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Revell 1/32 He162, with Aires and Eduard goodies...


Mustang JBB

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Howdy All, I am. A long time follower of LSP, but have never contributed. Now that I have moved into my new house and set up (mostly) new hobby room, I thought I would get after a new project. My eyeballs are not what they used to be so I have rid myself of all kits smaller than 1/32 scale and invested in in a great magnifying hood to wear and lots of extra light.

 

I have a few dozen 1/32 kits, including some that I really wish to build into "masterpieces", including the P-61, B-25, TBM, and the upcoming Tamiya Mosquito. However, my fingers are out of practice so I thought I would build a "quickie" withe the He162. I have had the kit for several years along with the Aires detail set.

 

the Aires set has you carve away the molded in cockpit detail. I grabbed my new Trumpeter chisels and went to town. The chisels come with many different cutting sizes and shapes, but I only have two. They cut great, but since they a real basically a sharpened rod, my hands cramped up quickly trying to hold the chisel and use force to cut. I am going to have to rig up some kind of handle before I use them again. So out came the Xacto wood carving blades to finish off the job.

 

Once the detail was gone, I began test fitting. Here is where the problems start. My Aires set had massive shrinkage issues. The cockpit does not fit, nor does the main landing gear bay. The cockpit is about 10% too small. Since it is designed to be the floor of the cockpit, rear bullhead, and nose gear well all in one, I can't use it. If I line up the rea bulhead, the nose gear bay floats above the fuselage floor and vise versa. The size and shape of the nose gear bay does not match the opening in the kit. The main gear bay is over 1/8 to short front to back.

 

After getting over my initial anger, I began to sort out the mess. I looked at the Eduard set and instructions on their website. I decided that I could combine Eduard, Aires, kit parts, and a little scratch build to make a decent model. I said I my fingers were out of shape right?

 

Here is a pic of the min gear bay.

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Here is the cockpit

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Here is a pic of the nose gear opening.

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So I called my local hobby shop and ordered the Eduard set, then began scratch build what neither Eduard or Aires would cover. I am using the Aires set as a guide to dressing up the kit parts until the Eduard sets arrive. Here is my progress on the main gear well. I still have a few parts from Eduard to add.

image.jpg1_zps7nall6lp.jpg

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Looks like a great start  Sorry about the Aires stuff. Just started a P-40 with a CMK set. Had the same problem 3mm short ailerons. 

With the Edurad set you get the one side gun bay open. But it does not include the 20mm gun. You have to order that separate from Aires

Just a heads up.  

 

Looking forward to see your work.  :hi:  to the Forums to.

 

Cheers

Edited by Vandy 1 VX 4
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Thanks guys for the welcome to LSP. The Aires set is not a total loss, I am using the cockpit side walls, control stick, bits and pieces, and the wheels. I hope to combine the Aires gun parts with the Eduard to make a complete gun bay. It will be a week or so before I can get my Eduard set, so I will fiddle with what I can and start prepping the remaining kit parts.

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I had a little time to build the Aires seat today. Nice piece. I will add the fabric seat belts eventually.

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I thought I would share a little trick I figured out. Maybe old news to some but I feel like a genius! I picked up and assortment of lead wire from the fly fishing shop a while back. Looking for a way to make some malleable straps etc, I decided to try flattening the lead wire. I just used my xacto handle like a rolling pin and worked the wire flat. It does try to curl if you go back and forth, but I found if you hold one end down and roll away from you every time, it stays relatively flat and uniform in width. I put a sample of rolled out 0.015" wire and 0.035 inch wire. These were just quick examples, the wire can be rolled even thinner. Of course once rolled thin, the lead is very flexible and easy to form. Hope you guys can use this idea.

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Spent a few hours last night cleaning up those fun little parts like landing gear and wheels etc. Sanding away all those little mold seams is not fun. I like to prep parts and separate them into zip loc bags by subassembly. Nose gear, main gear, cockpit, gun bay etc. The Wings and tail feathers have been glued together for several days, just letting all the liquid cement evaporate thoroughly before sanding. Hobby shop says I will have my Eduard parts tomorrow afternoon, so the action will pick up on this project over the weekend. Thanks for following along.

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I got a little work done this evening on the main gear bay. Re-learning patience getting this Eduard photo etch bent and glued. I forgot how frustrating this was. As you can see from the different colors of materials, I am including kit and Aires parts, along with good old Evergreen strips. Accidentally put a creased own one of the big PE parts, but I will blame this on the mainanence crew and call it weathering.

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I got a little more work done last night.  I forgot how much fun it is to stare through a magnifying hood, holding my breath, while I fumble with tiny PE parts and uncooperative CA glue.  Whew! I did use some 5 minute epoxy thinned with alcohol to attach the plated to the inner wall of the fuselage after roughing up both surfaces with sanding sticks.  drying time is lower, and clamps need to be used, but in the end it is much less frustrating than CA for those types of parts.  Just be sure to clean up the excess epoxy, before it cures, with more alcohol.

 

I added more Eduard PE parts, along with some of the Aires bits.  I have cleaned up all of the other kit parts so the main gear well is ready for paint now.  I also got started on the nose gear well, and related parts.

 

My wife is worried my eyeballs will just fall out of my head and give up.

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Comments and and tips are always welcome!

Edited by Mustang JBB
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Thanks Kev. Been having airbrush problems lately and so I decided to completely change gears while I sort it out. All this fidly bit stuff works a different part of my brain. I think. Where am I? What day is it?

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