Hog's firepower display - A-10C - Full makeup

[A-10LOADER]

Excellent work Red Dog, everything looks awesome !!

Steve

[Derek B]

Love it Oliver, brilliant!  

 

Derek

[jmel]

That looks SUPERB!!  What pilot is that?

 

Jake

[easixpedro]

Pilot looks perfect! Have seen that look many times as pilots roll and pull, looking to acquire the target. It’ll look really sharp with your intended display and I look forward to it coming together!

-Peter

[scvrobeson]

This looks really awesome! The pilot really does bring it to life

 

 

 

Matt 

[red Dog]

21 hours ago, geedubelyer said:

The addition of the right eye sight glass is very convincing.

Great stuff 

Thanks , it's a tiny detail barely visible but it was fun to convert that helmet to Scorpion. I hope that in the future we start to see more of these modern gear in our models

18 hours ago, A-10LOADER said:

Excellent work Red Dog, everything looks awesome !!

Steve

Thanks Steve. 

 

17 hours ago, Derek B said:

Love it Oliver, brilliant!  
Derek

Thanks Derek

 

11 hours ago, jmel said:

That looks SUPERB!!  What pilot is that?

Jake

Thanks Jake, It is one of the gem from Reedoak.

I initially asked Reedoak and PJProduction to consider doing a 1/32 pilot for the A-10 with the Scorpion gear. I thought it wouldn't be a bad idea considering the new A-10 models in 1/48 (I understand scaling is no issue with 3D modelling). PJ kindly declined and Reedoak didn't bother to answer.

So I looked for a donor pilot model to be converted. The best I could think of was Reedoak pilot with the regular HMCS but the open visor kinda looked ok for a Scorpion helmet. The default pilot pose is great for a ramp start where the guy is talking into his mike. 
I converted this to an in-flight pose by placing his hands on the controls and moving the O2 mask back on his face and making him look up searching for target. 

The scorpions helmet stuff was all added with scratch bits

 

 

6 hours ago, easixpedro said:

Pilot looks perfect! Have seen that look many times as pilots roll and pull, looking to acquire the target. It’ll look really sharp with your intended display and I look forward to it coming together!

-Peter

That's great Peter thanks. It was exactly my intention with his pose so I'm very glad you mention this. 

 

3 hours ago, scvrobeson said:

This looks really awesome! The pilot really does bring it to life

Matt 

Thanks Matt

[red Dog]

Thanks to Pete I'm trying to learn a new technique using JB weld

Product is great and I'm glad I have sourced it as I can see using it a lot in the future

 

But trying to represent the trackers on the vac canopy is not easy due to lack of such experience.
Since I'll have only one shot at this, it has to be perfect, so I started doing test with different techniques

 

1. I did as Pete suggested and applied JB weld from a tip straight on the canopy, using a paper template glued on the other side of the transparency:
As you can see, the lack of experience makes it complicated to always deposit the same amount of product each time. The curve of the canopy doesn't help and this was my first messy shot. Next ones were barely better  I'm concerned with regularity and I am not sure I can pull this off.

 

I then tried to bore holes through thin styrene (0.5, then 0.3mm) using the paper template with the dot location as a guide.
I first used the punch and die (4 holes bottom right) but quickly realized it wasn't convenient and my smaller punch was too big.
So I reverted to the usual drill. It's a draft so I didn't focus too much on being regular when drilling

The idea with that is to stick the styrene template to the model part and fill it with JB Weld, scrape the surface and remove the template leaving dots on the canopy.
I first tested on a flat surface:

2 and 3 were done as explained above. 3 was pretty good except for the 4 larger holes obviously.
For 4 and 5 I applied JB weld to a paper template on a dummy flat surface then placed the filled paper template where I wanted and scraped one pass only before removing the paper.

2 and 3 did not work on the canopy very well because the plastic template was too thick and would not bend enough to rest perfectly against the canopy
Product goes through too much and create a mess.


I then tried  the 4 and 5 method with the drilled paper template only on the top inner part of the canopy

 

We're getting close. Don't mind the top right dots, it's the ones from the too large holes. 
Middle part wasn't resting perfectly on plastic so I guess that's the reason the dots are bigger

 

Some more regularity  testing required but I'm getting more confident I can try that "one shot ruin the whole model" operation

I'll work some more with the 3 (0.3mm styrene template) and the 4 paper template technique

Any advice, shoot.

 

[themongoose]

Have you thought about making the template from tamiya masking? Something that would conform to the canopy sounds like it would help consistency.

[red Dog]

Excellent idea. 

I was already leaning towards using paper, masking tape should make it even better

Thank you

 

 

 

[Pete Fleischmann]

If you aren’t happy with the JB Weld dots, you should be fine wiping them away with acetone before they dry..assuming the canopy isn’t dipped in Future, etc.

actually- I’d try nail polish remover (with acetone) 1st before trying straight acetone to clear away the JB Weld.

 

cheers

Pete

[red Dog]

Thanks for the tip Pete.

 

The template with tamiya tape worked very well and gave me the below result on the test piece. Much better than the original decal test where the film remained visible

 

So the dots were applied inside the final canopy using the same technique: 

Thanks @Pete Fleischmann & @themongoose  and all of you having contributed to this result. I honestly was lost about how to do it and thanks to your advices a solution came out and I'm happy with the results

 

Way to go LSP

 

 

 

Edited August 28, 2023 by red Dog

[red Dog]

Final steps to close the canopies were done last weekend:

 

I gently applied desert dust on the large surface inside the cockpit. 

 

Added scratched instruments on the windshield

 

Then glued the front windshield to the fuselage

 

Added the rear-view mirrors and the canopy handles. These are supposed to be on the canopy but since I made a guide to mate the canopy to the windshield, I decided to put them there which is easier, stronger and won't make any difference in the end

 

And FINALLY ...

Fit is not too bad, I will just have a bit more work at the rear end:

 

 

having been stuck for so long at this stage I can't wait to make substancial progress now

Thanks for looking.

[JayW]

Dude!  This is turning out to be an outstanding project!  Testing on mules is a great way to go, isn't it?  We cannot ruin a project where we have invested our life in.  

[A-10LOADER]

Great work Red Dog, she's looking fantastic.

Steve

[themongoose]

You know you do this to yourself  every build is better than the last and you keep ratcheting up the result!!