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

[Troy Molitor]

My Gawd man!  Your paint mule is a PCM Fiat G.55!  Ouch.  (Humor).  

Looking good as always J.  

 

T

[Thunnus]

Thanks guys!

 

1 hour ago, Troy Molitor said:

My Gawd man!  Your paint mule is a PCM Fiat G.55!  Ouch.  (Humor).  

Looking good as always J.  

 

T

 

Close but no.  G.55 yes but it is a bottom wing from a 1/48 Flying Machines kit.  The kit came with an alternate bottom wing and two alternate fuselage sides, all of which I use as paint mules.  The rest of the kit was built to completion safely, I assure you...

 

 

[Thunnus]

As pointed out by others, the upper fuel port on the starboard fuselage spine shouldn't have been filled in so I had to restore by re-scribing.

 

The Hasegawa kit doesn't continue the steel strengthening strip along the  wing joint to the upper side so added it now.  Much easier to do now without the wings in the way.

 

Per Vincent's comment, I've replaced the starboard sidewall to the correct one without the map holder.  It had some damage to the top edge of the piece which might be visible through the canopy so I filled it in with Black CA to repair.

[Martinnfb]

Excellent start John, pulling out my comfy chair

[turbo]

9 hours ago, Thunnus said:

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.

 

Nice start on the camo trials John! The left side looks closer to what you're after from the reference photos. Mig AMMO Washable White might also be a controllable option to look at and the hairspray technique can be modulated to give a result closer to the left side by using a satin or matt basecoat, a thinner layer of hairspray, and longer drying times. Looking forward to seeing how it turns out!

[mhorina]

Thunnus,

Back in the day Bruce Radebaugh of Parts-R-Parts made a resin part to correct the alignment  of the oil cooler on the Hasegawa 109 G6 and 14 kits.  You would cut the whole ring on the nose and replace it with his correction part.

   Mike Horina

[Thunnus]

Thanks for the input guys!

 

Doing some more fiddling with the MDC cockpit set, trying to get the three major pieces (two sidewalls and cockpit tub) to fit in the fuselage.  The more I play with it, the more I am leaning towards having the three major pieces glued together and then attaching the whole cockpit assembly into the fuselage from the bottom.  This will reduce the amount of fit/placement variables and make things simpler for me.  To that end, I've removed portions of the yellow fuel line and re-positioned it (using lead wire) so that the rear edge of the sidewall can be pushed closer towards the seat.

 

The top edge of this sidewall was repaired with black CA glue.

 

This is how the three major components are fitting together.  All of the joints are not perfectly square but this should be fine in terms of the view from outside looking in.

 

And this is how the MDC cockpit is fitting into the fuselage.

 

You can see how moving that fuel line created a better fit between the sidewall and the seat.

 

Now I can start thinking about painting the cockpit and which parts I want glued together and which parts I'll keep separate.

Moving on to some other details... the MDC tail wheel comes in three parts with no positive connection between the parts.  

 

I beefed up the connections by drilling holes and using a piece of brass tubing to create a pin connection.  I've also created an axle for the wheel.

 

I've dressed up the drop tank and ETC rack.  Lightening holes in the rack were drilled out and the rack was thinned from the inside.  Connection points were drilled out to accept brass tubing, which will provide a more positive connection between the tank and rack.  The strap and fuel connection lines were re-done in brass.

 

Finally, the ejection chutes openings were hollowed out to accept the MDC ammo chutes.

[dodgem37]

Good show.

 

Sincerely,

Mark

[Wackyracer]

Your drop thanks are just awesome. Must remember these tips when I next do one. 

[turbo]

Drop tank looks awesome John! Did you scratch the strap fastener - it looks great! 

[PeterOlsen]

Nice work on the fuel tank and ETC rack Thunnus.

Cheers,

Pete

 

[Guest Vincent]

Hi

 

Remember that the ventral tank had a very visible hexagonal drain plug on the flat underside. The pointy end is in fact made of linen fabric mixed with varnish and it is kept in place with a steel clip

 

 

The front pressure port was usually not present on the Me109 tanks as the plane was producing the pressurized air from the supercharger

 

Have a look at the tank i did for MDC here : https://www.largescaleplanes.com/reviews/review.php?rid=847

 

These tanks were manufactured in steel or aluminium

Edited April 24, 2020 by Vincent

[Thunnus]

4 hours ago, Vincent said:

Hi

 

Remember that the ventral tank had a very visible hexagonal drain plug on the flat underside. The pointy end is in fact made of linen fabric mixed with varnish and it is kept in place with a steel clip

 

 

The front pressure port was usually not present on the Me109 tanks as the plane was producing the pressurized air from the supercharger

 

Have a look at the tank i did for MDC here : https://www.largescaleplanes.com/reviews/review.php?rid=847

 

These tanks were manufactured in steel or aluminium

 

Thanks Vincent!  As always... very useful information!  I'll try and scratch up that drain plug on the bottom per the MDC tank.

 

I hope everyone is doing ok out there!

 

Work continues on the G-14. I'm looking forward a few steps and know that before I close up the fuselage, I want to apply the rivets.  And since the Hasegawa kit has a separate tail unit, I want to make sure this seam is addressed prior to the rivet work.  This is a slight departure from the kit instructions where they would have you attach the tail as a unit after the fuselage halves are glued together.  In addition to making riveting a whole lot more manageable, doing it out of order will actually strengthen the tail/fuselage bond as I can access all contact surfaces of the join this way.

 

While the glue is still soft, I've attached the fuselage halves together with tape to ensure proper alignment of all of the parts.  I'll separate the halves once the glue is dry.

 

We've already seen how good the Eduard pre-painted instrument panels looks.  I wanted to do a comparison with the MDC resin IP just for kicks so I've taken the time to paint up the resin IP.  After the painting stage, the MDC panel looks a little messy but a lot of that is due to the different sheens of the paint used.  It should smooth out after a shot of flat clear.

 

I've elected to use Airscale decals for the instrument dials because of they had much finer detail than the MDC decals.  Each individual instrument was punched out and inserted into the appropriate bezel.  After all of the instrument dials were completed, I shot the panel with a flat clear and then I took the extra step of punching out discs of clear overhead transparency film (remember that technology?) for the glass bezels.

Here's how they look under the work table lights.

 

For a further comparison, I've taken some pics in the light box.  I took a few different angles since the clear discs in the MDC panel tends to give off glare (which is a cool effect in itself).

 

The Eduard panel is definitely neater since I can't match the printed details with my shaky paint brush.  But the Airscale instrument faces in the MDC panel have more detail than the Eduard instruments.  I'm not very happy with my paint job of the ammo counter on top of the MDC panel but I could possibly tidy that up.  The MDC panel definitely gives off more 3D relief than the relatively flat Eduard panel but I can't say that one is a clear winner over the other.  They both have their positives and negatives.

[ade rowlands]

It really is a shame MDC don’t do these cockpits anymore. The detail is stunning. Really could do with a couple for my Hasegawa G-14 and G-6. 

Edited April 25, 2020 by ade rowlands

[Guest Vincent]

One comment about the Eduard IP : the lower middle panel isn't correct for most builds as it provides you the bomb priming panel (correct for the JaBos versions) but attached is right side you also get the wing rocket controls which were really rarely installed