Kahunaminor

Welcome back, Working on the cockpit. Gunsight glass added and canopies masked inside and out. The kit doesn’t have a mirror so I found some PE mirrors and used my Molotow pen for the first time. The wiring harness is now in place: The fuselage is joined and ready for cleanup. I have affixed the front windscreen with its rear view mirror. The windscreen piece was a tad wide at the rear edges so I removed some material from the inside and blended it in. My plan now is to seal the cockpit with tape to keep the dust etcetera out. The engine wiring has been completed and another wash of AK Neutral Grey applied. It will get a Matt finish later on. Test fitting it and the cowling show a fairly good fit and look. The engine will go aside now until final construction. The cowling will also be left unfixed so I can paint the scheme in full remove it and add the exhausts prior to fixing it for good: The cockpit has now been sealed with tape masks and masking liquid. I used the extra canopy pieces to trace the shapes fore and aft and got a fair shaped mask. Then fit and sealed. The resin inner wing sections are both free from their casting blocks. I then fitted the kit MLG components to the wing inners. The wings are dry fit into place: Thanks for looking, Regards,

May I suggest you use “Future” to secure the mesh screens to the acrylic? It dries clear, gives you some working time to adjust the PE without marring the acrylic and has sufficient cohesive force when dry to hold the PE mesh in place. You can either fix the acrylic in place, mask the area during painting and add the painted screens after or you mask the intakes, paint the airframe and can add the screen/acrylic combination after painting if you like. Regards,

“The question is... do I still want to do the all-RLM76 scheme?” 1 vote for yes, please. Regards,

So progress on the cockpit saw the PE levers attached and a couple of extras added from scrap PE with Acrylic paint built up for handles: Then a Dullcote protective coat and when that was dry, some chipping and highlights with water colour pencils. The cockpit was then attached to the port side and held for a while with a clamp to ensure correct position: [/url The engine got fully assembled its PE cabling commenced: Next step is to close the fuselage and then continue with the engine. Regards,

Welcome back, Work on the office this day. Airscale WWII USN instruments and Allied cockpit placards to dress up the office. AK Dark Brown for green vehicles enamel wash for and the Ultracast seat was CA’d into place. Still some more PE handles and levers to go: Regards,

So progress marches slowly forward. In the cockpit, I have assembled and painted the main components. Making room for the Ultracast seat in the cockpit tub meant removing some plastic from the kit seat attachments.This is the original 2009 issue of this kit and does not include any decals or PE for the side consoles so they were drawn by hand with a Uni ink pen: The Ultracast seat was painted up and detailed with acrylics: The IP had its PE attached: The engine has been assembled and painted and awaits final assembly: The port resin wing inner has been cut from its casting block and test fitted. I also test fit the MLG components into their positions. A bit rough at the moment but I am encouraged by the fit so far: The tail wheel had a hole cut out to better reflect reality and the tail wheel assembly trimmed so it could be fit after joining the fuselage: Finally, the fuselage to cowling was sanded to allow a better fit as it kept popping the seams on the cowling assembly. The cowling also had a styrene rod attached to strengthen the seam: The whole lot has been gloss coated in preparation for the decals, Airscale sets for the cockpit to busy it up then some washes: Regards,

Looking great Dale, Paint job is just well executed and weathered nicely. I like the prop work too. Regards,

In an attempt to break the deadlock on my bench I have started what in theory is a straight forward build, with a little twist. Eduard’s Hellcats are lauded as relatively simple to build with a good result. I intended to build with minimal AM, Ultracast prop and seat, to just have something on the go as everything else on the bench just doesn’t interest me and I wanted to do something quick and not Axis themed to redress the disparity ratios in the display cabinet: I started in the cockpit area and assembled and dry fit the main components. The kit seat back and base was reduced so the Ultracast seat fits a little better: I then turned my attention to the engine and the front and rear cylinder banks were joined. The Ultracast prop has an integral shaft, so the front of the kit shaft was removed. It will be drilled out at a later date. This allowed the magnetos to sit properly in the crankcase. Small holes were made in the cylinders to accept the PE wiring harness at a later date: So there it stood, almost but not quite. It was looking too simple so I added the wing fold kit from Wolfpack just to add some spice. A beautiful set that replaces the entire wings sections with resin: Keep tuned and thanks for looking!

Forget about the antenna mast entirely. Look for a part, any other part and concentrate on finding that part alone. The antenna mast will feel neglected and magically appear! Great work so far.

Similar to the RB Productions item, in fact almost identical. I have mine attached to an old hobby knife handle, secured by screwing the blunt end into the blade holder openings.Cleaning? Yes just a lit match under the excess. Great work seems hardly adequate to describe your work John. Bravo!

Very nice work! Please continue. Regards,

Not sure if this is old news. I just watched Tamiya blog video from 2020 Nuremberg show on FB. Lots of R/C stuff and other not LSP stuff but there is a 1/32 F-51D “Korean War” release. Regards

Very, very nice. Thanks for sharing.

Lovely work and well documented John. Regards,

Stunning work as always John. May I suggest Quickboost’s 1/32 Revi 16B? From memory they come in a pack of three and should be available fairly easily. Scalemates description here: https://www.scalemates.com/kits/quickboost-qb-32-006-gunsights-revi-16b-3x--211725 If you cannot find a set readily, drop me a line and I will mail you a set. Regards. Kent

Mate, Frontline in NSW is also fairly well stocked IIRC. Regards PS What are you after? I may have it in stock at Kentco.......

Thanks, Hopefully back on the bench in 2020!

Sorry gents, This has gone onto the back burner and won’t make the cut off. I thank you for your support and ask that it is moved to the general WIP area. Regards,

You are a machine Sophie! Great work in cracking time, well worth the visit! Regards, Kent

Nicely done. Regards,

Well done that man and thank you for honouring them. Regards,

Sophie, ZM also do a book of concept notes which is quite good. Regards,

A great result Sophie, You have a build list of excellent kits in line. It will be a pleasure to watch these come to fruition. Regards,

Having been fortunate enough to see one in the flesh, currently a WIP by a very good modeller, I can attest finesse of the engineering and design. There is ample detail OOB for even this resin tragic to consider building it that way! Leave the AM guys to add gun bays and engines, Tamiya did a cracking job with this one. Regards

Many thanks, I got a bit vigorous in cleaning up the join between the fuselage and the upper gun opening. It is a very thin join and prone to breaking. I reinforced it with some 0.5mm rod and sheet: These will be sanded flush when the rest of the interior is done. I formed some 0.5mm X 1mm styrene sheet around the 6mm ish rod and then inserted into the irregular hole of the forward fuel filler opening. I think I may have cracked this at last! Regards,