1/32 HK Lancaster Dambuster....with Additions

[CraigH]

4 hours ago, coogrfan said:

A little something for inspiration: 

 

 

Thank you!

[CraigH]

Holiday over and back to the grind. I've been working on the front turret so this will be a fairly short post as there's not too much to it. 

I've replaced the kit gun barrels with the superb ones from Master Models. Expensive but well worth it the detail is amazing. Just sprayed black then detail picked out with a bit of vallejo gunmetal. Also added wiring from the handles to the guns and also the firing mechanism leads as well. The canopy is masked and painted and will go on shortly after I've cleaned the inside. (once forgot to do that and had a fingerprint inside). Then the masking can come off and we'll see what we've got. The beauty of this kit is I can leave fitting the turret til the last moment.

I've fashioned some stirrups for the front gunners legs so they don't dangle in the bomb aimers' face. I can't find any photos of these as they were only there for Chastise. Normally the bomb aimer doubled as the front gunner so it wasn't a problem. I've also added a couple of canvas bags to catch the cartridges.

Speaking of canvas, last post I'd decided to go with canvas covering for the wheel well section.........Not any more! It wasn't canvas but the fuel tank showing through the struts.

I'm sawing the lot out at the moment, fun job. I have seen ones where it's solid (the BBMF lancaster is) but there's no opportunity with this kit to make it look like fabricated metal so it's all coming out and I'll have the sides of 4 fuel tanks to replicate. Oh the joys.

As ever thanks for looking.

[Rockie Yarwood]

Really nice work, Craig!

[brahman104]

Very nice. And informative too!

 

Craig

[dennismcc]

Neat work on that turret, looks great

 

Cheers

 

Dennis

[CraigH]

3 hours ago, dennismcc said:

Neat work on that turret, looks great

 

Cheers

 

Dennis

Thanks Dennis

[TimW]

Sweet work!  I love it!

 

Cheers,

 

Tim W

[CraigH]

On 8/26/2022 at 2:33 AM, TimW said:

Sweet work!  I love it!

 

Cheers,

 

Tim W

Thank you Tim

[Nighthawk Calling 1]

On 5/31/2022 at 10:55 PM, LSP_Kevin said:

 

I know the feeling!

 

Kev

And magnifying glasses over my every day glasses.

[CraigH]

45 minutes ago, Nighthawk Calling 1 said:

And magnifying glasses over my every day glasses.

Yep exactly. And for close up work, glasses off and piece touching nose

[CraigH]

Hi again all. I've mainly been on with the landing gear for a while as there's lots of detail painting there that has to be done in the right order or it'll all end in tears.

 

So, if you remember I'd removed the struts which were used when the aircraft was on the ground to stop the  undercarriage accidentally folding. The left hand leg has the strut removed, the right hand still has it.

Also, where the strut connects to the folding mechanism, HK have made this a solid piece of plastic for some inexplicable reason.

It should be two round metal struts as in the real thing here:

 

so it needs cutting out:

 

 

 

Next was a base coat of Mr Finishing Surfacer 1500 in black. Then.....

 

• Spray the OLEO legs, hubs and the rear hydraulic struts with Mr color bright chrome and let it dry well.
• Spray the chromed bits with gloss varnish as it comes off at the drop of a hat and when you mask them the tape will play havoc if you don't.
• Mask the bits you've just sprayed chrome with tape except for the hubs. Give the hubs a coat of chipping solution or hairspray and leave to dry.
• Spray everything gloss black.
• Go ahead and do your chipping on the hubs, they got pretty worn quite quickly.
• Mask the black around the centre chrome folding gear assembly and spray that chrome.
• Next mask the black areas shown below and spray the main oleo strut grey or dull aluminium

 

• Unmask everything and spray the whole thing in gloss varnish to seal it or it will, very quickly start to lose paint.

 

You now need to add the small struts to the folding gear assembly. 0.6mm aluminium wire works a treat I found

 

 

Some fresh engine oil very thinly applied as a sheen to the hydraulic part of the OLEO struts.

 

For the wheel I sprayed tyre black then masked the central hub and sprayed that dull aluminium.

Chipping solution came next followed by gloss black and then some subtle (I hope) chipping around the rim.

Tyre walls were treated with various pigments then a mix of dark earth pigment was mixed with matt varnish to give a paste of mud which was applied around the rim, left to dry then worked with a stiff brush to give some residual mud. Scampton at this time was a grass runway.

 

You can also see I've taken out all the solid plastic between the stays in the wheel bay

 

That was 2 hours of toil. Looking at the main photos, it looks rough but remember, that's the outside, non visible bit. The inside is the bit that's seen.

 

The back wall is again pretty poorly detailed so some additions and fresh engine oil (the oil tank for the inboard engine sits in the wheel bay and leaks pretty profusely)

 

Finally, all the pipework, hydraulic and pneumatic, that HK don't provide needs to be added:

 

Here's the pneumatic pipework

 

And the hydraulic pipes run into the top of the main strut.

 

There's tidying up to do before putting it all together then repeat it all for the starboard side.

Finally, I've finished the FN5 front turret. Couple of pictures below although with the canopy on lots of the detail doesn't show through

Thanks for looking. Next is finishing detailing the fuselage, joining it up and adding the forward assembly to complete the fuselage

[CraigH]

Well, it's been quite a few days! Over last weekend I was almost in despair with this flipping model and its vagaries. I started some work on the flaps and TBH, they are a pile of poo right OOB.

 

As you can see the ejector marks are an absolute nightmare. They're everywhere all over the open surfaces of the flaps and pain to get to. These are the upper surfaces of the flaps but the lower surfaces are just as bad.

Also, there are errors on the lower flaps . The holes drilled out to lighten the flap weight on the outboard flap stop short by 6 holes. They should extend right to the end of the flap but they don't. Lord knows why.

The whole thing was finished off by the joins of the flap strengthening struts. They should be a nice tight right angle but every one as you can see they're a button shape due to poor moulding.

 

It was so bad that I did a bit of browsing and found an old WWII shutdown procedure which said the flaps should be closed after landing before taxying. "Great!" I thought. I can get away with working flaps up. I don't like it as the flaps are an area you can go to town on but the time needed for these would be horrendous, so, I glued them up retracted.

 

I was also getting ready for closing up the undercarriage so I dirtied up the area that can be seen through the crew door and spiced up the flare chute a little then went ahead and started the closure.

 

Weekend done, job done, ready to move on next week......or so I thought.

 

This Tuesday was a very special day. I was invited down to RAF Coningsby to see the BBmF aircraft by the current Flight Eng of PA474 who's been following my build and giving lots of support and advice. I expected a look round and to take some pictures but my word it was so much more than that!

Instead of walking round the perimeter of the hanger as all the other visitors were, being told about the aircraft and having what would have been a great time, I was taken all round the aircraft, up close, touching the damn things for around two hours by the said flight engineer, who I won't name because some people don't like it.

 

All I will say is "Thanks Chap". I can honestly say I could've died happy right there and then.

 

I didn't take many photos as I'm not an avid photo taker. I feel you lose the moment if you're obsessed with taking snaps and, anyway,  the knowledge and info that was being chucked at me demanded I listen and learn for every moment I was there. I touched the little plate covering the Battle of Britain bullet hole on P7350 and I had to hold back the tears.

 

Then we finally got to the lady, the beautiful P474 and Eng's pride and joy. We went all the way around, under the bomb bay, inside the wheel wells and studied the flaps......... The flaps, I had to ask didn't I?

"When you shutdown the aircraft, is it flaps up or down?" I asked.

"Oh, flaps down. It takes the pressure from the hydraulic pumps so nothing can move". was the reply

"Bloody hell" I said "you've just made me a shed load of work"......and the subject of a whole post to come 

 

I genuinely thought that was it but no. "Are you clear on board?" was the question to the technician. "Yep" was the reply so onboard we went!

 

Well hidden tears were in the eyes again so photos were hard to take but I got a few. He described her as a "reverse TARDIS" and it's true. She's so huge on the outside but climb aboard and she's so small. I'm 5' 8" and I bashed my head four times. There is just no space at all. We went aft then forward, all the way to the cockpit. Information and procedures flowing the whole time. I felt like a crew in 1943 learning the aircraft. It was fantastic and fascinating. I'm from an electro-mechanical maintenance background so I lapped it all up.

 

As I say, we reached the cockpit and he said "take a seat". "Bloody hell!, there's only one" I thought ( we were past the nav's seat and the eng's seat was up) "THAT one?" Tears again though I'm good at hiding it. I just go quiet. It's even tight getting your legs either side of the control column. So tight everywhere. I thought of the guys trying to get out of a plunging aircraft in the pitch dark, possibly on fire, and I realised why not many did.

 

The motto of BBMF is "Lest We Forget" and it was never more at the forefront of my mind than at that moment. We went through startups, fire procedures, shutdowns. The obligatory "Rad Shutters Auto" and the reasons why of course.

He signed my Haynes manual and I took the cockpit section of my Dam Buster Lanc for him to have a peek at in the flesh.

A memorable day I'll never, ever forget.

 

Thanks again chap and I'm always up for a day doing an oil change if you're ever short

 

 

So, to finish off this one, a couple of shots I did take. One showing the bloody size of her and a couple from the pilot's seat. Still can't believe I'm saying that....

 

Flaps next

 

 

 

 

[Panzerwomble]

What an awesome day out , the thought of sitting in that seat brought a tear to my eye too  

[LSP_Kevin]

Great build progress, great story. Looking forward to more!

 

Kev

[CraigH]

So what about these 'ere flaps?

As you saw earlier, they're a disaster. So first to the removal of the ejector pins. Not easy but the sharpened electrical testing screwdriver I used on the bomb bay came in handy again. Getting in to sand wasn't easy either but the bulk of the flaps interior are going to be black (P474's are so that's good enough for me!) with some subtle wear and scratching, remember these were not very old aircraft. 

The right angle joins with awful joints were another matter. I came up with a method as follows:

• First, cut down each side of the "joint" to free that plastic

 

• Next cut across the top of the "button"

 

• Clean out the corners to give a 90 degree angle ie get rid of the button.
• file across the top of each front to back strut to regain its shape.
• Hopefully, after you've done the lot, it'll look acceptable. Top is the adjusted one, bottom as it comes off the sprue.

 

Now we need to address the missing holes we talked about in the last post. 

There are six missing and they're shallow and flat so simply drilling was out. Since I don't have a spare milling machine lying around, the only thing I could think to do was to create a little fillet in thin plasti card, put the holes in and let it into the flap. Then I could file it down to try and make an acceptable bodge job of it.

 

So first I cut a bit of 0.5mm card 31mm by 6mm. The holes sit VERY close to the lower edge but I set them a little high so there was no chance of the holes splitting and then I could adjust when the fillet was in.

 

Next, mark and gentleman's parts the positions of the holes. 

Now, we need a hole of 2.4mm in diameter. It won't drill (I tried) the card is too thin so I used a rat tailed file, put a bit of tape around it at 2.4 mm in diameter and eased the holes out from there

 

Then it's a simple matter to glue it into place, file the edges down to blend it in as well as possible

then prime, check and spray aluminium to get ready for chipping. It's not perfect but better than having six holes missing

 

Only took 10 hours.......

 

Lastly today I started checking the fit of the wheel bays into the wing. Because I cut out all the plastic between the struts it means you can see the fuel tanks in the wings so I had to fabricate those too. I used a plastic bottle middle which is bendable to match the wing shape. Colour wise, I've seen some done in green and others in a red primer. I've gone for red primer as it seems that early Lancs had red primer and later ones interior green (P474 has green ones). You can see the message "STAND TANK THIS END" on the tank so I put that on as well using individual white letter decals about 1.5mm high. The eyes are NOT being treated kindly at the minute. 

 

 

Thanks for looking as ever.