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

[Out2gtcha]

Holy cow man.............nuthin left to say but model on! 

[Troy Molitor]

So awesome seeing this unfold before our own eyes.   One of my favorite aircraft coming together one bolt at a time.   Thanks for sharing your talents with us Peter.  

 

Troy 

[DonH]

2 hours ago, Troy Molitor said:

So awesome seeing this unfold before our own eyes.   One of my favorite aircraft coming together one bolt at a time.   Thanks for sharing your talents with us Peter.  

 

Troy 

 

Yep, I agree. And he even makes the bolts!!

[dodgem37]

Nice stuff, Peter.  Love the edges.

 

Sincerely,

Mark

[airscale]

11 hours ago, Troy Molitor said:

So awesome seeing this unfold before our own eyes.   One of my favorite aircraft coming together one bolt at a time.   Thanks for sharing your talents with us Peter.  

 

Troy 

 

 

Thanks folks & thanks Troy - that is exactly how I like to see it - one bolt at a time

 

I have made what is listed as the 'Right Switch Box' - it's this bit here..

 

 

..one of the advantages of making your own PE is that you can pre-think how to render shapes. In this case, the actual switch box is a simple rectangle with holes & details, but the circuit breaker cover plate is a structure i decomposed and 'folded flat' so I could try and fold it up in PE..

 

 

..with some folds & bends, I have a scale reproduction with all the angles juts right as they are from the drawing of just this part...

 

 

..made a base shape from thick card and assembled the laminate of the switch panel itself. It has a small dial so I added the decal and a sheet of glass to the back structure..

 

 

..then other components were folded or added and the switch handle made from bits..

 

 

 

..all sprayed with semi gloss black..

 

 

..and with the addition of the custom decals the component is complete..

 

 

 

..and this is where it will sit..

 

 

..more boxes & bobbins to come to carry on with the sidewall..

 

TTFN

Peter

[DonH]

That is beautiful. Great job and it is fantastic to see each box, plate and dial grow from scratch.

[dodgem37]

Dude!  That is downright killer!

 

Sincerely,

Mark

[Out2gtcha]

Thanks is for taking the time to document all this Peter......its modeling at it's very best. OUTSTANDING stuff man. 

[LSP_Ray]

Are looking at pics of the full size restoration again???

Amazing, Peter!

 

Damn, I just realized I typed that on the Spit build, too! I should just cut and paste from now on...

[JayW]

My gosh - what a wonderful build!  

[airscale]

thanks chaps

 

little bit more done this weekend, but the little bit was actually quite important (& time consuming) in terms of dictating the success of the cockpit structure..

 

..I need to not only get the side walls right, but becuse I want to build up parts like sidewalls, floors etc seperately, I need to make sure I have sub-assemblies that can slot together when it comes to actually completing the cockpit 'pod'

 

one part of this will be the floor where the fuel tank sits and where the 'A' frame and seat will be mounted - this was a laminate of the detail layer, a full thickness PE strengthener and a thick card sub-floor..

 

 

..one thing that soon became obvious was I got the bulkhead positions wrong (the slots in the floor..) - I took them from where they would be not allowing for the slant of the 'A' frame, but given the 'A' frame is at an angle, it moves where these slots should be

 

I used a template to set the angle of the 'A' frame... the upper plastic card bit has an angle at the front...

 

 

,,and taped up before adding lots of CA and strengthening bits where they can't be seen under the floor..

 

 

..I had to partially destroy the jig to get the sides out last week, but I figured a way to re-use it and spent hours fettling the parts so the floor sat correctly with the A frame in position and the slots for the bulkheads..

 

 

 

..the trickiest part is the bulkhead that goes where the big slots are - this is in bits in the real one and bolted together - I made it one piece so need to thread it onto the floor like cotton into a needle and twist it into postion..

 

..this means I have some tidying up to do around where the floor & bulkheads meet..

 

 

.. this is all now correctly positioned and I can use this when it comes to assembling the second bulkhead permanently to make the floor sub-structure unit..

 

 

 

 

..coming together..

 

 

..next I need to think about the fuel tank that sits here - I meant to design it in 3D but didn't get round to it and now my free trial has run out - I might try balsa and tissue or something as it's quite an organic shape & covered in rough self sealing rubber..

 

until next time..

 

TTFN

Peter

 

 

 

 

[dodgem37]

'. . . spent hours fettling the parts . . . "

I bet you did.

 

Nicely assembled.

 

Sincerely,

Mark

[LSP_Ray]

Well done! That initial structure is always the most important.

[Anthony in NZ]

Oh my.....are you human like the rest of us mere mortals???  Thats out of this world!

 

If ever you make it out to NZ, I have a real aeroplane you can work on!

 

Keep up the inspiring work Peter, I am in awe

[Kurt_W]

Just saw this thread. I haven’t been on the site in a while.

I met Mr. Lopez years ago. He worked with my father at NASM. Nice man.

Pretty incredible job you’re doing here.

Edited September 10, 2018 by Kurt_W