1/18 P51C Mustang "Lopes Hope the 3rd"

[monthebiff]

Sweet!! Bloody hell Peter this really is  coming together beautifully isn't it. Lots of progress recently, wish I could work along at this pace on a kit that's all ready to build.

 

Regards. Andy 

 

[Trak-Tor]

  

 

Juraj

[brahman104]

Brilliant work around the bottom of the windscreen Peter. I might need you to show me how it's done when I get to the B-17

 

Craig

[USMC Herc]

Peter 

I take some time off and this Mustang has her Fuselage covered.

Your covering this beautiful girl so fast. She will be ready to fly by the end of the year.

Keep making our jaws drop and enjoy the bruises as we read your post.

 

Jason

[Out2gtcha]

Magnificent!

[TwoHands]

HAMMER? He's using a hammer!!!!

[MikeMaben]

I used a mallet on a model once  

[dodgem37]

Great! show, Peter.

 

'and the overlaps start to get filed / sanded away..'

Any trimming before hand?

 

Love those fasteners.

 

Thank you.

Sincerely,

Mark

 

 

[williamj]

On 9/17/2019 at 10:39 PM, MikeMaben said:

 

 

Edited September 19, 2019 by williamj

[Kagemusha]

I seriously find it hard to make a comment on your builds, words don't do your work justice, my mouth is ajar in wonderment yet again. Hope you produce another book. 

[Brett M]

I can’t say anything new that hasn’t already been said.....your work is just brilliant. I just went through all 161 pages of Spitfire, now to catch up on this build. Thanks for sharing these incredible builds!

[richdlc]

that's all I can stands, I can't stands no more!

[Biggles87]

On 9/18/2019 at 3:09 AM, TwoHands said:

HAMMER? He's using a hammer!!!!

 

As an old aircraft engineer friend once said to me, “ there’s nothing wrong with brute force as long as you know how much to apply, and where to apply it,” as he tapped home the top strut bolt on a Piper Cub with a hammer.

 

John

 

Edited September 21, 2019 by Biggles87

[airscale]

hi folks

 

On 9/18/2019 at 10:08 AM, dodgem37 said:

Great! show, Peter.

 

'and the overlaps start to get filed / sanded away..'

Any trimming before hand?

 

Thank you.

Sincerely,

Mark

 

 

Thanks Mark - yes, the panels are trimmed to about a couple of mm from the overlap so it's quite easy to get rid of what is needed, in fact the only problem sometimes is that the panel seam practically disappears.. though that can also work in your favour...

 

On 9/18/2019 at 6:02 PM, Kagemusha said:

I seriously find it hard to make a comment on your builds, words don't do your work justice, my mouth is ajar in wonderment yet again. Hope you produce another book. 

 

 

Thanks Kag - another book - hmm, that depends on whether Kev is willing to put himself through it all again - in the case of the Spitfire book, that meant filtering all 10,000 images I had (original high res ones) to find the ones I used in my posts - that, and then all the editing and additional stuff the genius that is our Kev adds.. I suspect it's a 'you only want to do that once' experience

 

having finished the upper cowl panels, it was time to move below, the first one to set down was marked out with 3mm tamiya tape to allow another masking tape template to be made of just the straight rear edge...

 

 

..once that was done the panel was burnished down to the front defining edge and cut out - her it is once it has been fixed down and some of the fasteners added..

 

 

..then the remaining fasteners & rivets and a hatch was added..

 

 

..I was going to do the panel forward of this one which has the distinctive small air intake panels with lots of holes, but found the PE ones I had made are not scaled correctly as they are too big so PPD are running me up another set - as such I did the panel behind it instead and will complete it when the PE arrives..

 

 

..while waiting for the PE I decided to prepare & paint the wings so I can work on all the wing fillet panels - these had already been etch primed months ago so were cleaned up and sprayed with alclad white aluminium...  I was a bit worried about the fragility of the alclad paint, but after a gentle wire wolling to get rid of the dusty finish, it seems to be ok with some tape tests I have done - I have had it in the past where tape just pulls up or damages the finish..

 

 

 

..with that done, the rearmost fillet was planned - it looks like this and is not only a signature shape, but full of compound curves... thankfully it's in two parts - upper & lower and the seam can be seen - it's actually a weld, but I haven't figured out how to represent it..

 

 

..using drawings I made the upper shape and worked this into shape across the fillet to get the three dimensional shape..

 

 

..and eventually both upper & lower were added to the model...

 

 

 

 

...the fillet right at the front on the leading edge looks really difficult so back when I have worked that out

 

TTFN
Peter

 

 

 

[JayW]

Peter - the aft wing/body fillet panel looks fantabulous!  If you are planning to display your flaps in a deployed position, the flap actuator and its attachment to the flap itself is situated just inboard of that fillet panel and visible, and must be modeled right.  Finding the right drawings so as to lay it all out, I seem to recall, is a bit of a chore.  I can help if you wish, as I kept paper copies of practically every drawing I used for Miss Velma.  It is important to make the cutout in the panel and fuselage skin right, so now is the time to check.  And it is important to make the inboard end of the flap accurate (something rarely done in the world of P-51 modeling).   It is not simple, and it was an especially interesting part of the Miss Velma build years ago.  Here was my attempt (it turned out just fine):

 

 

Edited September 22, 2019 by JayW