Tamiya A6M2 Zero-Sen (Rabaul base)

[themongoose]

nice job on those holes. Did you use a punch to get them that round and so close together without messing up the thin webbing between holes? 

[Greif8]

Very nice progess Joachim!  The scratchbuilt radio shelf looks excellent, as does the prop.

 

Ernest

[Fanes]

On 4/2/2023 at 10:46 PM, themongoose said:

nice job on those holes. Did you use a punch to get them that round and so close together without messing up the thin webbing between holes? 

Exactly - I used my RP toolz punch-and-die. Can't imagine scratch building anything without it anymore

[Tomjw]

This is a fantastic start.looking forward to following...

 

Cheers,

 

Tom

[Troy Molitor]

Looking great so far, Joachim.  

[Fanes]

Gentlemen - we have an engine!

 

After the washes a flat coat from Tamiya acrylics was misted on and afterwards the assembly went on.

Everything went silky smooth, except for fiddling with all the ignition wires.

Getting all of them in the drilled holes on the cylinders needes two sessions and a lot of touch-ups.

 

 

There's some Aotake as well

Alclad Aluminium covered with transparent blue green mixed from Tamiya clears.

 

As you can see, only the front face was carefully painted and wired. The rest will be invisible.

As the next step, I will take care of the cockpit to represent a Nakajima built and land based Zero-Sen.

 

[Fanes]

Oh well, it's been a while. Work and some personal stuff kept me from continuing with my Zero-Sen.

I'll try to continue this build but since the GB has ended, moving the thread to the WiP section would be much appreciated.

 

Cockpit conversion

This will be quite a big chapter because there will be quite some work necessary to get an accurate representation matching "my" Zero.

Actually it was kind of overwhelming, when I realized the amount of small details that vary between different A6M2s.

The Tweak List has all of them - one simply needs to know what's applicable.

As said on p.1 I'll build a Rabaul based, Nakajima built A6m2 from 252 Kokutai.

According to the Pacific Profiles book the first wave of Zeroes (only five Model 21s) arrived at Rabaul on November 9 in 1942.

They lost quite a big amount of planes before they left for the Marshall Islands during February 1943.

Because my chosen subject was photographed at Lakunai airfield near Rabaul, a prodcution until autumn 1942 seems likely.

 

Enough with all the words let's move on to cutting some plastic.

I started with the starboard sidewall because it features most changes from the Tamiya kit.

There are a lot of good references in Sean's (Madmax) WiP from p.3 onwards:

If you haven't seen this one - take a peak. In my opinion it's one of the most beautiful Zero-Sen builds I have ever seen.

 

The radio equipment, as well as the RDF equipment and the morse key had to be left of.

Unfortunately, there are some shelves that need to be cut off. Creating new stringers from plastic sheet seemed like the easiest option.

 

 

The unforgiving macro shot shows all the little shelve thingies and mounting points, that were created from plastic strips and sheet.

I'm not really happy since most of them are somewhat sloppy, but that's the best I could do in two sessions.

 

Next up will be adding cables and plumbing to get the whole thing to look alive.

I hope to be able to keep the momentum, but there's a constant struggle between doing the subject justice and doing anything at all.

 

Cheers,

Joachim

 

[Uncarina]

I know that struggle well! However, you are doing a masterful job.

 

Cheers,  Tom

[ChuckD]

Agreed with Uncarina.  This hobby is about the journey, not the destination.  Enjoy the build at whatever speed works for you and we will follow along just the same.  Your work is looking great.

 

It's funny... You mention losing your mojo every time you open the box in this kit.  I feel the same way.  Its currently sitting on my shelf of doom with the fuse halves together and the cockpit done.  But every time I go back to it, I end up putting it away again.  Not sure what it is about this kit.

[John1]

Just discovered this build.    You are doing fantastic work, I'll be following along closely, as I am also thinking about doing this kit in one of those ad-hoc paint schemes.     

 

John

[Fanes]

Thank you very much for the kind words guys!

Currently I'm goiung with the flow and oh boy, this seems like complete insanity.

 

Little overview on the plumbing on the cockpit floor.

I went with a busy look - not with accuracy. There's too much going on in the original cockpit to really figure out what goes where. A little detail I'm quite proud of:

the small box on the floor with the four handles. Tamiya gives you the configuration post 1943 with only three T-handles. Luckily you get the A6M5 cockpit floor as well. So after a quick cut, there are now four handles, as there should be for an early Nakajima built Zero-Sen.

 

 

The starboard cockpit wall is now complete with all the wires added.

 

 

Switching to the port side now.

Not so much going on, since there aren't that many changes from the stock configuration.

Simply added a boatload of wires to the fuse box; scraped of the details from it to make it ready for the Quinta bits.

The small lamp was cut from another Tamiya part and wired up.

The trim tab mechanism got a chain made from twisted, annealed and compressed 0.2 mm copper wire - will add the trim tab wheel after painting.

The side console is only dry fitted, since there's some more work ahead.

So far I only scraped of the details on the front part - again for the Quinta 3D decals and cut off the dynamometer on the rear that I had already glued on. Had to add the six lightening holes of course.

 

Some more small stuff still along the road, but the fun has defintely returned to the bench.
 

 

[Fanes]

Tiny little bit off topic, but I wanted to share what I'm working on besides all the fiddling with the Tamiya Zero.

 I decided to have a little side project that's pure fun. Meaning: no super detailing, no strive for accuracy and definitely no pressure to deliver.

Since there was from time to time some interest in Star Wars stuff in the non-LSP-section, this little bust might be familiar to some other fans:

 

 

It's a 3D printed model - not the best print unfortunately.

You can see the resin with the first layer of primer on. THis was followed by a lot of grinding to get rid of all the print lines.

Right now the following coat of primer is drying and I'm looking forward to painting Boba Fett's armor.

I might start a thread over in the right section, but I don't plan on doing a strict WiP because that seems sometimes related to my losses of motivation.

[Fanes]

Building continues in sloth speed.

I already mentioned above that the left hand console needed some additions.

Again the Tweak List was invaluable to get close to a Nakajima configuration.

This time it was mostly removing stuff and adding some 0.2 mm copper wires.

 

 

With that done, only the IP needs to be prepped for the Quinta decals and then the cockpit should finally be ready for some paint!

[Fanes]

Resurrecting a thread from the dead.

The last three month weren't as productive as I would have liked. Mainly due to the fact that this Tamiya Zero has turned from a quickish build to a depp dive into a rabbit hole.

Loss of mojo included...

It took me around four weeks to finish the rudder pedals. The original has a string wound around the bar and I just had to recreate that.

 

 

Needless to say, fiddling ultra thin, elastic thread through a small slit requires a lot of patience and honestly - my usual patient self seemed to be absent.

After that painting the cockpit was a lot of fun. Even though the Qunita decals' colour is way off.

I did quite some research regarding the hue of the paint used in Nakajima built Zero-Sens (Nick Millman's ebook is invaluable).

In the end, I had to scrap all plans and mixed a shade from Tamiya XF-71 and XF-59 and XF-4 that came closest to the decals.

 

 

I'm not a 100% happy with everything - mostly with the 3D decals, since they still look grainy (despite being first gloss and then flat coated).

As for the seatbelts - the 3D decals are way too stiff to conform to the seat. I had to use a lot of CA glue (and swearing) to get them on. Of course two of them just broke apart..

My next build will for sure be void of any Quinta stuff. Back to individual decals for the dials on the IP and fabric seatbelts.

[Dpgsbody55]

Nice work so far.  Glad to see this one continuing.

 

 

Cheers,

Michael