Airfix 1/24th Mustang

[miked 0]

Wow Geoff!! I just read through the entire post. Great work. I just purchased this kit from one the members, and I can see that I need a set of those drawings. Where do I purchase the drawings from?

Thanks, Mike.

[JRutman 2,118]

Wow Geoff!! I just read through the entire post. Great work. I just purchased this kit from one the members, and I can see that I need a set of those drawings. Where do I purchase the drawings from?

Thanks, Mike.

You can get those drawings(which come in 1/16 scale) from Charley Neely who lurks on the P-51 SIG. They are well worth the bucks,

JR

[Ironwing 1,716]

Wow Geoff!! I just read through the entire post. Great work. I just purchased this kit from one the members, and I can see that I need a set of those drawings. Where do I purchase the drawings from?

Thanks, Mike.

 

 

Hi Mike,

 

Thanks for the compliment, always appreciated. If you plan on building the Airfix kit, prepare yourself for a god deal of work. While it is generally accurate in outline, it never the less has its problems. JR has some resin stuff that will take some of the angst out of it. The nose, main gear assemblies, prop/spinner and wheel wells are the biggest "fixes". The rest is adding details.

 

The Neely drawings are spot on in terms of overall shape. Here's the link: http://p51sig.ipbfree.com/index.php?showtopic=813

Hope this helps.

 

Best,

 

Geoff

[Ironwing 1,716]

Greetings All,

 

Theres been a bit more progress on the fuselage. I had to put the dog house down for a bit. It was making me nuts. The card air intake grills have been finished off along with the tail fillets. The mold plugs were cleaned up and made ready for pouring. Pics to follow...

 

The carb air intake grill. The perforated brass sheet, shown in the last post worked out pretty well. They were first cut from the sheet, shaped and then tacked in place with gap filling CA. Miliput finished the edges. Looks like the holes need a little cleaning. Having the perforated brass sheet took the headache out of this job

[Ironwing 1,716]

I wasnt crazy about the tail fillets as supplied by Airfix so I thought I would replace them. New vacform copies were made after reworking the shape. The pieces vacformed were made from pieces cut from another fuselage. This way, they just snap over the ones on the existing fuselage. Most of the original fillet is sanded off prior to appliction of the new fillet. This isnt yet fixed permanently in place.

[Ironwing 1,716]

The fillet in place on the fuselage. These were made using an old mattel vac form machine. It takes some time to sand away the back surface that articulates with the fuselage but the outcome is IMHO worth the effort. The tail planes can now be added, blended at the join line, then the fillet can be added after by sliding it over the tail structure. Fifteen thousanths (.015) card stock was used to draw the part leaving a wall thickness on the part of about .006".

[Ironwing 1,716]

This is the fillet for the wing. Im hoping to use the same process for it that was used on the tail fillet. Reworking the fuselage destroyed most of the fillet detail as the filling build up had to go all the way back to almost the back end of the pit.

[Ironwing 1,716]

Started work on the tire and rim assemblies. These are both available from JR.

[Ironwing 1,716]

The big work on the fuselage is complete. The tail is next on the block for rework. This doesnt require alot of reshaping. It's mostly sanding and detailing. Ill post as work goes forward...I should note that the main canopy section

does not stay in the position its in. The back end of the canopy should sit on the top surface of the fuselage. It's sitting up in the air now because of the way the plug is made.

 

Thats it for this trip.Hope everyone is well.

 

Cheers,

 

Geoff

[JRutman 2,118]

I was going to write a longer post filled with admiration but I was drooling so much that it shorted out my keyboard!

JR

[Ironwing 1,716]

I was going to write a longer post filled with admiration but I was drooling so much that it shorted out my keyboard!

JR

 

 

Youre crazy...where the heck is that scoop in the tunnel you mentioned in an earlier post? I cant find it.

[JRutman 2,118]

Youre crazy...where the heck is that scoop in the tunnel you mentioned in an earlier post? I cant find it.

I will have to dig through the ten pounds of pix I downloaded from the SIG but I know I saw it. I copied the pic as it struck me as something I had not seen before. Wonder if it was the usual problem with research in that it was a post war addition? That big 51 is honkin' nice dude.

JR

[JRutman 2,118]

Forgot,if you are not happy with your vac you are welcome to use mine. It is a little bigger than the Mattel. Hehe

J

[Ironwing 1,716]

H JR,

 

Thanks for lookin in. I might take you up on that offer to use your vac form if I cant get mine to work well enough. Of course, my daughter borrowed the shop vac that I need to pull parts. God knows how long it will take to get it back.

Anyway, Im glad you like the Mustang thus far. It was a couple of pounds of work, but I think I have the fuselage all sorted out. I'll give ya a holla lata...

 

 

Best,

 

Geoff

[K'Tesh 0]

I still think that you're working on a real plane... Probably got it hid in the same Hanger that they used when they faked the moon landing

 

Really Though, This is beautiful work!

If I was only half as good as you, I'd be winning awards.

 

Merry Christmas!

K'Tesh