Cicchino

Chuck, I really look forward to your builds and appreciate how well you both explain and illustrate your work. I’m sure you’re aware of Nigels Modeling Bench on YouTube and his Hellcat build. He cast some resin items to correct some shortcomings in the kit as well. May be worth a look. regards John Cicchino

I‘m not afraid of vacs at all and was working on and off on the kit for a while, using the great build referenced above as inspiration, but I realized the pending release from Infinity was a game changer and the vac was binned. No offense to John and Tigger, I have several others from him, and it was a good enough starting point until I saw the injection molds on here a while back. regards, Cicchino

What a weathering inspiration. What is that wrapped around the bomb?

I worked for a man in the early 80s who was a paratrooper with the 504th PIR in WWII; he was wounded at Salerno and sent home. Sharing an office with him for two years, all he spoke about was he jumped with 92lbs of gear. Never a word about anything else. Ernie Wilensky, died just a few years ago.

Ugh Spell check Margie Maru is his p-51s’ names. And he was an excellent ‘combat’ leader.

For all the schemes that have been done to death, Jack Bradley’s Margie Mary’s have been underserved. Bradley was a 15 victory ace and excellent com at leader: not sure why we haven’t seen more.

Wow, this post ended up with more legs than I thought it ever would! Per the last post, I was thinking of an underlying lozenge layer adding some depth to the finish similar to black basing / marble coats. Working on a black plane now (P-47M) figured a white one would make a nice contrast.

No longer pondering I actually took the unprecedented step and actually opened and read the instructions. Now don’t I feel like Col Jessup - thanks for all the replies and sorry for sending you all on a goose chase.

Sitting pondering the stash and looking at Göring’s D.vii from WNW. Would anyone know if the white was applied over the standard factory lozenge or was it a special scheme painted directly at the factory like Richthofen’s DR.1. all thoughts and opinions most welcome! regards Cicchino

I have the AD-5W complete with decals. No thoughts of selling it, but there are more a few others ahead of in line.

Paraphrasing a north German saying: “so flat you can see who will be visiting you tomorrow”

I have a Tigger vac on the bench now which I believe will now go hold, but a Tigger B-58 just showed up on the stoop this week. Really looking forward to an IM Wyvern!

This likely belongs in Tools and Techniques forum. I found this awesome tool on a model rocket page: PayloadBay.com. click the ‘Transition Tool’ link and you’ll find a fantastic tool for creating masks for stripes on conical surfaces like propeller spinners, bomb stripes, etc. It’s simple to use and I’ve already successfully created masks for P-51 Spinner stripes. I’m sure it could print onto decals as cut guides. This is a game changer. regards and stay safe Cicchino

Is that Big Beautiful Doll below the Me 163?

The Revell P-47 started it all for me. Fell in love with modeling and the Jug from that boxwood on. $2 at Grants department store in Florham Park, NJ. Building a Hasegawa 86th FG Jug at this very moment and after looking at evidence in Steve Luce‘s great book and a color video on Critical Past, I’m convinced that Revell got the blue cowl flaps for the 527th FS correct, and it‘s that blue that sets the box art off!

The differences in length, width and depth between the Trumpeter and Hasegawa cockpit is considerable; I’ve always found the Trumpeter kit to be a little too portly for my tastes. Note that visibility into the Jug‘s cockpit is more limited than that of a P-51D for example - I‘m finding the work I’m doing on my P-47 Cockpit is going to quickly disappear below the canopy sills.

Note that the AIMS sheet markings for ‘Oh Baby’ are less than ideal Based on pics, the ‘Oh Baby’ should have a white or yellow shadow, and the font style looks off The mission markings are over-scale the buzz number is the incorrect size as well. I ended up resizing and making a stencil for the buzz number on silhouette. As noted there are no dots - it takes two layers of punched white decal to cover the blue spinner without the blue bleeding through hope this perspective helps

Following this build with tons of interest! the D is high on my want list, but having seen the nose correction done, I can’t seem to bring myself to buy one until a corrected nose becomes available, along with the corrected wing airfoils. If I spend the money on a kit of this size, I’d really like to do it up right; same goes for a B-17E should the updated nose we’ve see; there become available.

Started looking at my collection and thinking about the best kit (accuracy, ease of build, enjoyment) I have by manufacturer, here’s where I landed - how about you? Tamiya: F4U Hasegawa: Ki-84 Revell: P-51D Trumpeter: TBF/ TBM HKM: B-25 ZM: A-1 Special Hobby: Yak-3 Hobby Boss: Il2-3m Roden: Fokker Dr-1 WNW: Fokker D-VII Airfix: Typhoon PCM: Spitfire XIV regards, John Cicchino

If this makes it into Hobby Lobby, I will have a squadron in no time,

Thanks all for the responses! I was hoping to find a suitable aircraft to use the new Aviattic Swirl cameo on, and the Oeffag seemed to be a good choice, but not sure I want to take on the work Blackbetty did in his incredible build ( I have two other Bavarian Albatrosses already in the queue). I’ll probably look for other alternatives to use the swirls. Thanks again!

Alex, for those of us without access to a 3D printer, any recommendations on how to obtain this correction set? Maybe you other LSPers would be willing to produce a copy for purchase? All help appreciated, John Cicchino

How difficult a conversion would it be to take the Roden Albatros III OAW to an Oeffag version? Or am I better served waiting for WNW to produce one. All help appreciated! Regards Cicchino

Wolf, Your work is immaculate. I have a question regarding the Taurus resin screws. I really like their detail, but I've struggled to place and glue them properly. Any tips on the process you use from removing from the pour block to getting them in the right place on the model and getting them glued down. Certainly appeciate any insight. My optivisor and needlenose tweezer combination isn't quite getting me there. John Cicchino

Jim, No joy on locating the Spit XII on Ebay. Perhaps I'm not looking in correct place? Appreciate any help. thanks