1/72 Revell Avro Lancaster B.III Special "Dambuster"

[Val]

Hi all,

With the Vulcan and X-Wing off the benches, and the Gnats driving me up the wall, it's time to start something else. So, the Lancaster is the next stop. The Revell 1/72 Dambuster to be more accurate.



We have plenty of goodies for this build:


A couple of sets of Master brass gun barrels, Eduard masking set for obvious reasons, Aires wheels, and Eduard seatbelts and cockpit photoetch set. I figured that a lot of detail will be seen through the green house on top of this kit, so I've gone to town.





Nothing has happened to this build yet, other than washing the sprues as I seem to remember Phil Flory having a problem with release agent on his video build many years ago.

After market Hannants Xtradecals are to be used with this build also:


To be honest, I bought these decals for a 1/72 Tornado GR.4 project (I've not started yet), and these decals are part of the set. Seemed to make sense to use them.

Hopefully we'll have a good time with this little lot!

Cheers,

Val

[Val]

I'll be using Neil's excellent build as reference (found here). I won't be correcting the shape behind the bouncing bomb and the wing dihedral though, simply because I'm not good enough of a modeller to pull-off finishing it well enough!

[Val]

Hi all,

Aaaaaaand we're off! Nothing much to report other than a couple of hours assembling bits. So far so good, fit seems great; good detail on this kit.



I haven't fitted the box on a stick that instructions call out for behind the pilots seat. I believe this is H2S box and wasn't fitted to Dambuster Lancs (as I discovered from Miggers' post on Neil's excellent build). What an H2S box is though, I don't know... I think it's an early form of RADAR? Hopefully someone out there can enlighten me!

Also, the pilots seat had a lot of flash on it, so due to furious sanding, the locating pin has gone. I've created another one of 1mm plastic rod, not that it's really necessary to be honest...



I've also sanded off the areas of the insides required in preparation for the photoecth. Painting will hopefully begin tonight; unsure whether to prime it grey first so I can see what I'm doing, or go straight in with a Nato/Rubber black... I'm sure I'll see the black over the plastic due to the colour difference and texture... hmmm

Cheers all

Val

[sean]

.....Another on the to do list, I shall tag along,

Sean

[bbudde]

On board here!

[woody37]

Hi Val,

Don't be put off tackling that dihedral, it really is a very easy fix. Slicing through the lower wing with a razor saw but not fully cutting through the leading and trailing edge will allow you to put a shim of plastic in to for the angle. A bit of sanding and filling the cut afterwards and job done. The upper wing will conform when glued.

Looking forwards to your progress

[CedB]

I'm in Val!

[Val]

Welcome on board everyone!

The internals are all finished basically:







The fuselage was primed/base coated in Tamiya's Nato Black. I put a reasonably thick coat on, but you can see if fine against the black plastic. Dry brushed with Xf-54 Dark Sea Grey, giving a nice metal/highlighted effect without being too sharp in this scale. Masking off the black areas, I then painted XF-71 Cockpit Green where required. Not sure how close this colour is (looks good enough to me) but the green areas are going to hardly be seen any way.

I brushed on some of the old style Flory Dark Dirt weathering powder on the cockpit floor and walls to add a bit of weathering. I thought I'd maybe over done it, but you can't see it that clearly on the mobile phone pics.

Then the photoetch. No real issues here. In fact I thought I'd perfected my technique... all smaller parts that go onto bigger photoetch I did with a drop of super glue and fitted them whilst the bigger part was still on the sprue. Fixing the bigger parts and any parts with glass dials to the model was done with white glue (Micro Krystal Klear). All a piece of a cake. So I got cocky and fitted the seatbelts. It was about 10.40pm by this point and thought it was bedtime, but as the rest of the cockpit took 30mins or so I thought it would be fine. An hour later, and seats covered in superglue, and seatbelts that stuck to everything except the seats...! Should have gone to bed!!

Anyway, I touched them up and they look fine.. I just about...! Next time I'm just using Tamiya tape again!

Cheers,

Val

[Val]

Hi Val,

Don't be put off tackling that dihedral, it really is a very easy fix. Slicing through the lower wing with a razor saw but not fully cutting through the leading and trailing edge will allow you to put a shim of plastic in to for the angle. A bit of sanding and filling the cut afterwards and job done. The upper wing will conform when glued.

Looking forwards to your progress

Hi Woody, thanks for your tips. I'm studying your excellent build, which is great! Thanks for your tips there. I'm not going to try to correct it just I don't think I'll make a good enough job of it if I'm honest. Appreciate the help though

Val

[Val]

Ok, so things have slowed a little...



The fuselage fitted fine, except I had a slight step on the section in front of the cockpit. Generally ok though, and I've run Mr Surfacer 1200 over the joins, lightly sanded off with the blue sander and polished up. I've put foam into all the entrances into the fuselage and I am next to spray neat Tamiya paint over the joins to make sure they're ok, then rescribe. I'd normally use black, but will have to be a grey as obviously black won't show!!

Now the fun:



The wheel wells are fiddly as heck. The side bars fit into a fairly shallow groove on the inside of the top of the wing, and a little tab fits under the bottom wing part. Holding the side bars with a finger and flooding with extra thin seems the only way to do this which of course left finger prints. Nothing a sanding stick can't solve though... The rear plate fits down onto these side bars, and then the centre bars fit to the bottom. It's not that it's a bad fit, not at all, but it's a combination of the Revell instructions and the flashy parts means it's hard to tell exactly where everything should go... The side bars stand slightly proud of the wing, is that right? Or is it going to need sanding back? Dunno. When everything is dry, I'll dry fit the engines and see what the reveals.

Here's another view, well flooded with glue:



Detail is great on this kit, got to say, and the fit is generally very good. The molds appear to be a bit old in places though and flash is causing fit queries.

Anyway, we'll see what the seams are like tonight and test fit the engines. Then we'll get the wheel wells painted if all else is ok...

That's all for now!

Val

[Val]

Ok, so I've been playing around with the wings/wheel wells/engines a bit more. Hmmm, becoming a bit of a pain these areas... One wing seems ok. I sanded back the side bars so they are flush and have dry fitted the engine; a decent fit and will possibly require some minor filling.

The other wing isn't so good. The side bars seem to have released the wing where it clips under the underside of the bottom wing half (where the rear firewall is located) and required a lot of sanding to get the side bars flush. To the point where the top of the bars have all but gone.





Not great... And this going to create a problem when the engine is fitted:



The picture doesn't show it well, but it is going to need a major filler job. The front landing gear fixing part (the part I'm talking about is fitted, and the other sides version is out of focus in the background) has had to be sanded at the bottom to fit right to make allowances for the wing being shallower than it should be to.

So, I've done something wrong. I don't know what though? Everything has fitted fine until this point? I can only assume I've clamped the wing to tight when I glued it and lost a bit of it's shape, causing the bars and engine to fit incorrectly. if I was going to do this kit again, I'd fit the wheel well side bars at the same time as I was gluing the wings together to ensure the correct wing shape is maintained (not as the instructions suggest). The solution from here is simply filling. Whether I can rebuild the side bars after the engine is fitted or not, I don't know. But that's what needs to be done.

I've had a look at the seams too:







Generally very good. The bit in front of the cockpit could do with some more Mr Surfacer 1200, as could the top of the engine bellow:



But the pics probably don't show it up well.

Other than the wheel well, I'm making good progress with this kit (for me).

More soon

Val

[CedB]

Seams? What seams? Good job Val

Those wells are a pain but I'm sure you'll sort it out.

[Val]

Seams? What seams? Good job Val

Those wells are a pain but I'm sure you'll sort it out.

Thanks I'm enjoying this kit so far.

[Val]

So, where are we up to? Rescribing and masking glass basically!



(I cheated with Eduard masks btw!!)

The rear of the bomb bay insert took lots of sanding, it had at least a 3mm step where it joined the fuselage.

The white filler lines are where my rescribing went hideously wrong... that happens a lot.

This is the second time I've used Eduard masks and I'm loving them. The first time, on my 1/72 BF110, they didn't seem to really come off the backing paper very well, seemed that they weren't quite cut through the masking paper. But this time, no such trouble! A piece of cake, just slip a sharp knife under the mask and stick it on. Recommended with a model with this much glazing!!

After a coat of Nato black:







The pics actually don't show it up that well, but the rescribing on the whole looks ok, better than expected. One or two areas need a bit more work, but nothing major at all. Phew! The main areas requiring attention is the top glass inserts, Mr Surfacer 500 to the rescue (I hope).

And the wheel wells:





Basically, painted neat Tamiya Nato Black (the front undercarriage section is Tamiya Cockpit Green) which gives a nice texture for the wash to get caught in. The wash is Mig Dark wash spread everywhere, and then taken back a bit with a cotton bud moistened in thinners once dry. It was then dry brushed with Mr Metal Color Steel.

That's about all. Fitting of all the glass and the engine next... I'm not looking forward to either!!

Cheers,

Val

[CedB]

Looking good Val! I think fitting the cockpit glass is the best bit - then it's a Lancaster!

[Peter Lloyd]

I love your treatment of the interior painting. Great work. Those dams won't stand a chance.

[Val]

Cheers guys, very kind of you

[Rickpadwick1801]

Looking good Val, I want to build one of these especially as I am reading the dambusters book by James holland at the moment.

[Lancbuilder219]

One of my favourites. Built a Revell kit as a BIII recently; it fought me every step of the way especially the u/c bays. She looks great so far.

[rob85]

Lovely work val, kit doesn't look to shoddy.

I will be tagging along as I have the airfix one in the stash and this looks like it will be good inspiration

Cheers

Rob

[Blitz23]

Looks really good mate, cockpits fantastic.

[Val]

Cheers guys, welcome aboard!

One of my favourites. Built a Revell kit as a BIII recently; it fought me every step of the way especially the u/c bays. She looks great so far.

I was getting cocky to myself about how well it was all going as well... Guess I've learned a lesson there! The wheel bays are going to be a pain... Cheers

Val

[Wolwe82]

It is going very nice so far Val, keep up the great work! What camo is it going to be? Sorry if you said so already and i missed it..

[Val]

It is going very nice so far Val, keep up the great work! What camo is it going to be? Sorry if you said so already and i missed it..

Thank you! I've applied some Mr Surfacer to some of the scribing mistakes and calm down some of the joins in the new installed bits. The aircraft I'll be doing is Lancaster B.III ED906 AJ-J, flown by Fl.Lt D.J.H Maltby DFC. It was the fifth lanc to attack the Mohne Dam causing the breach, apparently. I know this as it's the blurb which comes with the decals, and that's where my knowledge ends! I picked these decals simply because I had the sheet to make a 1/72 Tornado GR.4 and I thought I might as well use them as opposed to the box ones; never had any trouble at all with Xtradecals (famous last words!).

You can see them here:

https://www.hannants.co.uk/product/X72093

Cheers,

Val

[Val]

Hi all!

Well, the engine to wing fit is terrible as forecast...

This is the good one...



And this one is the bad one!



hmpf... Think I'll get some milliput into that for a start and go from there...

The fuselage is completely masked up, rescribed and glazed though:



All fairly straight forward apart from my lack of rescribing skills causing havoc, and the main canopy not fitting great when the side windows were installed. Some careful sanding seems to have cured that; standard Revell flash issues seems to be the main gremlin here. The out engines are together too.

More soon,

Val

EDIT: actually, the pictures make the gaps seem better than what they actually are!