Academy 1 48 Messerschmitt Bf109 G6 - Completed!

[giemme]

Hi everybody; back wit an AC build after some figure painting. This time is the Academy 1/48 Me Bf109 G6, which is actually a Hobbycraft reboxing.

The main goal of this build is practicing for German Mottle camo painting - first time for me - as I Have a Eduard FW190 in my stash but don't want to risk a messy painting on that, rather do it on this cheap kit.

For this reason, I'll try to make a quick and simple build ... (I'll try, I promise ... )

On with the pics: boxart

that is also the scheme I'll be doing, Hartmann's Yellow 1. Sprues:

Not much of a detail, and definitely no riveting at all. Decals:

I'll try to avoid them as much as possible, masking and painting for the most part - but we'll see.

So, after the box inspection, I started removing the main parts from the sprues to clean them up with my trusty Electrical Toothbrush Sander and doing some dryfit

Wings assembly: panel lines line up properly, no gaps whatsoever.

Fuselage assembly shows a couple of issues, as you can see in the above pics, but nothing that some filler and some TLC couldn't sort out. Before test fitting the two halves, I've also inserted the instruments panel and the main part of the cockpit, no trouble there. Also for the fuselage, panel lines match properly.

After a bit of sanding, the wing assembly goes in pretty well

Some refining needed in the wing root area, and at the trailing edges close tho the roots

Gun cowl: this is, so far, the part that I like less

There is some shape issue, plus I don't like how the gun barrel (sort of) looks like when in place. I think I'll have to rework that area a little, still trying to figure out how. In the meantime, I decided to glue the barrel to a steel rod:

Tail planes: port side one cliks in, the starboard side is loose ...

Canopy: the three pieces are transparent enough for me, but do have some minor fit issues. The windshield also has a little stress line, another thing I'll have to figure out how to fix

That's it for now. Comments, tips, suggestions, criticism welcome, as usual

Ciao

Edited November 25, 2015 by giemme

[GREG DESTEC]

Looks like a good project Giemme. I have never built this kit before so i'll be interested in your progress. All the best, Greg

[Gene K]

For this reason, I'll try to make a quick and simple build ... (I'll try, I promise ... )

There is some shape issue ... I think I'll have to rework that area a little....

Yes, is right. (thankfully).

Too bad Greg's icon is not an emoticon as it would be appropriate here.

Gene K

Edited September 1, 2015 by Gene K

[giemme]

Yes, is right. (thankfully).

Ciao

[giemme]

Greg and Gene, thanks for joining!

Here's a small update; I've come up with a plan for the exhaust stacks: I'm going to leave the machine gun cowl off till the very last stages, painting it separately. This way, I can insert them right before closing everything up

Speaking of exhausts: I tried to improve them a bit, using a drill bit (here's an "in progress" pic)

Same goes for the gun barrel (I only did one so far), drilling a hole all along it

The "plan" for the gun barrels is to glue the back part on a metallic rod, drill a receiving hole in the corresponding fuselage part and enlarge the gun seams on the cowl, to have the whole thing looking more like there are gun barrels, rather than two tiny pieces of plastic stuck in place (hopefully ... )

Ciao

Edited September 2, 2015 by giemme

[giemme]

Too bad Greg's icon is not an emoticon as it would be appropriate here.

I can almost hear Muttley's laughter while I'm reading ... :lol:

Ciao

[Engineer66]

Interesting topic Giemme I have the Bf109 E3 'Heinz Bar' version nearing the top of my stash so am interested to see how you get on with this one.

Al

[giemme]

Hi Al, thanks for joining!

Yours looks like an interesting subject too; is that the Academy kit?

Ciao

[PlaStix]

Hi Giemme. Wow you aren't messing about with this one! Nice progress so far and I like your modifications. It's always interesting to see these older kits being made.

Kind regards,

Stix

[giemme]

Hi Stix, glad to have you too on board!

As for the kit, I'm trying to resist and not make too many modifications - after all the main goal for this build is trying the dreaded mottling camo - but there are certain things that just don't look right ...

Ciao

[Fritag]

I'm on board too Giorgio,

​Maybe I should purloin the wife's electric toothbrush. It looks like exactly the identical version to yours.......

Steve

[giemme]

Hi Steve, glad to have you here!

​Maybe I should purloin the wife's electric toothbrush. It looks like exactly the identical version to yours.......

Go ahead, you won't regret it ... except for the wife complaining that you're dirtying it up ... better hide out

Ciao

[giemme]

I'm on board too Giorgio

I've just realized that there are now two pilots, you and Gene, following this thread ... I'm starting to feel a bit nervous ...

Seriously, here's another small update (I'm trying to get at interiors priming stage by the end of this week )

Cockpit sidewalls in this kit are pretty puny, so I decided to add a little detail. Starboard side, some cables, laid down and then cut to measure:

The distinctive feature of this side is the yellow fuel pipe, which has also got a transparent middle section. To obtain that, I first put in place a piece of very flexible welding wire, to get a sort of template:

I also had previously stretched some transparent sprue, so I cut the corresponding section out of my template:

Now, there's no way I'm going to be able to glue the three sections together without fogging or wasting the transparent one, so I decided to glue the metallic segments in place and position the transparent after all the painting has been done

How do I store the transparent segment without loosing it? (I know myself, it's going to disappear if it stays as it is ... )

I came up with this:

That is probably silly for all of you, but I was actually quite proud of this idea :

On with "port" side; adding a bit of structure and a wire/cable from the throttle

Some clean up needed, but that's basically it. Comments welcome.

Ciao

[giemme]

Hi everybody; more done on the interiors. I wanted to replicate the chain attached to the trim wheel, so I rolled over a piece of copper wire with the terminal part of a knife shaft (not sure I'm using the right words, picture explains better) - NOTE: I did remove the blade to complete the job, after taking this pic :

In place (sorry, out of focus)

Air filter intake assembly: the aligning peg is very visible:

So out comes my Dremel, with the ball pointed abrasive tool:

Looks good enough to me, some touch up needed though.

Next: spinner/propeller assembly. I don't care about a spinning propeller, so I won't follow the instructions for this. Still, I need to have the mounting pin (to the left into next pic) in place to properly align the propeller with the spinner:

The rounded point of the pin fits into the propeller, while the first outer ring should fit into the spinner back plate - but it doesn't, actually; it's a bit too large.

To correct it, I mounted it on a metallic shaft and then out comes again my Dremel:

I reduced the diameter using a sanding stick (with a slow rotating speed), trying not to overheat the plastic, enough to have a tight fit:

Again, sorry for the poor pics, blo**y phone camera...

One more thing: I drilled out the spinner hole for the cannon barrel

That's it for now, happy (modelling) WE everybody!

Ciao

Edited September 4, 2015 by giemme

[PlaStix]

Wow Giemme you are really cracking on with this one! Very impressive level of detailing. I really like all your additional wiring - it will certainly bring the basic cockpit to life. And your idea for making sure you don't lose the clear piece certainly looks good to me......whatever works in my opinion. It's good you noticed how prominent the peg was going to be when the intake was assembled - good save! Top work all round.

Kind regards,

Stix

[giemme]

Thanks Stix!

It's good you noticed how prominent the peg was going to be when the intake was assembled - good save!

It's even more evident "in flesh"; the kit allows you to build also a Trop version - in that case you have to mount the Trop filter on the air intake, thus hiding that peg. But Yellow 1 simply did not have that feature, so it had to go.

Ready for WE? Enjoy your modelling!

Ciao

[PlaStix]

Thanks Stix!

It's even more evident "in flesh"; the kit allows you to build also a Trop version - in that case you have to mount the Trop filter on the air intake, thus hiding that peg. But Yellow 1 simply did not have that feature, so it had to go.

Ready for WE? Enjoy your modelling!

Ciao

I am! Thank you.....can't wait! Hope you have a great weekend too!

[kwaterous]

Nice work going on here. Looks somewhat like what I did to a Revell G-10, but your work is much neater.

K

[giemme]

Nice work going on here. Looks somewhat like what I did to a Revell G-10, but your work is much neater.

K

Thanks K, also for joining the thread! Is your G-10 visible somewhere on the 'net?

How about a WE progress report? Here we go - miscellaneous things :

I wasn't happy with the kit gun barrels, so decided to scratch built new ones, with a bit of an actual shaft, to give the impression that they would actually protrude from the top cowling.

Similarly to what I did for the spinner, I used my Dremel at the lowest speed possible, with a sanding stick and a blade as tools, working on a 1/32 P51-D machine gun barrel

Cut to size

The two of them; I need to better refine the internal side of the barrels (sorry for the poor pic, I hope you get the idea)

Air filter intake: I removed the aligning peg from the backside, as it was getting in the way and leaving too much of a gap with the fuselage side; so to glue it in position I had to hold it with some tape:

Some CA glue from the back, then Tamiya Green Cap along the borders

All it needs now is some PPP along the seams, but later for that.

Similar process for the cowl bulges (but I didn't remove the alignment pins, in this case). Trying to persuade them into position:

Now, the backward part of these bulges has a quite visible fairing, totally missing in the kit parts. I thought I'd do that using Tamiya "Masking tape for curves"

I've cut two tiny stripes and stuck them on - this thing really curves!

Probably a bit over-scale, but I'm going to blend them in with the bulges using some PPP

Wing bulges:

Then, as a diversion, I thought it would be nice to have some "movement" on the tail planes; the idea was to replicate what I did on my latest Spitfire build - scribing and gently bending them, but I ended up snapping them off ...

Tools I've used:

So, I glued the moving part in position, using Tamiya Green cap and some blue tack to hold the parts in position

Some refining needed, though ...

I eventually started slapping some paint on. RLM66 for the interiors: I used Tamiya German Grey as a base

Then a lighter mix, with some Tamiya Flat White, spraying only from the top

Then a darker mix, adding Tamiya Flat Black, very thinned, this time spraying from the bottom

Maybe more visible on the rudder pedals (even if out of focus): the darker spots aren't a light effect, but the paint itself (same for the lighter ones)

The idea is to provide some basic contrast, that is going to be later "reinforced" with drybrush and washes.

You may have noticed that the trim wheel chain has disappeared ... it just popped off at some point, and I wasn't able to recover it.

Not a bad thing, anyway, 'cause after the primer layer, it looked nothing like a chain ...

So here we go again, this time using welding wire:

More chain-like, I'll only use washes on top of it.

Last thing for the day, I started working on the IP, painting black (Lifecolor Matt Black and Gloss Black, by brush) the inside part of the gauges:

Comments welcome, as usual.

Ciao

[PlaStix]

Hi Giemme. You have been busy again! You are making serious improvements to the basic kit. I am always impressed with the attention to detail you display when developing your kits. It is going to turn out a stunner at this rate. Keep up the good work!

Kind regards,

Stix

[giemme]

Hi Giemme. You have been busy again! You are making serious improvements to the basic kit. I am always impressed with the attention to detail you display when developing your kits. It is going to turn out a stunner at this rate. Keep up the good work!

Kind regards,

Stix

Thanks Stix! I'm trying to get to the camo painting stage as soon as possible, but the kit interiors needed to be taken care of, nonetheless. I'll post another progress report tomorrow, anyway - I've been doing some detail painting on the IP and the cockpit tonight

[Fritag]

Nice work Georgio - love the lateral thinking - and gonna watch the cockpit painting with interest.

Never seen that Tamiya take for curves before. Like that too.........

[kwaterous]

More good work on this one

Thanks K, also for joining the thread! Is your G-10 visible somewhere on the net?

It's here:

http://www.britmodeller.com/forums/index.php?/topic/234954668-monogram-148-bf-109g-10-finished/page-2

Was built for the Less Than A Tenner GB a year or so ago.

Cheers,

K

[giemme]

Nice work Georgio - love the lateral thinking - and gonna watch the cockpit painting with interest.

Never seen that Tamiya take for curves before. Like that too.........

Thanks Steve!

As for the tape: I picked it up at my LHS, I was told it's a brand new thing from Tamiya. Seems very nice.

More good work on this one

It's here:

http://www.britmodeller.com/forums/index.php?/topic/234954668-monogram-148-bf-109g-10-finished/page-2

Was built for the Less Than A Tenner GB a year or so ago.

Thanks K, for the link too. You did add some detail on that oldie, didn't you?

HEre's some painting progress; IP first (struggling to get some decent pictures with my phone, I'd better borrow my daughter's compact digital camera )

first a drybrush using Lifecolor Light Gull Grey

Then some detail painting

More details, a dark wash, and a drop of Tamiya Gloss Clear in every gauge, to simulate glass

Cockpit tub: again, a light drybrush with Lifecolor Light Gull Grey, another drybrush with Lifecolor Matt Aluminium on the floor, and some detail painting. I need to add a black wash to make the details stand out, and probably a bit more of drybrush (and some touch-ups too, of course ...)

That's it for the day, comments welcome

Ciao

[PlaStix]

Good morning Giemme. I hope this new day finds you well. The IP detail is looking very good. You obviously have a very steady hand! Lovely work all around the cockpit.

Kind regards,

Stix