor... I guess we all have experienced the same at some point. I have already ordered a new Brassin set and will start all over again once I have received it. I'll have to cast a copy of the remaining wheel once I build another Phantom (late thick wing Marines RF-4B in TPS scheme!), but that's not for the near future.

Stunning as usual, Chuck!

Thank you all! Rainer, I have used Bare Metal Foil for the oleos, that's what works best for me.

Thanks Anthony! No need to be sorry - the forums are the place to ask questions, aren't they? The sealant is simple red paint indeed; I think I used Mr Hobby red. It's the kit undercarriage spiced up with a few wires and Brassin wheels; I did not bother using PE parts on it as I don't think the Eduard parts look that much better than the kit parts. Talking about PE parts - this reminds me that I'll have to add a few of them to the painted hot section... "funny" times ahead!

Scooby had a distinctive, heavily worn antenna cover below its nose. To simulate this kind of effect, liquid mask was used again. A light coat of zinchromate from MRP leads to this result. I'll play around with oils later today to add more different shades as on the real a/c. More "micro painting" adds a lot of interest and realism to small parts such as this dielectric panel on the fuselage side. The photo also shows that I need to rework the washes on the fuselage. I also corrected the initially incorrectly masked hot section at the rear fuselage by painting the two rear panels besides the fin FS36320. Note the red sealant in on the hot section. Bonus: the landing gears are nearing completion. The oleos were made with bare metal foil.

I would never doubt your authority as a crew chief; I am an R&D engineer for car models and my eye may be "sharpened" to this kind of shape issues - I spotted it right away and I will definitely correct it on my kits as this is a very characteristic area of the helicopter. If you were in the R&D proofreading team, I really wish you'd pushed Kitty Hawk towards correct surface detail by the way - because that's something everybody can spot right away...

The small bits towards the end of a build always seem to take much more time than the big ones... but at least I managed to paint the nozzles and afterburner cans. The nozzles needed a bit of extra attention; they are 3D printed (not by me though!) and needed some careful sanding to obtain a smooth surface. The upper parts of the Aires afterburner cans hat to be reduced in diameter in order to fit the nozzles. All parts were first painted with Mr Metal Color Iron. Great stuff! The paint was not yet polished when the photo was taken. After polishing, liquid mask was applied with a sponge in order to obtain a slightly splotchy look. The recessed triangular areas between the feathers were tediously masked... And the feathers were painted with dark steel from Humbrol Metal Cote. Note how dark the paint looks before polishing. After polishing, I dabbed on some Mr Metal Color iron with a sponge. A dark wash reduces contrast and adds volume to the recessed areas. The afterburner cans are more difficult to photograph than to paint... The cans are green and buff on the inside, followed by a dark wash. The flame holders are PE parts which I heated with a lighter - what looks more like heated metal than heated metal? They look quite convincing once in plate. They will be barely visible at the end, though. Nozzles in situ. Their diameter is significantly than the Aires parts and definitely improve the overall look of the model.

The guys are right, just don't give up now! If you don't want to try painting the national insignia again, send my your address via PN and I'll send you a set of stars'n'bars from CAM if you want.

This is so far beyond anything I will ever achieve... wow. Just wow.

Absolutely brilliant so far. The weathering looks spot on! Pete, not sure if you do care a lot about shape accuracy on this build, but I am pretty sure the forward dog house cover looks too flat at the front. I discovered that when I had a closer look a the SH kits. The area I have marked red in below pic is way too flat on the kit IMO. The foremost part of the curve should be much more steep compared with the kit part.

Great project! You'll love the kit, it's brilliant, just carefully clean up all glueing surfaces. You should invest at least the amount for the Werner's Wings sheet in order to replace the kit stencils. They are totally off colour wise and won't be visible on the painted model. Keep in mind the upper surfaces are not FS36320 as incorrectly stated by Academy but FS35237. I threw pretty much all the (back then) available aftermarket at my kit and added some home made 3D printed stuff. It was huge fun. The cockpit needs wuite a bit of love and the clear parts aren't great, but apart from that it's one of the very best kits I have ever built. Looking forward to seeing your Viper come together!

VERY nice - I'd just suggest to add a light wash to the ignition wires to blend them in a bit more with the overall weathering of the engines.

Very nice! I would not wait too long before applying a coat of primer on top of the vinyl parts to avoid deformation.

This looks absolutely stunning, Pete!

There are two things which regularly stop me - my wallet and my schedule... Oh, and the fact that I don't have enough space for all the silly things I'd like to build! You are right. And the transitions between the different shapes are not right. I do of course have the fuselage cross sections; I will use them to check the shapes of the printed model. If it'll turn out to be too difficult to correct, I will use my handmade fuselage.

Just a small update, but an important one - my good friend Thomas has milled some stunningly beautiful stiffener plates for Scooby's rudder. Test fitting one of the stiffener plates on the rudder. The paintjob looks very rough - it will be sanded smooth before varnishing it and the varnish will later be sanded and polished as well.

The rear portion of the fuselage fell out of the printer yesterday and had of course to be assembled. It seems to lack the typical bottom heavy appearance of the Greyhound, but I will first print the missing fuselage center section before checking the shapes in detail. I will then have to decide how to proceed - with the hand carved model or the 3D printed one. Or maybe a combination of both, as on the Viking? We will see!

Looking very good, Iain - as mentioned elsewhere, I am working on pretty much the same project in the background since quite some time. And on its 4-engined cousin... I just have no idea where to put it!

It's been a while... but as you may know, I usually don't forget models I have started. The arrival of my new Mono X was a good opportunity to do some tests as I had a rather good looking C-2 CAD model on my computer. I started with the nose section which does not look too bad - it has some shape issues which need to be addressed, though. Time will tell wheter or not the printed model is a better starting point than my hand carved (but shape wise more accurate) fuselage. Maybe a combination of both will do the trick - we'll see! The nose is way too bulbous at the bottom and the cockpit windows need some tweaking as well, but it's quite a good base. Once I have upped my resin stock, I will print the rest of the fuselage and compare it with the pattern I have made. Stay tuned!

I've not only played around with the new toy, I also worked a bit on the stabilizers. Once the NMF section was ready, I added another stiffening strip (the S full of stiffeners...), then was it was masked before applying the orange. Masking the slightly thicker portion near the tip of the leading edge with liquid mask your turn out not to be the best idea I've ever had... The orange turned out nicely and I am rather happy with the NMF, but the part I've masked with liquid mask looks absolutely crappy. I'll have to figure out how to correct that. Careful when masking Tamiya lacquer with liquid mask - it leaves marks on the paint which in my case were a desired side effect (on the panel on the left) but could be annoying on a finish which is intended to look perfect. Of course I have played around with the new tool as well - and as you know, I never forget about started projects, I did something for a model started many moons ago: More on that in the respective thread ( https://forum.largescaleplanes.com/index.php?/topic/67443-in-cod-we-trust-grumman-c-2a-greyhound-scratchbuilt/ ) . Getting this one back onto the bench is not imminent, but there will be more once I have upped my resin stock again (which should be today).