1/32 Hasegawa N1K2-J Shiden Kai 343-45

[Dpgsbody55]

Looking great.   Even though the spinner hides a lot of your work, it still looks impressive.  Like your riveting, too, but I'll refrain from making the obvious comment on that.

 

 

Cheers,

Michael

[LSP_Kevin]

Impressive work as always, John!

 

Kev

[dodgem37]

Nice effect.

 

Sincerely,

Mark

[dennismcc]

Most impressive

 

Cheers

 

Dennis

[Out2gtcha]

Awesome! Looks really great

[Shiba]

Hi,  Some pics I took from SNASM years ago.

 

Close up of propeller hub, have an antifreeze tube (RED) for each propeller, and some more

 

Regards,

Matsu.

[spyrosjzmichos]

Excellent work! One day I have to man up and try my hand at full riveting!

[Thunnus]

Thanks guys!  I haven't updated in a while because I was busy with other things.  Those pics of the Shiden Kai are very nice Matsu!  I don't if I'll try to replicate those antifreeze tubes on the prop hubs.

 

I FINALLY received the HGW seatbelts from the Czech Republic so at least that is not holding me up anymore.

 

Less components than a typical Luftwaffe harness system so assembly was relatively simple.

 

Even though the fabric material is much more flexible than brass, it's still difficult to drape these things in a realistic manner.  And is it just me but don't all of the seatbelt representations, whether they are fabric or brass, seem a tad OVERscale?  Would the lap belts really fill up the bucket of the seat so completely?

 

Anyways... now that the seat is complete, I can take a few more pics of the cockpit.

 

Overscale or not, the seatbelts add a nice finishing touch to the cockpit.  Now I have to start getting serious about riveting.  I just received another set of Galaxy Tools riveters with the wider spacing.  Same vendor as before but instead of having to wait over 60 days, transit time was only 11 days.

[Alex]

Agree on both points on the HGW belts - overscale but still look great.  On mine I was initially a bit timid with their instruction to wad the individual pieces of fabric up and mash them around with your fingers before assembly, but it really did help the drape.  Next time I will probably assemble with white glue instead of CA to avoid overly stiffening them where there's glue.

Edited July 31, 2020 by Alex

[chuck540z3]

VERY sweet looking cockpit John!  If I might offer an opinion, I have noticed a distinct improvement in your modeling skills over the past 3 years, from very good to currently simply awesome.  I now look to your work for inspiration, so thank you for pushing me to improve as well.  You have become without a doubt one of the top modelers in these forums, IMHO, and that is saying a lot with the company we have here.  Your photography has improved a lot as well, which is a big part of what this WIP forum is all about.

 

Cheers,

Chuck

Edited July 31, 2020 by chuck540z3

[fastterry]

The cockpit is really well done, think I'll have to get one of those Brengun sets for my N1K2-J. I like the HGW belts as well and always drape them into the seat but the fact is most operational aircraft (WW2 at least) would probably have the harness straps over the side of the cockpit and the lap belts down over the sides of the seat. Pain in the bum to do and it doesn't look as impressive to the 'civilians' that might look at your model.

TRF 

[Thunnus]

16 hours ago, Alex said:

Agree on both points on the HGW belts - overscale but still look great.  On mine I was initially a bit timid with their instruction to wad the individual pieces of fabric up and mash them around with your fingers before assembly, but it really did help the drape.  Next time I will probably assemble with white glue instead of CA to avoid overly stiffening them where there's glue.

 

I do the crumple thing on all of my HGW belts.  I actually did the reverse process as you... initially I crumpled them too aggressively and that led to the painted finish cracking and peeling off so now I do it a little more gently!  I use a PVA glue but I still lose flexibility at the glue joints.

 

 

14 hours ago, chuck540z3 said:

VERY sweet looking cockpit John!  If I might offer an opinion, I have noticed a distinct improvement in your modeling skills over the past 3 years, from very good to currently simply awesome.  I now look to your work for inspiration, so thank you for pushing me to improve as well.  You have become without a doubt one of the top modelers in these forums, IMHO, and that is saying a lot with the company we have here.  Your photography has improved a lot as well, which is a big part of what this WIP forum is all about.

 

Cheers,

Chuck

 

Oh wow... thank you Chuck!  I greatly appreciate your comments and really respect your opinion as someone who represents, to me, the level of modeling/presentation that I want to reach.  I'm not a good modeler yet but the journey from mediocre to ok has been helped tremendously by posting my builds here and learning from all of the great builders that frequent these boards.  I've gained a ton of knowledge just by reading other people's builds and I've wanted to record my work in a way that would be similarly helpful to others.  Plus, I like photography so that helps too!

 

 

10 hours ago, fastterry said:

The cockpit is really well done, think I'll have to get one of those Brengun sets for my N1K2-J. I like the HGW belts as well and always drape them into the seat but the fact is most operational aircraft (WW2 at least) would probably have the harness straps over the side of the cockpit and the lap belts down over the sides of the seat. Pain in the bum to do and it doesn't look as impressive to the 'civilians' that might look at your model.

TRF 

 

Yeah, the placement of seatbelts is very interesting.  The fact that we have aftermarket belts available is pretty cool but I agree that bunching all of it onto the seat is probably not realistic.  Folding and bending is one way of making the harnesses look more natural but extending the drape beyond the seat itself and/or introducing twists may be the next step.  

[Thunnus]

Thanks guys!  The cockpit is basically finished but I can't put it into the fuselage until the riveting is done.  I've been procrastinating on this for a while now because the Shiden Kai happens to have a ton of rivets. Now that I've received the New Galaxy rivet tool in the preferred 1.00mm spacing, I had no excuses left to fall back on.

 

The first step is to draw the rivet guide lines onto the model using reference drawings, a flexible ruler and a soft-lead pencil.  Because there are so many rivets, the lines started smearing.  I decided to hold off on the more tightly spaced "intermediate" rivet lines and get the main grid lines in first.

 

Once the lines are drawn, I simply roll the rivet tool over the lines.  A decent amount of pressure is needed to make holes in the plastic and my rear fuselage joints buckled in a few places.

 

After riveting, I removed the pencil lines with Windex.  At this point, I was thinking about leaving the intermediate rivet lines off.  I mean, who is really going to notice?

 

Of course, I was compelled to complete the job and I put the intermediate rivets on as well.

 

At this point, the rivets are like little pimples... each hole is surrounded by a mound of raised plastic.  I don't like how this looks so I try to sand off the mounds and leave only the holes.  It's another step in the process but I think the results is worth the effort.

[Brett M]

Really nice work, John. I need to invest in rivet tools.
 

Second to last picture , to the right of the blank panel it looks like one of your rivet lines dips down a bit....might just be the picture though!

[turbo]

On 7/31/2020 at 10:22 AM, Thunnus said:

And is it just me but don't all of the seatbelt representations, whether they are fabric or brass, seem a tad OVERscale?  Would the lap belts really fill up the bucket of the seat so completely?

 

Ha, I'm glad you raised this John! It's a bit like the emperor's new clothes, nearly all AM belts look overscale to me but I've never seen anybody comment on it (I'm guilty of that too!). Certainly better than having nothing there though. Pit looks fantastic btw, lovely work!

 

Riveting certainly does require a lot of patience, but I reckon it's well worth it and is a major element of transforming the model from something toy-like to a level of realism we all aspire to.