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Avro Lancaster 1:48 Tamiya


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Thanks for posting updates- very informative stuff in there.

I recently finished a BF109 in 1/72 which depicted a machine with a very roughly-painted white quadrant on the black spinner. I replicated the photo exactly, but it does look an awful lot like a child's hamfisted attempt at brush-painting an airfix kit . I found that a very generous coating of good old humbrol 'mattcote' was so thick that it smoothed things out a lot. It all looked a lot more 'cohesive' (if that makes sense?)

Will

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Thanks for posting updates- very informative stuff in there.

I recently finished a BF109 in 1/72 which depicted a machine with a very roughly-painted white quadrant on the black spinner. I replicated the photo exactly, but it does look an awful lot like a child's hamfisted attempt at brush-painting an airfix kit . I found that a very generous coating of good old humbrol 'mattcote' was so thick that it smoothed things out a lot. It all looked a lot more 'cohesive' (if that makes sense?)

Will

Yeah, I think I know what you mean. I imagine my Lanc to be wet, so I'll be satin coating it (patchily) with something and that will 'pull it all together', I hope.

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Still loving this Don.

Keep up the the great work !

Gary...

Thanks Gary, your feedback encourages me a lot...

This is fascinating stuff, can't wait for the next episode !

Cheers

Den

...and Dan, you certainly know how to get me working!

The next exciting episode follows later! Watch this space!

(Anyone out there remember the Saturday morning pictures? Serials like King of the Rocket Men?)

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I'm too young to remember Flash Gordon (remember the fireworks in the tails of the Rocket ships?), Batman and Zorro at the Saturday matinees, honest !

Cheers

Den

Edited by spitfire
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Right then, painting the markings. Gulp! I've not done this before so it's a bit frightning

really. I've come a long way and don't really want a major foul up at this point, but the

Tamiya decals are rubbish as usual, and those wings are huge and very prominent. So

it has to be done then. I must have been dreaming of it because I woke up at 6:30 and

I'm on holiday, remember? I came down and cast around for something to do which

would put off the dreaded moment. I know, I'll reorganise my enamels. Obviously I

can't be expected to do anything until the paint drawer looks really tidy.

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Honestly, I nearly did the ironing as well! No more excuses, get the tools out!.

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This is my new compass cutter, (invented by Patrick Pending of the Acme Company)

which is about £3.50 at your local stationers. You can see how it works, the brass

thumb-wheel holds a very sharp blade. The clever thing is the way that it locks very

securely.

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This is the wing masked up and if you look very closely, you can see the circular cuts

in the tape. Did it leave a mark in the wing? Yes. I pressed on very hard and was left

with a pinmark. It was small enough to simply burnish out before spraying the red. Next

time I won't push so hard. Additional layers of masking tape would provide a secure

base if needed.

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Out with the middles then. I labelled them port and stbd in case the cutter had slipped

a bit, but I don't think I needed to. I stored them on a plate to preserve the stickiness.

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There are three shades of red in here. Two would have done the job but it was too

orangey for my liking so I went over it again with a darker shade. As usual, I'm trying

for uneven and blotchy here. I can do even coats, honest!

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Same sort of thing for the tails. At this point I checked against a colour pic of a Lanc. Not

for the shade or hue, because the old photo in an old book can't be trusted. I just wanted

to see how big the roundels were, even though it was too late to do much about it! Note

the absence of white on the port fin flash. I'm not copying this but it is interesting for the

permission it gives us to mes about a bit if we want to.

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Onlly when looking at this photo did I realise that there should be FOUR fin flashes. I'd

forgotten the insides of the fins, leaving me two colours behind (white and red of course)

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Blasting the white on was a quick job and while there was white in the brush I did this

to the decals.

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Can you tell what it is yet? There's a prize for anyone who can guess what this will be.

Next problem was waiting for the red to dry on the wings and fins (and the white on

the inner fins). What to do? How about some carpentry!

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I believe presentation is very important and hate to see a brilliant dio spoiled by

manky edges on some piece of rubbish chipboard.

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Mitres are cool and, for once, I cut all of them the right way round!

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There's a bit of a cramp shortage around here! Now I'm waiting for the base to dry!

Painting continues in the next update following in a few minutes. There's a limit to

the size of updates here. Just in case you are wondering why I'm doing this in instalments.)

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Part Two.

The red paint now having had a few hours, I pressed on. I pressed the masking tape

on to be precise!

IMG_0351.jpg

IMG_0353.jpg

The red wasn't really set hard but since I wasn't actually painting over it, I thought I'd

risk it. Do something which scares you every day; it keeps you fresh!

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Oxford and PRU blues here. You can see the streaking of the lighter blue. I realised

(too late for the first wing) that I can use this to suggest structure. Something to experiment

with next time maybe.

Unmasking is one of my favourite processes.

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Difficult to get all of the tape off as the reverse side is still to be painted red. Still, this looks

promising...and when the tape is off the wings and (mostly) off the fin, it looks like this.

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What do you think of that?

I am delighted. In fact I did a little geeky dance around the room at the sight of this. I

always have troubles with decals (second only to transparencies, dammit!); silvering,

falling off, going down really well but in the wrong place. You know the problems. The

painted roundels just look perfect! Well, actually they look convincingly imperfect

which is even better! I could hardly wait to show you today's work. I've been modelling

since 1966 and still get a huge rush from finding a new way to do something. My

(unasked for) advice today is never to stop learning, never stop trying new ideas, and

always close the curtains before you do the geeky dance thing.

The mistakes? You can see the camouflage demarcation through the roundels. Undercoat

would have helped, or planning ahead and painting the roundels first, or at least masking

them. The other slip up was to shade the colours in the middle and leave the edges of each

patch of colour relatively even. Oh well, if you aren't making mistakes, you aren't trying

hard enough.

I'm now going to run a bath and pour myself a mango smoothie with a large slug of Malibu to

sip in my suds. I'm celebrating!

Edited by per ardua ad ostentationem
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I'm too young to remember Flash Gordon (remember the fireworks in the tails of the Rocket ships?), Batman and Zorro at the Saturday matinees, honest !

Cheers

Den

And all in black and white! And then we played at being Zorro all the way home. Yes, those were the days!

Edited by per ardua ad ostentationem
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Attention to detail great workmanship and another informative narrative. At the risk of repeating m'self.... this needs to be a magazine article.

Ian

Edited by Ian
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They look great Don. I've never been brave enough to paint my own markings on.

I bought a compass cutter back in June and so far the only thing I've done with it, was cut out a intake cover for my lightning.

Keep up the good work

Gary...

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Attention to detail great workmanship and another informative narrative. At the risk of repeating m'self.... this needs to be a magazine article.

Ian

Thank you Ian. I will try to maintain a little narrative expectation, as they say. Look out for cliff-hangers!

The markings look great Don, and you are right it's a great moment when you take away the masking and it's actually worked !

Cheers

Den

They look great Don. I've never been brave enough to paint my own markings on.

I bought a compass cutter back in June and so far the only thing I've done with it, was cut out a intake cover for my lightning.

Keep up the good work

Gary...

Thanks Den and Gary,

I have been wary of trying this for ages too. Then when I did it I discovered that big roundels were easier

as well as better than the decals. I don't think I'll be trying the stars 'n' bars anytime soon though!

I've been busy today watching paint dry on the fuselage top. That's given me time to do some dio work. You

may remember that 'Queenie' was loaded with bombs when the photoflash ripped her apart? I am building

the moment when three or four armourers start to get those bombs off. No other trade will go near her until

that's done.

Because of the angle of the fuselage, their winches may not work smoothly. In fact they might end up

jettisoning the bombs one by one onto a pile of tarpaulin wheel covers! (Believe it or not, this was the SOP

for individual hang ups when the plumbers were in a hurry, which was always!) They will remove the fuses

first though, and to do that they need to get up into the bomb bay which is a lot higher than usual. What will

they use to get up there, I wonder?

I'll post some photos of their equipment later, after my Friday 'Early Doors' ceremony.

p.s. No guesses about that white-sprayed roundel decal yet?

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s usual, I've been putting off the difficult thing. Painting the top of the fuselage seemed to be full of difficulties;

how will I mask the hole? I've already abandoned the idea of brush painting because I just ain't very good with

a brush. Also, the wings have been sprayed so I have to follow suit really.

IMG_0001.jpg

Masking tape took me so far.

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And that old standby Kleenex took care of the big messy hole. Just like dealing with a cold really.

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I'm getting really interested in the idea of indicating structure by shading. I have post shaded with this in mind.

Take a look at Ian's Ki84 on the Pacific War GB for the pre-shading equivalent. That's the way I'll be going next,

I think (even if he's picked a really ugly aeroplane to work with. lol.).

http://www.britmodeller.com/forums/index.p...20&start=20

I realised that I'd missed a bit of green from the stbd wing.

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Just a quick patch job?

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Oh, no! I've been telling you that latex doesn't stain but just look at this. I don't know what happened there.

Fortunately, this area can be convincingly bodged over with an application of some snow.

So, that was the work on the aeroplane for the day. Now onto the dio ingredients as promised above. When I was

on IX Sqn and wanted to get to the top of an open bomb-bay, I used a Safety Raiser. The 1942 equivalent looked like this.

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Who would like to step into that photo for a look around?

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My version started like this. Evergreen plastic rod which kept rolling around and refused to cooperate until...

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...I started treating it like pine poles and notched the joints with a round needle file. After that things were easy.

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Make two sides.

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Join them together. The blutac floor made things a little easier to line up. Half of the task of the engineer, model

or otherwise, is concerned with devising ways to hold the workpiece!

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Ladder and safety rails added.

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Working surface planked with individual strips of placticard, textured with a quick swipe of 240 grit wet'n'dry.

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Chiefy takes the salute!

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Wheels came from a 1:48 Russian machine gun.

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Yes, the size is about right.

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And finally (for today) a spray coat of Red Lead. You'd be amazed how much paint this took. Most of it went

straight out of the extractor!

Making this little thing from nothing was very satisfying. Maybe one day I'll do some big-time staging with an

aircraft on a major servicing, that would look nicely complicated even though the actual process is fairly

straightforward if today's experience is any guide.

Tomorrow I'd like to paint the brown on the fuselage and then stick the wings on! And maybe I'll make

a crew hut too?

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Nice one Don, what about thqt battle damaged Wimpy we talked about as a follow up!! :Tasty:

Mario

I'm well ahead of you there Mario. Look at these photos!

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She looks like she's crying.

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I have a bit of a 'thing' for Malta, love broken aeroplanes, and the Trumpeter Wellington has an

amazing hidden (usually) interior. What's not to like?

Edited by per ardua ad ostentationem
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Hi Don,

Been following you along the path with this build. Allow me to echo the countless other comments - simply amazing work.

We're 4866.69 nautical miles away from home which is where, in amongst the rest of our stored worldly belongings, sits an as new in the box 1.48 Lanc such as this. Another pre - relocation ebay acquisition and the main reason for me picking up on your thread.

I used to log on to check the UK news but that was in the old days. Now it's to view your latest post and to bring the significant other half up to speed with the build.

The emotions experienced this end have run full spectrum from shock horror at your initial idea, through 'dear god he's actually done it' upon viewing your first photo's of the precision carved fuselage. This was followed by a couple of day's of 'this is intriguing' which was trailed by a low point when you demonstrated the bulged wheel method (I paid 15 quid for a set). Then we entered the 'where did he learn that?' phase which was only to be succeeded by 'love, come and have a look at this!. All of this has led to today --- completely inspired.

I usually explain to folks when asked that I miss the seasons and an open fire place. That's also now changed. Brazil is a nice place but my modelling tools and stock are in storage in Blightey. (except the paints which are in a different storage in Blightey - the caravan (Couldn't store them as flams but couldn't bear to part with years of hoarding and paint maintenance either)). I will be reunited with them at some stage but the anticipation of the day is heigthened due to this project.

Thoroughly enjoying following your progress and really, really looking forward to the end result.

Keep it up Don and cheers from this side of the pond. :cheers:

Alan

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...Thoroughly enjoying following your progress and really, really looking forward to the end result...

Alan

Well thank you Alan for that crackin' letter. It's very encouraging to me. I will stick with it to the end, I promise.

And welcome to Britmodeller! I am honoured to be the subject of your first post here. All the way from Brazil too, a very interesting place to be I imagine, though you do sound just a little homesick for the smell of Humbrol paint. lol. Please pass on my regards to the significant one.

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Super job so far, excellent work.

Dave

Thank you Dave,

You say "so far", and I realise that it seems to be going on and on and on. I'd hoped to be finished by now but keep finding more 'little' jobs to do. I'm also being slowed down by drying times right now. I just wish I knew how to work with acrylics!

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So... wots the white-sprayed decal for then? Enquiring minds are.. er ... enquiring :blink: P'raps you're going to slice it up for something :hmmm:

No, I can't tell you the answer yet. You have to guess.

(You are right about the slicing up though, I won't be using all of it in one piece. And there are clues in the thread. Early on.)

Edited by per ardua ad ostentationem
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