Learstang

Thank you, Michael! I hadn't seen that wreck before. Nice picture! You'll see wrecks like this where the metal parts are preserved, and the wooden and fabric parts are rotted away (Nige, in case you're wondering where the metal outer spars are, they may be in the back with the metal horizontal tailplanes). In the picture you can clearly see the difference between the aluminium parts, which are a sort of whitish-grey colour, and the steel armour, which is rust-red. Regards, Jason

Actually, they are Nige! Thank you! I may very well have these drawings somewhere in the mass of material I have on the Shturmovik, but this saves me the trouble of hunting for them. If you have any other drawings or photos you think might be of interest, please feel free to post them on this thread - even if I have them, someone else who's building this beast may not. It would be nice if this thread were not just a build thread for me, but would be of general value to anyone who's interested in building a single-seater Il-2 (yes, even if they're in the smaller scales!). Regards, Jason

Thank you Nige, I try my best. As far as wing covering, this is a somewhat contentious subject amongst Il-2 cognoscenti. Actually, the outer wings were never completely wooden, as some only had a wooden covering over an all-metal structure, and some had a wooden covering over a mixed-construction outer wing, where the ribs were wooden, but the spars were steel and aluminium. As far as I can tell, the spars were always metal. On the single-seaters, it's easy to tell the difference between the metal-winged and wooden-winged examples as the metal-winged examples had anti-flutter balances near the wingtips, whilst the wooden-winged examples did not. (As an aside, the HB kit correctly has the metal wings, but it doesn't have the balances - you might want to take a look at the review I did on this site to see what the balances looked like). With the two-seaters neither the metal-winged nor the wooden-winged examples had the balances. Also, on the wooden-winged examples there may appear to be panel lines where the spars were attached to the wooden skin, so it's surprisingly hard to tell from some photographs whether you have a wooden-winged or a metal-winged Shturmovik. From the middle of 1944, all the Shturmoviks, by this time the swept-winged version (the arrow) were being produced with all-metal wings and were produced this way until Il-2 production ended in October of 1945. Therefore, late-war arrows probably had metal wings. Where things get really fun is the middle of the war, where you have both metal and wooden-winged examples. It was once thought by some that the straight-winged two-seaters all had wooden wings, but this is clearly not true as I have seen examples both from photographs and from films that clearly had metal wings. To put it more succinctly, if you have a single-seater, look near the wingtips to see if you have the balances, which projected in front of the wings. If you have an arrow, look at the date to make an educated guess about the wing construction (late 1943 to early 1944 - wooden, 1945 - metal, in between - try and guess from photographs if you have them, otherwise just guess). For the straight-winged two-seater, unless you have clear photographic evidence that it is a metal-winged version, the best bet is to go with the wooden-wing, as it appears that the (vast?) majority of them were constructed this way. I know this is confusing, but such is the state of Il-2 research. I hope this helps! Regards, Jason

The first photograph shows what one madman with a knife can do (in this case a No. 11 blade). These 11 pieces are what I did to the 3 pieces that originally comprised the cowling panels (you can see 2 places where the pieces broke during this arduous process and had to be glued back together). The second photograph shows the finished carburettor intake all cleaned up. Remember that originally the kit had the external carburettor intake filter moulded onto the wing, which I removed (the carburettor, not the wing). Regards, Jason

Brilliant work, Fozzy! I do have one question, and if it's been answered already, please accept my apologies - why 1/30th scale? Not that it really matters, of course; what you've done is amazing in any scale. Regards, Learstang

Thank you, Nige! You are correct about the stiffeners being added to some wooden-fuselaged single-seaters, and they extended from the front of the wooden portion to the tail section. There are pictures of crash-landed single-seaters where the rear fuselage became detached, so there was a definite weakness there which the external stiffeners alleviated. It is my understanding that after these field mods were applied, the fuselage was strengthened internally at the factory. I believe the external stiffeners may have been used on both metal and wooden-winged single-seaters - I know from film footage it was definitely used on some of the metal-winged single-seaters. As far as the two-seaters, all wartime two-seaters were produced with wooden rear fuselages. Metal fuselages were added postwar, to extend the life of the airframe, but this was not done during WWII. As far as your other note, I think the problem is that the mould makers have one idea, and the bean-counters have another. The mould makers think it would be a great idea to have the internal detail, but the bean-counters tell management they can't afford the removable panels, so you get something that's halfway. The Tamiya example is the just the mirror image of the Hobby Boss example. At least, that's what I think is happening. To put it another way, it's the engineers saying wouldn't it be great if we did all this stuff and the accountants saying no, we can't afford it or it'll make the product too expensive. It would be fun to sit in on some of these meetings. Below you will find where to fill in the panel lines and rivets on the rear fuselage (the area is marked in tan). Let me know how it goes with Mr. Surfacer - I keep hearing that name but I've never used it myself. On my kit, I sanded the detail off. It's a laborious process, but there's little chance of the lines ever reappearing as might happen with a filler. Regards, Jason

You're welcome, Nige! Just remember if you use me as your source of reference material, the name is Jason, not James! I say this because there is a James on this site (A/K/A Hagar, and he's also doing his build on the Tanks and Things site) who is also doing the HB Shturmovik. No use besmirching his good name if everything I've done on this thread turns out to be wrong! (Not very likely - I may not be that bright, but I am thorough - I don't do anything without a photograph of the real plane to refer to.) Regards, Jason

I've decided to take the plunge and move the firewall back by extending the bearing struts. In the first picture you can see the results of this butchery, and in the second you can see where I'm going to have to trim some of the plastic off to get the firewall to fit flush. In case you're wondering why I cut the small struts where I did is that on the starboard side I had broken it and reglued it at that point so it seemed a logical place to cut and I just repeated the cut for the other side. Next of course will be fitting plastic rod and small rectangles of plastic for the extensions to the bearing struts. It looks like I'm still going to have to cut a hole in the firewall if I want to fit the large tube to the supercharger(?) at the back of the engine. Fun, fun, fun! Regards, Jason

I've now glued the engine to the bearers that were then glued to the firewall. When I placed the assembly in the fuselage I was in for a bit of a surprise. It fit fine, with one slight problem - there is a gap between the firewall and where the cowling panel would attach. I'll need to fill in that gap somehow. I could move the whole assembly back, but that would affect the placement of the exhausts so that's not really an option. I could just extend the bearers and move the firewall back, whilst keeping the engine in the same place. That might also give me room to attach the large pipe I built that fits onto the end of the engine. Or I suppose some strip styrene and some glue could do the trick. Decisions, decisions. The engine itself still has a ways to go - the exhausts need to be finished and attached, there are two coolant tanks I'm scratchbuilding that go on both sides of the engine just below the exhausts, the glycol tank still needs to be fabricated, the insane amount of wiring on top of the engine needs to be added, etc. Regards, Jason

Thank you for the links, richdlc! I just ordered from Model Hobbies - it's nice that they don't seem to have a minimum order like Hannants (30 Pounds Sterling for orders outside of the UK). Regards, Learstang

Here's the picture of the AM-38 engine I was talking about. It's going to be fun putting all that spaghetti on the kit engine. No tomato sauce, however. Regards, Jason

Thank you, Kev! She's bucking and trying to throw me, but I'm hanging on. The cockpit and engine are about 90% done, but it's that remaining 10% that's the killer. I was able to do a screenshot of an AM-38 engine from a wartime IL-2 film. It's unbelievable the amount of wiring there is on top between the cylinder banks. Since I have no idea what most of the wires are, I'm just going to fill up that space with different coloured and sized wires since nobody else is going to have any idea either. As far as the cockpit, I've got the primer pump done, but I still need to do the gun charging levers, the manual gear retraction device, the fuel gauges, etc. And then there's the wiring and tubing in the cockpit. Once I finish these and glue the fuselage together, I'm on to the wings, where I'm going to have to do a fair bit of the interior structure. With any luck, I should have this model done by the end of the decade. Regards, Jason

The correction was very easy - simply move the "banana clip" from one side to the other. All this entailed was cutting it off, gluing it to the opposite side, a little sanding and painting and the problem was gone. Now the guns are the correct mirror image of each other. As an aside, I'm not sure what that device was for since the ShKAS machine gun was belt-fed, not fed from a banana clip like an AK-47. Whatever it is, it won't be getting in the way of the starboard wing construction now. Regards, Jason

Whilst test-fitting the guns to the wings, I noticed a not so slight problem - the banana clip like device on the machine gun fouled the joint on the starboard wing. This is even evident in a picture I took from the Hobby Boss site itself. You'll notice in the photograph of the actual parts that they are identical - they should be mirror images. In the next entry I'll show how I corrected this problem. Stay tuned. Regards, Jason

Probably, but count me greedy as well. Bring on the I-15bis! Boy would that look nice next to my Shturmovik (assuming I ever finish my IL-2). Regards, Learstang

Thank you, Kagemusha! The progress is there, slowly if not so surely. I'm not exactly looking forward to the wings, where I'm going to have to reproduce a fair amount of the wing structure if I want to show off the guns and ammo. I'm still rather amazed myself at the kit being released - I hope it's a success so they'll release the other versions. An arrow (the two-seater with the swept-back wings) in the mid to late war "three-colour" scheme (olivish green, extra dark sea grey, and tan over blue) would look brilliant! So would a mid-war straight-winged two-seater in winter camouflage, with some big patriotic slogan on the sides. Regards, Jason

Here is a photograph of the instrument panel (obviously before I had glued it to the cockpit floor). It consists of a grey plastic back, a decal sheet applied to that, then covered by a painted clear face (I applied a mask to the dial faces). Fairly convincing, I think. Comparing the instruments on the decal sheet to the instruments on the 1943 IL-2 flight film, they appear to be quite accurate. I believe that most IL-2 instrument panels were painted grey, as here, though some may have been painted black or even tan. They should also be slightly weathered, with a few paint chips applied (I applied them after I glued the panel to the cockpit - I should have done the weathering before). A slight wash to accentuate the different panels on the instrument panel would also not be remiss, as they didn't exactly fit flushly together. Regards, Jason

I think it's that way with a lot of modellers, Fozzy. I know it's my favourite part - that's when that disassociated amalgam of plastic you've been working on for months (years?!) really starts to look like the aeroplane it's supposed to represent. Brilliant job! Regards, Learstang

Looks nice! But forget about the Nate, I want the I-15bis in the background! Regards, Learstang

Thank you Harv! Here are some pictures of the cockpit, this time temporarily installed in the fuselage (with the ubiquitous yellow Tamiya tape holding things together). The cockpit's starting to look something like the real article, if I may say so! Although in my model review on this site I mention the VV-1 external gunsight possibly being used, I now think that the internal PBP-1 reflector gunsight was probably used and will need to be added. I'll post pictures of that as I start work on it. (As always, excuse the blurriness of the photos, etc....) Regards, Jason

A rather complicated piece that is conspicuous by its absence from the kit cockpit is the primer/booster pump for the engine, situated on the front starboard portion of the cockpit floor on the real plane. The first picture shows a drawing of the booster pump, from the 1942 IL-2 Flight Manual, with the two small plastic tubes (located on the top of the large red arrow) I will magically transform into this device. The next picture (excuse the blurriness - this is the best I could do) shows the scratchbuilt apparatus glued to the cockpit floor. Unfortunately, I didn't think to take photos of any of the intermediate steps, but know that this was done just using properly sized styrene tubes and rods. There is still a little more tubing to be added, but it's essentially complete. Quite a lot of work went into those two fiddly bits, but I just wouldn't have felt the cockpit were complete without them. Regards, Jason

Here you can see the work I've done on the stratchbuilt upper access panels on the wings, and the supercharger(?) pipe. Unlike the underwing access panels, which were cut from the wings themselves, these access panels were cut from suitably thin sheet styrene so no thinning was needed. I've sanded down the elbow on the pipe a bit, but I'm still not sure I'm going to use it so I may not do anymore work on it. Above the pipe are the armoured shutter plates for the underfuselage radiator, which will be cut in half along the lines drawn on them and fitted to central posts which they rotated about (this will be clearer when I actually install them). Regards, Jason

It's been awhile since I've posted some pictures, but I have been working on the model, primarily on the engine and the cockpit. The first picture below is of the firewall with the part to be cut out crosshatched, with the finished piece (for now) next to it. Next to the finished firewall is the scratchbuilt pipe that will lead to the back of the engine and attach to what I believe is the supercharger. One problem with this is the firewall itself - the way the kit is designed, the pipe will have to fit through a hole drilled into the firewall. I'm not sure that this is the way it was on the actual aeroplane so I may not end up using that pipe after all. More research awaits. The third picture is of the access panels I cut from the undersides of the wings - the larger panel is for the 7.62mm ShKAS machine gun on the starboard wing, whilst the smaller panel with the spent cartridge and link openings is for the 23mm VYa-23 cannon on the port wing. These have been considerably thinned down and I still need to add the reinforcing strips that went on the insides of the panels. Regards, Jason

Looks pretty good to me! Regards, Learstang

Great looking Mosca, Doug! The Ishak has always been one of my favourite planes. I need to get one to put next to my Hobby Boss IL-2 (whenever I finish it). Regards, Learstang