red Dog

The next phase of the built will address the stern of the hull. It's a one part transparent piece that normally secures the two long front halves hull. There are some issues with it which the modeller might or might not decide to address: First if the fit between the hull parts when the internal compartment are not placed is ok, once you install the internal compartment, it's much more difficult to snap the stern one piece part into the two front hull halves. There is something that is not right between the engine compartment and the rear electric/torpedo room that prevent a perfect fit. More on that later. Secondly the way it's planned to be assembled is really not easy for us to work with. The rear torpedo/electric room need to be fully completed before being inserted in the stern hull. Once it's secured in there will be no way to work on it anymore. Inserting it is also an issue because of all the extra parts outside the pressure hull which will basically be totally invisible and sometimes seriously conflicting with the correct insertion of the compartment into the one piece hull. The compartment is quite long and the rear torpedo tube need to fit the hull exit which is impossible as it is too short. It needs to be lengthened. But that's a good thing as I will explain later. Finally the transparent plastic is a nightmare to cut and a lot of cuts are needed (or not if you decide not to work with the PE set). The PE sets are actually correcting a few design flaws but mostly ease up the hull work. The transparent plastic exit holes are not through and their effect is quite visible on the finished model. The modeller has the choice to open up each hole or use the PE that requires one big hole and the mating of the PE replacement sheets. When doing that, all the holes area are replaced with a thin PE sheet with the holes correctly placed and more importantly totally open. The big challenge is to ate these PE sheets flush with the rest of the hull. That is the route I decided to follow. On top of all that the transparent parts are a pain to take picture of So apologies for the crappy pictures 1. The PE deck Nothing really complicated here. The one piece stern needs to be cut in a complicated pattern for the deck holes to be real see through. Templates are supplied from RCSubz but I found them way too complicated to cut. So I dry fit the deck on the stern and then sprayed some colour. After removing the PE deck, I knew exactly where to cut larger piece without compromising the part solidity. Two issues complicating this stage: 1. the PE deck don't match the hull cuts preventing to build in the same stages. 2. the transparent stern deck kind of sagged and when the PE deck touches the two edges; there's at least a 3mm gap in the center. That will call for some reinforcement. 2. The side PE plates There are 3 PE plates to fit on each side of the stern. One long relatively easy PE plate to replace the water holes close to the deck. One very intricate PE to replace the holes close to the propeller and rudder assembly And a very small one just on top of the stern torpedo door. The long one requires simple cuts on the hull. The PE is then placed in position and heated up with a soldering iron. That melts the plastic behind it and allows the PE to be inserted into it. The trick is to try to be constant and to clean the excess plastic due toi heat. Needless to say the first tries were horrific The intricate propeller PE is something else. First the PE need to be heated and dipped into cold water before bending into the right shape on the original hull (don't cut first like I did otherwise it's harder to bend into shape... Of course that's what happened on the second half I did... Then cut the plastic where required and then place the bent part and heat it slightly to dig it into the plastic before gluing it from the inside. Easier said than done but the end result will be much better than correcting and opening all these holes. I was not convinced about the RCSubs instruction for the placement of this PE sheet. Might be me but when I follow the instructions, the PE parts kind of conflicts with the propeller shaft housings. It seems the PE parts is too forward in the instructions. I tried to correct the issue and moved the PE plates a bit more aft before cutting the required holes in the one piece hull part - it was a "pleasure" to cut open. Far from easy to get it right. Above is what I understand the placement of the PE from RCSub's instructions but I feel it too close to the shaft casings So I moved it backwards where I think it should be positioned. Hard to get photographic evidence on this so I'll leave it at that. The small PE sheet above the stern tube is not even worth mentioning as it was so easy after the other two, it will be pictured below with the stern torpedo tube modifications.

After a short break for the holidays, work resumed on the conning tower with more weathering in the rust tones. I sourced some 1/35 stl for submarine crew and rescaled them to 1/48. Trumpeter provides the watch crew in big seal (and I'll use them) but the kommandant in dress uniform which is kind of weird. The resin printed figures will be much more accurate. I also needed to make the deck gun because the deck gun crew from Trumpeter are quite poor and their pose is not quite dynamic. I want the gun to be in action, so figures needed to be converted, and I did the deck gun to ensure I could get the crew position right. The gun is made with the Trumpeter and RCsubs parts (PE and brass tube). No real need to get the eduard deck gun in 1/48 The crew was then created from different origin, tankers from tamiya, airfield mechanics from ICM, the spare box and of course Trumpeter's figures. Some were heavily modified with arms and heads. I doubt these guys always wore the maewest in all circumstance. I'm still debating adding them or not. It looks like there's a guy painting the conning tower in the background, but no - he's actually catching a shell sliding from the conning tower and will pass it to the loader. The deck will also be littered with spent casings. It was not uncommon to fire 100 shells in one engagement. I added the railing to the conning tower and detailled it with many PE parts from RCSubs which are really getting it to life. The crew was painted and I am so glad I found one guy climbing a ladder. I will print another such guy for the zentraleroom as well. The captain is a great resin figure as well Here's the whole scene, albeit not finel. The inside of the conning tower has been further detailled with the UZO and the periscope. Some more fragile details are still missing and will be added later on. Next step from here is work on the dreaded transparent plastic, I'll start with the single piece stern to warm up, teher's so much to do there... Thanks for looking

Hello gents, Would you guys recommend a transparent resin for SLA printing? I need to make a few light bulbs and in the long term I want to fix canopies as well Any advice welcome Thanks

Perfect. I have the LAU-7 separate in my order. Looking forward to the maverick. I hope to be able to add it to my order before shipping. Many thanks

order is in as well Question about the pylon set for the 1/18 harrier. - I assume the LAU-7 are NOT included in the pylon set correct? Any maverick planned? That one would be great in that scale.

Many thanks for the rebate offer aand congrats. My order for 1/18 harrier goodies is in.

Late to the party as well but I waited to get into the Xmas spirit. I'd like to be in as a recipient and a donor my donations is a book: An illustrated History of De Havilland Mosquito - Stuart Howe

Thanks guys Agreed Thierry. The corsair ones are terrible, the intruder are not so bad. they just need better angle when attached to their pylons. but shape wise they seemed pretty good to me I still have skyhawk ones as well, in a very bright blue plastic if I remember well

Hello gents, What are the most accurate Douglas fuel tank around? Lots of aircraft are using these such as the Intruder, skyhawk, harrier, Skyraider and Vikings with different tails I gather but I wonder if I had to get the best one from kits in 1/32 where would I find the most accurate ones? I remember the intruder were not that bad but I could use some expert advice? Many thanks

don't tempt me. I already measured if I had the room to make a full 1/48 deck Unfortunately I don't, so I'm back to my original project of siding different section of the same carrier deck in 1/48 one beside the other ...

Nope, it's not just you I think the same Just saw the USS YORKTOWN in 1/200. I was almost tempted My Enterprise was built once, destroyed once and since 20 years wait the moment to be rebuilt But I almost cashed on that huge WWII flattop

Yes it does Timmy. Many thanks You just confirmed the logic above. And thank you very much for making these files available to us. I'll have a bit of fun and I hope to find a way to make the front gear as I'd like my model to be gear down

Hello gents, I need a bit of guidance if I may Years ago I followed Timmy's converting a hawk to a T-45 with envy: Timmy was gracious enough to provide all the stl and drawings to help others do the same conversion - Thank you Timmy This was out of my reach at that time but now that I own a 3D printer and have a bit of experience with it, i am thinking of trying the same stunt. So I downloaded his files and send them straight to the slicer (chitubox) But these are very tiny and are certainly not scaled to 1/32 when they land in chitubox (the ventral pylon is barely 2.2mm long Look how small the pylon is when imported straight in chitubox (2.2mm long) . The bigger one is scaled to 2540% and is thus 55mm long as per below reasonning I tried to import the mesh in fusion 360 and then I realised that there I need to set a reference (mm or inches) which made me realise that the stl was probably designed in inches and therefore quite smaller in scale when fusion (or the slicer) imports it in mm. I suppose it takes the value without unit. so if a stl was 1 inch long, and the software set to mm, that 1inch becomes 1 mm, reducing the part in scale by quite a bit. With that in mind, 1 inch is 25.4mm so I should increase the stl by a factor of 25.4 That means that when I import Timmy's stl into chitubox I scale it 2540 % and I get the right 1/32 scale. Or I can import each stl into fusion , set the import to inch and reproduce a STL -( because I didn't find the option to do that straight into chitubox - Maybe I missed it?) When I do that I get that centerline pylon to a length of 55mm which seems quite OK for 1/32 and if I import that modified stl file into chitubox alongside the one above scaled 2540% they are of the same scale, confirming the ratio. BUT When I look at my chitubox plate, the parts looks too big, so now I doubt my logic is correct. What do you guys think, how do you overcome this unit aspect in the downloaded STLs depending on the unit the author used? Thanks for any input

hehe, I did the same already Pretty useful tool for difficult painting of the bomb stripes Thanks Jari.

great, the project is a da-nang based VMFA(aw)-235 Crusader in the 1967-68 timeframe I am hesitating to load 2 MBR with 4 Mk-81 each or asymetric load with 1 MBR and 4 Mk-81s and a WW2 1000 pounder (or 2000?) on the other side and the 8 zunis on the fuselage rails of course

I analysed the Magic factory A-4M kit where Mk-83 snakeyes as well as HD marks 82 can be found. These are 1/48. Mk-81 Diameter: 4.81mm Bomb body Length: 24.08mm Tail unit Length: 14.04mm fuse length: 2.31mm Total length: 40.43mm As I said above Eduard states that Mk81s are 188cm in 1/1 thus 39.1 mm in 1/48 and 58.75mm in 1/32 They don't mention anything about diameter though. Mk-82 Diameter: 5.32mm Bomb body Length: 30.92mm Tail unit Length: 13.33mm (not a snakeye tail but the HD tail, hence the difference) fuse length: 2.31mm Total length: 46.56mm What matters to me is the bomb body measurements 24.08 to 30.92 is exactly the ratio I need to convert the 1/48 resin Mk82 bomb body to 1/32 78% So in 1/32 a Mk81 would be Diameter: 7.215mm Bomb body Length: 36.12mm Tail unit Length: 21.06mm fuse length: 3.465mm Total length: 60.645mm With the above research I was able to work on a 1/48 cult 3D model (credit to BlueY) to create for my personal use STLS for Mk-81 Snakeyes - The fuse was easy and required a simple upscale of 150 % to 1/32 - The bomb body was the most challenging. It was adapted according to above ratio, the lugs were then moved to remain at the right spacing and the fuse hole was enlarged to accommodate the fuse. Length and diameter were slightly adapted from the ration enlargement to match the research data - The tail was simply adapted as per the ratio to ensure that it would fit the converted bomb body Here are the results: Top: the Snakeye in 1/48 upscaled to 1/32 (150%) Bottom: my rendition of the 1/32 Mk81, modified from the above And when placed on the MBR I found in the Hasegawa Skyhawk kit Which doesn't sound too bad considering the real picture: https://www.flickr.com/photos/usmcarchives/22797921173/in/photostream/ Now were these guys really using asymetrical loads with one side 4 Mk81 on a MBR and on the other side a big WW2 1000 Lbs bomb?

Those are the ones I used to make my own Mk-81s I also printed some Mk-82 snakeyes after scaling this model to 1/32 They are great and I can recommend them. But the deployed tail are a pain to print. Lots of supports needed and thus a lot of cleaning. Don't plan to make 24 of them I test printed these with two different angle and I still get too manu supports In the next pictures, the support points are not cleaned The below one is not the original 1/48 but a scaled down Mk81 I am working on (sorry for the crappy pictures) All credits to BlueY on Cults3D for the original design.

yeah I laughed about that one quite a bit already thank you

Work continued on the conning tower this weekend PE details were added as well as all handrails. The flotation device is usually missing from active boat (too visible or used and never replaced?) the PE kit supplies the attaching points. I also received the Wind collar I ordered by RCSubs. I considered doing the part myself but it's not a simple shaped form and even the one commercially available doesn't fit perfectly so I doubt I could have done better. That said it really gives the sub a meaner look. The aftermarket also comes with decals for a late war U-552. The red devils decals are more detailed but seems a bit smaller than the kit ones and the 7th flotilla emblem is also supplied (white snorting bull) Although the size might not be perfect, I prefer the more detailed red devil I also assembled the AA gun. the barrel has bene replaced with brass. I'll display the gun elevated so I increased the height of the mast First coat of final colour. I used XF-19 after a quick coat of scratching effect liquid. The light grey might seem to light but I expect the weathering to darken it hence why I chose this colour. Then obviously scratched the paint a bit the have the dark grey layer showing. I tried not to overdo it but basically you can do whatever you like as these took a real beating in the harsh conditions of the North Atlantic. The gun painting is in progress, that should be its final pose, not being used. Note the foot of the gun when it's secured horizontally for dives in its logement in the deck. Front view without and with decals, the previous work with the shell pass through and the insulation thingy was well worth it I need to make some paint touch ups and add some more putty here and there. Inside I detailed a bit further with some artistic licence. It will be packed with the deck crew watch and the captain. Final picture for today. I decided to leave the wintergarden railing out for now. I'm pretty sure I'll destroy it during the weathering phase. Note the snorting bull emblem which became the 7th flotilla emblem in 1941 after U-47 led by Gunther Prien was sunk. He was the bull of Scapa flow The 7th flotilla was based at Saint Nazaire, France that conning tower is a model in the model and provides great motivation for the next stages of this project Thanks for looking.

Lots of stuff on cults3D.com Even free ones from great modellers like Fancherello if you're into F-18 and seahawks. Some great Su-25 stuff as well from Umineko (Kobus here on the forum) lots of stuff varying qualities and cost but I found cults 3D quite useful Thinguniverse is another one Congrats on getting a 3Dprinter - Lots of fun ahread, but protect yourself from the nasty stuff

I follow the rule of thumb of 10 times the exposure time So my usualy exposure with the saturn 3ultra and elegoo fast resin in 1.6 I usea bout 15-19 seconds for initial exposure time to ensure the print adheres well? If my model is heavy I increase that by a bit

After weekend update: works continued on the conning tower Before being able to close it, I installed 3 white nano leds for the navigation lights. The leds are all white and will be painted their respective colours with Tamiya transparent green and red. Proper casing will be required inside the conning tower to ensure the light don't shine through. A small sheet of plastic and some putty should prevent that. Painted black, then black again and then grey. On the outside of the conning tower I placed two tubes to better simulate the holes through which the ammo shells are passed from the inside of the conning tower (top one) I don't remember the purpose of the smaller lower one. Some modification of the inside. The navigation periscope tube, adding the sub's control and replacing the voice tubes The PE deck is painted with a mix of XF-24 and XF-64. These resin bits for the attack periscope and hatch and UZO are a blessing. I didn't cut holes in the plastic deck as instructed as there is not much to see through here, I rather painted it black for effect and glued the PE deck on top. Finally ready to close the tower. Everything has to snap in place to ensure a good fit. I placed everything first and then glued after After working the joints, I redid the lost rivets with Quinta single rivets which are perfect for the job. That's where I am now: The conning tower has been painted XF-24 dark grey. I will paint it later light grey using the hairspray technique. Next add the railing and a lot of fun painting and weathering it Thanks for checking in

Will be there as always

Awesome stuff. Great choice of airplane, Great pose and great work Those wire antennas are looking especially great !!

I like the tradition and giving is more important than receiving. BUT It is even more rewarding when the gift actually is valuable to the receiver also. For instance I'm happy to give something out to somebody I don't know, but I would be happier if I know that the somebody is actually interested in what I give. And I feel the raffle ramdomness actually prevents that. Also the high shipping costs are playing against us as well because it's easier to pay hi shipping costs when you know the recipient is interested in what you send but quite less when you have a feeling the gift is going to be reused in next year's raffle. So I feel the raffle would be more complicated but much better if the presents were wanted. I understand the tradition and I feel it should continue but personally I am feeling guilty when receiving a gift from someone who had to pay a lot of money for shipping but I know I will not use it because for instance it's not part of what I usually built (like receiving a german WWII aircraft when I only build modern US navy aircraft for instance) I am grateful for the intention and the gift, but I know i will not build it and will probably give it back to next year's raffle hoping someone interested in that field will receive it. Please don't get this the wrong way. I don't want to sound ungrateful. I want the tradition to continue and get better with time if at all possible So here's food for thoughts/ WHAT IF We all offer something, it goes into a list of what's gifted. This is no different than what happens now AT Christmas, the raffle happens as usual but instead of linking immediately a recipient to a donor at random, the first name out of the hat gets to chose first from the list of available goodies. His name is added in regards of the item and from that point, donor and recipient can get in touch and work out the details. The item in question is of course not available anymore to the next guys. The second name out of the hat gets to chose second and so on until the last name is out of the hat. That's still a Christmas raffle and yes there is a first and a last and yes there are gifts more attractive than others, but isn't that the meaning of lottery or raffle? Of course it is more complicated and yes it requires quick reaction from anyone so maybe further SOP must be in place to ensure that the list doesn't get stuck because someone doesn't answer quick enough and we don't want this to last 6 months (anyone can also pass if they want). It could for instance happen after the holidays to ensure that most of us are more available, but that's part of the details that would need to be worked on. As I said, it's only food for thoughts in the best spirit of trying to make the tradition even more interesting.