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Hello, After having worked for a loooong time on the Revell 1/32 Fw 190 A-8 I needed something else to get my mojo back. The Fw 190 A-8 is almost ready for paint, but when I went over the fuselage rivets again to prepare the surface for painting, the glue joints of the cockpit broke and the cockpit got detached. Fortunately not on all sides so that I can push it up again from the bottom, but that incident vaporized my motivation for a while. So hopefully a fresh start will bring the motivation back. This time it is my favourite WW2 aircraft, the Me 262. I opted for 'White 17' W.Nr. 110958 of III./EJG 2 at Lechfeld for a number of reasons: 1) it is a very well documented bird, 2) there exists a color photo, 3) it had a very interesting camouflage with a nose section that came from a different aircraft (the nose tip appears to be from a 3rd aircraft). The Revell kit has great details out of the box. I wanted to use the kit parts for the cockpit as I don't like Eduard's color printed P/E approach as it is too flat and it depicts a blind flying panel for a very late production variant that had a single-axis auto pilot and required a large repeater compass. Unfortunately, they don't offer resin parts anymore like they did for the Fw 190. The kit part is very good except that instrument layout is that of a early production model and has a cabin pressure gauge that was never installed in serial production aircraft (only in some prototypes or aircraft for testing): Around the end of 1944, there was an effort to simplify the Me 262, the so-called 'Entfeinerung'. It is even mentioned in the cockpit overview of the pilot's manual, but I have also copies of wartime Messerschmitt documents that prove this. Very late production aircraft did not have the two differential pressure and oil pressure indicators anymore, just the fuel gauges and fuel pressure indicators and the two rpm indicator. W.Nr. 110958 was built around January 1945 and still had the differential pressure and oil pressure gauges. There exists immediate postwar footage of the cockpit of W.Nr. 110426 (captured by the Russians) and I own an original immediate postwar photo of the cockpit of W.Nr. 110836 that I use as reference for the required changes: - Remove the cabin pressure gauge (left of the SZKK2 round counter box) - Remove the indicators for the MK 108 underneath the SZKK2, the holes were sometimes left open or covered by a sheet of metall or fabric - Remove the fuel warning indicators (again, the holes were sometimes left open or were covered) - Remove the Junghans watch on the left side of the cabin pressure gauge as they were very rarely installed (in most cases the opening was left open) - The casings of the ASI and rate of climb indicator on the backside are too short and needs to be replaced with longer casings The second thing I wanted to correct was the relatively crude ZSK 244 bomb fusing auxiliary panel that was fitted to almost all the Me 262 As except for the recon versions and the ones (retro)fitted with R4M rockets. The ZSK 244 front plate is quite good, but the panel is flat and doesn't correspond to the original at all. The original had an angle of 15 degrees vs. vertical so that the pilot could better see and operate the instrument. Here are two photos of the original part: I constructed one from scratch using the dimensions of the original and photos as reference. The only part from the kit I used was the front plate of the ZSK 244. I had to carefully sand the kit part to the appropriate thickness. It was a lot of work, but now I am happy with the way the instrument panel looks. Next is painting. Roger

What to do after you realise that some of them are way to shallow to hold a wash but you've already painted, decaled and sealed with a coat of clear. Sharpened pencils? Thoughts? Cheers Bevan

Hi all, I took my sweet time, but finally finished another build. This time the Revell Me262B-1 nightfighter. I wanted to do another wheels up build. Luckily I had some pilots from my ZM He219 lying around waiting to get in the air. So I did a pretty quick build of the cockpit because not much will be seen with the pilots in them and the canopy closed. All in all it was a pretty tight fit. The rest of the build is pretty straightforward although I had some trouble closing up the gundeck. There are some pretty large gaps and steps to be filled and sanded. The same with engine covers. Just another example where the kit is designed to be build with panels open instead of closed. Anyway with that all sorted I had to make a choice for the color scheme. I really liked the one of Red 8, so went with that one. I found an excellent thread from Mark aka 'Madmax' here on LSP: Link. He did some research on this particular ac which helped me a lot. So all in all I'm pleased with the result. It's not my best build (had some trouble with the canopy as is evident in the pictures), but it looks pretty cool in my opinion. I've left off the external fuel tanks, because I don't like how they disrupt the lines of the aircraft. My guess is that the pilot dropped them before getting in action. Or call it artistic freedom. Products used: - Revell Me262B-1 - AIMS decal 32D007 - Master model FuG 218 antenna - Mr. Paint - Pilots - Zoukei Mura He219 - model stand of unknown brand

I think it is time to queue up my next LSP project. I want to get out of the 109/190 groove and try something different (for me anyway) and I've settled on a Luftwaffe jet fighter, the Me 262. My subject will be this aircraft... Lots of cool visual features on this aircraft.... the hard mottle on the tail... the blue and white checkers... the yellow numerals... the bold skull badge... so the painting and markings should be fun to do. Here is a profile by Tom Tullis that shows what the entire plane may have looked like... I'll be using the Trumpeter Me 262 A-1a (Heavy Armament) kit. The following aftermarket add-ons have been purchased for this build: Aires Me 262 Resin Cockpit and Wheel Bay set Barracuda 262 Resin Main Wheels and Nose Wheel HGW Seat Belts Montex Super Masks I'm still in the painting stages of the 1/48 Hien build so I'm not sure when this one starts. But before I start cutting sprue, I'd like to take a look at the kit contents and the aftermarket stuff too. Visualizing the build components helps the gears in my head to start turning, identifying potential trouble spots and highlighting options and possibilities.