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A Tale of two Cobras: FINISHED


Dukie99

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5 hours ago, Hawkwrench said:

What the heck is bondic???

 

Tim,

It's a UV activated gel that normally is used for a glue, but for modeling purposes, it works amazingly well to represent IP dial glass, landing lights, formation lights and other clear parts.

 

It stays a clear fluid until you hit with the supplied UV light for 5 or 10 seconds, then turns solid. I'd also recommend hitting it with a bit of clear afterword.

 

https://notaglue.com

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I finally painted the MFDs with transparent blue, I think it looks OK. I have now masked and glued the canopy of the Viper. The fit of the fixed parts is absolutely stupendous. The central portion was glued with  2 minutes epoxy for stength and the side walls with bondic. I glued the doors which you can pose open in the closed position and the fit is great with minimal sanding.

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I also glued the vac form canopy on the Whiskey with epoxy and bondic. The fit is a lot more approximative than for the Viper but that was to be expected. The clarity of the vac is great and I am pretty happy with the result. Now I need to mask it.

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Cheers,

 

David

 

 

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Looks sharp, David! I was hoping the Zulu cockpit was a bit more spectacular, but it seems there aren't many structures, hoses etc on the real thing to add to the model... I have started preparing a few parts of mine already. I am following your build closely! 

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On 4/6/2019 at 9:06 PM, Dukie99 said:

My understanding is that the large plate is armor plate and the horn shaped contraption is actually the weapon control joypad in stowage position. IRL it looks remarkably similar to a PlayStation controller, just deadlier...

 

David, does that mean that the pilot sits in front and the gunner in the back? The Playstation pad will be used by the gunner I assume?

 

Edit: Oh, never mind, on SVSM I see that both cockpits feature the controller... :BANGHEAD2: Don't know why I missed that on your model...!

Edited by One-Oh-Four
My Dumbass observing skills...
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Time for an update on the Zulu. After giving a coat of primer, it was time to add the photoetch. I am not a big fan of phototech because I am usually bad at it, but here the pe is a pleasure to work with, it is very thin and conforms well and all the places where the pe goes is recessed so you get a very nice flush finish without much effort. I like it a lot. See for yourself.

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Cheers,

 

David

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17 minutes ago, 1to1scale said:

The first round of these sold out in a the US, I’m waiting for the next ones to hit the US.

 

 

lol - yeah, found that out awhile back when I looked for one at SB. Must not be just them!

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A bit more progress: finished the main painting of the two Cobras. Sprayed future and the Whiskey and decaled it with decals from Caracal. I thought that this red on grey scheme was looking good. I need to paint the tail of the Zulu Nato black and then future and decals. The Zulu has been a joy to build, great engineering and details. Some pics:

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More progress soon.

 

Cheers,

 

David

 

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On 4/20/2019 at 12:48 AM, BloorwestSiR said:

Really great progress there David. Nice to see the differences between the two. Not just in the kits but the airframes themselves.

 

Carl

Carl, thank you for leaving a post. It is indeed nice to see the differences between the two airframes. What I found interesting is that the two crew positions are completely interchangeable: you can fly from the front seat and use the weapon systems from the back or fly from the back and fight from the front, something that could not be done in the Whiskey. If the pilot spots a target from the back it will show on the displays of its co-pilot seamlessly, where in the Whiskey, the pilot would have to give his copilot visual directions for him to spot, acquire and engage. I am sure the crew love these features.

 

OK, time for an update. If you have followed this build from the start, you will recall I was not super happy with the 20mm gatling gun provided in the kit

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The gatling gun in the Whiskey kit was completely useless, so I had replaced it with the Masters offering and I was very happy with the result. So I bought another one to replace the Zulu gun. I thought that it would be useful to show how the Masters gun build and how you adapt it to the kit parts, fortunately that was very easy, so here we go:

Masters parts and instructions

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You start by using kit part C18 (the part looks a bit messy because I salvaged it after building the gun from the kit parts)

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Then you glue with CA the brass base of the gun on the kit part. The brass is almost a perfect fit to the kit part, you just need to slightly scrape the inner lip of the part and it will fit snugly.

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In the brass base there are three holes to accept the barrels. I used a drill bit to drill the three holes in the kit parts

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and then glued the three barrels with CA

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Then you glue the middle brace:

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and you finish the gun with the muzzle brace (using thin CA):

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Then I glued kit part C18 to part C35, primed the gun with Aclad gloss black and then Alclad steel

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Then I glued the base together. I painted it before assembly Yellow primer. Not sure this is accurate however.

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The manual calls you to glue part C38 (the part of the gun shield that moves with the gun). Before doing that you need to add the corresponding shark mouth decal (if you are building one of the three shark mouth versions in the kit). If you glue the shield without the decal, good luck putting the decal afterwards.

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gun shield glued to the gun assembly. The hole is just big enough to accomodate the Masters barrels, just go slowly:

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Then I glued the two sides of the turret around the gun. The fit is perfect and the gun moves up and down.

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You need to paint the turret gloss white before assembling it because the shark mouth decals only has white printed on the top part of the decal. I think they left the white out on the bottom part to allow for the curvature of the turret (there is no transparent film between the bottow teeth). I have not applied that decal yet.

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This leaves a seam on the turret but the front seam will not be seen once the turret is in its housing and the back seam can be eliminated without fouling the front of the turret (at least that is the plan).

I think the Masters barrels are a nice addition to the kit and they fit very easily to the kit parts.

More progress soon.

 

Cheers,

 

David

 

 

 

 

Edited by Dukie99
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