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Sopwith 2.F1 Ships Camel - Nearly Complete


seiran01

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I was waiting to post photos until finished, but am thinking now it may make more sense to put the in-progress pix here for the time being.

So here we go! - Quick build of the Ships Camel, modified to represent SD Culley's mount as it was configured when he took off from a Lighter and successfully shot down a zeppelin.  The aircraft itself is one of the options in the kit, but the kit depicts the plane as it appeared in "standard" configuration of a Vickers gun in the fuselage and Lewis gun on top of the wing. This is correct for the aircraft earlier in its life. For the zeppelin intercept, the aircraft had the Vickers gun removed and a new twin Lewis setup fixed to the top wing. 

 

Engine: Quick and somewhat dirty, using AK metalizer and a quick wash of Tamiya black panel line accent. AK Engine Oil slopped on the firewall.

lC8riCt.jpg

 

Fuselage mods: Fairing things over to match the photo of the plane in this configuration.  Comparing the historical photo and the restored aircraft, it seems the "hole" for the Vickers was not fared over, but the ammo bins have been removed. 

jTRLWAp.jpg

 

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Wood effects are AK Rust Streaks (enamel wash) streaked over Mr Color tan and clear coated in clear and sometimes thinned clear orange. You can see the black fuel tank (oil tank") has been "completed" with sheet plastic here. The top of the tank is included in the kit as an upside down U shape, but with the Vickers gun removed, more is visible inside the fuselage.

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Seat: First time I've been really happy with my paint job on PE seatbelts :)

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Dry-fitting everything:

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Tail surfaces have been painted instead of using kit decals. A mix of Drooling Bulldog and Mr Paint colors. Flexible gun mount details removed from underside of top wing, rib tape from a rejected tester of Aviattic rib tape applied. I ended up doing a double layer of rib tapes as they're barely visible under even a thin coat of paint (hence, rejected sample - product still in development) 

UWV1Fg1.jpg

 

Alright, now it's looking like a plane!

NiCPoGV.jpg

 

PC-12 (Mr Paint) is on

uCa3YPl.jpg

 

First decals on as well. Struts painted in the same manner as the interior wood areas.

5CAuBPs.jpg

 

Double Gun Mount: Copying pictures of the mount from the restored aircraft in the Imperial War Museum, here's the gun setup using an extra Lewis from my DH.9 kit, note that the front mounting rods are still to be fabricated.  Taurus hex nuts used to cap off the rods on the outside of the guns. 

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Cabane strut rigging: First time I've ever used the flat elastic (made by Prym) for rigging, and I'm immediately impressed. much better to work with than EZ Line. 

TTfGqPd.jpg

 

Rigging the evil little Acorn: I experimented a few times with the best way to rig this, and the approach I ended up using was to drill an X in the piece using a #77 drill bit. Thread first elastic line through, and then push the 2nd line through with a #80 drill bit. Still very fiddly, but less difficult than other methods I tried first.

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And now fully rigged with the exception of the control lines to the ailerons, and the one lines connecting upper with lower ailerons:

UksSLQQ.jpg

 

 

At this point, I have not fixed the broken aileron roundel on the lower wing that broke during application:

 

 

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At this point i was thinking that I had about 90min of work remaining - attach final ailerons, rig those, and finish attaching the Lewis guns.  Until Cartograf karma struck.

Final aileron to glue on: the PC12 color didn't perfectly match, and the roundel didn't line up with the wing roundel. A bit of grumbling, but I determined the best fix was to repaint the aileron PC10 with a different roundel decal and make it look as a replacement component on the plane:

 

Ulo5NwB.jpg

 

 

The Cartograf hassle at this point was that the low tack masking vinyl I used (vertically in the aileron channel) decided to come down and stick to a portion of the wing roundel decal. Lifted a large chunk of red and white decal that had been sealed under two clearcoats. I was lucky that my decals did not crumble in the water like another builder also working on the kit, but I did have them start breaking when applying them. These decals would not respond to Microsol and barely responded to Solvaset - very different from Cartograf decals that I'm used to.  I had ended up using a hair dryer to get the decals to snuggle down onto the wings.  Turns out they have barely adhered to the wings at all.

 

After a long string of very colorful language, I realized other roundels on the decal sheet were the same size and cut a patch to cover the removed chunk.  ...Only to find out how translucent the damn white is on the decals!  So here's how it looks right now, Iin a way worse before I patched the decal on the wing.  Need to get a new set of decals and strip this off completely... but even with this annoyance, I've thoroughly enjoyed this build!  

 

sxA7OsU.jpg

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Mike,

 

First, thanks for sharing this, it is very inspiring! I absolutely love the wooden fuselage, and hadn't seen that approach before. I've struggled with the roundels a great deal myself (most recently with Frank Lukes Spad), and can now heartily recommend a circle cutter for cutting masks such as https://www.amazon.com/dp/B004GXBXXU/ref=asc_df_B004GXBXXU5161739/?tag=hyprod-20&creative=394997&creativeASIN=B004GXBXXU&linkCode=df0&hvadid=193987317966&hvpos=1o1&hvnetw=g&hvrand=14365491378533495936&hvpone=&hvptwo=&hvqmt=&hvdev=t&hvdvcmdl=&hvlocint=&hvlocphy=1013509&hvtargid=pla-308335985962

 

A little fiddly sure, but you have complete control over colors, weathering, and positioning, and paint always looks better. Hope this helps!

 

Cheers, Tom

Edited by Uncarina
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