1/32 Hasegawa Bf 109G-14 Hartmann Double Chevron

[ade rowlands]

21 hours ago, Thunnus said:

I agree with Antonio.  I think the white was applied in blotches with the original 74/75 camo showing through.  That's how I was going to approach it.

I see it the same way, I was going to go standard Camo, mask off the lines with blu tack or some of that masking putty stuff. Then go over the rest of the fuselage and top of the wings with a thin coat of white. I have some of the Mig Ammo washable paint which I might use so I can easily modify the top white scheme by simply brushing it away with a moist brush. Only thing I wasn’t sure of then was were the Chevrons and national markings again painted over the white or was the white painted around the existing ones leaving a thin border of the original camo showing. 

Edited April 19, 2020 by ade rowlands

[scvrobeson]

Continue to show that you're the 109 master John!  Can't wait to see this one come together too.  Looks like you've got all the aftermarket that could be needed for 6 builds.

 

 

 

 

Matt 

[wpierson]

That's going to be an amazing model with that cammo pattern!

 

[wpierson]

I've a couple of  suggestions for what it's worth. 1. Try using rubber cement for temp gluing the cockpit sidewalls to the floor then seeing if the tub fits correctly if placed into the fuselage from the bottom. If it does, Great! Take it apart and glue permanently with glue of choice. If not, then you know to glue sidewalls separately. 2. The Germans for what I've read used a temporary white paint for winter cammo that was sprayed rather haphazardly with national marking, etc. masked off or sprayed close to the edge (a bit of overspray was often seen). In the Spring, that coating was scrubbed off to reveal the factory cammo.

[Thunnus]

On 4/19/2020 at 12:54 AM, dodgem37 said:

'keeping everything together and dry-fitting both sidewalls at the same time'

I use masking fluid as a helping hand.

 

Sincerely,

Mark

 

Thanks for the comments everyone!  Excellent suggestion Mark!  I'll try that next time as I do have some of that blue Micromask stuff on hand.  For this stage, I used Blu-Tack but I noticed that it did not stick very well to the shiny side of the cast resin.

 

 

On 4/19/2020 at 6:39 AM, ade rowlands said:

I see it the same way, I was going to go standard Camo, mask off the lines with blu tack or some of that masking putty stuff. Then go over the rest of the fuselage and top of the wings with a thin coat of white. I have some of the Mig Ammo washable paint which I might use so I can easily modify the top white scheme by simply brushing it away with a moist brush. Only thing I wasn’t sure of then was were the Chevrons and national markings again painted over the white or was the white painted around the existing ones leaving a thin border of the original camo showing. 

 

Great game plan!  I'll be doing something similar but probably without the use of masks.  I'll probably play around with a paint mule to see what kind of wear effects I can utilize.

 

 

23 hours ago, wpierson said:

I've a couple of  suggestions for what it's worth. 1. Try using rubber cement for temp gluing the cockpit sidewalls to the floor then seeing if the tub fits correctly if placed into the fuselage from the bottom. If it does, Great! Take it apart and glue permanently with glue of choice. If not, then you know to glue sidewalls separately. 2. The Germans for what I've read used a temporary white paint for winter cammo that was sprayed rather haphazardly with national marking, etc. masked off or sprayed close to the edge (a bit of overspray was often seen). In the Spring, that coating was scrubbed off to reveal the factory cammo.

 

Another great tip for temporary attachment of resin parts!  Thank you!  Makes sense that the Germans would use temp white paint that would allow them to revert to normal camo colors once winter was over.

 

Further futzing with the MDC resin cockpit.  I just noticed something during dry-fitting.  A notch in the kit fuselage that seems to correspond exactly with a tab on the resin cockpit.  It's not mentioned in the instructions but could it be a designed locating aid?  One way to find out.

 

A couple of snips and cuts and it appears that this is something that MDC planned although not specifically documented.  It's hard to keep the resin tub in place without glue but it seems to butt up nicely once that notch was cut away.

 

With the luxury of some extra sidewalls, I've cut away a rib on the bottom edge of the sidewalls to see if it would improve fit.  This would press the sidewalls closer to the fuselage walls and make the opening from the bottom wider, hopefully making it easier to fit the cockpit tub into position from the bottom.

 

I temporarily secured the sidewalls using bits of Blu-Tack and then pushed the cockpit tub into place from the bottom opening.  Success... at least partially.  Not the cleanest fit but I was able to squeeze both sidewalls with the cockpit tub AND was able to tape the two fuselage sides together.  Some more trimming is required but I think I'm getting there.

 

The delicate resin experienced the first breakage... the small pin to hold the trim wheels on the port side of the seat broke away.  I recovered the tiny piece and may attempt to reattach it at a later stage.

 

Some clean up work on the fuselage was performed.  Don't need those little bumps on port side (they hold the umbrella on 109's based in the desert) and too many fuel fillers on the starboard side.

The bumps are cut away and the fuel ports filled with Black CA glue.

[Troy Molitor]

Looking good John.  

[MikeMaben]

Hi John, just an FYI , of those 2 ports you filled, the upper one was for MW50 which most G-10/14s had.

[dodgem37]

'Hi John, just an FYI , of those 2 ports you filled, the upper one was for MW50 which most G-10/14s had.'

You're not alone.  I did the same thing with mine before correcting it.

 

Sincerely,

Mark

[rigor]

Looking forward to this one John 

[Guest Vincent]

On 4/18/2020 at 7:07 PM, Thunnus said:

Just starting to fiddle around with the MDC cockpit.  The resin here looks excellent.  There is just no way that a photoetch set can match the physical oomph of quality resin.  

 

 

Hi. Don't use this sidewall with the map case, it is only for the G2/G4 version, use the other one

 

Also i would use the other style of foot rest plate on a G14

 

I created this cockpit for MDC (as well as all 109 related parts for MDC). If you have a question, don't hesitate ! Seems that someone redid the instructions after the ones i did and missed some things like the removal of the sidewall casting spars (which you did) and the cutting of the rear shelf notch (which you also did)

Edited April 21, 2020 by Vincent

[Antonio Argudo]

coming along nicely John, 

 

 

Edited April 21, 2020 by Antonio Argudo

[Thunnus]

21 hours ago, Troy Molitor said:

Looking good John.  

 

Thanks alot Troy!  I appreciate it!

 

 

15 hours ago, MikeMaben said:

Hi John, just an FYI , of those 2 ports you filled, the upper one was for MW50 which most G-10/14s had.

 

12 hours ago, dodgem37 said:

'Hi John, just an FYI , of those 2 ports you filled, the upper one was for MW50 which most G-10/14s had.'

You're not alone.  I did the same thing with mine before correcting it.

 

Sincerely,

Mark

 

Ha ha!  Thanks guys!  I should've checked my references before trusting the kit instruction sheet.  I'll have a new port scribed shortly.

 

 

6 hours ago, rigor said:

Looking forward to this one John 

 

Thanks!  I'm looking forward to it to.  The camo is something that I need to get my head around.  Still working out some ideas in my head and on the mule as you'll see.

 

 

6 hours ago, Vincent said:

 

 

Hi. Don't use this sidewall with the map case, it is only for the G2/G4 version, use the other one

 

Also i would use the other style of foot rest plate on a G14

 

I created this cockpit for MDC (as well as all 109 related parts for MDC). If you have a question, don't hesitate ! Seems that someone redid the instructions after the ones i did and missed some things like the removal of the sidewall casting spars (which you did) and the cutting of the rear shelf notch (which you also did)

 

Thank you so much Vincent!  Even without written instructions, most well-designed resin sets can be figured out eventually.  So I'm glad I discovered the removal of the sidewall spars and rear shelf notch.  So... there are differences in some of the parts and they are not identical to one another.  That's helpful and I'll make sure I use the starboard sidewall without the map case.  As always Vincent, I always appreciate your input and expertise on all things 109!

 

 

3 hours ago, Antonio Argudo said:

coming along nicely John, 

 

 

 

Thanks Antonio! Looking forward to seeing more updates on your build!

[Thunnus]

Scrounging in my pile of aftermarket parts (including the "used" stuff, which is separate from my "new" pile), I found a few things that will be useful in this build.  One is a set of MDC ejection chutes.  As I recall, Damian of SOW was kind enough to send me these for my K-4 build and I had forgotten that he had sent me an extra pair.  So that's a nice time-saver as is an Eduard canopy mask set for the Hasegawa G-14 kit that also turned up.

 

Another thing I found was a set of Master brass gun barrels and pitot tube.

 

It looks like the gun barrels can be slid in from the outside and seated in a very positive and secure way so that I can leave them off until the very end.  Another time-saver that will eliminate the need for any masking or re-painting.

 

The small intake scoops on the nose should be in line with one another, not offset.  That means the forward scoop needs to be moved up a bit and the circular port moved up too.

 

I have a bunch of these Barracuda scoops from past builds at my disposal.  Not the exact same size but close enough for me.

 

I'll probably leave the little scoops off until after I rivet the fuselage.  The new placement of the circular port is based on a drawing from the 109 Lair website.

 

I just noticed that there is some variation in where this port may be located.  There are two G-14 drawings at the 109 Lair.  I prefer the higher position of the "Late" version to avoid the re-scribing over the old port but I'm not sure it if it is appropriate for Hartmann's machine.  The G-14 "No. 43" has the circular port on the nose closer to the scoop.  It also has both fuel ports on the starboard fuselage spine that I've just removed in addition to the small bulge in front of the starboard beule.  Unless there is documentation that says otherwise, I'll be going with the G-14 "Late" and will have to re-scribe one of those starboard fuel ports.

 

Bf109G-14 "No. 43"

 

Bf109G-14 "Late"

 

Finally, I did an initial foray into the white wash winter colors sprayed over a standard 74/75. The right side was treated with hairspray and the left was scrubbed with Micromesh after painting was completed.

 

Disregarding the shape of the mottles (I admittedly have a hard time establishing "good looking" random mottles and will need to map those out prior to actual painting), I'm looking at the wear patterns caused by both the hairspray method and by physically removing paint using Micromesh.  I have to be very careful with the Micromesh as any surface deviation on the model will show up right away.  On the left side of the wing you can see the indentation of Luftwaffe wave symbols that was sprayed underneath the camo on my test piece.  I'm going to do more testing in the ample time I have prior to the painting stage of this project but you can get an idea of where this might be going.

 

[ChuckT]

Interesting comparison. Looking forward to more from you,

Chuck.

[Kahunaminor]

Great work John,

Nice finds on the AM front, Master barrels are great and the ejection chutes are a pleasant surprise!

 

Regards,

 

Kent