GEEBEE!

[mconnelley]

Hello:

   

   In between an F-4 and an F-8, I thought I'd do something light and fun: a Geebee!  It kind of has to be out-of-the-box since I don't think there is any aftermarket stuff for the old William's Bros. kit.  

 

   So far, it's been pretty good.  A lot of flash but the fit is quite good. The engine is very nice out of the box, which is good as that's front and center on the Geebee.  I cut off the kit connector rods from the gear box due to some bad mold misalignment, and I made new ones from some Evergreen styrene rod.  The plug wires are some craft bead copper wire.  

 

Mike

[mconnelley]

Next I worked on the cockpit.  I haven't found any period photos of the interior, and the instructions are a bit vague on colors and such, so here's my interpretation.  The cockpit parts fit together quite well, but the location of the cockpit in the fuselage leaves a lot of guesswork.  Since I had cut open the side door, I tried to align the bulkheads to be on either side of the door.  Also visible are some of the tabs that I glued to the fuselage near the seam to aid in the alignment of the fuselage halves.

 

[mconnelley]

And before too long, you have something that looks like an airplane.  The main tricky part here was setting the dihedral, since the wing attachment was (you guessed it) a bit vague.  I found a drawing that showed 4 degrees of dihedral, so I made a template out of a cardboard box to set the dihedral as the glue set.  

 

At this point, the canopy is just set in place.  It's quick thick, which is good as it's also somewhat frosty and needs a good sanding/polishing inside and out.  That I did, and a dunk in Future floor polish as well.  

 

 

Here it is now, with the canopy attached, masked, and ready for primer.  In the photos below, the engine is just press-fitted into place.  To mask the canopy, I cut 1 mm wide tape strips and laid them into the canopy where the frames will be.  Then I put Tamiya tape over that, and traced out the outlines of the frames.  I removed all of the tape, cut along the traced lines, and put the canopy masks back on.  

 

 

 

[MikeMaben]

Looks good Mike, not often seen built .

[themongoose]

5 hours ago, MikeMaben said:

Looks good Mike, not often seen built .

…and not to this level  some cool interior work going on here!

[ChuckD]

Ah, an aircraft straight from aviation's "let's throw it at the wall and see what sticks" age.  It always amazes me that the Geebee was ever able to achieve flight.  Anyway, the model's looking good!

[Modelboy]

Thats the cutest thing ever. 

[Out2gtcha]

Terrific work going on here!

Coming along swimmingly so far, especially considering the age of the kit.

[chaos07]

Cool subject!

[PEYSSON Gilles]

Hello

In French, we would say : " chapeau bas !!! "

Very good job on the cockpit

 

Gilles

 

 

[denders]

Nice!  I've got one in the stash to build.

[Dpgsbody55]

 

Looks good so far.  Great work on the cockpit.

 

 

Cheers,

Michael

[Uncarina]

Very strong work!

 

Cheers,  Tom

[mconnelley]

Hello:

   Here is the Geebee in primer, and the first coat of white paint.  The primer is a bit translucent, and the white plastic is translucent as well, so I put a few layers of primer on the help build some opacity, especially since the white paint isn't going to help much.  

 

   The stick coming out of the nose is a piece of sprue that I glued into the hole (for the engine) to help handling of the model during painting.  

 

 

   After the first coat of white paint.  The paint finish looks a little pebbly, and didn't spray that nicely...it always felt like the airbrush was nearly clogged.  I thinned the Vallejo paint with Future, but maybe that's a bad idea.  I might give the paint a fine sanding to smooth out the bumps and paint again.  I'll try thinning with something else (Googling suggests just plain water as a good idea...definitely not alcohol), and I'll give it another coat of white.   Sorry that there isn't much dramatic to see...just white paint over white plastic.

 

 

Mike

[LSP_Kevin]

Nice progress, Mike. Next time you have trouble with translucent white plastic, try spraying the inside black prior to assembly. This helps block the light tremendously, and results in less paint needed to do it from the outside - especially if that paint is also white, like in your case.

 

Kev